Microstory 646: Tidal Lock a Planet

< > Table of Contents

Lots of celestial objects are tidally locked to each other. It’s not a particularly rare phenomenon. It can happen between planets orbiting their stars, or between satellites and their parent planets. Due to some complex deformation in relation to each other, these objects will lock into a sort of rhythm that prevents one side of one object from ever facing the other object. This will leave one side of the object in perpetual lightness, with the other stuck in perpetual darkness. Oirpelne is one example of this, along with Earth, and its one moon. It’s important to understand that tidal locking does not happen upon a satellite’s formation, but as a result of changes over time. Furthermore, cosmic scales are not the same thing as other perceived scales. Though locking happens in a relatively short amount of time, it still takes vast amounts of time from the perspective of anything capable of witnessing it. Not so in this case. One of the effects that the complete deoxygenation of Kesliperia had on the world was complete restructuring of its topography. Mountains, canyons, and tectonic plates shift around, and under, each other. The terrain is unrecognizable today to anyone who saw it last week. This deformation caused Kesliperia to begin an irregular orbit around its parent star. And this happened immediately; on human timescales. Less than one day, to be exact, for it was occurring during the Week in One Day taikon. As with many other taikon, this should be a physical impossibility. Thankfully, the Sacred Light is unimpeachable, and this all happened within the timeframe useful to Lightseers eager to see the realization of the taikon prophecies.