Sister Catherine frowned at the half-melted ice sculpture in the middle of her plain, side table. Mr. Theopolous the custodian had made it especially for the occasion, although she was not at all sure the image of a grim reaper was a good choice, but Theopolous had strange tastes. Encircling it were half-empty plates of crackers and simple dips. Light from the rose-scented candles flickered against the stone walls, illuminating her room along with a single oil lamp on the bedside table. The smell was a welcome change from the ever-present incense that permeated every inch of the Convent.

An oversized, black leather trunk stamped with 'Sister Margaret' sat open on the floor, mostly full. She told me at the conference in Utah everyone bought a lot when she had one of these parties. And they are such good products, too. I do not know why someone would not want one…

A knock on the door jolted her out of her musings. "Sister?"

For a moment, Sister Catherine considered hiding the evidence of the party, but she knew it would not do any good. She opened the door.

"Mother Superior," she welcomed. "We don't see you in this wing very often."

The ancient nun's deep-set eyes swept the room. Clutching her Bible to her chest with worn, bony fingers, she said, "From the sight of this room, it may have been too long."

"I'm sure I have no idea to what you are referring."

Mother Superior walked into the chamber and began examining objects from the sample case.

"Sister Catherine," she said, "you have been here with us for forty-seven years, but I have been here for far longer. In all those years, I have needed only one tool, the one our Lord intended."

Her fingers drummed her Bible, the hint obvious.

Sister Catherine's temper flared. "With all due respect, Mother Superior, just because something is new doesn't mean it won't work as well or even better than the old, outdated, traditional tools of two thousand years ago. I mean, in this age of internet access, you won't even allow us electric lights!"

The old nun's eyes narrowed to slits. "Is that so?"

Sister Catherine looked down, feeling the cold glare. "I apologize. My zeal to do good works with these tools got the better of me. It's just…"

"Just what?"

"That they work. It makes our task easier that we may better guide the souls who come to us. Technology is not evil. If only you would allow me to prove that to you!"

Mother Superior paused in thought. "Very well. Let the two of us go out into the world and you can try to prove the value of these things to me to my satisfaction… or you will never use them again."

The City was unaware of the two Sisters on its sidewalk, quietly observing those who bustled by. The cacophony of a thousand noises assaulted their ears and exhaust from the cars rushing by burned at their nostrils.

Mother Superior bristled. "One approaches."

Sister Catherine looked up from the iPhone she had taken from Sister Margaret's case. "There are three on this side of the street alone."

Mother Superior raised a thin eyebrow.

"There's an App for that." Sister Catherine smiled. "And across the street is an escapee."

Mother Superior's eyes burned with intensity. "Where?"

Sister Catherine pointed. "There. The gray-haired man in the red shirt with rings on each of his fingers."

Mother Superior withdrew a small rod from the folds of her robes. Instantly, it grew in taller than her and a long, curved blade sprang from the tip. She flew unseen across the street and swung her full-sized scythe in an arc, slicing the invisible spirit inside the man in two. Just as quick, she reached into his chest as he stood there and pulled out a ball of white-hot energy. His body fell to the ground.

People on the street saw him fall. A young man moved to help him, stepping right through Mother Superior's black habit as if she were not there, unseen and unheard. He knelt beside the escapee's body.

"This guy is dead!" the man announced to the gathering crowd.

Sister Catherine landed beside her invisible superior and held out what looked like a plastic cup. "Put it in here."

"What?"

"Put it in and I'll put the lid on so it won't escape again. You'll see."

Doubtfully, the old nun dropped the energy ball into the cup and her younger partner clamped on the lid. Inside, they could see the light moving back and forth, battering against the sides.

"See? ReaperWare keeps the souls safe and secure. These vessels go inside a larger, flexible carrier that can be worn as a large purse or a backpack for those times when you want to be visible, and your hands stay free for the scythe. Instead of one soul per trip, this holds fourteen. Our productivity will soar! We can give it to everyone in the Convent--"

Mother Superior's scythe plunged into Sister Catherine and the old nun plucked a bright blue ball of light from her chest. She held her Sister's soul in her hand and bent low over her astonished face.

"Sorry, my dear. I have held the record for most reaping for over two thousand years. I am not about to lose it to some upstart. ReaperWare indeed!"

She picked up the soul carrier and placed Catherine in one of the vessels, next to the escapee. The carrier zipped closed, and she put it over her back.

She mused, "It is awfully comfortable, though. I think Sister Margaret has a date with the Well of Souls, too, before she sells these to anyone else."

I have loved you all my life, as long as I can remember.

But to you, I am only your brother's best friend. Everyone calls you 'Teresa', but only my heart truly names you. I am so glad to live near you, to lay my head down in rest so close. Many a night I will stand upon the black-and-white Cimmerian grass just outside your house, wanting to howl out my joy to the big moon or the little moon. (Our elders inform us that our original home had only a single globe in the Stygian sky.)

Yes, I spend so much time sniffing about your stuff, learning your movements, knowing your business. But you have nothing to fear from me. I swear and promise. Truly, I do.

You are tall and slender with light hair and bright, watery eyes. I have looked to you when younger, skipping on that same grass in pony-tails and shorts, wanting to join in. But I always stayed playing ball with your brother. I have seen you grow from a gawky girl in thick, black eye-glasses into a beautiful woman who places clear lenses to her orbs. My eyes are forever tracing out the gentle curves of your form; my ears prick up at the pitch and tone of your melodious voice; my nose twitches at the fainest scent of your wonderful, odoriferous perfume. I stare, I hear, I smell -- all at the very edges of my abilities, the very best, the zenith of my talents -- all to be with you though cursed by a vast distance. Distance of cruel space, and distance of your unkind indifference. I know some day, you will choose to cross that gap and see me for the one I am truly, the one who should be with you, care for you, protect you. One day you will let me fully be myself and do all I hope for, and strive to, and know I should. One day I believe you will – you must. You need only to command my heart.

And how many times do I stand by a wide window in a dark kitchen to watch you come home from dates with boys? Too many to count, sadly. Boys like the one who sits at your patio table now. I am near (as always) burying my face in some tasty victuals.

I listen. A bunch of words are said. I pay attention to none. It is just meaningless noise.

"Deimos and Phobos," he swears. Not for the first time that day, nor in his short life.

You scowl. You shift about your feet in your sandals, nervously. "Are you trying to make me angry? People just want a reaction. That's why you do what you do."

"Me wanting a reaction! You're just upset about the party," he says.

"You were there with me. Not there to play attention to her. Did you sleep with her – No! I don't want to know."

"You told me you didn't want a commitment," he replies.

"Just because I don't want to wear your Varsity jacket or high school class ring, doesn't mean I don't want some faithfulness, a little fidelity. Maybe I just love too much. I don't know."

"I'm out of here. Text me when you want to be reasonable," he says, stands and walks away from you. He strides past me without meeting my glaring eye.

You seem so sad. You dab at your eyes with a tissue. You stare a moment into space, at the distance, at the landscape, at the extinct and dead volcano that people have named Pavonis Mons.

Is this my moment? Is this my chance? Is this my destiny?

I must know!

I approach you; I would speak to you today, confess my love.

"Arf! Arf!" I pad my four paws close; push my cold, black nose to yours; and kiss you with my tongue. "Oh, Fido," you speak, rubbing me behind one ear. My left leg begins to scratch upon the tiled patio floor. And I love you all the more.

It was an excellent idea at first glance. It would be simple enough, at least at first, we'd make a good honest living, Sam and I - though he wasn't particularly concerned with that part of it.

You see, Sam collected racehorses. Oh, not personally; he wasn't nearly rich enough to own his own. But he collected everything about them. He knew every horse by name, by age, by reputation. He had photographs of them on their usual training runs, he had schedules of how they spent the day, he used to be up on the downs every afternoon with binoculars to watch the horses go by. And, almost as an aside, he could tell me the odds of any particular horse winning on any particular day.

Not the odds that the bookmakers give you. Those have a safety factor built in, which is the profit margin for the bookmakers. No. The real odds. I'd done just about enough maths that I could do the accounting, add on the profit factors, and so on; between the two of us, we could make a betting firm. Which, despite what anyone else might tell you, is the only really sure way to make money on the racetrack unless you're a professional jockey.

At first, everything went wonderfully. Sam and I would get into my old van (actually my Dad's old van but he let us borrow it) on race days and drive down to the course; I'd give Sam the day's weather report (straight off the weather department's website) and Sam would immediately write down the odds for each horse. When we got there, we'd set up the stand, I'd add the profit margins onto the odds (and sometimes they were very slim margins), and take people's bets; after the races, I'd pay out the winners and Sam and I would split the take.

Sam's odds were rarely wrong, so things went mostly alright. There was that day that Bright Future fell at the first fence, and bought down the rest of the favourites with him; we ended up paying more than we'd taken to a few lucky people who'd decided to go with their gut and bet on a no-hoper; but days like that were few and far between, and on average we were showing a profit.

Then the problems began. At first, I thought it was just another bad day; Sally's Dream came a distant third in a race that Sam had given eight-to-one odds on chance of winning. Sam was a bit less calm about it; he insisted that there was no way that Sally's Dream could possibly have done that badly, and when I'd asked what he'd meant he gave me a worryingly long list of ways that a horse could be sabotaged (fed a laxative, for example). Of course, the course checks for that sort of thing; drugs, to either speed up or slow down a horse, can make millions for an unscrupulous person. Sally's Dream came out clean; but Sam's list had included at least three methods that they apparently didn't check for.

So did the next four favourites to fall foul of whatever was going on. But by then, Sam had found the pattern. See, he was obsessed with horses; he could tell you every detail of their lives, from the colour of their bedding to what they'd had for lunch last Tuesday. He'd also convinced himself that he and I were going to find out who was doing it and stop them; he dragged me back and forth at the dead of night to watch the horses that he said were nearly certain to win the next races.

And it was him that spotted that the same stable-hand had been in the last four of the five stables shortly before their horses started failing. He wasn't sure what the stablehand had done, but he was sure it was something; and no-one messes with horses in Sam's mind.

I should have spotted the problem back then. I really should have.

Sam saw that stable hand at our last race meeting. And filled with righteous anger and armed with nothing but a shrill voice, he blew the cover of the Jockey Club's top investigator.

Sam's still fine, of course. That scene, above all others, was what pointed the investigator in the right direction; because once introductions had been made, and once Sam had been convinced that the introductions were correct, the investigator discovered that there had been two other people near those horses before their races; Sam and I. (Not Sally's Dream; I'm still not sure who stopped that one. No, just the other four).

It had been perfect. Slip the right mix of stuff into their feed, and a horse will slow right down the next day; I used to mix it up in the kitchen in the afternoons. If it hadn't been for Sam, I would never have known what to mix up; I would never have been able to get near the horses; and if it hadn't been for Sam, I would never have known how rich one could get by fiddling the odds; and if it hadn't been for Sam, I would never have been caught. If it hadn't been for Sam, I would never have ended up in prison.

I hear he's working for the Jockey Club himself now; they're closing in on the man who slowed Sally's Dream.

The aging superstar fled across the crowded spaceport – and the obsessed fan followed.

"We need to be at the gate by 1500 hours," she told the provolved iguana sitting on her shoulder.

It looked at her and nodded in agreement. "You worry too much, Margi," he told her reassuringly. "He loves you and will hold the hover-yacht if we're late."

"I don't like being late ever, Sawsa. It's like I always tell you – ‘It is just as easy to be ten minutes early as to be ten minutes late." She tapped the reptile gently on its spicy green nose. "Am I right or wrong, Sawsa?"

"Right as usual, King Friday," he clamored joyfully. It was true that provolved iguanas could talk and think for themselves, but most were simple, agreeable companions.

The fifty-something woman passed an advertising motion detector and it flashed a promotion for the holo-zine she always read. On the cover was a moving holograph of Margi's true love and his girlfriend blissfully hovering over the Great Red Spot of Jupiter.

"Look at that skinny little witch, Sawsa." Margi wrinkled her nose, as though smelling something revolting. "Someone should force feed her packets of cheeseburger rations, so she would gain about 20 kilos. Women look better with a little meat on their bones. Right or wrong, Sawsa – right or wrong?"

"Right again, King Friday," sung the iguana, swishing its tail about slightly. Within another 750 generations, the provolving of iguanas would take a nasty turn and the talking reptiles would become unfriendly, hissing violently at humans while talking only amongst themselves. "You are so lucky you responded to that email at work. It looked suspicious – the whole ‘Spend a Lifetime of Joy with a Superstar' in the subject line. I still can't believe that he sent you that boarding pass to meet up with him at the spaceport. You are so lucky," said Sawsa dreamingly.

"So lucky," agreed Margi, hovering with the rest of the spaceport guests, racing towards their appropriate gates. "He must have read all my fan letters. I knew my proclamations of true love would win his heart." "The holo-zines say he watches all the fan-holos himself."

Margi could see him now, her true love, standing beside his hover-yacht. He seemed to be agitated and nervous for some reason. She held out the boarding pass and the gate shimmered and let her through.

The superstar saw her now and ran to embrace her. "Thank god you made it! I thought I'd need to hold the hover-yacht for you! We're headed first to Venus and then to Europa for their deep-sea festival of lights."

They embraced again. Margi suddenly became worried.

"What's wrong, Margi? – I don't want anything to mar our time together."

"What about your girlfriend and your children, Stevie Deep?"

"I've wasted enough time with that skinny witch, Margi," he told her. "I'm tired of making love to a stick." The Superstar put his arm around Margi's ample waist. "I need a woman with a little meat on her bones! And don't be concerned about my children. I have so much money that my children will never want for anything." He stared deeply into her eyes. "I loved the screenplay you sent to me. You really are a spectacular author."

They were hovering at the yacht's door now, just a step away from an eternity of joyful bliss. Stevie Deep drew her closer to him. "After reading your brilliant screenplay, I watched all your fan holograms and realized we were meant to be together forever. I love you Margi, more than I could ever say."

"I love you too, Stevie Deep," she said. And they lived happily ever after. No, really – that's the ending: and they lived happily ever after. Hooray!

"Please describe it as best you can Mr. Colebank."

Colebank tried to form the image in his mind, but what he was trying to conjure was the vision from a dream and he realized in his attempts to meet the man's request his imagination was filling in gaps, creating something that hadn't originally been there, a color maybe or a slight luminescence, and the result was artificial.

"It was nothing. How can I describe a nothing? It was an empty meaningless nothing. I'm sorry, it's…" Colebank tried to relax, but he could feel perspiration forming on his upper lip. He dabbed at it with a white handkerchief. The old man across the table jotted something on a pad.

"It's okay," the old man said. He reached out his hand, and in what Colebank thought was an odd gesture, he placed it on Colebank's arm. "Don't be so hard on yourself."

A large robot rolled into the white room. Aside from a few lights, it was all shiny chrome. It had nothing Colebank would have called a face. It had a tray in its metallic hand with two tall glasses of icy lemonade. The ice clinked as the robot came to a stop. It set a glass in front of each man. Colebank watched as beads of condensation slid down the sides of the glass. Right then he realized how perfectly thirsty he was and how the lemonade was exactly what he wanted.

The other man took a sip. He had steely eyes and was bald. A gray Van Dyke brought his face to a point.

"What is the meaning of this?" Colebank asked at last forcing himself to ignore the lemonade for some reason.

"Mr. Colebank, I'm going to do something that's against my better judgment. I'm going to tell you the truth. It won't be easy for you to hear, not at all. But I have always believed in the truth and I think it is essential now." He smiled.

Colebank cautiously nodded.

"Mr. Colebank, do you know who I am?"

Colebank thought for a moment. He didn't remember ever being told the old man's name.

"I'm sure you don't. My name is, in fact, Abraham Jesup Colebank."

Colebank felt a strange prickle on the back of his neck. "Are we… related?"

The old man chuckled. "Isn't everything related in some way?" he asked.

Colebank's face flushed. Was the old man patronizing him? "Well, I'm not related to this robot. It's a machine."

The old man laughed louder this time. "Actually, you are as related to this robot as you are to me. Would you like to meet the common progenitor of all three of us?" he asked. "What you are about to see will shock you. But it is the truth and there is no denying the truth." The old man pointed to the table and right in front of Colebank's eyes a large specimen jar materialized out of the air. The jar was filled with a blue liquid and submerged in the liquid was a human brain.

Colebank was so startled he nearly fell out of his chair.

"This is Abraham Jesup Colebank," the old man said.

"But I thought… that was you." Colebank whispered.

"A lucky coincidence," the old man said chuckling again.

"What are you talking about?" Colebank felt a surge of anger. This was a sick joke. He clenched his fists and felt his face flushing. The old man jotted some more on his pad.

"This is insane," Colebank yelled standing abruptly. "I want to leave. I want to leave right now."

For the first time the old man put his pad down. He walked around the table and came up to Colebank's side. There was a look of sadness and empathy on his face. "It's okay. We don't have to go any further. Let me show you out."

They started walking toward the white door on the far side of the room. "You see," the old man said, "A. J. Colebank is searching. He will settle for nothing short of unraveling all of life's secrets and achieving godhood. You might say he's a man obsessed."

Colebank could have sworn the door was only a few steps away, but as they walked it seemed to be taking forever to get to it.

"He did everything he could to preserve his physical body. When science failed him, he tried cloning himself. I am the happy product of that experiment. However, he found that while I was identical to him, I was not him. Next he tried transferring his entire consciousness into the body of a machine. The robot is the result of that experiment. But sadly that did not work either. That brain in the jar is just an illusion. In truth, A. J. Colebank's brain has been spread out over the area of a square city block, his brain cells embedded in a superconducting material to create neurochips in a supercomputer. And his consciousness presides here in this simulated reality. The robot and I are jacked in to help."

The door seemed to be about half as close now, but the old man seemed to be done talking. Colebank started to worry that if the old man didn't say anything else, the door would be there and then…

"Help with what?" Colebank blurted out.

"He wants to try his hand at creation. Not just physical objects, but an autonomous consciousness, so he can populate his reality with free thinking beings. If successful, he might someday even be able to reincarnate himself."

Colebank swallowed hard. There was a lump in his throat and his eyes began to water. "What does this mean for me?" The door was fast approaching now. "I'm sorry about the outburst before…"

The old man patted him on the shoulder. "Not to worry, we'll keep working on it. You have nothing to be sorry about."

The old man opened the door and Colebank walked back out into the empty meaningless nothing.

Stephen woke up in the middle of the night, only one worry on his mind. The temperature in the bedroom was cold, outside a terrible storm was beating down on the county ( and his farm was just in the middle of it ! )and his legs were trembling with weariness cause of the hard work in the fields of the day before. The young man didn't want to go out of his bed, but he knew he had to. He didn't remember if he had extinguished the oil lamp which was in the shed near home.What if he hadn't? That was a dangerous situation, he couldn't allow such a thing within his premises.

He had sometimes heard terrible things about the people who had forgotten such precautions: buildings in flames cause of the lack of attention of their owners, several dead and wounded men cause of such an oversight…

So he stood up, tried to set in order his shock of brown hair, then put on an old overcoat, went downstairs, crossed the meadow notwithstanding the incredible amount of rain which was falling heavily on his backyard, reached the wooden shed- fully drenched with winter downpour…- and found the oil- lamp near the straw. Stephen cupped his right hand at the back of the glass- paying attention not to touch anything because very hot- and blew towards it, so to extinguish the fire completely. Immediately after, he got out, went home again, climbed the stairs, put his cold body- without drying at all- into his bed and felt into a deep sleep.

But it didn't last for long…

Stephen woke up in the middle of the night, only one worry on his mind. The temperature in the bedroom was cold, outside a terrible storm was beating down on the county and his legs were still trembling with weariness. The young man didn't want to go out of his bed, but he knew he had to. He didn't remember if he had extinguished the oil lamp in the shed nearby.What if he hadn't? That was a dangerous situation, he couldn't allow that within his premises, of course…

He had sometimes heard terrible things about the people who had forgotten such precautions: buildings in flames cause of the lack of attention of their owners, several dead and wounded men cause of such an oversight…

So he stood up, tried to set in order his hair, then put on an old overcoat, went downstairs, crossed the meadow notwithstanding the incredible amount of rain which was falling heavily on his backyard, reached the wooden shed and found the oil- lamp near the straw. Stephen cupped his right hand at the back of the glass and blew towards it, so to extinguish the fire completely. Immediately after, he got out, went home again, climbed the stairs, put his cold body into his bed and felt into a deep sleep.

But, after a while, Stephen woke up again, his blue eyes exhausted: the young man was gripped by a doubt, once more…

Actually, the man named Stephen was completely tied on the metallic operating table, his brain fully linked via thousands of sensors to a robotic system placed above sending every single minute a given stimulus which caused the human to think of the oil lamp, to see it inside his mind, to perceive even the warthm coming from that…The machine made him go downstairs, pressed him be worried for the danger which the flames could provoke to the house, forced him to face the storm in the open and enter at night the shed outside the building, all this just to extinguish the oil lamp…but, of course, there was no fire, no storm, no shed or bedroom around, and, more than that, there was no lamp lighted…except on his mind. Only empty walls all around, the cold operating table he was on and the robotic instrumentation above his head.

That was all part of a multilevel experiment the alien species of the so-called "Tall Ones" had started 50 years before. They had been studying the Earthmen for so long, taking on board many of them from a lot of countries on the planet, imprisoning them into small rooms, exploring all their neural paths, their feelings and their doubts, too, even dissecting some of them at times…

Now, they could say they knew almost everything about the human brains: they knew how to make them feel pleased or worried and how to convince them to act accordingly… "Compulsions" , or "obsessions" , the humans called such impetuous needs that way…but, according to the aliens, that was the road to find a way just to rule all Mankind, steer men an women towards a deed, control them, make anyone fight against something or someone else, or surrender at a given order….

On his spaceship, the representative of the alien "Tall Ones" , sitting on his central supervising position, was looking at the data flow displayed on the holo videos all around, with medical updating about all the people kept uncounscious, placed on the several tables in the many rooms, more than two hundred...He was listening to the several voices - audible on the headphones –coming from the inside of the many prison- rooms all around the one mile long disc- shaped spaceship orbiting Earth at present.

"I must destroy that shop selling chocolate bars to my babies…they are too expensive, my sons will make me poor by buying them every day….I must destroy that shop…"

"I need to swim the whole ocean to get to Antarctica, no matter how cold the water is, I know I need to…"

"I want to drive my private aircraft, even if it has got no fuel, but I do want to…"

"I will fly out of that window, I will soar up in the air without problems, definitely…"

And many, many others, too…

The art critic was strolling through the gallery's new exhibition. Peering over his shoulder to his left, his head stayed in one space as his body attempted to continue in the direction it had been traveling. The critic approached the drawing slowly and swore, "Got in himmel."

His paintings were wooden, but his drawings, they were different. Some would claim they actually had a life of their own. Those statements were made by the serious collectors, grabbing every drawing offered. The price was never an object. They sold for a pretty penny too.

He cared little for the fame. Success allowed him to live a comfortable semi-reclusive life of his own choosing.

He could cross the street. He was able to walk down the stairs. He couldn't drive his vehicle. The mania, when it pounced, hit red hot, was mind searing accompanied with mental tunnel vision. He never knew when or why. He had to do it. He wanted it. He could do little else. He had to finish the drawings. When it left, he was both physically and psychically drained to the point of fever. No force except death could stop him until it was completed.

And then, his creations stood there in front of him, if only for awhile.

As a child he had the same "fits". That's what they were called back then. The monster is what he called her. She would wake and demand. She wanted something. Heat, rage, pin point focus-desire and then attack. When they occurred during his childhood, the end result was an altercation and violence.

His parents withdrew from most social events that would have a potential for the monster to strike. He became meek if only to protect himself as well as others, but the monster lurked. When she struck, he never had control over the burning desire. As a child he rarely remembered. He just did whatever it was. Regret was the by-product.

After some time, and severe mental training, he found that he could actually channel that energy and solace with literature and art. Later, these channeled fits allowed him to see and do things he wouldn't understand for years. It was as strange as it was ineffable.

He matured learning to live with these attacks of mania. He studied art but never mastered the pigments. The paintings were mediocre at best except for one or two and they got him an interview at an art academy. "You know son," they said. "Have you thought of teaching?" That was a polite manner of suggesting his work was not up to the quality they expected.

And then She hit like never before. She knew what she wanted. Graphine transmitted, then imparted life from his fingers to the paper, to the physical beauty portrayed. Then gone. Exhausted, "Here," is all he said. The drawing was handed to the committee. There was silence. He was admitted.

When the mania took over, when She was hungry and turned her eyes toward him and pounced, there was no concept of space or time, and no need for food. He could never explain it. He knew better than to try. He had an internal burning fever of desire for? They just happened. He created the renditions and they were alive. He was the only human who ever got to meet them.

"Please don't send us back." They would beg. They didn't want to return to the paper, or to the sketch books, but they had to. He had only so much energy he could funnel into his work to make them come alive. They would live for those brief time periods.

He loved his drawings too. They were his children, some his lovers and others just passing friends. They always came alive if even for seconds, minutes and rarely, oh so rarely and so lovely, sometimes for a few hours.

"Thank you," is all he ever said.

People said, "We could see them breathing in the frame." They were quoting from one critic's art review. "…an alchemist, a genius, or a devil…" was what he wrote. The critics love his drawings. "Why do you waste your time painting? Your draughtmanship is a god sent gift."

Some viewers would retreat, fearful or awe struck by the reality staring back at them. Others fell in love and paid any price. One patron, as he left the artist's studio with his new purchase noticed what he thought looked like water stains on the face of one of the drawing.

Over time, the constant loss of all his art was too much. He drew very little.

The completed drawing was different than any of the others. The long flowing hair was typical, but the wings, he never drew wings. You could almost feel the feathers. The woman had a seductive smile, and a warm loving presence, that if she were alive, would bring a man to his knees and women would step back in awe and respect.

The corner's report stated heart failure. They found him with this one in his hands.

Angela didn't yawn like most people did. First, she would scrunch her face into a tight pout, lips pursed and eyes squinting so hard that it was evident that she could barely see. She would exhale loudly through her nose. . .this was the warning stage. The sharp intake of breath that accompanied the expansion of her face and immediate, ridiculously wide-mouthed, closed-eye rictus of apparent agony, made a whistling/squeaking noise like you'd just stomped on a dog's playtoy. After this, she didn't make a sound. Dead silence. The whole ordeal took at least fifteen seconds, start to finish. How she didn't dislocate her jaw when she did it, had been a mystery to me, for years. I promise you that if you'd never met her, and if you just saw a video of her yawning, you'd swear it was a Hollywood special effect. Maybe those weird CGI mummies from the series of the same name could have outdone her, but barely. It was a fascinating thing to watch.

And scary, too. At least this time it was. It was dark, we were on a winding Kentucky backroad at the time, and she was driving.

"Dammit Angela!" I shouted as I reached across to grab the wheel, barely managing to keep the car within the boundaries of the narrow road. "You're going to kill yourself—probably somebody else—one of these days." My heart was still pounding in my chest from the instant adrenalin rush. "You just scared the living crap out of me!

"Sorry." Her face had just snapped back to normal, no apparent harm done. "I didn't get much sleep, last night. They were buzzing the house, again."

"Oh Lordy, girl," my voice was exasperation, itself. "You didn't call 911 again, did you?"

"No, you were right about that. They said that the last time was my final warning. They haven't even sent a car out since last year."

"They can charge you with misuse, you know."

"That's what they keep telling me. Bob, I know you don't want to hear this, but I'm telling you that UFO's are freaking everywhere!"

"Ang, you know how I feel about it. When one of them walks up and bites me on the butt, I'll believe it. Till then. . ."

"I'm not the only one, Bob. Angela's Space Angels gets more hits than Top10UFO, Informant News and TruthSeekers, combined. Only MUFON's website gets more than me. I hear stories from all over. Just the other day. . ."

I looked over at her, fearing another yawn, and she was staring up through the windshield into the moonless sky.

"Look!, UFO!"

Without even thinking, I looked. "That's a plane, Angela. See the lights on the wings? We're maybe a mile from the Harlan airport."

"Yeah, I guess it is." She sounded disappointed. I couldn't tell if it was because she would have had me as a witness, or just because it wasn't little green men from Mars. "But when I was passing-out flyers at the mall, yesterday, one lady told me that she sees them all the time around the Lexington airport."

"Maybe she doesn't know the difference between a plane and a flying saucer, either." I wasn't proud of myself, but it had to be said. "When you saw an obvious small airplane in the sky, your FIRST thought was ‘UFO', Angela. I have to say it doesn't help your case."

"But I have thousands of photos and hours of video that people have sent me from all over the world, it's on my website. There are literally thousands of people in the chat sites and blogging about their experiences. . .I read them all, every day."

"Any of those pictures yours?"

"No." She paused to concentrate on the road. We were on the switchback that lead to Highway 90, almost home. "Whatever that green glow is doesn't show up on film or digital pictures. I've tried dozens and dozens of times."

"So how come other people can take pictures, and videos?"

"Oh, the pictures they take are never the same as what I see. I think the ones around here must use a different technology. Though I did get a very good drawing of one in my email, yesterday. I haven't put it up on the site, yet. From a teenage boy down in Somerset."

"A drawing?" I tried to mask my interest, if she thought she was making headway with me, she'd just go on and on and on about it.

"Oh yes. The kid's got some talent. It's a perfect depiction. He's definitely seeing the same craft I am. He says that he's seen them his whole life. Same as me."

"I thought you said in one of our meetings that you didn't start seeing them till you'd already been drinking for years?"

"I did, but it wasn't strictly true. I saw them when I was little, but then they seemed to fade—eventually to nothing—until I started the binge drinking. I killed so damn many brain cells, maybe whatever changes as you age that makes everyone else blind to them was damaged, or something. I know you're not supposed to lie in AA, but I kind'a forgot that I'd seen them till I was three or four."

I got a funny feeling when she said this. It sounded like it might be something important. But we were almost to my home, so I started gathering my stuff. "Thanks for the ride, Angela. I'll pick-you-up, next week. Carpooling to AA was a good idea, seeing how close we live."

As I watched her drive away, I pulled out my cell and dialed a twelve-digit number. "Harris here, sir. Altering the distortion field frequency had no effect on the Subject. I'll file a full report tomorrow, but I'd like to have Research to look into early childhood Immunity slash subsequent brain trauma, and there might be an unregistered adolescent Immune in Somerset. Only this one, can draw."