A Clockwork Lime: How the World Got Stuck with Lime-Repellent Mucus 500 Million Years Ago or The Strange Tale of the Original Carbon Problem
by Claudia Alexander

This is a story of how a jellyfish gained a spine! Jellyfish Baron Pudgy (technically an invertebrate of the Kimbrella family) happily bides his time, courting the chatty and fashionable Dame Edith (technically an invertebrate of the Crinoid family), on an outcropping of continent Rodinia, 500 million years ago (just before the explosion of vertebrate life in the Pre-Cambrian era). His companions, all invertebrates, find their sports and entertainments ruined by an environmental disaster perpetrated by the mysterious Limers! Even famed mad scientist, Dr. Anem One, cannot deduce the designs of these dastardly opportunists, who dump acid and calcium solids into the world oceans. When the Limer gang, with their environmental acids, ruin the complexion of the lovely Dame Edith, Baron Pudgy knows he must take matters into his own hands … er filia. A true story of survival in the face of disaster, with a nod to the classic short story A Clockwork Orange.