THE RED WEED AND PARSON NATHANIEL Lyrics

THE RED WEED AND PARSON NATHANIEL Text

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JOURNALIST: Next day, the dawn was a brilliant, fiery red and I wandered
through the weird and lurid landscape of another planet; for the vegetation which
gives Mars its red appearance had taken root on Earth. As Man had succumbed to the
Martians, so our land now succumbed to the Red Weed.

Wherever there was a stream, the Red Weed clung and grew with
frightening voraciousness, its claw-like fronds choking the movement of the water;
and then it began to creep like a slimy red animal across the land, covering field and
ditch and tree and hedgerow with living scarlet feelers, crawling! crawling!

I suddenly noticed the body of a Parson, lying on the ground in a ruined churchyard. I
felt unable to leave him to the mercy of the Red Weed and decided to bury him
decently.

BETH: Nathaniel! Nathaniel!

JOURNALIST: The Parson's eyes flickered open. He was alive!

BETH: Nathaniel! I saw the church burst into flame! Are you all right?

PARSON: Don't touch me!

BETH: But it's me - Beth. Your wife.

PARSON: No. You're one of them. A devil!

BETH: (to JOURNALIST) He's delirious!

PARSON: Lies! I saw the devil's sign.

BETH: What are you saying?

PARSON: The green flash in the sky. His demons were here all along - in our hearts
and souls - just waiting for a sign from him. And now they're destroying our world.

BETH: But they're not devils - they're Martians.

JOURNALIST: We must leave here.

BETH: Look! A house still standing! Come, Nathaniel, quickly!

JOURNALIST: We took shelter in a cottage and Black Smoke spread, hemming us in.
Then a Fighting Machine came across the fields, spraying jets of steam that turned the
smoke into thick, black dust.

MARTIANS: Ulla!

BETH: Dear God - help us!

PARSON: The voice of the devil is heard in our land!