Elio felt his age like a landslide. “Can you stop it?”
“You’ve been here before,” Elio whispered.
He raised one hand. From his palm bloomed not heat, but sound —the actual vibrational frequency of Abuelo, the red giant, compressed into a visible filament. It shone like liquid ruby. He wrapped it around his fist like a boxing wrap.
“Tonight, it will reach Alpha Centauri. Tomorrow, Sirius. In one week, your Sun.”
Elio approached and, without thinking, placed a hand on the being’s wrist. It was cool, like river stones at midnight.
Then he launched himself skyward. The sonic boom shattered every window in the observatory, but Elio did not flinch. He watched the blue-and-crimson figure arc over the Andes, trailing a wake of stardust, until he became indistinguishable from the morning star.