65 million years ago, Earth
Nikola Tesla divided Earth's east-west axis into 360 degrees of longitude, with each hemisphere spanning 180 degrees. To protect the Tower Island power station at 90 degrees east longitude, Tesla chose the Maya region at 90 degrees west longitude as the impact site for the Mars explosion fragments, directly opposite the station.
The project team implementing the plan scanned and surveyed the types and quantities of underground mineral deposits in the Maya region. Along with metal ores such as copper and lead, the area had an excessive reserve of anhydrite, or calcium sulfate—not an ideal situation.
After assessing the issue, Tesla and the other scientists decided it wasn't too serious. When the anhydrite was struck, the resulting sulfur would enter the atmosphere, turning the sky yellow-brown. It would then oxidize and fall back to the ground as acid rain, poisoning the air and water.
Thanks to sedimentation, the process wouldn't last more than a few decades, so they considered it manageable.
Tesla had overlooked the fact that the Maya region was rich in barite, or barium sulfate. With sulfur and barium both shooting into the sky and then returning to the water, invertebrate marine animals whose cell walls lacked the protection of skin or hair, such as shellfish, died in large numbers.
More fatal still, the ocean's cyanobacteria nearly vanished, reversing the role of the ocean, Earth's largest oxygen-producing machine.
The cyanobacteria that could produce oxygen through photosynthesis had gone extinct, while the organic matter in the dead shellfish continued consuming oxygen.
Maria was both a genetic engineer and a biologist. Abbott and Tesla were physicists, but they were also highly accomplished chemists. Even so, there was only so much they could do with what they had. The group looked at one another, helpless.
Abbott