Tidal

Been a while since I got philosophical with you, but since this might be my last chance ever I figure it's as good a time as any.

I've been thinking a lot about how we all change each other. It's all connected together, you see. The universe is a big, crazy place full of vast forces tugging on away and it's not crazy at all to say that something happening hundreds of millions of miles away affects my life in a very personal way. I know, sounds out there and pointless, but stay with me.

The sun is a ball of burning plasma, hydrogen fusing into helium and from there into heavier elements. The process creates heat and light as waste, and the very concentration of those elements creates a gravitational field that eventually draws together clumps of rock and metal to create a planetary system. The goldilocks zone is where Earth resides, that stellar sweet spot just far enough away for our home not to burn, but close enough to stay warm and support liquid water. The heat of our star creates the conditions for life, the power of its gravity a stable orbit.

Now, today, I'm sitting out under overcast skies, a weather pattern created by variations in atmospheric temperatures. It may rain, which will give life to our crops. Crops the enemy is sure to reap over our corpses, should their efforts succeed.

That's just how my brain works, you see. I think of the tidal forces of the moon, churning the sea, and I see a corollary in people to match it. I think of the sun, the life-giver, and there too I can't help but laugh at how the larger pattern is mirrored on a small scale with us. All of us. It's organized chaos.

Haven exists today because enough of us came together to shed some light on the world around it. The random accumulation of people gathered as if by gravity, organizing into distinct groups with a purpose. Like a star the individual atoms crashed into each other to create something new. With the denser, stronger new material came more gravity, a self-sustaining process that ends with a stable new nation of similar systems.

The Union. It's sort of a small galaxy when you think about it. But much like Andromeda, which will collide with our own Milky Way in a few billion years, the UAS became attracted to us. Gravity kills after all.

Which puts us where we are today. Similes and metaphors aside, the amazing progress and growth we've seen comes at a cost. Human nature is difficult to stick into a mathematical model and predict. People have been shitty to each other as long as there have been people, and today is no different. One side wants, the other side has, and violence is all too often the bridge over the divide between them.

No matter what momentary bursts of emotion took me, I've never been able to sustain true hate for the undead. Zombies do what they do because the organism in charge has very basic needs to meet. It's all sort of automated, animal. I don't hate wolves or bears for acting in accordance to their wild nature. The UAS, like the marauders before them, are different. They know better. They have choice. They can still choose to back off and give peace a chance. The likelihood rapidly approaches zero, but it isn't impossible.

Tidal forces, pressure changes, the flow of matter pushed on by other matter. I see these concepts all the time, both in physics and in real life. My hobbies tend to bleed over into the everyday that way. The UAS comes in and displaces the undead, driving them toward us. We respond by calculated movements designed to return the favor. When all the turbulence begins to fade toward equilibrium, there's more pressure. Two opposing masses facing one another over a space, the matter in between compressed.

Just my observations and musings. The situation in real terms is exactly that; the UAS is trundling here slowly but surely. They'll be here tonight if they keep on as they are. The zombies between are being pushed this way yet again, and this time no amount of clever work with ammonia sprayers will ward them off. By this time tomorrow, barring a miracle, Haven will be in a state of total war.

Cross your fingers, make your prayers, and remember always that from the madness of a broken world we built amazing things together.