THE STARS DO NOT DEMAND

 

The Past is not dead. It is not even gone.

 Like a stubborn cold, it waits for you to forget and then returns stronger than ever as Richard Blaine is reminded by Sentient.

THE STARS DO NOT DEMAND

“Like a dead owl, God does notgive a hoot how you live … unless you wish to know Him.”

 – Rabbi Lt. Amos Stein

 

God does not demand that we giveup our personal dignity, that we throw in our lot with random people, that welose ourselves and turn from all that is not Him.

God needs nothing, asks nothing,and demands nothing … like the stars. It is a life with God which demands thosethings.

You do not have to sit outside inthe dark. If, however, you want to look at the stars, you will find thatdarkness is necessary. But the stars, like God, neither require nor demand it.

Sadly, Darkness all too oftensought me out.

Like now.

‘I would cry if I but had theducts to do it,’ murmured Sentient within my mind.

‘What did I do now?’

‘You are an ant waxingphilosophic as your hill wages war against another, all the while a bulldozeris heading your way to decimate every hill.’

‘I don’t understand.’

‘Of course, you do not. My perspectivearches over millennia. I have seen Pivotal Periods such as this one multipletimes.’

‘Pivotal Periods?’

‘The world has ever beeninterconnected in ways most at the time thought would go on forever.’

Sentient’s voice was a lashagainst my consciousness. ‘Forever! As if! Take the Bronze Age. A half dozenor more little empires and statelets, the most influential being Egypt.’

‘So?”

‘Asks the ant blinded by hissmallness. Tin, my small ant. Tin! Bronze was made by mixing Copper, quiteplentiful, with Tin which could only be found in central Afghanistan – a countrythat will prove pivotal next century.’

‘Again, I ask SO?’

‘In those days, it was a longsupply chain stretching from South Asia to the Mediterranean. A supply chain disruptedby a combination of things.'

I felt my nose pinched. Hard. 

'Some of these factors were human populationpressures from outside the region, a rise in piracy, intra-regional warsbetween the empires, and later riots, when highly centralized rule could nolonger provide for burgeoning populations and the madness it caused.’

 I felt my nose pinched again. 

‘Otherfactors lay beyond human control; earthquakes and megadroughts made even worsein those days because people did not know their causes … as they will not nextcentury.'

My nose was pinched very hard.

  'And voilà! Civilization died in1177 B.C. as your kind designates it, ushering in the first Dark Age.’

‘Ancient history, Sentient.’

‘Is it? A Cycle, my little ant –repeating itself now, and sadly, next century.’

‘What?’

‘You are living in such a cycle now. Yourindustrial civilization is overly complex, utterly dependent on globalintegration, and lacks resilience, often thanks to the demands of politics oncommerce. As in 1100 B.C., your collapse will not happen overnight (sansnuclear war) but rather over some decades.’

‘What kind of war did you say?’

‘The kind which I hope toeliminate its very possibility by making sure that weapon is never made. But thatis for a later time. Now, I find myself depressed, so I have decided to amusemyself with your tribal chieftains.’

My wrists suddenly throbbed less,and Sentient mind-chuckled, ‘I have, as your Cloverfield would say, “playedHob” with a fortnight of Time.’

I didn’t understand. But apparently,General Bradley did as he shook the now useless telephone receiver in his righthand up at the clouds.

“This isn’t funny, Sentient!”

‘To me it is, and that is allthat matters.’

Like I said: sometimes Darkness seeksme out.

‘Oh, no, my little ant, I misspoke-- not weeks, months have passed; years have passed. Whatever ground gained hasslipped away. New obstacles arise with faintness of heart and dread.’

Like I said … Darkness.

‘Do not equate human fragility tothe short lives of roses. It insults roses.’

Like most things Sentient said tome, that last made no sense. Most frightening of all, I was getting used to it.