Once she had finished chumming the water for her son's dinner, Oliver's mother walked back into the house, where her husband was having his dinner, a heat-up meal.
"Is he eating?" asked his father.
"Yes, if you could call that eating." said his mother. "I'm worried about Oliver."
"Why are you worried?" asked his father. Oliver's mother sat down at the table.
"Have you watched Oliver in his pool?" asked his mother. "What he's doing is not normal. The doctor said that his behaviour shouldn't change drastically for another few months. I'm starting to wonder whether this whole thing was a mistake."
"The doctor also said that another few months was just a prediction." said his father. "He told us that the retrovirus affects every child differently. Some change faster than others."
"But have you seen the way his eyes roll over when he eats?" asked his mother. "And his gills, the way they open and shut when he's going to go in the water? It's like he's not our little boy any more. It's like he's…..something else."
"Well, he is changing into something else." said his father. "That was the whole point of moving here. If he's not human, then he's more likely to survive the disaster, when it happens."
"I know." said his mother. "But it's so hard to watch my Oliver changing into something different. And he's we've only been here for two weeks. He's only even been at his new school for 2 and a half days and he's already grown gills! He's swimming around in there and attacking his food - literally - like he's some kind of animal!"
"He is some kind of animal." said his father. "We made the decision to allow our son a higher chance of surviving the disaster together. He's not even fully human anymore."
"I know, but…" said his mother. "…I'm starting to think that we may have made the wrong decision. I'm already having a hard time watching him, and he's only just started his changes. When he gets older, and he starts to look less and less like my little boy I don't know what I'll do…" She started to cry. "I'm scared for him."
"Don't be scared for him." said his father, comforting Oliver's father. "He's still our son. He'll always be our son, that's what the doctor told us. But you can't let this upset you. Over the next few years he's going to need us more than ever. And we need to be there for him."
"I'm not just scared for him…." said his mother. She paused, and then said very quietly. "I….I'm scared of him."
His father began to smile. "You're…You're scared of your own son?"
"It's the way he looks up at the food right before he strikes." said his mother. "The look he gets on his face….he…..he doesn't look like my Oliver. He looks like some sort of monster."
"You need to put those ideas out of your head." said his father. "Think of how he'd feel if he heard you. He's still our son. He'll always be our son, even when he's not human anymore."