The Eve Of The War

Journalist : No one would have believed, in the last years
of the nineteenth century, that human affairs were being
watched from the timeless worlds of space.

No one could have dreamed we were being scrutinized, as
someone with a microscope studies creatures that swarm
and multiply in a drop of water. Few men even considered 
the possibility of life on other planets and yet, across
the gulf of space, minds immeasurably superior to ours
regarded this Earth with envious eyes, 
and slowly and surely, they drew their plans against us.

At midnight on the twelfth of August, a huge mass of
luminous gas erupted from Mars and sped towards Earth.
Across two hundred million miles of void, invisibly hurtling
towards us, came the first of the missiles that were to
bring so much calamity to Earth. As I watched, there was
another jet of gas. It was another missile, starting on its way.

And that’s how it was for the next ten nights. A flare,
spurting out from Mars - bright green,
drawing a green mist behind it - a beautiful, but
somehow disturbing sight. Ogilvy,
the astronomer, assured me we were in no danger. He was
convinced there could be no
living thing on that remote, forbidding planet.

‘The chances of anything coming from Mars are a million
to one,’ he said.
‘The chances of anything coming from Mars are a million
to one - but still they come!’

Journalist : Then came the night the first missile
approached Earth. It was thought
to be an ordinary falling star, but next day there was a
huge crater in the middle of the
Common, and Ogilvy came to examine what lay there: a
cylinder, thirty yards across,
glowing hot… and with faint sounds of movement coming
from within.

Suddenly the top began moving, rotating, unscrewing, and
Ogilvy feared there was a
man inside, trying to escape. he rushed to the cylinder,
but the intense heat stopped him
before he could burn himself on the metal.

‘The chances of anything coming from Mars are a million
to one,’ he said.
‘The chances of anything coming from Mars are a million
to one - but they still come!’
‘Yes, the chances of anything coming from Mars are a
million to one,’ he said.
‘The chances of anything coming from Mars are a million
to one - but they still come!’

It seems totally incredible to me now that everyone
spent that evening as
though it were just like any other. From the railway
station came the sound of
shunting trains, ringing and rumbling, softened almost
into melody by the distance. It all
seemed so safe and tranquil.