As Brad packed up his gear, he felt a hand on his shoulder.
"Great job, Brad! Chad's never looked better, but I think he could look better. You know I'm majoring in Classical Sculpture, and I was wondering, if you could loan me Chad to study. After all you're not going to need him until the next science fair,right?"
"You want to study Chad?"
"Yeah, he's the ultimate life study. Come on, we've know each other since we were practically in diapers. Hey, Brad, you think I can have that statue?"
"Well, I'm not sure. You'd have to be careful. If anything happened to Chad-"
"Nothing will happen. He's stone remember? He won't even know what's happening-"
"Actually, he will. You see he's totally aware."
"Even better."
"David, I'll have to think about it."
"Sure, bud, that's fine. Think about it. But I really would love to get him in my studio for a few days."
Brad just nodded and went back to packing. He didn't see David running his fingers all over Chad. He even snapped a few close ups with his camera phone.
David raced back to his studio. He uncovered the marble statue that he had begun two weeks ago, when he had first heard about Brad's science fair project. It was a basic human statue posed like Mercury with the same dimensions as Chad, but very rough. David printed out his photos, grabbed his chisel and hammer and went to work. He worked all through the night, and by dawn, he had an almost exact doppleganger of Brad's statue of Chad. He grinned, as he contemplated owning Chad, and Brad's embarrassment when he tried to reanimate this stone statue at the science fair. David took another look, and grabbed a motorized polisher. He needed the two to look exactly alike. That meant no chisel marks should be visible. He yawned. Pulled a sheet over his statue and went home to bed.