change.
Change, some say, can come in many forms. Sometimes change is slow and methodical, passing over us like a shift in the season, a bit cooler each day until short pants weather turns to long pants weather, and you need to replace your brimmed sun hat for a wool toque.
Aboard a space freighter there was no such thing as slow change. When the night came, the lights flipped off with a switch. The air circulation fans stopped or started again in a moments notice. And bad things popped out of corners, blindsiding you in a flash from an unseen place at the edge of your perception.
Slow change can be just as deadly, but when things change for the worse in barely the span of a heartbeat that’s the worst.