into the picture, like a swarm of
lightning bugs, the thin sharp nosed shadows of space ships, hurtling,
like comets, toward the clustered star smear. And then silent thoughts
flashed from the screen into the minds of the spectators; of time
passing in months, years and centuries, passing and passing until they
themselves seemed to be rushing and rushing into the blackness toward
blinding balls of white light, the size of moons.

The dark shapes of smaller spheres circling the blinding ones moved
forward into the picture; red, blue, green, yellow, purple and many
mixtures of all these, and then one planet filled the screen, seeming
to be inflated, like a balloon, into a shining red ball. There was a
razor edge of horizon then and pink sky and an expanse of crimson.
Flat, yellow creatures lay all around, expanding and contracting. A
roaring rose and fell like the roaring of a million winds. Then fear
flowed out of the picture into the minds of the watchers so that they
gasped and cringed, and a silent voice told them that the atmosphere
of this planet would disintegrate a human being.

Now the red ball seemed to pull away from them into the blackness and
the blinding balls of light, and all around could be seen the streaks
of rocket flame shooting away in all directions.

Suddenly a flash cut the blackness, like the flare of a match, and
died, and the watchers caught from the screen the awareness of the
death of a ship.

They were also aware of the rushing of time through centuries and they
saw the streaking rocket flames and planets rushing at them; saw
creatures in squares and circles, in threads wriggling, in lumps and
blobs, rolling jumping and crawling; saw them in cloud forms whisking
about, changing their shapes, and in flowing wavelets of water. They
saw creatures hopping about on one leg and others crawling at
incredible speeds on a thousand; saw some with all the numbers of legs
and arms in between; and were aware of creatures that were there but
invisible.

And those watching the screen on which time and distance were a
compressed and distilled kaleidoscope, saw planet after planet and
thousands at a time; heard strange noises; rasping and roaring, clinks
and whistles, screams and crying, sighing and moaning. And they were
aware through all this of atmosphere and ground inimical to man, some
that would evaporate at the touch of a human body, or would burst into
flame, or swallow, or turn from liquid to