Crichton starts too, nearly pulls his hand away, but thinks better of that and leaves it gently laid against Arthur's back. Touch is important. Well... to Crichton, it is.

"You're coughing up flower petals..." Oh boy. Arthur said he experienced months back in his home world, the flowers are probably long forgotten by now, huh.

"We're having a plague of flowers and plants on the ship right now. Try to think back. Touching them does all kinds of bad things to people. And if you start coughing up petals, it means you're... headed for a bad end if you don't figure out what to do about it. I'm not a botanist. I can't tell you what these are. Best I can do is describe them."