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| Umbriel; A tiny world basks in the warm red glow of a dying sun. | |||||||||
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| Topic Started: Nov 26 2014, 06:12 PM (8,960 Views) | |||||||||
| Picrodus | Nov 26 2014, 06:12 PM Post #1 | ||||||||
:Ominous Wind:
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Three billion years in the future the sun has swelled up as a red giant to the orbit of Earth and nothing is left of the inner systems former glory. The once lush planet Earth now a burnt cinder orbiting only about 13 million miles from the sun. However there is still a shelter in the solar system where life has taken hold. However because of the red sun's massive and super heated form, this haven no longer exists in the inner system but the outer system. Towards the end of the age of humanity 3 billion years ago the humans set up ark ships that which were in fact glorified seed banks meant to seed the many future water worlds of the outer solar system in hopes that in the far future they would wake and colonize these worlds. These ships blasted off from Earth off towards many targets in the outer solar system where they would bury themselves in the primordial wasteland of the planet/moon that was their target and await the time when the shipboard sensors detected an atmosphere suitable for life to inhabit. Although feeble atmospheres did form on a few worlds of the outer solar system, only one ark stood the test of time and remained functioning throughout the eons. As can be expected from technology. Who expects 100% efficiency from machines especially ones that are now billions of years old. The ark that stood the test of time was one located on Umbriel, a moon of Uranus. Umbriel by this point had formed a feeble atmosphere with oxygen, and useful amounts of carbon dioxide due to large deposits in the ice and primordial outgassing, as well as a few other trace elements. Its loss of atmosphere was also almost negligible due to its orbit lying within the gargantuan magnetosphere of its parent. The Ark ships carried two components. One component, or the first stage, was to release seeds of trees, plants, and crops kept fresh by the ship when enough carbon dioxide was found to be present. After the plants were released they would work to create a sustained biosphere and with that a stable atmosphere and eventually produce enough oxygen for animals and humans to be released from the ark as stage two. Sadly, (or not depending on your view) there was never enough oxygen/atmospheric pressure for stage two to be initiated. Because of this life on Umbriel has not turned out the way the terrans expected. Here the plants took a very shocking turn in evolution. Now Umbriel is a world dominated by a new type of creature. Umbriel is a rather cold world with the climate being retained at about 50° fahrenheit at the most and -30° at the least. Because of this, of the plants released only the hardier mountain dwelling species survived. With the most successful being Conifers, it is no surprise that they gave rise to the new creatures. The Planimals. Umbriel rolls on its side through the universe due to it orbiting on the equatorial plain of a planet with a 97 degree axial tilt. Its poles alternating between 40 years of day and 40 years of night. The trees and plants, to escape either extreme, would follow the terminator by developing movement or risk death. The development of locomotion was the first step towards becoming Umbral animals. And many plants did die in the early stages of colonization. However this terminator was extremely forgiving, taking 40 years to switch from pole to pole. Plant seeding occured 500 million years ago when Umbriel was still warming. The current date is 3 billion years hence. The earliest divergent Conifers developed locomotion by dragging themselves along by their roots which remained underground. They were the first plants to do so though other groups later followed suit and broke the barrier into becoming more than plants, they were planimals. Similar locomotion can be seen in today's primitive monopedal fur trees. When the humans created these Arks they imagined that they would wake up to beautiful worlds prime for colonization ripe with crops to upstart civilization once again. Unfortunately a less than useful species took the dominant role...and on a world colder than they had expected.... Welcome to Umbriel the Conifer moon!
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 My Deviantart A work in progress. Other Liked Quote: "The "habitable zone" will expand along with the Sun. This will warm once-frozen planets and their moons, bringing a brief springtime after a 10-billion-year winter." | |||||||||
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| Beetleboy | Dec 30 2016, 03:14 AM Post #91 |
neither lizard nor boy nor beetle . . . but a little of all three
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There's an update and it's amazing! |
| ~ The Age of Forests ~ | |
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| Picrodus | Apr 7 2017, 07:14 PM Post #92 |
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:Ominous Wind:
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Trap Boar In a remote sandy corner of the Gobi badlands, a female Trap Boar prepares for sleep during the longnight… The cold sands shift, the wind howls, thus proclaiming the onslaught of the umbral longnight. Such is evident to a pair of weak seemingly rust-encrusted eyes that struggle to observe the final setting of the elderly sun. Strange rounded tusks and barbules derived from the scales of its conical forefathers protrude from the sandy soil. Its plate shaped head shifts directions towards the howling sandy onslaught as the sand resting on its headcone slides off between these sensitive structures conveying soil temperature and composition. It knows winter is coming. No prey will come this way for a long time, it is time to sleep. And thus the bronzed, sandblasted eyes sink beneath the sand. Down into its burrow it crawls on its four spaidlike limbs. Unlike its terrestrial ancestors, it has foregone its single limbed, five toed lifestyle and instead crawls on its belly beneath the soil, a burrowing animal. Down in its burrow the Trap Boar curls up in a nest of sandy animal remains. Inside its branch derived, caged chest lies a fairly advanced digestive structure, not unlike a taproot of terran old. This is what has allowed it to free up its other roots for new purposes. This 'tongue' structure is busy digesting the last prey item that failed to see its last, fatal mistake into the gaping, hungry maw of the Trap Boar. The top of the head promptly snapping shut on the stomach cage, sealing the prey's fate. Here the prey slowly digests in the 'stomach' of the Trap Boar, as it will provide nutrition for the Trap Boar during the longnight. In the Umbral spring, as a red glow crests the frozen horizon ever so slowly, the Trap Boar will 'give birth' to two infant cones already complete, limbs and all. This is a newer occurrence in umbral fauna, that these infant cones had rested inside the stomach cage behind the tongue as it simultaneously digested the prey and sent nurtrients to the growing infants. It is a revolutionary adaptation, a pregnancy of sorts, perhaps signifying a new age on the tiny moon of Umbriel. |
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My Deviantart A work in progress. Other Liked Quote: "The "habitable zone" will expand along with the Sun. This will warm once-frozen planets and their moons, bringing a brief springtime after a 10-billion-year winter." | |
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| Rodlox | Apr 8 2017, 01:16 AM Post #93 |
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Superhuman
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the dawn of a new, ruling clade. excellence. glad to see you back, and Umbriel's return as well. the Trap Boar is neat and cool. |
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.---------------------------------------------. Parts of the Cluster Worlds: "Marsupialless Australia" (what-if) & "Out on a Branch" (future evolution) & "The Earth under a still sun" (WIP) | |
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| Vorsa | Apr 8 2017, 06:26 AM Post #94 |
Mysterious tundra-dwelling humanoid
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It returns!! Great to see this amazing project return! Loving the trapboar. You'd never suspect looking at it that it evolved from a plant - a truly fascinating and alien organism! |
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My Deviantart: http://desorages.deviantart.com/ Birbs "you are about to try that on a species that clawed its way to the top of a 4 billion year deep corpse pile of evolution. one that has committed the genocide you are contemplating several times already. they are the pinnacle of intelligence-based survival techniques and outnumber you 7 billion to 1" - humans vs machine | |
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| Picrodus | Apr 10 2017, 03:02 PM Post #95 |
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:Ominous Wind:
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Thanks for the kind words guys. Things will continue to speciate from here. Become more alien, true animals. Although that's not to say the planimals will give up that easily. |
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My Deviantart A work in progress. Other Liked Quote: "The "habitable zone" will expand along with the Sun. This will warm once-frozen planets and their moons, bringing a brief springtime after a 10-billion-year winter." | |
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| LλmbdaExplosion | Jul 10 2017, 06:44 AM Post #96 |
Vieja Argentea the oscar cichlid
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So someone played Plants vs Zombies too much 
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When life give you lemons.............Don't make lemonade!Make life to take the lemons back!Get mad and than.........Yell,demand and burn down their homes. Prepare for unforeseen consequences,Mr. Freeman! | |
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