92. Industrialization

O Man!
What troubles have you brought upon yourself?
With your machines that spew black smoke?
You have broken from nature.
You have broken from the past.
Listen!
Can you hear the powerful sounds of the locomotive
Swiftly crossing the river?
No longer can you go back to simpler times.
This is progress you say.
Progress to what?
We have new medicines
With technologies to get things done
Quickly and efficiently.
Now we have time to ponder the mysteries of the universe.
At what cost?
Coal soot blackens the sky and trees.
The peppered moth had to change its clothes for you.
Classes separate.
Those at the bottom are miserable
While they work and toil in the mines and factories.
Those at the top happily counting the money
That they earned on the backs of the poor.
All services for the poor are work.
Children work.
Women work.
Men work.
All in dangerous conditions.
What is the loss of a hand to you, factory owner?
What is the loss of a life?
Just a machine part to replace.
They are expendable.
Just a new fabric dye for your textiles.
People see that their clothes are dyed in blood.
People see the mummified corpses used for paint.
Yet many ignore it.
But the writers
They are watching.
They know what’s happening.
They cry tears of black ink onto their pages
Marx and Engels
Wrote about change in government
They spoke of economics.
Dickens wrote of social change.
Browning wrote of the children’s cry.
Darwin wrote of evolving.
Some dismissed it trying to fight against that so-called religious abomination.
Others accepted it.
Some to an extreme.
“If they can’t find a way to live,” the rich man said,
“Then they deserve to die!”
Decrease the surplus population.
Right Mr. Scrooge?

91. Prologue IV

O sweet muse!

You have shown me so much.

For that I am grateful.

I’ve seen the living fossils

Evolving from the mud.

I’ve seen the passing of empires

Built on dust and blood.

Fearful men came and went.

Ozymandias statues crumbled to the ground

As new ones were erected over them.

I’ve seen the fires of revolution

The bloody rivers of war and conquest.

Now you point on.

I shake with the thought of future terrors I have yet to see.

You, like the angel of death before my grave,

Silently point to that cobweb encrusted door

Begging me to see that dreaded inscription.

Please muse, I say, must I push on?

Still silently, the bony finger

Clasping blackened scythe

Urges me to push on

As witness.

30. Jewels of the Ancient World

As time went on

Cities expanded.

Growing into glorious and prosperous jewels.

Civilization and culture provided heat and pressure

The ancient stone began to melt.

Gods provided water

That delivered the precious elements

Into the fertile grass laden valleys.

Slowly the years churned the raw materials

More elements were delivered

The cycles of the expanding and contracting waters

Left their mark on the land and her people.

The jewels grew

Evolving over time

With each deposit.

With each little bit of culture.

With the fusing of each raw material

They matured

Slowly growing to form such powerful beauty

That glinted and shimmered

Under the hot sun.

27. Man

Here comes the revolution!
Listen to the drums!
They’re getting louder!
Out of forests of Africa
Giving way to savannahs
Monkeys fall from their trees.
On awkward legs and hands for feet
They cross into new territory.
Making the first steps into humanity.
Slowly from fours to twos
They make their trek.
They free their arms and hands
Slowly moving into the future.
They hunted the savannahs.
Brains got bigger
They got smarter.
Sheding their fur
Developing tools.
They realized they were naked.
So they looked for shelter.
They made clothes.
As Habilis
As Erectus
They erected their monuments with new advances in tools.
The pointed rock became important.
It was passed down.
Slowly modified.
It wasn’t enough.
It wasn’t enough.
Another monument was built.
Fire.
Animals feared the red flower of man.
They used it to keep warm.
It still wasn’t enough.
A new group would put these things to better use.
The world of Erectus and Habilis slowly came to an end.
They walked on into the deserts of time.
A new creature came out of Africa.
Homo Sapiens.

25. A Small Saurian Uprising

In the aftermath

Scurrying among the feet of Tyrannosaurus and Brachiosaurus

As they’ve done for millions of years

Were the new kings of the Earth.

They walked the windswept deserts

They flew the dusty, volcanic black skies

Feeding, as scavengers, on the carcasses of their overlords.

The only living remnants of their mighty empire were the small lizards and birds

Scurrying and hopping among the dead bodies.

Over the millennia

The grasses and plants came back.

The skies became blue and clear.

Once again the trees grew to towering heights.

The dust from the old empire cleared

Revealing a new world.

The sun shone through a new canopy to a new forest floor.

Mammals took their place as the rightful heirs of the world.

They filled in old niches.

Lived with the birds and lizards.

For a long time things were peaceful.

The mammals and birds were equals

But the birds had a problem with this.

As the ancient heirs to the dinosaur throne they wanted to rule.

Evolution became the solution to their problem.

The birds grew gigantic

They developed powerful legs and huge jaws.

With these weapons, they took many parts of the world.

They terrorized the small horses.

The rebellion started.

Titanis in the north, Argentavis in the south.

The leaders of the rebellious terror birds.

They ruled their lands with iron wings.

Chomping down on the little animals and making life miserable.

They slowly moved up north

Crossing the land bridge.

Then they met resistance.

Finally, death came for them as well.

No one knew what it was that stopped them.

Now the giant birds live peacefully as docile Cassowaries, Emus, and Ostriches.

.

23. The Cretaceous: The Great Decline

Go forth!

Diversify!

The wise one said.

The continents split

So did the many body types.

The world continued to be a great garden.

A hot paradise

Filled with lush, green forests.

Ferns grew wild and trees towered high.

New changes came to the Edenic world.

Plants flaunted their youth

For bees and buzzing insects

To polinize and reproduce

Forests and bare earth

Gave way to fields of grass

Where Ankylosaurs and Triceratops

Grazed peacefully.

As the Ceolophysis prophecy foretold.

His tyrant descendant,

King Rex,

Lorded over the land.

Threatening the weakest of animals

With saw-like teeth.

The dinosaurs thought their reign would never end.

They became greedy with their size.

They felt invincible.

They continued to grow

Until their necks reached over the forest canopy.

Rodents and smaller lizards scurried around under their feet.

Even their cousins, the birds had to live in the shadows of the great ones.

Eventually, hubris caught up with them.

22. The Jurassic: The Empire's Peak

Pangea slowly began to split

Becoming Gondwana and Laurasia.

What once was hot and dry

Became warm and wet.

The climate turned more tropical.

Triassic deserts turned green

As trees and plants rolled out into the full Jurassic Eden.

Leaves were traded for needles

Coelophysis dreams slowly become reality

As this “Other Lizard” claimed his dominance.

He sharpened his claws

He lengthened his serrated teeth

Growing to an enormous size.

“Other lizard’s” victims changed as well

To cope with his tyrannical reign.

Plates of armor and bony spikes were forged

In their evolutionary arsenal.

Others changed from claw to foot

Standing on tree trunk feet.

“Other Lizard” ruled this coniferous Eden with tooth and claw.

Threatening the titanic sauropods

Munching on Iguanadon.

“Whatever I want I will take” was “Other Lizard’s” law.

Tiny therapods and rodents

Feed on left over carcasses.

Pterosaurs grew wings

Took to the air

As Plesiosaurs and Ichthyosaurs grew fins.

They journeyed back to the sea to start a new life

Away from “Other Lizard”

And his terrible reign.

Dinosaurs came into their own

As the rulers of this Jurassic garden.

20. The Dawn of an Empire

New leaps forward came.

They modified their scales.

Skin was invented.

They hunted their ancient rivals.

They looked back at their ancestors

Still confined to the oceans, lakes and rivers.

They found that they could never go back.

They had to push on as reptiles now

They needed to build a new empire of their own.

These new empire builders found a changed world.

There was one landmass

Pangea.

There was one ocean.

Panthalassa.

Reptiles now had the run of the land.

They played with their designs.

Some created great sails.

Others grew big,

Competed for dominance.

Then things changed.

A new schism happened.

Reptile split with mammal.

Then the die-off.

The sail-backed Pelycosaurs,

Along with the trilobites before

Live in mammalian museums now

Locked in stone

As mementos of the past.

19. The Invasion

Rise!

Rise!

Rise up my fellow lobe-fins!

Grab your helmets!

Grab your weapons!

March to the shallows!

The land dwellers will fear the mighty Crossopterygian army!

Invade the beaches!

Fight!

Fight your way through!

Every step inland is a victory!

From now on we will write history!

Wait a minute!

I can’t breathe!

Many died in those years.

They learned a lesson about the surface world.

Gills don’t work without water.

Some managed to get back to the safety of the shallows.

“This battle may have been won,” they said shaking their fins,

“But we will be back.”

“The war’s not over.”

Fish engineers decided to continue their search for the perfect weapon.

A few years back there was another invasion.

The invertebrates,

Sworn enemy of the fish,

Successfully colonized the land.

The fish were angry at hearing of this victory.

They swore never to let another humiliation like that happen again.

They made their fins shorter and their bodies bonier.

With every invasion,

With every push onto land,

With every loss of life,

The fish perfected their bodies.

Adapting to life on land.

Onward fishy soldiers!

Until the land is yours!

A new fish engineer had an idea.

He closed his gills and brought sacks of air out.

He called them lungs.

When he showed them to his brothers

They liked what they saw.

They adapted it.

With these new lungs the fish left their oceanic empire

Continuing to colonize.

18. Fish

Meanwhile,

A new, bigger revolution was brewing.

Under the tempestuous ocean

The little squirts were evolving too.

They evolved fins and tails

Eventually eyes.

They became fish.

But they needed something new.

Something more.

They looked to their designers for something.

They set to work.

They looked at themselves

Found that something was missing.

They took their gills and modified them.

Then they filled them with teeth

The jaw was invented.

With their jaws

They moved up the natural ladder.

They were no longer the slow bottom feeders

Sucking things up from the mud.

They could go out and take charge of their destiny.

They were hydro-dynamically sound

Sports cars of the marine world.

Instead of shells and exoskeletons,

Which would only hold them back,

They had bones and armor.

Fish dominated in the Devonian and Silurian.

Fighting their way like soldiers

Moving up the ranks to become top predators.

Dunkleosteus

The terror of the deep.

The first Jaws

The Tyrannosaurus of the fish world.

Terrorized the sharks.

He became too powerful for his own good.

He would never lead the new invasion,

But he helped the real invaders,

Chased by the likes of Dunkleosteus

The lobe-fins needed a new place to live.

They were tired of being terrorized by the bigger fish.

So they planned to take the land

17. The First Conquerors

Plant your roots in the soft soil.

Spread your branches to the sky.

You are the first to reach land.

New territory!

Rejoice!

Let the others figure it out.

You will be the foundation of the new world.

The symbol of a new order.

Stretching to the sky like green flags in the sand.

Spread your seeds and build an empire.

They grew tall as trees,

Taking in Carbon Dioxide,

Expelling Oxygen.

Seedless plants grew strong in the soil.

They pushed inland as the mosses stayed near the shore.

The planet became a lush green wonderland.

An Eden.

The first colonizers were quiet.

They whispered their dominance

As the wind blew through their leaves.

They didn’t need to be loud.

The first conquerors found that there was a price for this success.

The elements.

Storms uprooted them.

Fires burned them.

Droughts dried them out.

Hold fast my friends.

You’ll go far.

Evolve.

You’ll do great things.

Because whatever comes your way

Whether it be insects

Mammals

Or storms

You will survive

Bringing new life to the world.

16. A New Hope

As for the rest of you invertebrates

Continue on your way!

Move up!

Keep changing!

Diversify!

Swarm the oceans!

Remember your trilobite forebears!

They brought you into this new world!

So they did.

The extinction gave new opportunities

To the animals.

New niches were opened.

Bryozoans formed forests as corals created reefs.

Brachiopods littered the seafloor.

They diversified.

Habitats opened up.

New creatures moved in.

Adaptive radiation brought new styles

To shelly animals.

A nice little bit of insurance from predators,

While Brachiopods articulated Conodonts made teeth out of bone.

Graptolites floated lazily by

Guiding fossil hunters to the Ordivician and Silurian.

14. The Explosion

An explosion of life

Came rushing from simple designs.

The bomb had gone off.

New creatures.

Strange creatures.

Wiwaxia,

Morella,

Yohoia,

Plenocaris,

Canadaspis,

Corals,

Trilobites,

Anomalocaris,

Ottoia,

Waptia.

Hallucigenia

Continents joined and divided

Sculpting the landscape above and below the waves

As little archeocyathids grew into ocean forests.

Ancestors of fish and us,

The little squirts,

Swarmed the seas

Breeding in the Cambrian.

New life exploded on the scene

The trigger remained a mystery.

Shelled and soft creatures lurked in the water.

This was the hunting ground of Anamalocaris

The terror of the deep.

Claws that grasp

Beak that bites.

Even the kindly armored trilobite was no match for him.

The others nibbled and grazed on the bottom as Ottoia burrowed in the soft sand.

It dug around snatching poor creatures up when they wandered too close.

That was life in the Cambrian.