A/N:  Chapter two is up!  I'm trying to update this as much as I can before Saturday because I have relatives flying in and staying for two weeks, during which time I probably won't have many chances to write.  I'll try to get one more chapter up before then, and it will most likely be longer than this one (but that's not a promise).

Oh, and thanks to all who took the time to review!  Yes, Kit will be coming into the picture in the next chapter, and Dairine's trying to get Nita to acknowledge her feelings because Dairine's not stupid—she knows that Kit and Nita are more of a couple that they'll admit.  Now that that's settled, on to the story!

Chapter 2: Necessary Modifications

            Dairine let out an exasperated groan as she walked into her room, shut the door with a bang, and flopped down on her bed.  How could her sister be so blind?  Dairine knew that Nita liked Kit, and as more than a friend.  Nita and Kit had been wizarding partners for the better part of three years and had gone through more together than Dairine even knew about.  There was no way that they didn't have feelings for each other, after all of that.

            And still, Nita continued to deny it.  Dairine could somewhat understand this; she supposed that Nita might be afraid that a romantic relationship with Kit might endanger their partnership—or worse, their friendship.  Still, Dairine thought, even if it didn't work out, they're good enough friends now that they could break up and still stay friends afterwards.

            She sighed and got up from her bed.  Never before had Dairine bothered her sister about Kit, but she felt it was a long time coming.  And that flyer had so conveniently appeared…  Dairine would have been foolish to pass up such an opportunity.

            Shrugging those thoughts aside, she unzipped her backpack and Spot came scuttling out on his spidery little legs.  Dairine lifted him up and set him on her desk after pushing the mess of blank CDs and assorted papers aside.  She flipped up his screen, thinking that she would write that essay for English to get it out of the way, but before she could open her word processor, a reminder popped up on the screen: "Pull April Fool's prank on Nita."

            Dairine smiled, a scheming smile that Nita said made her look like the cat that's just eaten the canary.  "Spot," she said, "what's today's date?  On the Gregorian calendar?" she hastily added, remembering that the manual expressed all Earth timing using the Julian calendar.

            March thirty-first, Spot replied, and Dairine heard behind his words a tonal equivalent of her smile.

            "Ooh, is Nita ever in for it.  Big time," Dairine said to herself, the evil grin still plastered to her face.

            Dairine had always been one for making trouble.  She's always loved pulling pranks on her sister, and when they had been younger, she and Nita had had pranking wars.  Dairine would always win; her jokes were more elegant, whereas Nita's were average.  Now those days were gone, but Dairine still tried to pull off something for April Fool's, when she had an excuse.

            Now all she had to do was think up a really, really good prank.  She sorted through a list of possibilities in her head, crossing them all off of her mental list.  Though it pained her to admit it, she was out of ideas.

            Dairine let out a frustrated sigh.  "Any ideas for a prank I could pull on Nita?" she asked Spot, not really expecting a response.

            Trying to get her back for anything in particular? he asked.

            Dairine thought about that.  "No, not really," she said.  "But I want it to be good.  She's just bugging me right now!"

            You tried to talk to her about Kit again, Spot said, his phrasing somewhere between a statement and a question.

            "Uh huh," Dairine said.  "But she just won't see reason.  I know she's got feelings for him, but she won't admit it."

            And you can't make her.

            "No—" Dairine started, but then her eyes lit up and her smile rekindled.  "Maybe I can…"

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            The digital clock beside her bed read eleven thirty at night before Dairine was convinced that her dad and sister were asleep.  Quietly, she got out of bed, grabbed Spot's case from her desk, and walked out of the room.  She descended the stairs, taking care to skip the third step from the bottom, which had a tendency to creak noisily, and shoved her feet into her tennis shoes, not bothering to untie them.  Still in silence, she slid out the door into the backyard.

            Though it was almost spring, the night air was cold, and Dairine took no time in getting to her destination.  She set down Spot in font of the birdbath in the yard, cracked her knuckles, and started her work.

            Her plan wasn't a terribly difficult one to implement.  All it required was a knowledge of the target—Nita—and a little bit of wizardry.  Dairine felt around in the open air above the birdbath, while at the same time uttering a single word in the Speech.  Immediately, her fingers found a tab of air.  Dairine smiled; this was even easier than she'd thought it would be.  Supremely confident, she gave the tab a pull.

            It wouldn't budge.  So Nita's smarter than I gave her credit for, Dairine thought, approvingly.  She's still not smarter than me. 

            "Spot?" Dairine whispered into the night. 

            Her computer popped up two stalked eyes to look at her with.  Yes?

            "Do you have the spell ready?"

            In response, Spot flipped up his screen which was covered with the tracery of characters in the Speech.  With one hand still on the tab, Dairine knelt down and read from the screen.

            It was quick and dirty, as spells went, but with its own compact eloquence.  Dairine finished reading it and tried the tab again.  This time it slid open, though not as smoothly as it should have and more like an old and rusty zipper.

            Dairine didn't care.  She reached one hand in through the opening into Nita's otherspace pocket, fumbling around and trying to find what she was looking for.  After much time spent pulling things out and returning them when they were not what she was looking for, Dairine seized upon the object of her search.

            She pulled it out, a wound-up ball of compacted light.  With a flick of Dairine's wrist it unfurled, displaying a long series of characters in the Speech: Nita's name.

            Dairine quickly skimmed through it until she came to the part that described personal relationships.  Here, she examined the writing carefully before turning to Spot.  "Ready to make some changes?" she asked.

            Spot's hard drives whirred in response, and the two of them began to work.