The ants had computers of their own: round, rice-sized granules that, unlike dinosaur computers, used no integrated circuitry at all. All computations were performed using complicated organic chemical reactions. Ant computers did not have screens but used pheromones to output information instead. These subtle, complex odours could only be parsed by ants, whose senses could translate the odours into data, language and images. The exchange of information across the ants’ vast network of granular chemical computers was also effected by pheromones rather than by fibre-optic cables and electromagnetic waves.

The structure of ant society in those days was very different from the ant colonies we see today, bearing a closer resemblance to that of human society. Due to the adoption of biotechnology in embryo production, ant queens played a trivial role in the reproduction of the species, and they enjoyed none of the societal status or importance that they do nowadays.

Following the resolution of the First Dinosaur–Ant War, there had been no major conflict between the two worlds. The dinosaur–ant alliance endured, contributing to the steady development of Cretaceous civilisation. In the Information Age, the dinosaurs were more reliant than ever on the ants’ fine-motor skills. Swarms of ants worked in every dinosaur factory, manufacturing tiny component parts, operating precision equipment and instruments, performing repair and maintenance work, and handling other tasks that the dinosaurs could not manage.

Ants also continued to play a critical role in dinosaur medicine. All dinosaur surgery was still performed by ant surgeons, who physically entered the dinosaurs’ organs to operate on them from the inside. They had a range of sophisticated medical devices at their disposal, including miniature laser scalpels and micro-submarines that could navigate and dredge dinosaur blood vessels.

It also helped that ants and dinosaurs no longer had to rely on word corps to understand each other. With the invention of electronic devices that could directly translate ant pheromones into dinosaur speech, that peculiar method of communicating, via formations comprising tens of thousands of ant soldiers, gradually became the stuff of legend.

The Formican Empire of Gondwana eventually unified the uncivilised ant tribes on every continent, establishing the Ant Federation, which governed all ants on Earth. By contrast, the once united Saurian Empire split in two. The continent of Laurasia gained its independence, and another great dinosaur nation was founded: the Laurasian Republic. Following a millennium of conquests, the Gondwanan Empire came to occupy proto-India, proto-Antarctica, and proto-Australia, while the Laurasian Republic expanded its territory into the lands that would become Asia and Europe.