Alien Abduction

The following is fiction….

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Picture this if you will…

Eddie Stephens stood shoulder-to-shoulder with a sea of rock fans at an L.A. Guns concert, soaking in the neon grit and guitar-soaked electricity of the night. The band ripped into “Electric Gypsy,” the crowd surged, and Eddie—calm, observant, drink in hand—felt a strange vibration ripple through the air.

No one else noticed.

Typical.

Because just as the solo wailed, the sky above the venue cracked open like a cosmic egg, and a narrow beam of pale green light dropped straight onto Eddie, swallowing him in a silent flash.

Eddie didn’t even spill his drink.

Suddenly he was drifting inside a biomechanical, pulsating chamber that looked like Tool’s “Lateralus” artwork, a Nine Inch Nails stage set, and a Radiohead Kid A hallucination all welded together. Shapes shifted. Machinery breathed. Voices murmured in harmonious dissonance.

A tall, shimmering, vaguely reptilian figure floated forward.

“EDDIE STEPHENS,” it hissed soothingly, “YOUR REPUTATION FOR RESOLVING HIGH-CONFLICT DISPUTES IS KNOWN ACROSS THE GALAXY.”

Of course it was.

The aliens explained that time around Earth had been bent—folded like cosmic origami—so not a single client, colleague, or judge noticed Eddie’s sudden disappearance. To the human eye, he was still at the concert. To the courts, he was still mid-hearing. Caryn thought he was in the hallway texting.

Convenient, really.

Eddie was guided into a cosmic tribunal chamber where fractal mandalas rotated like Tool’s discography animated on an interstellar LSD trip. Two alien species—one crystal and furious, one jellyfish-like and melodramatic—hovered across from one another.

Their issue?

Custody of a temperamental young star that kept flaring, exploding, and spinning off in unpredictable directions.

Eddie dove right in. He reviewed their orbital parenting plans. He calculated pattern stability. He questioned which guardian maintained a safer gravitational environment.

By the end of the hearing, both species were sobbing glowing tears.

One offered him a nebula-flavored cookie.

Another hugged him using four tentacles and a cloud of lavender cosmic dust.

And then the referrals started.

He mediated asteroid sibling rivalry.

Settled a boundary dispute involving a black hole that refused to give neighbors their matter back.

Even helped a gas giant break up with a narcissistic moon.

Between cases, the aliens rewarded Eddie with mind-bending concerts—Radiohead compositions performed by sentient frequencies, NIN-inspired industrial soundscapes where percussion was made of meteor collisions, and luminous Tool-like polyrhythm rituals performed across dimensions.

But as the days stretched… or folded… or didn’t exist… something began to shift.

Eddie noticed his skin sometimes shimmered like scales under alien light.

His tongue… felt different.

Sharper at the tip.

Split?

He ignored it.

The aliens didn’t.

They calmly informed him that “Eddie Stephens” was a carefully designed persona—an Earth-friendly disguise to protect his true nature. That he was not from Earth, but placed on Earth.

Eddie laughed.

They didn’t.

Now, here’s the funny part.

Eddie hadn’t planned to face an interstellar tribunal that night alone.

Originally, he’d invited Erik Overland to join him at the L.A. Guns show.

Tickets purchased.

Plans made.

Great seats.

Perfect view of both the band and, unbeknownst to Eddie, the extraterrestrial extraction zone.

But Erik, at the last minute, backed out.

“Long day.”

“Too tired.”

“Going to stay home and watch something on Netflix.”

Whatever the excuse really was, it saved him.

Because the aliens had done their homework.

They intended to survey both Eddie and Erik—two notable humans with unusually excellent taste in music. But Erik’s absence forced them to cancel his “evaluation.”

Alien notes recovered later (through means we don’t discuss) reveal the following:

“SUBJECT: ERIK OVERLAND
STATUS: NO SHOW
RESULT: AVOIDED INSPECTION
RECLASSIFIED AS ‘HUMAN – PROVISIONALLY UNMONITORED’.”

Which is the polite extraterrestrial way of saying:

Erik dodged the probe.

To this day, he has no idea how close he came to being levitated into a cosmic legal internship—or how narrowly he escaped a full spectral scan of his neurological patterns.

Does he sleep easier because of that?

Probably.

Would Eddie have appreciated the company in hyperspace court?

Absolutely.

But fate, as always, is picky about its guest list.

When Eddie finally returned, stepping back into the exact moment he’d been taken, no one noticed a thing. Courts stayed on schedule. Clients stayed satisfied. Caryn assumed he was grabbing an iced coffee.

But when she looked at him closely—really looked—she hesitated.

“You look… shinier than usual,” she said slowly.

Eddie just smiled.

Or did he?

Because the real question whispering through the universe now is this:

Did Eddie Stephens truly return from that L.A. Guns concert…

or is the being who came back something else entirely?

Reptilian skin, forked tongue, alien memories, and all— wearing Eddie’s face like the world’s smoothest disguise?

And somewhere out there in the cosmos, a group of aliens review Erik Overland’s file and note:

“SUBJECT REMAINS AT LARGE.”

Picture that if you will.