You are in the coastal forests of Germany, 155 million years ago.

The air was heavy and warm over the Jurassic lagoons. You sat behind the shelter of a limestone outcrop, watching the last vestiges of sunlight turn the shallow, brackish water into a sheet of orange bronze.

A sudden, sharp shadow cut across the sun. It landed on a limestone ridge about twenty feet away with a delicate clack of hooked claws.

A Scaphognathus. It was about three feet from wingtip to wingtip, with a short, bluntly rounded head that looked, quite remarkably, like a small, blunt boat. Its eyes, massive and dark, scanned the scrubby desert brush rather than the water below. Its beak was short, and inside, you could see only a few large, cone-shaped, interlocking teeth.

Just then, it froze, its blunt snout turning slightly towards you and it crouches low, letting out a low hiss, clearly agitated by your presence…