| It was a brutal file to read. Because of relentless cost-cutting, little Lisa and her mom received sub-par care at a public clinic. At some point, poor hygiene resulted in a severe infection. It's not as if people have forgotten to wash their hands, medical austerity programs would never go that far, but hospital borne infections have been on the rise over the last twenty years. Don't ask me why, I don't know.
We had done this to little Lisa. We failed her. And this 'we' decided to kill her, through me.
The Olsons lived with their daughter near fashionable Washington Square. Their apartment was well furnished. Clean. A little Spartan. It was not the kind of place you expected to find a baby. The mother, Stacey, let me in. She was short, brunette, surprisingly attractive and very tan. The father, Andrew, was tall, well tanned, slim and trim with a shaved head. Good stock. On their walls were motivation posters, mostly with pictures of people running or riding bicycles. There were a few pictures of the happy couple too, running or riding bicycles.
I felt awkward visiting clients wearing a plumber's outfit, but I'll explain that later.
Stacey led me into the baby's room. Lisa was in her crib, sleeping. We stepped back into the kitchen area of the apartment. Andrew was there, flipping around on his SystemiX (it's hard to describe, think of it as an iPad on steroids; you didn't need to type or say anything, the device practically read your mind).
I sat down, Stacey brought us all glasses of vitamin enriched mineral water.
"I hope everyone is doing well today," I said. These sorts of meetings can get pretty awkward.
"Doin' fine," Andrew said, "gotta triathlon in a couple of weeks, so I'm just resting before I hit the pool."
"He's been training so hard," Stacey said, "I think he's gonna do great this year." The two smiled at each other.
"How are you guys feeling?" I asked.
"I'm pretty tired," Stacey said. "I'm still studying for my speech therapy licensing test, and I've still got plenty of bookkeeping work to do too."
Stacey was finishing school, working part-time as an accountant, and regaining her pre-pregnancy figure. I'd be tired too. You might think it was a little weird, I'm here to kill their baby and neither one seems to care. Welcome to the New World. I was glad, their ambivalence was going to make my job really easy.
"How long does Lisa normally sleep?"
"She's always napping this time of day," Stacey said, "A couple'a hours at least."
"She has such a hard time sleeping at night," Andrew chimed in, "she must be exhausted by this time of day."
"Probably experiencing some pain. It's normal in cases like this." I took a sip of water. Time for business. "Did someone brief you already on the process?"
"Yeah," Stacey said, "that other guy, Mike, told us what needed to happen."
It was simple. Andrew would leave for his training session. Stacey would go run an errand, just across the street to a small store for some basic necessities. She would be gone for just a few minutes. When she came home, the baby would be dead. Just another case of sudden infant death syndrome. An emergency call, some paramedics, a toxicology test. When the police dropped by for a statement, there would be a Company attorney to meet them at the door. The world moves on.
"So, are you two going to try again?"
"We're not sure we want kids now," Stacey said.
"We were much happier before," Andrew said.
Typical. The first one doesn't turn out right, all they want is out. "That's too bad, you two would really be great parents."
"That's sweet of you," Stacey said.
"I don't want to push," I said, "but we're on a schedule. If you want some time with her, now is the time."
Andrew got up. "That's alright, I better get going." He calmly walked over, gave his wife a kiss, grabbed his gym bag and left.
Stacey got up and went to the baby's room. I got out our SIDS kit. It was an aerosol general anesthetic that caused muscle paralysis. The baby would peacefully go to sleep, then her heart would stop beating and her lungs would stop breathing. It was called EBETTS, the drug broke down very quickly, and wasn't detectable by a standard postmortem. The government had developed it, of course, and had secretly given it to insurance agencies across the US for just this sort of thing. It was designed to fool the authorities into believing a baby was dead from natural causes.
That's the government for you, creating a secret undetectable drug in order to fool its own people.
EBBETTS came in tablets. Put the tablet anywhere near a baby, add a drop of water and the ensuing chemical reaction would make a kill-zone about the size of a crib. It took about ten minutes altogether, which is just enough time to get an alibi from a neighbor or a local store. New forensics can tell, to the minute, how long a recent corpse has been dead.
As long as you didn't kill the family dog, it was foolproof.
I walked into the baby's room where Stacey was stroking her child's hair. She wasn't crying, but I gave her my silk handkerchief anyway. Then she did something no one else had done to me in years. She gave me a hug.
"I better go get my alibi," she said. Then she was gone.
Little Lisa was sleeping face-down, her left leg unnaturally straight. I put an EBBETTS tablet down next to her. I don't know why, but I started playing with her hair. And something hit me. I'm not sure what it was. I paused. Not ready to pour the water on the tablet. Not sure of anything.
It felt longer, but it was no less than a minute. I slapped myself across the cheek, poured a little water on the tablet, and left the apartment. There was no reason to stay, EBBETTS always worked.
As I walked out of the apartment building and got into the "Hill City Plumbing Company" minivan, I began to cry. I have never cried. I didn't know why. Panic set in. I just kept bawling. I was paralyzed. As much as I tried, I couldn't get the key into the ignition.
Just then a hand grabbed my arm. It helped me guide the key into the ignition and start the car.
The arm belonged to Mike Johnson, my boss and top field agent. Unbeknownst to me, he had been waiting in the van.
"Drive back to the garage," he said, "we need to talk." | 
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