{
  "$type": "site.standard.document",
  "canonicalUrl": "https://serpentsquiggles.neocities.org//posts/fiction/aurora/memory07",
  "path": "/posts/fiction/aurora/memory07",
  "publishedAt": "2023-08-03T00:00:00.000Z",
  "site": "at://did:plc:ivoe7cntxuy6at7uzmxzs2ft/site.standard.publication/3mfk6cpprzt2t",
  "textContent": "It is the fate of comets to dazzle and destroy.\n\nThe prelude to even the grandest song is utter silence. In the vast\ngulfs where even the nearest light is but a small fraction of the\npanorama, the music of stars and spheres is a dim murmuring. In this\nblack empty quietude, a player composes their next movement.\n\nA comet flies through the void between the stars. She has no stellar\nlight with which to dazzle, and no celestial body to destroy. The\ncomet is alone: no one to shine for (as she melts to gaseous nothing)\nnor dance with (unto their obliteration).\n\nBut the comet does not drift through space: she flies like an arrow\ntowards her mark. Among the uncountable multitudes, one star is\ngrowing ever larger.\n\nRadiation sears against her black shell, internal heat mounting. She's\noutgassing, her hair unfurling as mist behind her. This isn't a mere\nphysical process. She feels the will of the sun she nears, the\ncacophony of a billion patterns of lux, thoughts of countless\nradiant nascent minds just an incoherent babble washing over her. The\nsun has a will, and so does she, (it a gestalt, hers a refined\nunity). Will and purpose is written in the crystalline structure of\nice frozen within her. This is enchantment. When purpose is cast with\nwill, the world bends toward it: like this, the comet sings.\n\nThen the song falters, as if a player missed a note. The crystalline\nstructure, the lux within her, is isomorphic to a grand, infinite\npattern unfurling. A fractal web, but a flawed fractal, this web hangs\nwith tattered edges, threads torn apart and only partly sown back\ntogether. But the comet still sings, and her trail of sublimated vapor\nstill conforms to the pattern of her imperfect will.\n\nHer coma becomes twin wings unfurling behind her, and she rides the\nsolar wind.\n\nThat great stellar mass pulls. Her path into the system is twirls and\nspirals, stealing momentum as she accelerates to her destination. That\nplanet spins around the sun, a blue jewel deep in the innards of the\nsystem. It was terribly close, and terribly hot this near to an\never-screaming explosion of radiation. Why was this her destination?\nWhat comet would ever fly this close?\n\nThe question echoes in her mind. It is the fate of comets to dazzle,\nand their song could be heard many clusters away if you listened\nclosely.  She had heard seven comets dancing destruction upon a planet\nhere (already deep past, by the time she had heard it) --- but what\nbrought them here?\n\nAnd what brought her here?\n\nIt's so hot so close to the star. But her last twirl around a planet\nspent momentum instead of stealing it, and she was on course to spiral\ntoward the blue orb that had witnessed so many comets. It had lured in\nso many comets.\n\nIt had trapped so many comets.\n\nIt's so hot. She feels the planetsong calling to her, pulling her\nin. A small white moon gyres around it, and why did its light look so\nugly?  She spirals in. She feels the thick brush of an atmosphere, and\nknows this is going burn. All her velocity will be friction, now\n\nIt's so hot. It's too much. Her song was still missing notes --- her\nlight had nearly gone dark, a mere billionth of a galactic spin ago,\nand that was hardly enough time to shine clearly again --- but she\ndidn't have the luxury of convalescence.\n\nShe didn't know what brought all those comets to this world. She\ndidn't know if she'd need to dance destruction with them. She wasn't\nexpecting it to be so hot. But it was worth it. She needed to do\nthis. She didn't float, she flew like an arrow towards her mark ---\nbecause all of this was for---\n\nFor what? Why was she... it's slipping her mind. She's missing notes.\n(She remembers how ugly that moon looked, but even that's slipping\naway, like it were a dream.)\n\nIt's so hot. She's burning up on entry. She's losing mass. She's\nlosing her. Losing her mind. It was her fate to dazzle and be\ndestroyed\n\nA comet falls to earth.",
  "title": "Memory vii: Meteor Cadence"
}