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Terry Benson woke and sat bolt upright in the spacious bed. Right away he saw it wasn`t
his bed, and that was really worrisome. Terry Benson was married.
 
There was another problem with the bed, too. He had never seen this bed before in his
life. He had no recollection of getting into it, and he had no idea who it belonged to.
Gingerly, he lifted the thin, shimmery material that covered the bed, and stepped onto the
bare floor. He saw at once that he was naked, and that his clothes were nowhere in sight.
Clearly, this was the biggest problem of all. 

Terry shook his head and tried to enumerate the sequence of steps--or mistakes--that had
gotten him into this awkward position, but there didn`t seem to be any. He didn`t have a
hangover, and there was no taste of stale cigarette smoke in his mouth; he didn`t feel
distraught, depressed, or crazed. In fact--and this was hard to explain--his body felt
particularly good all over. At no time in his life could he recall having awakened in a
state of such complete refreshment. 

Oh shit, he thought. Maybe I did bang some Sarah Lee. Or Sally May. Or whoever it was. I
guess she must have been something special, since I`m feeling so chipper. But
damn!--glorious sex I can`t remember--that spells trouble for sure. 

Terry stood there, racking his brains, but he couldn`t remember a single thing about the
night before. There had been an after-work cocktail party, that he did recall. But the
party had taken place in the late afternoon, and Terry was absolutely certain he had
refrained from indulging in any alcoholic beverages, or any other enhancements, for that
matter. He recalled being particularly proud of that fact, come to think of it, as he
strolled home from the party through High Park, on the way to the bullet train
sub-station. 

And after that? After that he couldn`t remember anything at all. 

Oh Lord, could it have been Trista, the one from human resources?
 
It was possible. But for some reason Terry had the impression that Trista wasn`t the
cause of his sudden forgetfulness. No, there was something strange at work here--something
that just wasn`t right about the entire situation.
 
Quickly taking in his surroundings, he noted that the room he was standing in was rather
odd. Though expansive for a bedroom, it was sparsely decorated, with a plain, Spartan
functionality. There were a few objects in the room whose function or purpose he did not
recognize at all. Even more peculiar was the fact that there were no windows anywhere;
just four slick, granite-colored walls. 

"What the hell have I gotten myself into?" he muttered aloud.
 
At the sound of those words, the overhead lighting system clicked on at the opposite end
of the room. The sudden glow was accompanied by a brief whispering sound, and Terry
whirled about to see that the room`s only door was now open. 

Beyond the door there was a brightly illuminated hallway. 

"Weird," Terry whispered. After taking one last look around for his clothes,
keys and wallet, he cautiously made his way to the exit. Stepping into the hallway, he saw
that the corridor was as Spartan and unadorned as the bedroom. And it led in just one
direction.
 
I guess I won`t be sneaking on by for a hasty exit, Terry thought to himself. Not unless
I manage to snag some clothing first. But if I keep it cool and don`t panic, maybe I can
avoid bumping into anyone before I do just that.

It certainly made sense to try to grab some clothes and get the hell out of there,
particularly before he wound up ensnared in some uncomfortable scene. But even as the
thought crossed his mind, Terry realized that part of him wanted to bump into someone. He
was curious to find out what was going on (and more than this, he was positively burning
to know who he`d spent the night with--if anyone.) For a few seconds he waged a little war
with himself as to establishing what his correct priorities ought to be. 

After another moment`s hesitation, he eventually concluded that discretion was the better
part of valor, or--using a more twisted form of logic--he concluded that discretion was
the better part of indiscretion, particularly when one was at a loss trying to recall
precisely what form of indiscretion had taken place.
 
Stealthily, he padded down the bare corridor, passing a door on his left and another on
his right. Neither door had a doorknob or latch of any kind, nor would they budge when he
pushed on them. He shrugged and continued on down the featureless passageway, growing
increasingly conscious of a suspicion that someone was steering him in this one direction,
possibly toward some unavoidable confrontation.
 
And then he came to the end.
 
Blocking the way was a set of double doors, slightly larger than the ones he had just
passed but also lacking any kind of latch mechanism. They were sealed shut. 

A couple of overhead security cameras, and this place would make a pretty good prison, he
decided. 

Terry stood there for a moment, uncertain, and feeling downright apprehensive due to his
nakedness. At last he realized there was no choice but to abandon the
"play-it-cool-and-quiet" approach. 

"Hello?" he called aloud. "Knock-knock. Is there anyone here?"
 
He raised his fist, hesitating for a second before he started banging on the door, but
there was no answer. Just as he brought his fist down, the double doors parted, sliding
rapidly and almost soundlessly into pockets in the walls.
 
"Wow," Terry muttered, "Star Trek." Upon saying these words, he
caught himself, struck with the insane notion that he had just uttered something
prophetic. 

Standing there before him, like a prop from a B-grade movie, was a child`s rendition of a
humanoid robot. Basic torso. Wheels. Head and two arms. Composed of something metallic.
Twin laser beams shot from the robot`s eyes, coming to a point of intersection where they
touched Terry`s chest, marking him with a single dot of red light. Apparently the lasers
were purely optical, since he didn`t feel any discomfort where they touched him. 

The robot spoke: "The human called Terry will now step onto the back of the
transport bot." It extended a slender, metallic arm, gesturing to something beside it
that looked like a low, flat cart. Wheels were notably absent from the cart; it appeared
to be hovering in mid air. 

Terry looked from the robot to the cart, and back again. "Whatever you say, C3PO,
`cause I think I just lost my marbles."
 
"My instructions do not allow me to continue this humorous exchange," said the
robot, now scanning up and down Terry`s chest with the laser beams. "Please
hurry." 

Terry stepped onto the cart, too bewildered to do anything else. There were protrusions
at the front end of the cart shaped like handlebars, and he grabbed on to a pair of these.
Then, without warning, the cart began gliding away, leaving the humanoid-shaped robot far
behind. 

"I`m on acid?" Terry asked himself as the transport bot rapidly accelerated,
whisking him swiftly down the long, straight corridor. "They slipped me acid at the
party last night?"
 
"I lack programming to ascertain this probability," said the transport bot. As
it spoke, another set of twin laser beams shot out from an instrument console near the
handlebars, and began scanning Terry`s face and chest.
 
"Lucky for you," Terry blurted out. "Programming can be fixed. But what I
think I`m lacking here is a basic grip on reality." 

"I lack programming to ascertain this probability," repeated the transport bot,
coming to a sudden halt. "Disembark immediately and proceed." 

Terry let go of the handlebars and stepped down from the transportation device. 

He noted that the corridor was appreciably wider at this end, but was still relatively
featureless and gray. Then, unbidden, the realization came to him that he was standing
aboard some kind of spaceship. In made perfect sense, in a crazy, insane asylum kind of
way. It fit the whole weird pattern of events that had occurred from the moment of his
awakening in the strange bed. He must be some sort of alien abductee. But if that were the
case... 

"Take the elevator to the command level," said the transport bot in a toneless
voice. As if on cue, a door slid open at the terminal end of the corridor, causing Terry
to think that all the doors must be voice activated. 

Feeling slightly giddy, he turned back to the transport bot: "Well, thanks for the
ride, cabbie. It`s been uplifting." 

Then he stepped forward into the circular elevator chamber.
 
OK, he thought, so much for the James Bond one-liners. I`m standing here naked, some of
my short-term memories have been erased, and it seems I`ve been abducted by aliens
possessing a vastly superior technology. Faced with just these circumstances, what would
James Bond do? 

The elevator chamber started to move, breaking Terry`s train of thought as it began
hurtling upward at what felt to be a tremendous rate of acceleration.
 
Well, for one thing, James Bond would probably have a few gnarly spy devices tucked away
someplace. And he most certainly wouldn`t be naked--he`d be wearing a tuxedo.
 
Then another thought occurred to him, spurred on by a marked change in the immediate
atmosphere: 

There is a really bad smell in here.
 
Suddenly disturbed by the bad smell more than by anything else that was happening to him,
Terry twisted at the waist and scanned all around the small elevator chamber. He saw that
everything was a uniform soft-white color and at least seemed clean. 

So if it`s not the elevator...
 
He lifted his left arm slightly and sniffed. 

"It`s me!" Terry exclaimed, shocked and disgusted at the realization. "And
I don`t just smell bad, I smell rank. Like I haven`t had a bath or a shower for the last
ten months..." 

Terry caught himself, struck by something he`d just said. 

"Geez," he whispered, "How long have I been on board this thing,
anyway?"
 
There wasn`t time for Terry to take this line of reasoning any further. The elevator
chamber had rapidly decelerated to a smooth but sudden halt. The door swept open, and
Terry found himself stumbling out into the center of a spacious, but dimly lit circular
chamber. There was no overhead illumination, but indirect light spilled out from the
numerous instrument readouts and displays that ringed the circumference of the room. This
was obviously the focal point of the ship`s operations.
 
And, of course, there were aliens on the command level. Big ones. Several of them
occupied the verges of the saucer-shaped control room, but there was one who stood to the
fore, gazing at a massive viewscreen that was filled with a stunning hemispheric image of
planet Earth. Then, all the details blurred together as Terry experienced a rush of terror
and excitement. He took a few giddy steps into the room and nearly collapsed. 

"Greetings, Earthling," he called out. "No, wait. That`s your line."


The alien standing before the viewscreen turned and beckoned to Terry, motioning for him
to come closer. It was much larger than a human being, and more thickly built, although
its form was partially concealed by the long garment that fell like a curtain from its
shoulders. The large head was hairless, with no visible hearing organs, and the skin was a
mottled grayish-brown. A pair of prominent eyes regarded him from across the room, and the
being beckoned to him once more. 

Terry walked forward in a daze, now more than ever feeling acutely conscious of his
nakedness. Don`t these aliens understand that most humans feel particularly vulnerable
when naked? he asked himself. Then he decided that it was probably better not to know the
answer to that question.
 
Finally he stopped a few paces short of the massive, big headed extraterrestrial, who
gazed at him with large, unblinking eyes. The eyes were mostly black, due to the wide
diameter of the pupils, giving the creature the appearance of wearing a vacant expression.
From beneath the heavy, somber-colored robes draped over its shoulders, the being produced
a device which it placed over its primary circular mouthpart--actually there were three
mouthparts, the central one being the largest--and with the aid of this device the alien
was able to produce mechanical sounds approximating human speech. It was not a translator,
as Terry would later deduce, but rather an aid that supplied consonant sounds that were
impossible for the aliens to form with their three conjoined orifices.
 
"I should command you to bow down on your knees," droned a hard-edged,
digital-sounding voice. "Yet your odd, human gestures hold little meaning for me. As
it happens, you are my cargo, and not my possession, so there is no need." 

There was a long pause. "I`m ... I`m speechless," Terry stammered. 

"No, you are bewildered and frightened. An average specimen, typical of the poorly
evolved terrestrial organism that calls itself Homo Sapiens." 

"Hang--hang on a second. How do you know I`m average? You don`t really know anything
about me..." 

"Incorrect," the alien cut him off. "We know everything about you,
everything. Down to the last detail. Almost from the moment of your birth. I might add
that in all my travels I have never encountered a race so undeserving of its position of
planetary dominance. Comparatively speaking, your cockroaches show some admirable traits,
but you..."
 
Terry felt his back stiffen. "You`re really rolling out the red carpet here aren`t
you?" he interrupted. "That all they teach you about manners over on Alpha
Centuri, or wherever the hell you come from?"
 
As the words came out, Terry sensed it was a mistake to adopt this confrontational tone,
but he simply couldn`t help it. It was one thing to be called bewildered and frightened,
not to mention average. But it was another thing to be insulted on behalf of one`s entire
species. 

"Ignorant. Uneducated. Foolish." The alien spoke in a measured cadence,
unruffled by Terry`s outburst. It made a sweeping gesture with the wrinkled, brown skin of
one arm, gesturing with a hand comprised of tiny appendages resembling vine tendrils.
 
"Do you not see the expanse of your homeworld as it lies there beneath you? Do you
not stand in awe? Are you not humbled?"
 
Terry gazed out the viewport, or monitoring screen, or whatever it was. Billowing white
clouds streaked across sparkling oceans that appeared rippled, even from this distance--a
gleaming surface of the most profound shade of blue. He saw hurricane clouds formed into
magnificent whorls that spiraled alongside gracefully curved chains of islands at various
locations out in the Pacific; he saw the rich greens of forested landmasses, saw the
shaded reds and oranges and yellows of deserts that blazed in the sun. 

"Well, sure," he said, exhaling deeply. "I guess there`s nothing like a
little First Contact to give you some perspective on things."
 
"You flatter yourself," said the alien. "You are not the first contact.
Far from it." 

Terry swallowed, then tried to put on a brave face. "Right," he said.
"You`ve already studied humanity. You`ve learned our ways and you speak our most
influential language. In fact, you must have passed your Test of English as a Foreign
Language with flying colors. You`ve probably done lots of experiments on me, and I`m none
the wiser. So when do I get to go home? You can drop me off in a cornfield anywhere.
Really. I`m eager to rejoin my unremarkable species."
 
"Irrelevant. The human called Terry was brought before us so that certain precepts
and conditions are communicated to his people. You shall behave as a guest aboard this
vessel, and be thankful not to deserve treatment as a prisoner, a scientific specimen, or
a slave. The human called Terry should be honored to be so chosen, foremost amongst all
the males of his kind." 

A rapid-fire succession of thoughts flashed into Terry`s mind: Chosen. Hand selected.
Destined for a higher cause. Singled out from the ranks of Earth`s teeming billions.
Foremost amongst all the males of his kind.
 
"Hey there, big guy," he said, finally allowing a grin to spread across his
face. "Intergalactic relations just took a small step forward--a giant leap for
mankind. Now we`re getting somewhere."