George's Secret Key To The Universe

'It's a huge cloud in outer space, much bigger than the ones in the sky,' replied Eric, 'made up of tiny, tiny particles which are all floating around inside it. There are so many of these particles that the cloud is enormous - it's so big that you could put millions and millions of Earths inside it. From this cloud, many stars will be born.'

Inside the cloud, George could see the particles moving around, some joining together to form huge lumps of matter. These great lumps spun round and round, gathering even more particles all the time. But as the particles joined together, the spinning lumps weren't getting bigger - instead, they seemed to be getting smaller, as though something was squeezing them. It looked like someone was making gigantic dough balls in outer space. One of these giant balls was quite close to the window now, and George could see it spinning round, getting smaller and smaller all the time. As it shrank, it became hotter and hotter - so hot that George could feel the heat from where he sat on the sofa. And then it started to glow with a dim but frightening light.