Death of All Life on Earth: How Human Zeal Against Climate Change Caused the Death of All Life

By Don McComber

This is the first of four books about how humans won the war on carbon, and accidentally caused the death of all things living. When Carbon Dioxide began to decrease in the atmosphere, first the trees and plants didn’t grow, then slowly died starting in high latitudes and working inexorably toward the equator. All of the wild and domestic animals were either killed for food or starved. In the course of a dozen years, billions of humans starved to death or were killed by “eaters.” This story is about a young woman on whom every horrible, heart rending tragedy was heaped and yet she somehow, almost singlehandedly gave mankind a tiny chance of survival.
Hang on tight to this apocalyptic tale as it drags you through hope and heartbreak then tragedy and finally triumph.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Trafford Publishing
• Release date: Apr 27, 2020
• ISBN: 9781698700922

Don McComber

He was born and raised in a tiny prairie town, had a career as a scientist, traveled the world and developed a deep respect for American Heritage. He writes about those exceptional people who risked everything to come to this land of freedom and promise. These are the people who gave their lives to create a new country called America.

Book preview

DEATH OF

ALL LIFE

ON EARTH

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How Human Zeal Against Climate

Change Caused the Death of All Life

DON MCCOMBER

©

Copyright 2020 Don McComber.

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the written prior permission of the author.

ISBN: 978-1-6987-0093-9 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-6987-0092-2 (e)

Because of the dynamic nature of the Internet, any web addresses or links contained in this book may have changed since publication and may no longer be valid. The views expressed in this work are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Getty Images are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

Certain stock imagery © Getty Images.

Trafford rev. 04/25/2020

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CONTENTS

Preface

Cheyenne

Before The Panic

Begin The End

North Dakota

South Bound

Black Hills

Torrington

Smoke

Black Canyon

Florence

Paintbrush

Mexican Odyssey

Bad Times

Epilogue

PREFACE

A ll of the towns, roads and geography depicted in this tale are real. The water tanks, windmills, canyons and rivers are actually there. The scientific concepts and information are genuine, and only the people and the story are fictional.

Every effort was made to keep politics out of a hopelessly political subject. This book contains two subtle scientific and irrefutable facts that are frequently ignored; yet form the basis for the story. This is generally about the interactions of the characters and their daily life and death struggles to survive in a world of mass extinction. Specifically, it is about a young woman on whom every horrible, heart rending tragedy is heaped and yet she somehow, singlehandedly gives mankind a tiny chance of survival.

CHEYENNE

M andy day dreamed about a science class over a dozen years ago.

So tell me class, what things do we need from nature to maintain human life?

Dirt, James Bender quickly replied.

OK, why do we need dirt?

Ta grow stuff, James answered with a slight smirk on his face.

Don’t you really mean we need to be able to grow food?

Ya, Mister Barnes, that’s what I mean.

Alright, so we’ll put number one on the board is; grow food, even though it still requires a lot more specificity. How about another need from nature, uhhh, Mandy what do you say?

How ‘bout oxygen?

Good, what about it?

We have to be able to breathe somethin’.

OK, so number two on the list is, let’s say, a breathable atmosphere. What else do we need to survive?

Little Billy Crites was waving his hand from the back. Go ahead Billy, Mr. Barnes said as he pointed to him.

Temperature, Billy quickly replied.

You’re on the right track Billy, what about temperature do we need?

Uhhh, not too high or too low.

Good, we need a temperature compatible with our body temperatures. Does that sound like a good number three for our list? About half of the students in Mr. Barnes’ science class nodded. And, we need a temperature compatible with growing plants. Let’s go back to number one and get a little more specific.

To grow plants you need, soil, sun, water, and air, Peyton Middleton blurted out.

Now we’re getting somewhere, Mr. Barnes said as he started a new list on the board. Let’s call number one plants. And, let’s make number two air, and number three water and number four sunlight. We all understand that both plants and animals need all four of those things to survive, right?

Now nearly all the class nodded.

Ya still need dirt, James Bender added.

Right, we need to add soil to our list. Uhhh, plants, air, water, sunlight, soil, is that looking like it makes sense class?

A small chorus of yes, was the response.

Now let’s go into each need and see how its presence affects both plants and animals. We need plants to eat, and we need animals to eat, and the animals we eat, need plants. Plants need soil, water sunlight and air. What about the air is it that plants need?

The class looked at each other while little Billy Crites was waving his hand frantically.

Go ahead Billy.

It’s carbon dioxide that plants need to grow.

That’s exactly right Billy. We need the plants and the plants need carbon dioxide, so in a sense we need carbon dioxide. But we need oxygen and plants need carbon dioxide. So under the category of air, we need to add both carbon dioxide and oxygen. Is that right … and her memory trailed off back to the nightmare of the present.

Mandy was thinking about that conversation and how the basic science had been manipulated, right from the beginning. It had been years now and she and her twelve year old twins and several small groups living from special greenhouses were the only survivors from nearly everyone she had ever known. As she looked south from the top of a long hill on the plains just south of what used to be Cheyenne, Wyoming, everything was brown or gray, and long abandoned cars were scattered from ditch to ditch on the now littered and dilapidated highway. She looked to the west at the great Rocky Mountains and everything was gray. There wasn’t a single spot of green anywhere. All the trees and plants had died. Regularly, they came upon a human skeleton that had been picked clean of everything edible.

They had stayed in their home in north western North Dakota for years after everyone else in the area had left hoping the hell would stop. She and her husband had stored 15 years worth of beans and dehydrated food for the anticipated apocalypse. Their house had been located up a nearly impassable dirt road in a small valley adjacent to the confluence of the Yellowstone and Missouri Rivers and southwest of the town of Williston. It was away from the major highways and that is what probably saved them from being attacked for their food. Gasoline for cars and motor bikes went away quickly when the electricity went off. Underground tanks probably still had gas in them, but without the power to operate the pumps, it was useless. It was about then that all the food in the stores had run out and the only thing left to do was take it away from someone else or …eat them. Most folks had gone south where there were reports that green plants still existed and it was warm enough to survive outdoors. But those that remained either had a cache of food, like Mandy did, that sustained them or had developed a taste for other humans. Mandy called them, eaters.

Now everyone was gone from the Williston area. (They were also gone from North and South Dakota, Nebraska, Colorado and Wyoming and Montana.) Many had gone south on foot years ago and perished of starvation or were killed within a few weeks along the way. She and her twins Jack and Cindy had their hand powered gas pump and the old Ford Bronco, capable of going around all the car jams on the roads. They had a winch with which they could pull cars out of their path if needed. They had passed through dozens of towns without seeing any life, plant or animal. Even the city of Cheyenne was totally abandoned. They stayed on US Highway 85 most of the way south until it fed into Interstate 25 just north of Cheyenne for the trip south into Mexico and the promise of food.

They had decided to go south in the previous spring to get away from the devastation and find other humans that had survived. They carried a good satellite radio they listened to twice a day for a few minutes to conserve the batteries. At six in the morning and evening somebody from a station in Mexico City broadcast for about five minutes with the latest news on the slow, inexorable death of all life on earth. How did it ever come to this? She murmured to herself. How in the hell did our good intentions get away from us? With that, she looked at Jack and Cindy and smiled because she had to maintain an attitude of hope.

BEFORE THE PANIC

M andy Watson was in high school when her Dad was reading the paper, and he started talking loudly to the sky about something he had read. You wonder what in the hell could they be thinking. He raved. It’s just a good damn thing they can’t really do nothin’.

Mandy’s Mom just shook her head and softly spoke to her as she was sitting at the kitchen table. He gets so stirred up over politics. Just ignore him.

But Mom it’s true. We need carbon dioxide to survive.

I know dear, but there’s nothing your Dad or you or I can do about it. If they want to start a War on Carbon, let them go ahead.

But carbon is the basis of all life, Mom.

You and I and your Dad know that but most people don’t. Just don’t worry about it and do your homework before supper.

One property line of their ranch ran down the center of the small valley that led to the Missouri River. Their land covered eight sections; a little over 5000 acres. Most of it was dry grass but the bottoms where the ground water was close to the surface was good for hay and alfalfa. The growing seasons were so short they only got one cutting off their hay meadows, but it was enough to support their herd through the winter. Mandy had to drive to high school in Williston and did so well before she was really old enough. It was no big deal because most of the kids from the surrounding ranches did just that.

On the other side of their valley old Mr. Chamberlain had a ranch even larger than theirs. He was a comical old guy that never hesitated to turn around and unzip his pants for a good pee with little regard as to where he was. If he happened to be talking to someone, he would barely miss a word. For this reason, he was known around the area as Mr. Pee. He thought it referred to his first name Paul, which was just as well. It wasn’t as if he was trying to be nasty about it, it was just his way. Some in Williston didn’t like it, but most just smiled and laughed under their breath. Some of the older ladies would act like they were covering their eyes, but would sneak a look trying to get a glimpse of his member. Most of the folks had seen him flop it about after he had finished, at one time or another and it was just part of the local culture. He was a good neighbor though, and when Mandy’s family first moved to their side of the valley, he loaned them all sorts of equipment and even came over and ran it when needed. His wife had died shortly before that and he tried his best to keep busy outside the house, so he wouldn’t have the sorrow of going inside where she had cheerfully greeted him every day for over fifty years.

The neighbors across the river on the Bull D Ranch were about as dysfunctional as a family could be. They were rolling in money from all the good years of selling cattle, and employed a number of equally dysfunctional people that spent more time fornicating with each other and family members than they did working. But, somehow the work got done and all the old cars and pickups were able to traverse the rough dirt roads to and from the liquor outlets in Williston when they weren’t running into each other in the yard. The old man Bull Drago, his parents from Bulgaria where their name was much longer, drove the whole thing. He always claimed he could whip all the men and screw all the women in town in a single day. On occasion, when necessary, he did beat the living hell out of one of his sons or one of the cowboys just to demonstrate the truth of his claim. When it came to dealing with neighbors though, he had a heart of gold and always, always could be depended on to help. All in all, the Watsons lived in a little heaven surrounded by nature and some very odd folks that always kept the community filled to the brim with gossip and humor.

After the main war on carbon dioxide was officially announced, nothing of consequence along that line took place for years. The price of electric power went up and gave everyone something to complain about. The area boomed over the technology of hydraulic fracturing, and the additional oil and gas it allowed from the deeply buried shale. As a result all the little towns around boomed and hundreds of mobile homes went up to house all the workers and their families. Fees, fines and taxes were added to these new finds that kept constant pressure on the oil companies to find more and more fossil fuels. The area thrived. The schools were overloaded as were the grocery stores and such, and new ones went up to relieve the stress. Little Billy Crites came to town with one of the oil families and he and Mandy became close friends in high school.

He and his family were oil itinerants and after several years, they moved on to richer finds and higher wages, but Billy stayed behind. He was one of the smartest kids in school, but had no interest in going to the local college and simply wanted to stay on the prairie and become a cowboy. Shortly after his family departed, he signed on at the Watson Ranch, and shortly after that, he and Mandy fell in love. He was called Little Billy because he was over six feet tall and 230 pounds of hard muscle. Slowly his name morphed to Little Bill and finally to plain Bill.

Times continued to be good for the folks out living on the land. In the cities, all kinds of restrictions on the use of fossil fuel for homes and vehicles were developed by the various regimes that controlled them. The raw price of oil kept going down almost enough to counter the added restrictions and taxes of all kinds and shapes and the net result was slowly increasing fuel costs. Rapidly growing restrictions on the emissions of carbon dioxide slowly but surely started to change segments of the economy. Car and truck standards were developed that almost killed the full sized vehicle business and created a whole new industry that rebuilt or refurbished the old ones to which lower standards applied. Everyone that needed to haul something drove older vehicles. Every year, the atmospheric carbon dioxide measurements were blasted out on all radio and TV and when they continued to rise steadily, governments around the world struggled to come up with further controls. Finally they started to offer a gigantic billion dollar prize for a scientific solution to the creeping carbon increase. Serious efforts were started to find a way to contain or absorb millions of tons of carbon dioxide. The coal industry was nearly out of business because of the restrictions on the emissions from power plants and everyone was scrambling to find ways to continue to keep the power running without dumping carbon dioxide into the air. More and more power was generated from natural gas that simply stimulated the economies of the shale states, which was a good thing.

This didn’t affect life in rural North Dakota and except for constant complaining about the price of electricity; everyone went about living their lives. There was the constant turmoil between the ranch hands from the Bull D, pronounced with three L’s, and the oil workers. Both thought they were the toughest men around and extra cops had to be hired in Williston to try to keep them from killing one another. Come to think of it, the Bull D boys were always right in the middle of all the trouble. Every time someone went to town from the Watson outfit, they observed a scuffle from the folks at the Bull D and anyone that would stand up to them. There were a half dozen big, mean men and every one a bully. If they couldn’t find someone to fight with, they fought with each other. Mandy and her Mother had to be sure not to run into any of the bunch as they would spew nasty sexual threats about what they would do them, and on occasion they had become feely at the women’s private parts. They were careful not to tell Dad or Bill about these, because they didn’t want to start a big conflagration where someone could get seriously hurt of even killed. A good hard slap and harsh words seemed to keep the Bullls as they called themselves, at bay for the time being.

Their neighbor to the north was Missus Kukal and her bunch of kids. They all had names the ended in onnie. There were Bonnie, Connie, Donnie, Fonnie, Lonnie, Ronnie, Sonny, Vonnie and finally little Tommie. They must have used up all possible letters in the alphabet that made any sense. The Missus was a big woman with giant sagging breasts who could outwork any two men. She only wore a bra to town and she said it, made her feel like a trussed up cow in a branding cage. Several years back, her husband Harold went to town and on the way picked up a female hitchhiker and kept on going. He never came back, which was fine with the Missus as she and all the kids could easily handle the farm work. She openly admitted that after he was gone, they had more time to work the farm, and he was the poorest worker of the bunch. Most of their property was up on the flats out of the river valley that straddled US Highway 2. The farm house was only a quarter of a mile off the highway and was protected from the north winds by a scraggly shelter belt of Chinese elms and Juniper. It was odd that all the boys were tall and thin and all the girls were short and fat. Their favorite pastime was mooning strangers on the highway. More than once each month the city cop had to go out and warn them to stop, but it was a formality because nobody really wanted them to. The boy’s skinny bare butts were hardly noticeable when they hung them out the window; it was the girl’s rear ends that were so enormous they completely filled each window and stunned folks that weren’t prepared. Some even claimed temporary blindness. It was another source of community fun that made life there tolerable.

To the east were the Burtslaffs; Corrine and Ralph. They had been elderly every since Mandy could remember as all three of their kids had grown up, gone to college and moved away. They employed about a half dozen young men who worked the ranch, and a woman who did the cooking and laundry for the whole bunch. Joella was a dark skinned, middle aged woman with white teeth and an attractive shape. All the young men were constantly after her to bed them, but she held them all in disdain. On occasion, she had to beat the hell out of one of the Bulll boys with a bat she carried for just that purpose. She was a fireball when aroused and held the respect of everyone who knew her.

It was a custom for the Watsons and their neighbors to help each other when it came time for the harvest, haying and branding. So when these occasions came up, everyone that could would get up well before first light and head for the host ranch, gulp down a monstrous breakfast and work all day until dark. Then they would help themselves to another monster meal and head for home for the night only to repeat the routine day after day