Experience Writing Halloween Challenge: THE BLOOD MOON

Once long ago, when the blood moon filled the sky, people living in Ancient Mesopotamia believed that seven demons were going to attack and kill their king.

The Incas believed that a jaguar was attacking and devouring the moon.

Hindu folklore connects the blood moon to the immortal demon Rahu, who was decapitated by the gods after stealing the elixir of immortality. Rahu’s severed head chases the Sun and Moon, occasionally swallowing the Moon.

Once the total lunar eclipse passes, the moon goes from its coppery red color back to its natural shade of cool white light.  As the Moon returns to normal, the monsters are driven back; the demons return to their hells, and Rahu’s severed head goes to its rest.

None of these cultures had any idea that in about 5 billion years, the Sun will run out of hydrogen fuel in its core and expand into a red giant.

Earth may not be annihilated, but it will not be habitable. Mercury and Venus will be vaporized. The Goldilocks (habitable) zone will move outward, potentially warming icy moons around Jupiter and Saturn into temporarily habitable environments. The outer planets will drift, and their orbits will change.

In the end, our Sun will go from being a red giant to a white dwarf, and at that point, I guess you could say the jaguar and Rahu’s head will have devoured our solar system.

It’s a strange twist: it wasn’t the blood moon we needed to be afraid of all those centuries ago, because The Red Death (I think calling it that is spot on) won’t come with the Moon.

It will come with the Sun.