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The Siege - Three The Siege - Three reasoned, for him to form any opinion of his own. And occasionally such new events did occur. Once, late in 1989, for instance, when Ted and Bud were driving home from a trip to Florida, they both witnessed UFO activity. It was around three in the morning, as they approached the area near Crystal Springs, Mississippi, traveling along the small, winding roads and trying to stay awake and alert. Bud took the wheel, and Ted climbed into the back seat to take a nap and refresh himself for the next stint of the journey. As soon as he lay back and closed his eyes, Ted had a psy- chic flash, a vision of several deer standing by the side of the road. “Bud, I think you better slow down,” he said, raising up again to peer out the front windshield. “With all these trees, it’s hard to see the roadside, and I just had a psychic glimpse of some deer ahead. If we come on them too fast, they might dart in front of the car and cause us to have a wreck.” Bud slowed down accordingly, and about three miles fur- ther they saw three deer very near the road, refusing to move away. The car went by them slowly, and as he watched the animals, Bud remarked, “I wish I could do things like that. It never ceases to amaze me how you can do such things.” “T don’t know how I do it,” Ted replied. “It just seems to happen.” “Things like that prove your psychic ability to me,” Bud told him. “I don’t have any doubt about that. But I still have a problem with the UFO stuff. It isn’t that I doubt what you’ ve told me, but I’ve never seen anything myself. And the stuff you see on TV isn’t very convincing. Besides,” he continued, “the government says it’s all bullshit, it’s not real. I just don’t know what to believe. Hell, I wish I could have some kind of physical proof and know it for myself.” “T wish I could give you some,” Ted laughed, “but I don’t know of any. I have no control when they come and go, and I don’t even know what it is they do.” He lay back for a nap, but a few minutes later Bud called out, “Ted! Take a look at that!” Ted sat up again and looked out the window. Descending through the sky straight in front of them was what appeared Masquerade of Angels 22 to be a bright shooting star. “Pretty damn brilliant,” Ted said, “and really clear. But, you know, that shooting star seems to be going slower than the ones I’ve seen before.” A few minutes later, a second shooting star suddenly shot up from behind the car, flying over and directly in front of them, completely silent. “That’s odd,” Ted said, “for that star to follow the same path as the first one, don’t you think?” Then a third star shot overhead maybe three minutes later as Ted and Bud watched in amazement. But they hardly had time to comment on it when a fourth one appeared, flying slowly in the same direction as the others. “Enough, that’s enough!” Bud insisted. “I don’t want any more proof! That’s all the proof I need. I believe you, Ted, I believe you!” And that was the end of the shooting stars after that. A much more dramatic event occurred in the following spring, in April 1990, when Ted was visited by Marie Jackson, the woman who had first brought him into the spiritualist association and who had trained him in his psychic develop- ment. Although he was no longer actively involved with the association, he and Marie remained very close friends over the years. But since they lived so far apart, visits were rare, and their first few days together were filled with long talks as they caught up on each other’s activities. A few nights later, well after midnight, Ted was startled from sleep by Marie calling his name from the living room where she slept on a sofa-bed. “Ted!” she shouted, “get in here! Right now!” She sounded anxious, so Ted roused up and hurried into the living room. Every light in the front of the house was blazing, and there was Marie pacing nervously, puffing on a cigarette and looking very worried. “My God, Marie, what on earth happened?” Ted asked. “T don’t know,” she replied, shaking her head, “but it’s really got me going. This was just too weird.” Ted tried to coax her into sitting down, but she was too agitated. Masquerade of Angels 23