"And . . . done," the happy housewife declared triumphantly, setting down her microfiber dust cloth. "Now my kitties are all spick and span." She gave the tabby-shaped cookie jar a pat on the head and giggled to herself. She was aware that the cat wasn't alive (she wasn't crazy, no sir), but she still enjoyed pretending otherwise. 

     Then she noticed that the banisters weren't quite as immaculately clean as they should have been, and she proceeded to veritably bludgeon them with a feather duster. 

     "I'm heading off to work, honey," proclaimed her husband, emerging from their bedroom in a crisp new suit. 

     "You look wonderful, dear!" his wife replied with sing-song cadence, still violently beating the railing. "I take it that today is the big day?" 

     Her spouse snapped his fingers and winked his eye. "Sure is, buttercup! Today's the day I make the big presentation!"

     With the banisters sufficiently pounded into dust-free submission, the wife scurried down the stairs and threw her arms around her husband, popping a high-heeled foot in the air as she embraced him lovingly. "I'm sure that things will go wonderfully, dear."

     "Better than wonderfully," asserted her husband, his eyes locked with hers in a fierce gaze of romantic passion. "It'll be absolutely fantasma-kerfiddle-dee-roofabus."

     She ran her bright red fingernails through his long, gray hair. "And when my big, strong loveykins comes home, he'll have a piping hot plate of meatloaf waiting for him."

     The man smiled and squeezed his apron-clad wife even more tightly. "That's what I like to hear."

     "Oh, Ronald," she cooed.

     "Oh, Annie," he whispered.

     Their lips grew closer.

     "Dear, you'll be late for work if you don't leave soon," Annie reminded him, drawing away slightly.

     "The presentation can wait, sugarplum. All I need right now is you."

     And with that, their faces intertwined in a kiss of utmost tenderness and intimacy. 

     That's when the screaming started. 

     "Oh god," came a terrified voice from behind them. "What did they do to you guys?"

     The two quickly ceased their vigorous osculation. A ragged-looking blonde man stood in their doorway, his eyes stretched wide with dumbstruck horror. 

     "Who are you?" Ronald asked authoritatively, one arm still locked firmly around his wife's hips. 

     The stranger rubbed his hands against his face in disbelief and mumbled something about this being hilarious if they weren't all about to die.

     "Honey, isn't he one of your coworkers?" Annie suggested. She smiled for no reason.

     "Why, so he is!" Ronald said, smiling in return and throwing in a chuckle for good measure. "I didn't recognize you for a moment there, Stanley. How are the kids?"

     "It's me, Campren!" the intruder cried, gesturing to himself wildly. "Snap out of it!"

     The cheerful, carefree, red-blooded American smile on Ronald's face didn't waver for instant. "Annie, I think that Stanley's stopped by to discuss the big presentation."

     "Why, that's wonder-- I mean, fantasma-kerfiddle-dee-rumpus!" Annie cried out, waving a hand in the air dramatically. "Will you be joining us for meatloaf, Stanley? Everyone in our rotary club says I have the meatiest of loaves in the whole community!"

     "This is even worse than I thought," Campren whimpered. "I've gotta stop this. Sorry, guys."

     He leapt into the home and grabbed a particularly heavy-looking kitten figurine.

     "Stanley, what are you--" was all that Ronald was able to say before the smiling cat made contact with his forehead. Immediately he crumpled to the floor in a shower of kitten fragments. 

     Annie gasped. "Look at the mess you've made of my nice, clean carpet!" she chided Campren. "Now I'll have to get the vacuum and--"

     A second kitten, and Annie joined her husband on the floor.

     "You'll thank me later," Campren said, looking down at the two fallen Champions in front of him. "I promise I'll find a way to fix you guys, but first I've got to take care of--"

     He was cut off by the sound of footsteps descending the staircase. This came as a surprise; he hadn't been told of any other inhabitants of the house.  

     "Mom? Dad?" came the voice of a teenage girl. "Is everything all right?"

     "Err-- everything's fine, honey!" Campren called back, using his best falsetto. He realized afterward that he probably would have had better luck imitating the father. "Nothing's going on down here."

     But the footsteps kept getting closer, closer. 

     "Stay upstairs, sweetheart!" Campren tried again, using lower register. "Your mother and I are having our private time."

     It didn't work. Ronanld and Annie's daughter only quickened her pace.

     Finally, Campren caught sight of the pair of feet that was coming down the stairs. His blood ran ice cold. They weren't human.

     "What do you think you're doing with my parents?" hissed the giant, blue bug creature.