It was another bleak night in Hooverville as Jo Hammet skated down the deserted city streets. COVID-19 had come to Hooverville, but the plucky kid detective, now wearing a face mask, was not deterred. She knew Dr. X wouldn't take a day off.
Arriving at the Hooverville Museum of Art and Geography, she found it was now filled with doctors and nurses tending to patients in makeshift beds.
"What's going on here?" she asked.
"They've converted the museum into a hospital for coronavirus patients," explained the museum janitor. "You should probably go home."
"I can't go home!" said Jo, aghast. "I've got to stop a mad bomber from destroying the city!"
"Maybe you should leave it to the authorities this time," he suggested.
"They can't beat him. Did they stop him from destroying the Hooverville Television Relay Station? I'm the only one who can stop Dr. X!"
At that moment, B. F. Skinny skidded into the room. "Whoa, tough crowd!" he exclaimed. "It looks like the Black Death in here, ha, ha!"
"I'm not with him!" said Jo, as she discreetly took Martin's note from the talking rodent.
Having the note, Jo slipped out of the museum. She may have been brave, but she was not a covidiot. Fortunately, she had never actually used the museum to solve the crossword puzzles because it was basically impossible, and instead always resorted to brute-forcing it. Once she had the address, she set off for the sabotaged site on her trusty skateboard.
"I'll getcha!" said one of Dr. X's goons, chasing after her. However, he kept six feet away, maintaining social distancing.
Arriving at the sabotaged site, Jo successfully picked the lock by solving some fifth-grade math problems. It always amazed her that all the puzzles she had to solve just happened to be at her own grade level, but took it as another sign that she really was the kid for this job. Once inside, she put on the special glasses that allowed her to read the minds of Dr. X's goons as they telepathically discussed the location of the bomb and how to get to it.
"All right," said Jo, taking notes in her journal, "it looks like I'll need some toilet paper, hand sanitizer, and disinfecting wipes to get to that bomb. Those items shouldn't be too difficult to find."
With that, she took off down the empty streets of Hooverville. The goons were again in pursuit, but they continued social distancing. Even when she tripped over a fire hydrant, and they could have easily captured her, they still kept six feet away. Not that she especially wanted to get thrown into that "Towers of Hanoi" dungeon, but she had to admit that the social distancing took some of the thrill out of these cases.
She arrived at the Squishy Juice Bar only to find that it had, of course, been closed due to the coronavirus pandemic. Disappointed that she wouldn't get to see her old friend Bernie today, Jo skated on. Perhaps she'd have better luck at the junkyard. That was an essential service, right?
Indeed, Jimmy the Shadow was waiting there in his usual spot outside the junkyard's entrance. Jo skated up to him... keeping six feet away, of course.
"Hey there, Jimmy," she said. "Do you happen to have any toilet paper, hand sanitizer, or disinfecting wipes?"
"Are you out of your mind, kid?" he asked. "No one has that stuff nowadays!"
"But this is a junkyard! You must have used toilet paper lying around here someplace."
"I did," said Jimmy, "two weeks ago. Then hoarders descended on this place and cleaned me out. There's none left for you, kid. Beat it."
Thwarted again, Hooverville's little heroine continued on to the Boulder Canyon Mine-Shaft, where Maggie Mead had been self-isolating since long before the coronavirus came along. Jo found her, surrounded not only by rocks, but by mountains of toilet paper, hand sanitizers, and disinfecting wipes - all of it carefully organized, of course.
"I might have known you'd be a hoarder!" said Jo.
"Don't come any closer!" exclaimed Maggie, holding up a gloved hand. "You'll spread coronavirus to my best friends, the rocks!"
"Rocks can't catch coronavirus!"
"Oh, and I suppose you're a medical expert now?" said Maggie. "Just like you were the park service ambassador from Yosemite?"
"Look, how about I find three objects from the mine for you, and then you can give me what I need like usual?"
"Absolutely not! Do you have any idea how long this virus lives on surfaces? I'm not touching anything you've handled!"
"Then what can I do?" asked Jo.
"Oh, just go home!" said Maggie in exasperation. "Take what you need if you must, but leave! Listen to your government, young lady, and work from home!"
And so, Jo got the bomb from the sabotaged site, took it home with her, and disarmed it there. She wasn't entirely sure that that was what Maggie had had in mind, but still, it was another happy ending for the good people of Hooverville.