Heart and Sol

It is oft speculated which of the varied forms of love is most powerful.

One might posit that it is the familial *Storge*; citing the pure love and hope in the heart of a mother, or the righteous pride with which a warrior defends their nation and kin. Another may proffer that it is instead the empathetic *Agápe*; owing to the compassion of a godly soul opening their heart to the needy or the selflessness of an activist championing a cause far greater than themselves. Still others may suggest that it is the committal *Pragma*; on sole account of the continual process of growth and understanding that evolves throughout a lifetime with one's partner, exuded by those when they deeply know another person so wholly and intimately.

Regardless of each type's relative potency, it can be generally agreed upon that love is *universally* powerful. It is patient. It is dynamic. *It is magical.*

It was with this universal sense of love that Sol basked Earth in her warmth. It was with this patience she tended to the planet, nurturing its life across eons — from the industrious archaea, she watched laying the bedrock for complex lifeforms, to the sapient humans with their boundless innovation and creativity. Sol loved it all, no matter its form, with unrivaled intensity.

Then, there was the Hateful.

He was another of her kind. Older. His domain was blessed in having not just one, but two satellites primed to generate the bounty of life. Unlike Sol, however, the Hateful was arrogant and impulsive. None of the lifeforms of his oceanic Rythlos developed eyes or vision to gaze upon him, so he lashed out — boiling the fledgling ecosystem for this perceived slight. The extremophiles of the frigid Tmtes, though capable of complex feats of intelligence and adoption of learned behavior, never progressed to a sufficiently high degree of intellect or reasoning to genuinely appreciate their sun's gift. As such, they too were consumed by his malice.

The Hateful envied Sol.

*Despised* her.

He looked upon the world she painstakingly cultivated with absolute scorn. Furious and indignant that she should be graced with the complexity and variability of its inhabitants. He *raged* as its dominant species' venerations of her presence echoed throughout the cosmos, forever reverberating her praises to their brethren. The Hateful then directed his anger towards Earth. He began moving with single-minded determination, emanating contempt and spewing vitriol.

Sol became aware of the Hateful's intentions as he began his bitter campaign, and grew concerned. Though she had known life to be resilient, shrugging off one extinction event after the other, the arrival of the Hateful would be an insurmountable catastrophe. The beings she cared for would be obliterated *en masse* in a nuclear conflagration and die hopelessly screaming.

Not even the brightest minds of her world's highest body of research, with knowledge both mystic and mundane, had a solution to the challenge imposed by the Hateful. The more prevailing proposals incorporated occult rituals perfected across the millennia of humanity's existence, but for all their influence, they did not possess the power or resources to spark the large-scale reactions necessary for planet-wide protection.

Sol knew what had to be done. Brimming with unbridled love, she began to change.

Her radiating warmth would act as a bulwark against the destruction threatened by her sibling. Her rays, an outpouring of her adoration of life, would grant those basking in its glory an immunity as unbreakable as the bond she shared with them. As the Hateful one ravaged and tore his way through the neighboring galaxies, Sol became bemused by his impotent rampage, reveling in the thought of his arrival. Because once he descends upon Earth, he will discover its population can not only endure his onslaught but prosper despite it.

After all, love conquers hate.