THOSE GREAT CREATURES

“You must not forget”, our history teacher Mr.Richard was saying, “the world was a much warmer place during this time, and hence there were lesser glaciers and more seas than we see now. But disaster struck around 1.2 billion years ago. Does anyone know which disaster I’m talking about?” “Dramatic climatic change resulted in the extinction of the dominant species of the time” said a voice from about two rows behind me. “If you had said that two years ago, I would have said you had the perfect answer, Emma” he smiled. “But, according to the paper published by one of the leading authorities on the subject, Dr. Nick Fleming, the climatic change was anything but dramatic. Recent evidence shows that the temperature had risen slowly for over a century, resulting in a slow death for most of the species of that time who could not adapt to this aberration. Coming back to the point of our interest, why did a species who managed to dominate every other form of life die out because of a simple rise in temperature? Well, the consequences of such a phenomenon, my dear students, are not in any means trivial. Firstly, it resulted in severely dry conditions in certain areas, resulting in the deaths of millions of these poor creatures. Next, they endured numerous forest fires, which, apart from depriving them of food and shelter, led to a lot of air pollution. Then, the glaciers melted, releasing billions of gallons of water into the seas, which in turn, led to submersion of coastal areas and numerous floods. Such phenomena continued for over a 100 years, slowly killing off these beautiful creatures, and approximately 1.2 billion years ago, a small asteroid crashed into the Earth somewhere near the East coast of present-day Alagaesia, throwing the already unbalanced environment into further turmoil, killing of what was left of this species completely. It is terrible shame” he concluded “for they had extraordinary mental capacities, which helped them in world domination for so many centuries, before they succumbed to nature.”

“That is the way you teach history” We were in the library. “It felt like we were taken back in time” I was saying as y best friend Aaron searched for pictures of those creatures. “Ah! Found some” We peered into the book at the small images. “They don’t look like much” I said. “Actually, they’re quite small. Look at them, they have absolutely no fur, except for that bit on the top of their heads. They look quite ridiculous”. But Aaron’s tail was swaying, a sign of interest. “You know what, I would really have liked to meet one of the humans.” He said, as we replaced the book and walked out of the library.