THE PALEOCAMBRIAN WAR
*The Only Thing They Fear is You*
The end of the Neopyrgian period had set an evolutionary arms race - on one side, the pioneering Albazoans, masters of the seafloor, soft-bodied creatures that enjoyed life under the cloud cover of that cold and stormy world Paart was. On the flip-si46de, Metazoans, bottom feeders, living from the organic leftovers adrift in the sea, crawling between vile germs and decaying matter, decomposing it... For millions of years, the status quo of nature were Albazoans populating fields the size of entire continents, while Metazoans were practically exiled into the shallower regions, where the waters were simply too violent for the simple life-style Albazoans had.
The polyps couldn't fight against the
weather, which would keep their brood adrift alike any other particle, which if
not by the benevolent intervals of peace - just a shy and little, "Hi"
from the big bright light in the sky - could make them float for decades or
even centuries... An innovation, accompanied by the forces of time, starts to
turn the table over the Metazoans.
The sessile polyps already knew that in
order to reproduce efficiently in their harsh environment, they could either
bud and let their brood fall over near them, or, they could let it choose where
it wanted to go, and when it were strong enough, and big enough, it could find
it's way, into a better spot and set it's foot firm into the ground.
The climate at the time stimulated anemones, medusae and other cnidarians to be streamlined, while other more sessile animals, could grow long filaments to collect incoming organic matter
Geologically speaking, the very end of the Albanian Epoch was marked by intense earthquakes and volcanic eruptions, titans - long dormant under the icecap that sealed almost the entirety of the only continent... Sthalika.
Still, those mere tremors would not stop any of the creatures around the globe, what came after the tremors, were the main attraction of the circus that's about to begin... Before we get ahead of ourselves, let's take a look into the world as it was.
150 million years ago - from this point in time of course - the great continent Sthalika had formed, putting the world into an ice age, and establishing the means by which the current ecosystem has formed.
50 million years ago, the tremors that formed the continent, are now back, and fusing the rock above through brute force, until, about 20 million years ago, the very first crack into the ancient polar ice echoed around the world like 900 megaton bomb. The blast was so intense, it stopped the weather for the next week in a 3000km radius, Vol shone with all it's glory upon the frozen lands of the equator, as snow and pebbles fell hours after - upon the equator and south pole.
Like this, but without the fireball (Deep Impact, 1998)
And while the wind regained it's strength, falling back in track with implacable force, more and more similar events, a chain reaction that lasted ages, boom, boom... Boom... Kilometer per kilometer, the ice and land bellow broke, a seemingly never ending Réveillon where the fireworks were as loud as Krakatoa could ever be, a dozen times a year...
Paartian mornings were announced with the omnipresent cracking of ice - like the rooster calls nowadays on Earth... And once water flowed down the mountains as the ages passed, and the sea flooded the ravines and icy canyons carved with loud spasms of the earth, there was no turning back.
A recurring event everywhere for the next 20 million years
The starting shot has been given, the rivers became seas, and the seas interconnected with the ocean... And the further continents were from the poles, the more unexplored space were left for the nearby living Metazoa, polyps, reefs, critters, blooming within the promised land.
However, the breaking of the ice was only the start, while continents moved towards the south, they disrupted the oceanic currents that maintained the accelerated sedimentation of the deep sea, and the stormy world faded away in the sands of time...
Albazoans persisted, in the southern hemisphere, now - reduced in areas with cold currents similar to those found in the last eon.
The anemones and chalimorphs didn't hated each other, they didn't think one was better than the other, they didn't even acknowledged each other's existence, even after all this time, they both have been fighting the same enemy, in the dark, with the tools they had available - against Time.
The ever lasting titan, ghost of past Christmases, the herald of extinction - Time. And just as light had become once again abundant in this world, like prisoners in the solitary for years, when the day rose once again, upon the newborn shallow seas of Paart, the critters from both sides could tell, without a doubt, that the darkness was no more...
Nevertheless, they saw the world as it is, it's scary, it's lonely... Their ancestors had guided themselves with their hearts and simple nervous systems, they could no see the world in it's majesty, glory, and unrelenting force. The very force that wouldn't spare their lives - it will be a crime consummated long ago, left for whatever survives long enough, to dig around these lands, and see through time, the unwritten history of this newborn world...
KEY EVENTS IN THE PALEOCAMBRIAN (by category and approximate chronological order)
Appearance of:
The anemones and chalimorphs didn't hated each other, they didn't think one was better than the other, they didn't even acknowledged each other's existence, even after all this time, they both have been fighting the same enemy, in the dark, with the tools they had available - against Time.
The ever lasting titan, ghost of past Christmases, the herald of extinction - Time. And just as light had become once again abundant in this world, like prisoners in the solitary for years, when the day rose once again, upon the newborn shallow seas of Paart, the critters from both sides could tell, without a doubt, that the darkness was no more...
Paart's early Cambrian seas would often show Metazoa thriving more and more.
An aspidopod (dark arthropod on the right side) attacks an elpidomorph larvae (center pink creature)
Left side, brachiopods feast on dead elpidomorph.
Nevertheless, they saw the world as it is, it's scary, it's lonely... Their ancestors had guided themselves with their hearts and simple nervous systems, they could no see the world in it's majesty, glory, and unrelenting force. The very force that wouldn't spare their lives - it will be a crime consummated long ago, left for whatever survives long enough, to dig around these lands, and see through time, the unwritten history of this newborn world...
Paart during the Cambrian had most of it's landmass on the northern hemisphere
KEY EVENTS IN THE PALEOCAMBRIAN (by category and approximate chronological order)
Appearance of:
- Animal size ranging between 1cm and 9cm
- Reef building animals (Sponges and Corals)
- Simple shelled animals (Mollusks, Brachiopods, and Clams)
- Plate tectonics allow the water to flow into the northern hemisphere
- Volcanic activity increase carbon dioxide in the atmosphere
- As the ice blocks absorption of gases by the soil, the atmosphere enters into a greenhouse process, allowing the polar ice to melt faster as the continents migrate southward
- Oxygen levels stabilize near the equilibrium point at 9%
- M.O. Valent, 14/04/2020
- M.O. Valent, updated in 15/04/2020
- M.O. Valent, updated in 25/04/2020
- M.O. Valent, updated in 27/04/2020
- M.O. Valent, updated in 29/04/2020
