Sophia took a brief second to compose herself before turning to the camera. She was a professional enough that staring blankly out in space did not make great TV.

"Well, with that I believe that it's way past time for a commercial break! I'm certain that our sponsors will be grateful for your time!"

Sophia waited until the light on the camera denoting "on air" switched off. At the exact instant of change, she dissolved into a puddle onto the floor. Her limbs were bent and twisted in unnatural angles, but she couldn't be bothered to care. I believe that emulating a puddle of goo for a minute or two is more than fair. Brain, brain, go away! Come back another day! Her void of thoughtlessness was ruthlessly squashed by a harsh noise:

"CAN SOMEONE TRADE ME A PAIR OF PANTS, PLEASE!?" Her co-anchor bellowed out at the top of his lungs.

Sophia couldn't help the burst of unwomanly giggles that erupted from her mouth. A Pavlovian response conditioned into her via her culture attempted to cover up her fit of giggles with a hand, but her mind quickly determined that it wasn't worth the effort.

Is ANYTHING I do worth the effort anymore!? Before her brain could fully revolt against her self-imposed hiatus, and spiral further down the path of moroseness, she heard a response to Sal's plea/demand that made her loose all self control.

"TRADE? TRADE!!!??? Who do you think wants to wear YOUR pants right now!?" Soph had no idea which tech it was that blurted that out, but it made everyone in the room, even old Sal, start laughing uncontrollably.

Oh, thank God! We needed that!

________________________________________

*Sal*

I really am getting too old for this. Sal complained to himself. Here I am, continuously shocked into muteness, unable to perform the most basic things that I have done throughout fifty plus years of professionalism!

I couldn't speak! I couldn't even THINK for the majority of the interview, and when I did act it was in the exact wrong way!

Like a runaway train, his head just kept showing him all of his mistakes over and over again on a continuously repeating cycle. A being with wings just appears and I freeze up like a guilty schoolboy. He's nice and friendly and makes a quip and I piss myself out of some mistaken fear of divine punishment. My following embarrassment coupled with fear over his proclamation of impending doom sparked my rage and I started blindingly accusing our visitor of deception. I should have maintained a calm demeanor and scathingly rebuked him with insightful questions that would allow our visitor to hang himself with his own responses. Instead, he revealed me acting like an ignorant fool and did things that I can't explain!

Sal went over the two main pieces of evidence provided by the winged man. I LOOKED for gossamer thin gloves and headgear and found none! It was his actual skin, and hair, and clothing that rapidly switched colors. From what I know of current invisibility technology, what he did was impossible! I guess that I will need to verify from Sophia and the different camera angles, and all of the techs, but the ability to disappear from multiple perspectives instantaneously is beyond human technology. Granted, I may be behind on the latest invisibility news, since they don't have a network - Invisibility News Network - hmm - catchy! There could be some awesome taglines!

The old man refocused on his current plight. No, him specifically mentioning "Chromatophores" was deliberate. He was teasing us into making our own investigations, which will of course further solidify his claims.

A grudging respect started to descend upon Salvitore. It was hard, but necessary for him to separate his emotions from his thoughts.

Then he showed us his wings. Even then I was waiting for some invisibility fabric to become dislodged when he took off his shirt-thing. Nope! And then the stress test he performed in the studio... The energy that he put into his wing strokes... Any human-made contraption fitted onto a human body put under that amount of force would have suffered from some sort of malfunction! Maybe I don't know all of the latest discoveries, but the flawless execution in conjunction with his words weave a believable tale, at least to my sensibilities.

Sal looked over to his co-anchor, who was even now talking to the camera leading into the commercial break. Dang! She carried this interview! She engaged with our visitor, and asked him some good questions. She hit that last nail right on the head with the "how much time" question. She could've asked so many other questions, but that was the one to ask! And she kept in mind our insatiable thirst for sponsorship and is transitioning into a commercial break like a pro!

His eyes twinkled in amusement as her body plopped down unceremoniously at the break. So many questions yet to ask, though. He was quite vague on these "Those Who Destroy." Sal grunted in respect. Always keep the audience wanting more! Well done, alien! Well done!

Finally, Sal couldn't take it anymore. "CAN SOMEBODY TRADE ME A PAIR OF PANTS, PLEASE!?" He inquired, potentially with a bit of over zealousness.

"TRADE? TRADE!!!??? Who do you think wants to wear YOUR pants right now!!!???" He heard Jimmy, way in the back, retort.

That Assh... Sal couldn't deny the guffaws bursting through his lips. Oh, my! I guess I deserved that!

The author's tale has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.

"TEN SE...SEC...SECONDS!" Sandy managed to squeak out through her laughter.

How in the HELL are we supposed to continue with the show!? What does ANYONE do after a disappearing friendly alien routine!? What has my life become that I even have to ask myself that question?

The "On Air" light came back on and Soph was up on her feet ready to go.

"Welcome back New York! Well in this segment we were supposed to talk about...well, let's just skip onto our instant reactions to what has just occurred here in studio and around the world. Sal, you are amazing at uncovering hidden details that us regular folks sometimes fail to recognize! Would you mind blessing us with your perspective?"

Sal was genuinely touched at her words. Granted, he felt that Salvitore was better for TV than Sal, but right now it didn't seem important. Also, he could tell that even through her professionalism, she was desperate for a breath and could really use his focus to spend up some necessary air time. The show must go on...

"Well, I think that..." He started to go into some of his insights on the interaction when, within a minute, those guests that the alien had warned about inevitably showed up.

A black suit stepped forward and introduced himself.

"Hello. My name is Agent Jones, and before we proceed I am requiring you to shut down your production. That means 'Cameras off' people. Rules have been violated! The United States government attempted to exercise it's right to engage the emergency broadcast system and this station, among others, failed to comply. Cameras OFF! I will not repeat myself again.

__________________________________________

*Agent Jones*

The agent waited in silence until the "on air" lights were turned off each camera before continuing. Until then, he steamed.

The signs are adding up that this isn't some stupid billionaire prank. First and foremost, billionaires typically do not like spending money on silly pranks. Second, the amount of infiltrators spread across the globe adds up to a MASSIVE conspiracy. The old adage of 'Three men can keep a secret, if two of them are dead' still holds true today. Otherwise, something like this would have leaked.

Third, the digital infiltration is the most shocking. Multiple failsafes have been added to the digital infrastructure on a steady basis ever since the radio broadcast of "The War Of The Worlds." The government might have trouble with hackers, but that is completely different from flipping ALL of the OFF switches and nothing actually going off. Satellites, cell phone towers, power supply... In order to prevent mass hysteria and panic it should have all been negated, but instead we get a childish message "Sorry ID10T Error: Please check your buttcrack. Don't worry. We'll wait! We understand that finding it may take a while and your TIME IS VERY IMPORTANT to us!"

Fourth, there were the travel issues. New York city traffic is bad, but not when you have sirens blaring. Of course, when all of the traffic lights show green and intersections are filled with car accidents, though none are serious since it seems that all of the lights turned red. Every car stopped, and then all lights turned green so no one went through the intersection at fifty mph.

Fifth, an agent on the team had the TV channel playing on his phone. When I saw the individual in question disappear and then manipulate his coloring at will... I knew that we had a minimal chance at a successful capture. Night Vision goggles were designed to be used in minimal light, not during daylight. Infrared sensors, which we have in our phones, ironically enough, MIGHT help us track the individual, but that is a clunky solution at best and ineffective at worst. I have a feeling they came prepared to avoid all known forms of detection, and for us this was an operation deployed on the fly and without the more esoteric methods of tracking.

"We have cordoned off the building. Until we have determined what transpired here no one leaves this building and no one enters this building without our permission." Or if they have functioning wings and can go invisible, they can just leap off the roof and then glide down for several blocks. And even if the wings are not functional, his ability to blend into the background should still allow him to slip past us unseen if he hasn't already done so.

At this point I am very hopeful that we do not encounter the individual if he is who he says he is. Not pissing off the technologically advanced, genetically modified humanoid would be at the top of my list of sound political decisions. But, as they say 'Ours is not to reason why.' I am still required to do what my orders tell me to do. The good news, however, is that if we DO catch the individual, that probably means that the threat is terrestrial in nature and therefore achievable.

_________________________________________

*NASA Director Dr. Julian Miles*

Jules sighed. "Yes, Mr. President. We are utilizing every resource we have at our disposal, both within the atmosphere and beyond, to determine the source or sources of these so-called aliens."

It's never fun when a boss reams me out when the boss has made an assumption based on insufficient data. These beings are just TOO human! Humans with wings, really! I don't buy it! If they are aliens then there IS some sort of deception going on!

In the scientific community, the general consensus was that aliens should look nothing like us. Sure, there was the theory of convergent evolution, but that required nearly identical environments. The "Butterfly Effect" written in Ray Bradbury's "The Sound of Thunder" should make convergent evolution moot. Any even seemingly minor changes in gravity, temperature, atmospheric levels and several hundred other factors would cause a domino effect where the endpoints of two nearly identical worlds would end up radically different evolutionary.

Fudge! Even on Earth, back hundreds of millions of years ago insects and dinosaurs were larger, mainly attributed to a different concentration of oxygen and carbon dioxide in the air. That these humans with wings are "floating" around means that something smells fishy in the state of Denmark!

"Why we haven't found these aliens, Mr. President?" Luckily Jules was just on a phone call with the President and not video conferencing with him so Jules could roll his eyes all he wanted. Presidential candidates should be required to submit to an IQ test. Any candidate that scores under 90 should be barred from the office! We'd have a LOT LESS candidates, that's for sure!

"Well, Mr. President, it's a big ass sky." Oh my God! I can't believe that I quoted that movie! It's so stupid AND it made me ball my eyes out like a little girl when that guy was given the Astronauts' badge! Why, Jules? Why!?

"Mr. President, The United States of America has always been at the forefront of innovation and technology." That may not be entirely accurate but close enough for government work. "As of right now, that may no longer be the case.

"IF we are actually dealing with aliens, then traveling from beyond the solar system would indicate a significant gap in current technology. IF we are dealing with another nation or a corporation, then this matter is beyond my expertise. Have you made inquiries with DARPA?" I swear! I have had more intelligent discussions with my four year old grandson! Hmm... Would the President get offended if I asked to conference my grandson into the call so that my grandson could explain it to him?

The conversation went on like that for several more minutes.