Mom!

I've figured out what's going on with Betelgeuse! It's Gluon!

Gluon is* on vacation in the Betelgeuse neighborhood and has met and is attempting to mate with a dogduck! A dogduck, of course, is the antiparticle to a duckdog. Their attempts at mating are releasing huge numbers of photons and anti-photons which are producing the variances in Betelgeuse's observed brightness. If their mating is successful, the resulting pressure wave from the matter/antimatter annihilation will result in the destruction of the entire constellation of Orion!

After a few million years, the remnants of Orion will coalesce into a new constellation known as Anas Canis (Duck Dog) in our universe and Canis Anas (Dog Duck) in whatever universe the dogduck came from.

* When we say "is", please bear in mind that Betelgeuse is some 700 light years from earth. Since Gluon transcends time and space he/she is there both right now and 700 years ago at the same time. Otherwise, we'd have to wait 700 years to see the resulting super-duper-nova. Gluon can get around the confines of relativity, but light cannot.