Disclaimer: Of course (and unfortunately) the universe and characters are not mine.

Author’s Note: Written for seldear for the New Year’s Resolutions Challenge 2008. It turned out much less shippy and much more frienship-y than my usual Nita/Kit stories, but I like it that way. I'm already kicking around ideas for a companion piece, to be set after A Wizard of Mars (which means it won't get written until AWOM comes out) that would focus more on their relationship.

After the Moon

She’s used to space by now, a veteran explorer of the moon, and yet every time she looks up at the blackness of the sky, and follows it into the distance where it meets the gray-whiteness of the ground beneath her feet, her breath catches and something deep inside of her stirs in primal exultation. On days like this, it’s only there for a moment, a comforting curl of feeling that slips away before she can name it, harness it, and put it to use. I wish it would stay, she thinks. In the next few minutes, it might come in handy.

“The moon,” Kit whispers to the void, “used to be a lot quieter.”

He’s not talking about any audible noise—with no atmosphere to carry sound beyond their bubble of borrowed air, the place is empty, barren, and silent. But there are different kinds of noise, and this place is bursting with them. Even now, more than a month after that final intervention against the Pullulus, Nita can still hear the echo of death and determination and spellwork and power that lingers in the chalky white ground of the giant crater, like the faint crackle of electric discharge permeating the air after a storm. There are signs of more recent transits, the residue of other wizards who’ve returned to this place since then. Perhaps to meet, perhaps to mourn, perhaps to move on.

Kit shakes his head and kicks at a small stone. Nita watches it bounce away from them in the one-sixth gravity toward the lip of the crater and the too-close horizon, and wonders if it was a good idea for them to come here. She knows he’s been avoiding the place. When he said he wanted to come, she figured it was the right thing. When he said he wanted her with, she figured that was right, too. But now she just feels like an outsider looking in on a private grief she isn’t meant to share.

So she sits in the silence and looks at the stars in the unclouded sky, and waits for him to say something.

After a while, he settles his back against the boulder she’s perched on top of, and looks up, too, so that if Nita tilts her head down just a little, she can see the tears pooling at the corners of his eyes. “It’s stupid,” he said softly. “I shouldn’t be sad. I should be so happy to have been a part of something this big—I mean, it’s not every day you save the universe, and a new manifestation of the One comes along, and you’re there to see it. But I can’t help missing him.”

For a second, Nita ponders placing her hand on Kit’s shoulder. We used to touch, she thinks, and it didn’t have to mean anything other than comfort. When did that change? She slides off the boulder and sits beside him, close enough that the length of their bodies meet. “It’s okay to miss,” she says. She should know. From day one, wizardry has been a long lesson in how to mourn the loss of things she loves.

“I thought I knew enough about loss,” he says, echoing her thoughts. “I knew that was what this was about from the start—first Fred, then Ed, then your mom—” Nita’s stomach constricts at the thought. “You’d think, by now, I would have talked myself out of it,” he continues. “The pain should be enough.”

“We’ve just had some hard jobs lately,” Nita says.

“I can’t help but notice,” he says, in a quieter voice, “that we keep being handed harder jobs. And sometimes I wonder if it’s happening to everyone—or just to us.”

Nita smiles, an expression that has more to do with determination and drive and purpose than amusement. “We seem to have this conversation a lot.”

“I know. It’s just I always wonder—what could be harder than this?” He shakes his head. “And then before you know it, I’m on my way to finding out.”

“Are you thinking of giving it up?” she asks, in a small voice. Because if you are, she thinks, I’ll beat you up. Except we both know wizardry doesn’t live in the unwilling heart—

“No!” He looks at her, wide-eyed at the thought. “I mean,” his face softens, his tone becomes less accusatory, “I don’t think I could. I knew the price when I signed up. I’m just surprised, sometimes, that I’m not thinking about it. I mean, if it hurts”—his face tightens, and Nita knows him well enough to know he’s trying not to cry—“shouldn’t you try to make it stop?”

She lets out a deep breath, comforted by the coolness of the ground beneath her and the warmth of the friend beside her. “I know what you mean.” She leans against him, letting her head rest on his shoulder.

She feels him lean back, but then he sighs, and sounds too old for his years. “Where do we go from here, Neets?”

She ponders the question for a minute before answering, “After the moon, Mars is the next logical step.”

He’s quiet for a second, and though she’s not looking at him, she knows he’s raising one of his eyebrows at her—probably the right one.

“The scientists at NASA have been saying it for years,” she continues. “When was the last time a manned mission went anywhere exciting? We haven’t even been to the moon in ages. We need another giant leap for mankind. We need to have some kind of purpose again. What if it was Mars?”

“It’s dangerous,” Kit says. “And a long way from home. Who’s going to volunteer for a mission like that?”

Nita smiles, a genuine grin this time, because she can hear the answer in Kit’s voice just as easily as she can hear the question. “Someone always does,” she says.

“Why?”

“Because it’s dangerous, and a long way from home, and they’re in need of an adventure,” Nita replies, looking at her friend. “Or because they understand they’d be a part of something so much bigger than they are, and they want to make a difference. Or maybe just because, underneath all the danger and the stress, there are moments of it that would be so awe-inspiring that the rest of it would all be worthwhile.”

Kit shakes his head, in wonder this time instead of frustration, and Nita sees but doesn’t mention the tears that get shook out of his eyes. She’s too busy looking at the expression on his face, the tears contrasted with a fierce determination that’s been missing in him for too long. “We are a wacky bunch—humans, I mean. Believing in the importance of all kinds of intangible things. How crazy is Mars?”

He turns to face her and she can see his whole smile when she says, “No crazier than you.”

The smile widens, a feat Nita hadn’t thought possible, and he’s still crying but it doesn’t matter. “Mars, then,” he says. “I guess we’d better get started.” He stands, and she does too, and together they take one long look at the empty crater before beginning to speak the spell that will send them home.