A Brother and Sister Stumble Across a Cosmic Battle

Andy and McKenzie were twins, technically, but it was almost impossible to tell. The pair were about as close to polar opposites as was imaginable. Andy was a gawky, painfully awkward teenage boy with next to no social life beyond his weekly D&D sessions. Meanwhile McKenzie was an attractive and popular girl with curly blonde hair cut stylishly short and a perpetual sneer of judgment written on her face. The twins had just recently reached their eighteenth birthday and it was clear that the only connection they shared was living under the same roof.

However, today was one of the rare days in which Andy and McKenzie were stuck together. Their parents had saddled them with the task of cleaning up the family's vast backyard. Begrudgingly, the two of them had trekked out to complete the job in silence.

Andy sometimes wondered where things had gone wrong with him and his sister. It hadn't always been this awkward. At one time, McKenzie had been his closest friend in the world. They used to be inseparable, but that all changed in middle school. It was then that McKenzie slipped into the popular group while Andy slipped through the cracks.

Things only got worse in high school. Puberty transformed McKenzie into a stunning blonde beauty. Meanwhile, it had almost completely passed by the gawky, awkward Andy.

"Hey, stop day dreaming idiot!" McKenzie snapped, breaking Andy out of his funk.

"What? Oh, sorry," Andy mumbled, realizing he had been kicking the same pebble with his right foot for over a minute.

"God, you're such a spaz. Pay attention, I don't want to be out here all day."

You never used to talk to me like this, Andy thought. What happened? What did I do to upset you so much?

Suddenly a strange musical note erupted from the woods bordering the twins' house. There was something sweet and alluring about the melody. It tickled at Andy's ears, enticing him to go towards it.

"Andy, Andy! Where are you going?" McKenzie demanded, crossing her arms over her rather plump chest and frowning.

"Didn't you hear that?" Andy asked.

"Hear what?"

"The singing!"

McKenzie shook her head in disbelief, clearly believing her twin brother had gone mad. From the look on her face, Andy could tell he was the only one who had heard the beautiful singing.

Suddenly, another wave of lovely sounds pierced the evening air, rustling through the trees and circling Andy's eardrums. There was something irresistible about the song such that Andy felt compelled to dash forward into the undergrowth without a second thought. Vaguely, he heard his sister’s voice continuing to admonish him. It didn’t matter anymore. Andy needed to find that music!