It started out like any job. I just had to infect the father, who would infect the mother, and she would infect the child; the family would be gone in three weeks. So I got into the house and went unstairs. I heard the mother singing to the child, but couldn't make out the words. I went into the parents room and saw the father, asleep. I creeped over to him an injected the sickness into him, and almost missed the sound of the mother leaving the childs room. I hid, fast, as it would not do for me to be seen.

"Oh, Richard, already asleep! Well, I should get to bed as well. I must wake Jimmy at the crack of down. The boy has chores to do…" The mother chuckled and got into the bed before turning off the lights, giving me a chance to excape out the still open door.

I was almost to the stairs when I heard soft wispers in the childs; Jimmy, the mother had called him; room. I went in to see what was the matter and saw, to my horror, a small boy with big, green eyes, crying; his mop of shaggy, dirty-blonde hair almost obscuring his eyes from my view. I knew that as I was, I could not see what was the matter; the boy would freak out and alert his parents. I changed my shape, for I am a shape-shifter. I chose the shape of a small toy puppet of myself. I walked into the room, unnoticed.

"Boy…what is wrong?" I said, walking over to the bed and looking up at the crying child.

"I can see it…my father will die first, then my mother, an then…me….." He slowly picked me up, as if I would break, and asked one of the hardest questions I have ever had to answer. "Can you save me, little one?"

I nodded, for I could save him. I hade the antidote in case I got infected by acident. If I used it on this boy, I would have to stay a toy until it was safe. Ah, but the way his eyes light up! I could not refuse now.

"And what about your parents…?"

"I do not care for them…Mother makes me cook and clean, and Father makes me cut the lawn and trim the hedges. I wont have to do that when they're gone…"

I looked at this boy, so ready to let his parents die, and knew I could not ever leave him.