#wasp 12b

Space is so interesting, but also deeply sad if you think about it. When we look into the sky, we don't see the present, we see the distant past. In other words, we look up at a graveyard. All the stars we see, all the planets that we know are out there, could be gone by now. There aren't all that many new stars being made.

And some planets are just a constant apocalypse. Wasp 12b is being ripped apart by it's star, Mars once had oceans, it could have had life hypothetically. Our universe is so vast and full of potential and possibilities, we don't need to come up with new fantastical worlds. We just have to look to the skies, and find inspiration.

Take Wasp 12b, imagine if it was hospitable. Imagine if there were people. Imagine how desperate they got to escape.

Days start passing faster and faster until you go to sleep and wake up next year. The sun grows bigger and bigger until it takes up the whole sky. Nights are a sweet relief from the oppressive heat, so the people become nocturnal. The plants can't survive so they begin to wither, so life goes underground.

People want to flee, of course people want to flee. Their world is on fire and if they can't get away, get anywhere else, they'll burn with every trace they existed in the first place. It keeps getting hotter and more and more of the sky is fulled with the star dead set on destruction. The very thing that gave them light and warmth and life is going to be the thing that destroys it.

The people want to give up, but they never do. Maybe they escape, maybe they don't, but that story would be so damn compelling. I would happily read it, or write it if necessary.