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Twenty- Two Who could know heaven, save by heaven’s gift... ? Marcus Manilius Early in the spring of 1992, Ted went to central Arkansas for a weekend visit with Karla Turner and her husband, Casey. Through the lengthy investigation into Ted’s experi- ences, he and the Turners had become good friends, so the visit was both for work and for pleasure. After his arrival on Friday, they talked until well after midnight and then rose rather late on Saturday morning. “How did you sleep?” Casey asked as they sat sipping coffee in the living room. “Fine,” Ted said, “for a while, at least.” “Don’t tell me something happened last night,” Karla said, shaking her head at the expression on Ted’s face. “Many people, including other abductees, have stayed in that room before, and no one has had any problem.” “T don’t know if it happened or if it was a dream,” Ted told her, “but I sure thought I was awake. I was acting com- pletely awake, in fact, I was just getting out of bed to go to the bathroom, and then I started hearing helicopter blades whishing through the wind, right over the house.” Karla and Casey looked at each other in surprise. “We’ ve had quite a bit of helicopter activity,” she said, “back when we lived in Texas and here, too. My dogs hate the ‘copters, and they always bark when they’re overhead, but I didn’t hear anything last night. I know we would have heard it, and the dogs would have barked. Are you sure about the noise?” “Yeah, I sat up on the side of the bed, listening to the whirr of the blades,” he went on, “and then the damnedest thing happened. This man just appeared, coming right down through the ceiling.” “A man? What did he look like?” Casey asked. “Human 2a or not?” “Oh, he looked human,” Ted said, “and he was wearing military fatigues. He came down into the room, and he had a little tow-headed boy with him, about seven or eight years old. You’re going to think I’m crazy,” he paused, “but that boy looked like me. Like I looked at that age, when the aliens cloned me.” “What did you do? Did anything happen?” “Not really. The soldier just talked to me. He said that they were returning something that had been taken from me. And that’s all I remember.” “How do you feel this morning, then?” Karla asked. “Actually,” Ted smiled, “I’m in a pretty good mood. I don’t know what that was all about last night, but I wasn’t frightened. It seemed like the soldier was trying to be nice, trying to make up for something.” “What do you think he meant, about returning something that had been taken?” Casey wondered. “Tf that little boy was supposed to be you, how could they give you back to yourself?” “Who knows what he meant?” Ted said. “It doesn’t make any sense.” “No,” Karla agreed, “but you do realize how similar this scenario was to the episode you and Marie saw happening to Amelia, don’t you? The virtual reality scenario?” “My gosh, that’s right,” Ted said. ““Amelia’s experience started with the sound of a helicopter, too, and she said she saw through the ceiling.” “And the two aliens came down into the room, right?” “Yeah,” Ted nodded. “I wonder if there was a sphere of blue light around me that I couldn’t see from the inside. That illusion Amelia saw never made any sense, and this one doesn’t, either. I didn’t see any blue light, but then neither did Amelia, just Marie and me.” But five days later, when he was back home in Shreveport, Ted had another experience that seemed related Masquerade of Angels 219 The Light - Twenty-Two