Each episode adapts — and sometimes quite radically alters — a short story written by Wells: The New Accelerator, The Queer Story of Brownlow's Newspaper, The Crystal Egg, The Remarkable Case of Davidson's Eyes, The Truth About Pyecraft and The Stolen Bacillus. Each is presented as if it were a 'real' incident that Wells had investigated with his girlfriend, Jane Robbins, and as if it had served as an inspiration for a short story. The flashbacks are to 1893 within the 1946 frame story, near the end of Wells's life, when he is interviewed by a secret military research institute interested in his past exploits.