Night after night, Maya drifted into the past, tracing the echoes of his existence like constellations in a shifting sky. But the further back he went, the more he felt it—his essence slipping into something more familiar, something he had almost forgotten. The sensation of being a star.

Here, in the fabric of dreams, he was weightless again, free of the limits of flesh. He moved not through steps, but through light, stretching like the cosmos itself. It was a reminder—a whisper of what he had been before, and what he could be again. The dreams were not just glimpses of Kabel; they were glimpses of himself. Each time he woke, he felt the tether between his Uman body and his celestial origin grow thinner, his awareness expanding beyond the illusions of time.

The Mexican desert exhaled secrets as Maya wandered, his bare feet kissing the sun-warmed sand, each step a question unanswered. The horizon shimmered, a golden veil where earth and sky conspired to blur the edges of reality. He had walked for days—or perhaps only moments—time folding into itself beneath the weight of his seeking. The jade bee stone at his chest pulsed faintly, a heartbeat tethered to something beyond the dunes, beyond the stars.

Then, it found him.

A melody, faint as a whisper from a dream, curled through the air like smoke rising from an unseen fire. It was not merely sound—it was alive, a rhythm that wove memory and longing into a single thread. The notes danced, spiraling like the galaxies Maya once cradled in his light-form, yet grounded in the raw pulse of Eta’s ancient heart. A guitar’s soft murmur braided with the breathy sigh of a flute, underpinned by a drum’s steady throb, each beat a summons that tugged at his soul. The music was both alien and achingly familiar, as if it had been sung by his own voice in a lifetime forgotten. It called not to his ears, but to his essence, stirring the green ember within him that had dimmed under the weight of centuries.

Maya paused, his breath catching, his gaze lifting to the crest of a dune where the sound seemed to bloom. The melody swelled, now laced with voices—wordless, yet heavy with meaning, humming truths older than stone. His feet moved before his mind could question, drawn forward as if the music were a current and he, a leaf upon its tide. The jade stone warmed against his skin, its pulse syncing with the rhythm, urging him closer to the source.

As he crested the dune, the scene unfolded like a painting brushed by starlight. A circle of souls gathered around a low, flickering fire, its flames casting tongues of amber and crimson that licked the night sky. They were not the robed mystics of ancient temples nor the wild shamans of forgotten jungles. They were ordinary in their appearance, dressed in the unassuming garb of Eta’s modern wanderers—faded denim jackets, cotton shirts tucked into worn trousers, boots scuffed by desert trails. Some wore woven bracelets, others simple necklaces of bead or leather, their attire echoing the eclectic streets of Paris, New Orleans, or the coastal towns Maya had drifted through. A woman with braided hair adjusted her shawl, its edges frayed but vibrant with embroidered spirals. A man in a linen vest leaned against a guitar case, his fingers tapping a rhythm on his knee. Another, older, with silver threading his beard, cradled a flute carved from pale wood, its surface etched with patterns that caught the firelight like constellations.

Yet, their ordinariness was a veil. Their eyes gleamed with a quiet fire, not of this world but of one older, deeper. Each gaze held galaxies—stories unspoken, dreams unburied, truths that hummed in the silence between their breaths. They were musicians, seekers, storytellers, yes, but more: they were echoes of a time before language, when souls spoke in vibration and the universe sang itself into being. Their presence resonated with Maya’s own, kindred spirits who carried the weight of forgotten wisdom in their bones. The air around them shimmered faintly, as if their collective energy bent the desert’s reality, threading light through the shadows.

The fire crackled, its sparks rising like tiny stars, and the melody shifted, welcoming Maya into its embrace. A young woman with eyes like polished obsidian met his gaze, her smile soft but knowing, as if she had been expecting him. She strummed a guitar, its strings humming secrets in a minor key. Beside her, a drummer with calloused hands coaxed a heartbeat from a hide stretched tight, each strike a pulse that echoed Zaon’s distant light. A flutist, her hair catching the fire’s glow, sent notes curling skyward, thin and trembling like a prayer offered to the cosmos.

Maya stepped closer, his form flickering briefly—green light bleeding through his Uman skin, a reflex of recognition. The circle parted silently, not with ceremony but with the ease of those who knew the rhythm of arrival. They did not ask his name, nor did they offer theirs. Words were unnecessary when the music spoke for them. He felt their souls brush against his, not in touch but in resonance, a harmony that stirred the jade stone’s pulse into a steady glow.

—They are like me.

Maya thought, his heart swelling with wonder. Not stars, not gods, but Umans carrying sparks of the infinite, their ordinary forms vessels for extraordinary truths. They were the desert’s hidden choir, singing not for glory but for remembrance, their music a bridge to the time when Eta’s heart beat in unison with the stars.

As he sank to the sand among them, the fire’s warmth kissed his face, and the melody wove him into its tapestry. He was no longer a wanderer, but a note in their song—a green star finding its place in the constellation of their shared dream.

As the circle played, an old man with eyes like polished obsidian leaned toward Maya and whispered through the melody:

—Our ancestors built a chamber beneath the stone hills. They say it listens when the right tones are sung… and sometimes, it answers. Not in words, but in numbers and dreams.

Maya’s pulse slowed. The rhythm they played was eerily close to the overtone sequence he had once sung in another temple, under another sky. Not a coincidence. A re-activation.

He didn’t speak. He only listened. The mountain was humming again.

Suddenly, a guitar murmured its secrets in a minor key; a hand drum throbbed like a newborn star; a flute curled its song into the sky, thin and trembling like a wish. Maya closed his eyes, and in that moment, he became less body, more echo. The music did not play around him—it played through him. He was no longer in the desert. He was in-between—threading the veil of time, riding sound like light across the ages.

As he sang, his voice wove itself into the night, mingling with the starlight, spiraling upward like smoke from the fire. The melody resonated with Zaon, the sun itself, and in that moment, something deep within him awoke. His form pulsed with a sudden intensity, his skin glowed red as if lit from within, his hat shimmered, a luminous blue like the hidden heart of a flame. Gasps rippled through the circle, but Maya stood steady, feeling Zaon’s energy surge through him like a forgotten song finding its way back home.