After an initial cold and annoyed approach, caused by the delay of the journalist, Wells begins narrating the adventures of his past, flanked by the famous prof. Cedric Gibberne, recently deceased.
The scene opens showing a pleasant bickering between Wells and Dr Jane Robbins, who has just started working at Imperial College London.
This bickering continues through the halls of the university and leads Wells and Jane in a classroom where some teachers and some students gathered to attend a demonstration by prof. Gibberne on the relationship between the nervous system and electricity, through the use of an electrovoltaic spectrograph.
During the activation of the spectrograph, however, a frightening roar makes Gibberne and the assistant Whittaker literally fly a few meters from the desk where the experiment was in progress.
To this mystery is added the fact that the doors are unhinged in the opening directions, and not as they should be in the case of an explosion or an implosion (theory discarded thanks to Wells' observation); moreover, the windows have not suffered any damage.
Wells and Jane thus begin to investigate, finding clues that lead them to a surprising discovery: the existence of an "accelerating drug", invented by Mark Radcliffe, another professor at the university, which allows people, for a short period of time, to be faster than sound.
Returning to the pub the following day, and apologising for his behaviour towards his friends, he explains to them that, in his opinion, the underground accident made him go to the future and then brought him back to the past.
Mocked by his friends, Arthur promises to give them a proof, remembering a betting journal he had in his pocket at the time of the accident, which actually bears the date of the supposed coming week.
Wells takes from the inside of the trunk an oval-shaped object resembling a stone; according by Ellen, it is a crystalline substance of unknown origin weighing 13 3/4 ounces, resistant to any acid and any attempt to engrave with a diamond.
Entering the store Skinner finds himself having to negotiate the price with the despicable Mrs. Cave, William's greedy and mean wife, who gets the stone for a paltry sum.
At night William, awakened by Rosa's cat, who bursts into the bedroom of the couple terrified, goes to the shop, located downstairs, and notes with amazement that the egg gives off a strange whitish light.
The following day Mr. Jacoby Wace, a regular customer looking for second-hand jewelry, comes to the shop, and Rose shows him the stone Skinner brought.
However, as soon as the man touches the crystal egg, it illuminates and emanates a sound similar to a moan, as if endowed with his own will, and then it pushes the scalpel back towards Jacoby, scratching his cheek and sticking itself to the wall behind him.
Realising that the egg reacts to any light source, as long as it receives it at a precise angle, the man reactivates the strange object, remaining enchanted.
Looking more carefully he notices that a sort of world hides in that glow, a sandy expanse with a reddish color, where a few moments later a strange creature reminiscent of an insect appears.
Turning off the lights in the room and placing a candle next to the egg, the object begins to glow, showing Wells and Jane the same vision that appeared to William a short time before.
At the end of the story, Ellen bring Wells to a restaurant inside the building, and then mentions that she found a file on him, old but still open, with the security services.
As a result of an unauthorised experiment at the college, young lab assistant Sidney Davidson, nephew of Dean Frederick Masterman, begins seeing visions of a ship at sea and a deserted island.
Putting together what they discovered, Jane and Wells believe there Sidney is not hallucinating, but the experiment made his eyes witnessing an island where the ship carrying the second coil sunk a few days ago.
When Dean Masterman returns from his journey and rushes to the asylum to see his nephew, Jane and Wells profit of his heated discussion with Dr. Symonds to run away with Sidney.
At the university, the Dean finally meets his nephew, who discovered that there is another survivor on the island, and listens to Jane and Wells' explanations of the events.
Albert Pyecraft, a fellow of a club of which also Wells is member, is a mathematics genius, despite working as a common teacher at a crammer directed by the cruel Mr. Jagger.
When Albert does not show up for work or at the club for two days, Wells goes to his place and finds him floating on the ceiling: his wish to "lose weight" has been interpreted too literally.
Visiting the club, he finds Pattison hidden in the bathroom and victim of the same cure he requested: his hair keeps growing at high rate all over his body.
Albert, who forgot about the competition in the past days and is forced to improvise, regain his security when Violet enters the room, and deliver his lecture.
At the end, Albert loses the competition but the committee offers him a professorship at Oxford; having finally found his courage, he asks Violet to marry him.
At the university, they discover that Whittaker is currently at the hospital with a broken leg, due to a previous experiment leading to an explosion; his place has been temporarily taken by Harold, Gibberne's inept nephew.
Since Harold has stupidly rearranged them, Gibberne doesn't know which bacillus is missing, so cannot predict the outcome: dropping it in drinking water can potentially endanger the whole country with a disease.
He then taught science in schools in Wrexham and London whilst studying to re-take both subjects, eventually gaining first-class honours in Zoology and second-class in Geology in 1890.
The New Accelerator The Queer Story of Brownlow's Newspaper The Truth About Pyecraft The New Accelerator: Brownlow's Newspaper: The Crystal Egg: The Remarkable Case of Davidson's Eyes: The Truth About Pyecraft: The Stolen Bacillus: A Region 2 DVD of the series in non-episodic form was released in the Netherlands in 2004 with the original English language soundtrack, and optional Dutch and French subtitles.