A billion stars shine in the night sky but are outshined by the lights of the downtown city center skyscrapers that lay just beyond the Trinity Park Bridge. A mother and her twin children proceed to walk along said park on a dusty, grabble path. Their light chatter has quickly become a fit of laughter and loud banter.

"Well, actually, scientists have discovered exoplanets similar to ours that are deemed to have traits suitable enough for preserving life. So who knows? Maybe there are aliens out there and we’re dumb enough to find them,” Carmen agreed with her twin, Enola, about the possibility of alien life.

“Or maybe they already found us, but we’re too ugly for them to even want to look at,” Enola suggested, which caused the two to burst out laughing.

“I don’t even know which one is worse. The fact that they don’t want to meet us because we’re stupid or downright ugly,” Carmen said as she tried to compose herself.

"Well, have you seen people? I don’t think it’s hard to guess why they may avoid us when we do things like, " Enola tried to explain why aliens might avoid humans before Carmen cut her off by gesturing to a nearby person who was trying to hop over a fence only to fail miserably and fall on their face.

“Things like that?” Carmen asked before a second of silence fell over them, which was then interrupted by the group laughing their heads off.

"Yeah, I think that works,” their mother responded as she tried to regain her composure until she received a phone call from someone. She soon walked off to the opposite direction they were headed towards for some privacy. She sometimes did this during these trips to the park, but it always bothered Carmen a bit. Going to the park is supposed to be relaxing, but it seems her mother can’t seem to find the time of day to relax a bit anymore.

The trio continued on walking and fell into a moment of silence. After a few minutes, they arrived at the park bridge and decided to view the highway bridge that was right next to it. The road was filled with cars and trucks that seemed to be loud enough to be heard a mile away. For Carmen, though, the noise simply went from one ear and out the other. After a few moments without speaking, Carmen looked up towards the moon, which seemed to be a glowing pearl in the sky.

“Enola?“ Carmen said in an attempt to grab her twins attention.

“Yeah? What is it?” Enola responded as they stopped their music playing on their earbuds to give half of their attention to their sibling. She was busy checking out the sports car that found its way onto the highway and didn’t pay much attention to her twin. That didn’t matter to Carmen as much at the moment. She knew that Enola was probably half listening to her anyway.

“Do you think we can go to the moon one day?”

That question brought Enola out of her car haze and caused her to contemplate the idea a bit. She brought her hand to her chin before shrugging her shoulders at the topic.

“Due to how fast technology is changing and how fast it takes to build rockets, I guess we can go to the moon one day. Maybe when we’re thirty or something. Why do you ask?” Enola asked as she turned towards her twin with slight curiosity.

Carmen looked down at the river below, which reflected the moon's image, and tried to think up a solid reason why she asked the question in the first place. Sure, they were just talking about aliens a few minutes ago, but the idea of going to the moon was more complicated since, unlike aliens, it was highly possible. It’s not as if she even wanted to go there in the first place. Of course, it is every child's dream to one day go up and visit the place, but right now everything feels off.

“I know we can go up to the moon one day, but I don’t know if we can go up there one day.”

“I mean, if trips to space sell out like concert tickets now a days, then I guess it could be kind of complicated for us to go to space, seeing how difficult it would be to even get a pass on a ship. Then again, in a decade, there would probably be so many space travel companies popping up that it wouldn’t be that hard to get a pass to visit the moon,” Enola responded as they looked up to the large moon in the sky. Her face soon turned from calm to midly confused. The emphasis on the word “we” caused Enola to do a double take. Sure, it’s not like they were professional astronauts or whatever, but some random billionaires still got to go to space, and that is enough evidence for her.

“What do you mean by “we” anyway?" I know we aren’t astronauts, but it’s not like we’re stupid or anything. Some lame old billionaires got to see space, so why can’t we? You’re not an idiot; I’m short of not an idiot, and I’m strong and everything. Why can’t we go? Hell, I bet with the smarts you have, you can just build a spaceship of your own at this point,” Enola said before leaning against the bridge fence. She didn’t get why they couldn’t go on a level of expertise, but another level seemed to be on her Carmen's mind.

monetary kind of level.

“I think you’re kind of missing the point here because the simple fact that those lame old billionaires were billionaires to begin with is how they got to go to space in the first place. They’re rich! We’re just some poor commoners compared to them. Even with my brains and your brawn, the money it takes to build a spaceship control panel alone would cost a fortune. Back then the idea of going up there seemed easy, but now the more possible it becomes, the more unlikely we will get to go!,” Carmen exclaimed, frustrated at the aspect of them possibly never being able to go to space and visit the moon. Forget Mars. You can’t dream that big if the easiest possibility was outside of your reach. She leaned against the bridge fence and went back to looking at the passing cars with her head in her hands and her mind elsewhere. After a minute, she could hear Enola sigh before she popped up right beside her.

“It’s because of the phone call, is it?” Enola guessed correctly as the frustrated sigh and head nod her twin did gave any evidence.

“You guys are going to leave for work near the week of our birthday. You guys might make it back in time for it,” Carmen said before looking over to the direction they’re headed off to have her phone call.

“You know she has to go,” Enola reminded her, as if they had already discussed this for a while now.

“I know, but it’s not fair. Life’s not fair. It hasn’t been fair to any one of us as of late, and I fear it could stay that way forever.”

“Then why don’t you write?” her twin happily suggested.

The suggestion caught Carmen off guard a bit and caused her to glance towards her twin with a surprised face.

“What?” 
“I heard about the comic and novel site you were talking to mom about a couple days ago when we were at the mall. You said that if your writing’s good enough, they could pay you. So why not write? I know you’re a good writer.” Enola explained her suggestion before going to lean on the railing. “Besides, it’s not like it would kill you to try. We recently graduated after all. You have plenty of time now to write and draw. Who knows? Maybe it can become your full-time job or something if it becomes successful.”

Enola patted her twins on the back, who still seemed lost in her head a bit.

“I know it’s just. I don’t know if my writing would get noticed,” Carmen said with worry, as the idea of not getting noticed with her writing has kept her at bay.

“Then get people's attention. Do videos or something. You’re going to have to do something either way. I’m not going to be here forever, you know. We already graduated, and summer is finally here. So I’m going to search for work. I could even go working with mom, and if that goes well, I may be gone for a few weeks at a time,” Enola reminded her sister of their recent graduation and need to find a job.

The idea of them being full-fledged adults now that they have finally graduated brought Carmen both a sense of ease and anxiety. Sure, the fact she never experienced a normal childhood has caused her to grow up faster and mature a bit, but the idea of going out in the world without adult supervision alone is enough to make her dizzy. She has already experienced the “wonder” of being without her mother for a weekend “business” trip to Austin for her middle school government club, and it was definitely not joyful for her. The level of anxiety and panic she felt there could have caused her to explode or go insane. Maybe even both.

“I know. But the idea of getting noticed in writing is harder than you think. I have already published stories before that were nicely written, but they lack stuff that is trending right now, so they haven’t gotten noticed as much yet. People these days either like novels of video game action, reader inserts, or romance, and sometimes even all three, and I’m only good at one of those genres. Reader inserts are rather complicated to me because I can’t seem to image anything cool in first perspective because I barely have any “cool” experiences to draw ideas from. But what scares me to write the most is romance. Romance is a popular writing aspect that hooks readers, and I don’t know how to write that to save my life. Hell, I’m asexual and aromatic! How can I possibly draw from “experience” or “imagination” to make my writing worth noticing?”

Enola just shrugged in response to her sister's problem, which caused Carmen to facepalm.

"Well, you have to deal with that on your own. We might not have any cool experiences to draw any inspiration from, but I believe writing self-insert stuff is the least of your problems. You write good without romance, and if that’s not enough, then you have to find some way to write it into your stories. Why not just watch shows or read books or something? Maybe you can get ideas from that?” she suggested, as she knew that her sister always got new ideas for stories after they watched something new on TV.

Carmen thought the idea over before nodding.

"Yeah, I think that could work. I may know an anime show I have been meaning to watch for a while now that has a love story in it.”

“Oh really? What is it?” Enola asked curiously, as the mention of anime had peaked her interest a bit.

Carmen smiles before taking out her phone and typing the title of the anime show in a search engine. After it popped up, she showed the phone screen to her siblings. who saw the show poster that had a girl on a moon.

“It’s called The Last Planet.”