“Jessi, can you hear me?

It’s Ivan.” A faint, ragged breath against the ventilator tube.

Her eyes opened, unfocused and bloodshot, and found my face.

“You’re safe,” I told her.

“You’re in the hospital.

We removed the patch.”

At the word patch, something terrible moved across her face — a flash of pure recognition, and then terror.

The tears came, and her heart rate spiked on the monitor, and she began to breathe in frantic, shallow gulps.