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In the pre-show auditorium, a crazed professor beckon's to the audience.

Prof. (walking towards doors): I've been working on this darling for years,
and it's finally ready."
 
(Prof throws open doors to reveal an old station wagon)

Prof: Doesn't look like much, eh?  Well, let me tell you, this is the first,
well, time machine.  I'm a biologist, not a mechanic, but I needed to build
this to continue my studies.  I've been trying to study reasons for
evolutionary changes, and as no proof seems to leap forward, going back in
time is my only option.

(Prof sits down at an unorganized desk and swivels in his seat to view the
audience)

Prof: Look, I can't go because someone who knows this baby forwards and
backwards needs to stay at the control center.  (He motions to his computer.)
 I've loaded the on board computer with all the information we have of the
time periods, but I need someone to go with it in case of. . .well. .
.problems.  Don't worry, Bev will know what to do in case something. .
.happens.  She's the voice-activated computer, but she can't move.  You'll
just be along for the ride.  You'll also be the first people to venture back
in time if you choose to go.  It's your choice.  If you do choose to go, walk
straight through the doors on your left and walk all the way to the end of
the row.  Sit down, and pull the safety belt across your lap, left to right.
Maybe we'll finally determine the reasons for the evolutionary changes.

The group moves into the vehicle and sits down.  Once everyone is strapped
in, a white screen lowers and the Proffesor's face fills the screen.

Prof: Good luck.

(Professor hits a button.  The six degrees of motion machine lurches forwards
and it looks like you go through a tunnel.  A number in the middle of the
screen gets bigger and bigger, until it says "15,000,000,000-The Big Bang."
The car floats back and forward in the dark, with only one small, pulsing
light in the middle of the screen.)

Bev (clears throat): What you see before you is all the matter and energy in
the universe.  It's about to explode, and then it will spread out at the
speed of light.  The universe is still expanding now.  Well, in the future,
not now now.  You know what I mean, the now we just came from.  Ugh!  You
have no idea what time travel is doing to my circuits.  It's almost as bad as
Y2K, only I was programed to handle this.  (takes a deep breath) In about. .
. two seconds the "Big Bang" will occur, and the matter will expand at the
speed of light.

 (A flash of light and the tubing appears.  This time the numbers go down
until "4,600,000,000" flashes on the screen)

Bev: This is the approximate date of when the earth was created.  It's
actually a process that took millions of years of swirling dust colliding
into each other, but by now earth is pretty much the size it is now.  Not the
now now, but. . .I've already been through this.  There isn't much to see
now, but all those chunks that you see flying about in space will collide to
add mass to the planets and their moons.  Let's go down there.

(The earth races towards the audience quickly)

Bev: There's the earth.  As you can see, the earth's mantle isn't stable yet.
 In fact, it's still not quite stable.  The plates still move as they are
here, and volcanos still spew lava.   (Vehicle swerves to miss a flying chunk
of fire.)  I've gotten all the information I need now.  The atmosphere is
primarily made up of water vapor, carbon dioxide, and nitrogen, with some
carbon monoxide.  The ozone layer is still unformed, and there's no sign of
life yet.  Let's go forward a billion years.

(The machine lurches and the numbers count down to "3,500,000,000")

Bev: I just need to get a quick sample of the ocean here.   (The screen shows
a short robot arm scooping up some water in the ocean.)  I don't want to
contaminate the future–who knows what this could do to humans–so I need a sec
to analyze this.

(The machine rocks with the water.)

Bev: Just as we suspected.  There's a plethora of organic molecules in this
water, and even a few lipid bi-layers.  Nothing living here. . .though we do
have amino acids.  Let me try another sample.

(The robotic arm extends once more.  The rocking is light)

Bev: EUREKA!  It IS a prokaryotic cell.  They supposedly developed about a
million years ago from the now now.  They contain a cell membrane, a
chromosome, plasmids, a mesasome, flagella, and a mesosome for the chemical
reactions to take place in.  The cytosol bathes everything in the cell, but
it has no membrane-bound organelles.  The cell doesn't use aerobic
respiration. . .it's a heterotroph. Wouldn't Oparin and Haldame be proud?
This is only a trial run, so I don't want to linger, but. . .wow!  There's
another.  There's so much to learn. . .but I will come back.  I just want to
overfly a beach before we go.

(Flies up.  There's barren land in sight.  Rock is the unchanging landscape.)

Bev: There's a stromatolite!  Those were fossils. . .but we must go.

(The machine lurches.  "2,300,000,000" flashes the screen)

Bev: I just need to pop in to check up on the oxygen levels. . .be out in a
sec.

(The machine lurches once more, and the numbers on the screen stop at
"1,700,000,000")

Bev: Okay, I was just checking to see if oxygen had started to accumulate in
the atmosphere by 2.3 billion years ago.  It had, but only in small
quantities. Now now the oxygen level has reached the point that it really is
today.  This played a big part in the role of evolution.  The stromatalites
we looked at earlier and the cyano bacteria in the ocean raised the oxygen
levels slowly over the course of over a million years.  Oxygen is a very
reactive substance, so it was like a poison to all organisms that encountered
it.  Those that adapted to it and began to use aerobic respiration received
more energy and therefore gained an evolutionary advantage over their
counterparts.  The revolution also lead to the creation of the ozone layer,
so all future organisms were sheltered more from the ultraviolet rays.  We'll
make one last long jump to 1,400,000,000, but after that things happened
fairly quickly.

(Yet another long lurch to "1,400,000,000")

Bev: This is it.  Let me get one of these cells onto the screen.  (A large
cell fills the screen) Here we have a eukaryotic cell.  Membrane bound
organelles are enclosed in the outer membrane.  Mitochandria in the cell
facilitates aerobic respiration which allowed the eukaryotic cells to grow
larger and use more energy.  Other membrane organelles float about in the
cytosol, the jelly like, nutrient rich substance.  A nucleus controls the
cell and contains chromosomes that store genetic information in strands of
DNA.  With eukaryotic cells came the possibility of sexual reproduction in
the exchange of chromosomes with another eukaryotic cell of the same
"species".  This allowed for more variations in the cell, and with growing
competition for food, traits could be selected for quickly with a wider range
of variation possible.  Let's move onto some of the complex organisms that
stemmed from the eukaryotic cell.

(The machine jumps forward and the screen flashes " 540,000,000")

Bev: We just entered the Cambrian era.  Hard parts, which take up more energy
than an prokaryote cell could support, finally exist.

(The screen jumps a bit and the screen flashes "520,000,000")

Bev: Oops, I didn't jump far enough. Here we have a trilobite.  A distant
relative to the horseshoe crab, this organism had a hard outer shell and
legs.  It lived along the bottom of the ocean.  They were prominent, and
thrived for millions of years.  Molluscs evolved in this time period as well.
 Vertebrates came in the next time period.  Let's move on to the Ordovician
era.

("505,000,000" is the number that the countdown stops on as the forward lurch
ceases.)

Bev: This era saw the advent of vertebrates.  Fish, such as Astraspis, had
plated scales, but they also contained a phosphate skeleton.  These jawless
fishes had brains, but we don't know much about them.  In addition to this,
coral and bi-valve molluscs appeared during this era, while all of the
organisms from the Cambrian era remained.

(Once again, the machine lurches forward, and the countdown ceases at
"420,000,000:)

Bev: We have just entered the middle of the Silurian era.  Throughout the
era, heterostracans, descendants of Astraspies yet more abundant,  evolved
into more mechanically efficient fish, and they spread to new continents.
Towards the end of the era, Euramerica was created, and around the same song
cyathaspids, an early variety of herterostracans evolved to inhabit brackish
and freshwater environments in Euramerica.  In this fashion, by adapting to
new environments, the decendents of heterostracans survived to be
pterasphids.  Many groups evolved in ways such as this one throughout the
time period.

(The machine lurches forward without warning.  "375,000,000" flashes.)

Bev: Well, here we are in the late Devonian era.  Land plants have been
around since the late Silurian, but Devonian plants grew to be over a meter
in length, using asexual reproductions and producing large quantities at
first.  Flora evolved rapidly, though, so by the end of the Devonian era
trees, such as Archaeopteris, could stand.  As far as fauna went, though,
animals could go onto land for brief stints of time.  Lobefin fish had fins
that were adapted into the pattern that animals such as horses use for
motion, only it originally evolved for efficient swimming.  The bones from
the first amphibian were found in the middle of bones from the late Devonian
age, so the animal could breath and move on land.  Ichtyostega, yet another
amphibian from the time period, devel op ed a rib cage.  Evolution continued to
select for traits that would expand territory and give the animal a better
chance for survival.

(Once again, the machine lurches to "330,000,000")

Bev: Here we are in the midst of the Carboniferous.  Small amphibians and
reptiles lived off of worms and grubs, as well as insects, in the forests.
Their body size enabled them to become agile,
although their prey was slow.  The forests of the times, though, w ere giant.
Trees such as the giant lycopod trees became 30 meters tall, a nd the forest
floor was covered with dead leaves and small animals.

(The tubing appears, the ride jerks forward.  The countdown goes on until
"270,000,000" hits.)

Bev: The Permian.  Did you ever think you'd see an ice age?  Trick
question–you've been living in one.  Well, Gondwanaland is over the south
pole, covered with a giant ice sheet, just like Antarctica is covered.  Ice
ages aren't marked by perpetual ice.  In fact, the ice sheets recede several
times over the course of an ice age.  As far as major adaptations go,
reptiles living in the tropics now have thermoregulation.  They can gain more
heat in the warmer regions, and that means the reptiles have the ability to
become more productive.  I'm running fairly low on fuel–the next three stops
will have to be quick.
 
("245,000,000" flashes on the screen)

Bev: The Triassic.  Finally an era most of you have heard about.  It saw the
first of the dinosaurs.  They were basically larger reptiles, but dinosaurs
started small to begin with.  Theropods were the first dinosaurs, and they
were the ancestors of birds. Lightly built, they. . .. AHH!  Here comes a
Eoraptor!  They were supposed to evolve later. . .
(The machine jolts to "200,000,000")

Bev: Whew.  That was close.  In any event, now we're in the Jurassic era.
Yes, that's the era the movie was set in. . .but they had some of the
dinosaurs in the wrong eras.  Allosaurus lived in the Jurassic, but
Tyrannosaurus rex lived during the Cretaceous.  Yikes!  I'm really running
low.  We'll have to skip the Cretaceous and go directly back to the
professor.  I hope this was. . .fun?

(One last long motion, this time backwards–the screen reads "0")

Prof: Did you find anything?

Bev: Well, we didn't encounter any major problems. . .and we did manage to
gather data from all the eras.  Speculation was confirmed, but we didn't
encounter any specific events, with the sole exception of the Big Bang.

Prof: Worthless!  Get out!  I NEEDED that information.  Shoo!  I'll put
someone who knows what I want in there!

Bev: But this group learned something.  We traveled through time since the
beginning of the universe, and they're the only people that have actually
done it.  Don't you even want to speak with them?

Prof: I have access to your data banks.  (Turns towards the audience.)  Well,
go ahead, unbuckle your seats, and turn to your left.  Shoo!

(The screen fades out and the buckles unlock.)