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with so many people! Or maybe they want these fluids for the survival of their own kind. Who knows? We can’t believe anything they say.” Ted was chagrined by his lack of resistance the night before. Did he really know something that made him agree to the procedure? Or was that just the result of the aliens’ ability to control his thoughts and responses? Whatever the reason, he did not like being taken by surprise, and he really did not like giving in without a fight. That wasn’t his nature. A week or so later, on a rainy afternoon, Ted was at home visiting with his friend Bud and planning to finish signing and addressing his Christmas cards. The two men talked for a while, and then around four p.m. Ted pulled out the cards and began working on them. Bud excused himself and left the kitchen area for the bathroom. At four thirty-five, Bud came back in and sat down at the kitchen table with Ted. “How did you get so many cards addressed already?” he asked in surprise, glancing at the large stack of envelopes on the table. “What do you mean?” Ted asked without looking up. “You’ve been gone long enough for me to have finished, but I stopped for a while to have a cigarette and another cup of coffee.” “Are you crazy?” Bud laughed. “I just went to the bath- room and then I sat down on the bed to listen to a song that was playing on the radio. Then I came right back in here. I haven’t been gone five minutes!” Ted looked up at his friend in puzzlement, but Bud’s face was dead serious. In fact, he looked pale, and his manner was somewhat disoriented. “Don’t joke with me,” Ted said, growing concerned. “T want to get these cards finished and take a nap before dinner.” “T’m very serious,” Bud argued. “And I’m not joking.” “Do you remember commenting when you left the room that it was four o’clock and you were already hungry for dinner?” Ted asked. Bud nodded, and Ted pointed up at the wall clock. It now Masquerade of Angels 212 showed twenty minutes to five. Bud jumped up from his chair and went into the living room and then the bedroom, checking all the docks. Then he came back in quietly and sat down, confused. “What did you do?” Ted asked. “Tell me everything you remember.” “T just went to the bathroom,” Bud replied, “and then I sat on the bed and listened to the radio.” “What song was playing?” “T don’t remember.” He got up and retraced his path through the house to see if he could recall anything else. “Come in here!” he shouted to Ted, who followed quickly after him. Bud pointed at the coffee table. “Did you put the scissors there?” he asked. Ted stared down at the scissors in astonishment. For two days he had been looking for them, and Bud had helped him search the place earlier that day. Both men were certain that nothing had been on the table except for a potted plant and an ashtray. “No,” Ted said, “I didn’t put them there. Did you? Are you trying to trick me?” “Of course not,” Bud snapped, shaken by the time loss and the reappearance of the scissors. “We must just have overlooked them, that’s all,” Ted tried to reassure Bud, and he glossed over the missing time as well. He realized what might have happened, that Bud might have had an encounter in the other room while he sat, oblivious to anything, working on the Christmas cards. But there was no way to know for sure, since Bud remem- bered nothing extraordinary. If the aliens were responsible, Ted wondered what the purpose of their visit might have been. Was it a sort of calling card, he asked himself, to let their presence be known? Were they showing him that there was nothing he could do to stop them, awake or asleep, if they chose to intervene? Shortly after Christmas, another strange episode occurred while Ted’s friend Carl was visiting for the holidays. That Masquerade of Angels 213 The Light - Twenty-One The Light - Twenty-One