The darkness was now nearly complete, only the dim light of the stars above and the flashlights on our phones providing any illumination as we trekked up the hill. We had gotten about halfway up when Intrepid decided to strike up a conversation. "Commander, can I ask you a question?"

I glanced over my shoulder for a quick second before turning my attention back to the path ahead. It was beginning to get a little rocky, and the last thing I wanted was to take a tumble all the way back down the hill. "Sure thing," I called out, "And when we're not on duty, you can call me John."

"John," she repeated slowly as if she were trying it out. "Alright. So…what was it like up in the Polar Circle? Did you guys get to see the Northern Lights or anything like that?"

While the darkness hid my smile, I'm sure she could hear it in my voice. "Just about every night," I answered. "One of the things I honestly wish I had more time to appreciate when I was up there."

There was a moment of silence before Intrepid spoke again. "What was it like?"

"The Northern Lights?"

"Yeah."

I exhaled as I tried to put what I'd seen into words. "It's…a little hard to describe. Imagine ribbons of light that shimmer and slowly wind their way across the sky, lighting up the night."

It went silent again, and for a moment, I'd feared I hadn't explained it right until she sighed softly. "That sounds beautiful," she opined wistfully. "I'd really love to get to see that someday."

That brought me to a halt, and I turned back around to face Intrepid. "You've never seen them before? Weren't you up in NYC?"

"Yeah, but I never sortied far enough north to see 'em," she shrugged.

I mulled it over for a bit before I replied. "Well, one of these days I'll see if I can get you a patrol far enough north to see them, at least."

Her smile could have lit up the sky all by itself. "Really?"

"Can't make any promises," I cautioned, "But if I get a chance to get you up there, I'll give you a heads up and send you."

"That's amazing!" she exclaimed as she stepped forward, eager to resume the climb up the hill. "Thanks, Joooooo-!"

Hidden in the darkness was a large rock that neither of us had seen. I only missed it through sheer luck, however, Intrepid wasn't so fortunate. Her foot caught on the rock, sending her flying forward, arms outstretched. Acting on instinct, I darted forward to catch her, saving her from planting her face into the dirt by mere seconds. In doing so, we found ourselves in each other's arms, our faces mere inches from each other.

Backlit by the flashlight, I could see Intrepid's blue eyes, wide with shock as she looked up at me. I'm sure mine were equally wide with surprise as we realized just how close we were to each other. We stayed there for longer than we needed to, holding each other as we stared into one another's eyes. I'm not sure what she saw in mine, but in hers, behind the sudden embarrassment and concern, I saw something I couldn't quite put my finger on…something intriguing, but just out of reach…

"You okay?" I asked as I tried to keep my tone light. Emphasis on tried.

'Y-yeah…th-thanks, Commander," she stuttered, then quickly caught herself. "I mean, sir-I mean John!" She sighed and looked away. While it was too dark for me to see, I'm certain she was blushing. In no small part because I could feel my cheeks flushed as we carefully disentangled ourselves.

"Sure thing," I nervously replied, busying myself(and avoiding eye contact again) by shining the light over her, making sure Intrepid and the telescope she was carrying was okay. "Glad you're not hurt."

"Me, too," she exhaled as she straightened out her uniform. "Don't know how I missed that rock!" She chuckled weakly, but even in the dark of the night, I could see she was trying to hide something.

I didn't press the issue at the time, since it was a minor mishap and I didn't want to sour the mood. "It's dark, it happens," I reassured her as I cast my flashlight beam back up the hill. "You good to go the rest of the way?"

Her spirit remained undaunted as she flashed a big grin and a thumbs up. "Lead on!"

It took us another ten minutes to make our way up the hill, both of us keeping our flashlights pointed just ahead of us to make sure neither of us tripped on anything. Once we got to the spot, I stopped and looked around before deferring to the expert. "This a good spot?"

Intrepid looked around a bit more before she glanced up at the sky and nodded. "Perfect!" she declared as she set down her telescope case and knelt beside it. "All I need to do is get this set up. Mind giving me some light?"

I already had the light focused on the case before I even responded. "Sure thing."

She unlatched and flipped the case open with several deft moves, revealing the telescope safely nestled within. "Whoa," I muttered as I looked it up and down. "A lot bigger than the one I had as a kid."

She stopped unpacking for a second and grinned up at me. "That's right, you mentioned you had one when you were young. Just the basic model, I take it?"

"Yeah," I nodded, "Wasn't exactly all that great, just made stars go from tiny white dots to bigger white dots. Pretty good for looking at the moon, though."

Her smile got a little bigger before she turned back to unpacking the telescope and the mount. "This'll be pretty good for looking at the moon, too," she said, "But tonight we're going to take a look at something a little farther than that…"

That piqued my curiosity. "So what are we taking a look at?"

"Mars."

For a second, I didn't believe her. "Mars? We're going to see Mars with that thing? Not just some red dot?"

She motioned for me to stand aside as she set up the hefty-looking tripod. "Yep! It's not going to be super detailed or anything like that, but you're going to be able to get a good view of it."

"Man, telescopes have come a long way," I mused as she made the final adjustments to the tripod. "Why Mars?"

"Because it's in opposition," she said with a grunt as she picked up the large telescope and began to mount it on the tripod.

"Ironic that the god of war would be opposed to what's going on right now," I quipped, much to her amusement.

"Not like that," she giggled, "It means that the Earth is between Mars and the Sun, making it the best time to observe."

"Ah," I nodded slowly. "How often does it happen?"

She paused in her work to glance back up at me. "For Mars?"

Her tone suggested other planets could also be in opposition, but for the time being, I wanted to focus on the immediate planetary body. "Yeah, I guess. But the other planets can do this, too?"

"Some," she answered as she worked on tightening the clamps on the tripod. "Mars is roughly every two years, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune are about every year."

"I take it that your omission of Venus and Mercury means they can't be in opposition?"

"Correct!" she smiled, "Their closer distance to the sun means the Earth can't get between them and the Sun."

"And what about Pluto?" I teased.

Intrepid looked up from her work to shoot me a playful scowl. "Don't even get me started on Pluto," she warned. I chuckled and made a mental note as she made the final adjustments to her telescope. "Alright, looks like I'm all done here. Go ahead and turn off your flashlight, John, and look up."

For a moment, I hesitated. The darkness of my nightmares lingered in the back of my mind, and I worried that if I turned off the flashlight, I would be back there, alone in the endless void. Then I looked at Intrepid, still happily at work adjusting her telescope, and I felt a wave of relief over me. As long as she was there, I would be okay.

I shut off the beam, plunging us into relative darkness. But in that darkness, I saw so much light. On this side of the island, cut off from the light of base, I could see every star in the night sky. Beautiful pinpoints of brilliance set into the black tapestry of space. It'd been so long since I'd seen the sky like this, let alone been able to fully appreciate it. "Whoa…" I whispered softly.

"Right?" Intrepid commented as she angled the telescope. "Absolutely breathtaking."

I nodded, forgetting that she wasn't looking at me, and even if she was, she might not have even seen the subtle gesture. "I'd almost forgotten…"

As she continued to make her adjustments, searching for the Red Planet in the inky blackness, she asked, "Maybe I'm overstepping my bounds, but when was the last time you had a real break?"

"Months at least," I absently answer, still enraptured by the starry night. "The Polar Crown campaign was a brutal slog, really didn't give you any time beyond sleeping, eating, and fighting. And we've been so busy even before that…"

"Sounds like you could use some time off," she mused. Almost as if she could sense my coming objection, she quickly added, "Not like full-on leave or anything, but maybe finding something you could do at the end of the day to just…relax, enjoy yourself. Not have to focus on work so much."

I mulled it over. She had a point, and I didn't think the base would stop functioning if I took an hour or two each day to myself. "Maybe," I wavered. "Just don't know what I'd do with myself anymore." I paused, then asked, "What do you do to relax?"

"During my free time, I like to read, watch movies, or stargaze," she made a few more adjustments on the telescope before her head jerked up as she realized something. "Oh, by the way, I got a movie ticket from Casablanca. Why don't we go watch it?"

The next words just jumped out of my mouth without a second's thought. "What's the movie?" I was grateful for the darkness, as it hid my perplexed expression. Why had I asked that? We've barely even started this outing and I was just jumping on board a second one without a moment's hesitation?

"Casablanca," she answered, blissfully unaware of the confusion swirling around inside me. "The base theater is doing a classic movie night and that's the one they picked. I think Casablanca just wants people to see it because of her name."

"Casablanca, huh?" I murmured as I looked back up at the night sky. "Never seen that one before."

In the dim starlight, I saw her head whip up from the telescope. "Wait, really? You've never seen Casablanca?"

"Nope," I confirmed. "Seen bits and pieces, but never the whole movie."

"All kinds of firsts for you, then," she grinned as she went back. "First planet, first time seeing Casablanca." She paused for a second. "This is your first planet, right?"

I nodded. "I've seen Mars with the naked eye before, but this'll be the first time I've seen it up close. Or as close as we can get."

"Oh, we're gonna get pretty close," she said as she made the final adjustments to her telescope. "Yeah, that's perfect…wanna take a look?"

"Love to!" I smiled as she looked up from the telescope and held out her hand. I took it and she guided me to the telescope, pointing to the eyepiece on top of the smaller scope.

"Just put your eye there and take a good look…"

I took a few careful steps to the telescope and peered through the eyepiece. Sure enough, I could see Mars. Not just a red speck of light in the night sky, but a reddish-brown orb suspended in the vast void of space. "Wow…" I breathed. While it wasn't terribly detailed, it was more than I ever expected to see from a portable telescope.

"Pretty cool, huh?" Intrepid grinned as she leaned down next to me.

I had to agree. "Yeah," I answered, still staring at the planet millions of miles away. "Never thought I'd see something like that. At least, not without visiting an observatory."

"Telescopes have come a long way," she agreed. "Getting there's still the hard part."

I straightened up, giving my back a bit of a rest as I nodded to her. "One day," I reassured her. "One day we'll get out there."

Even in the dim light of the stars, I could see the hopeful smile on her face. "You think so?"

"Absolutely," I happily confirmed. "Maybe not within my lifetime, but…yeah, one day…I think we're going to take to the stars and never look back."

I could feel her blue eyes peering at me before she finally said. "You really love space, don't you." It was a statement, not a question.

"I do," I confessed, "I really do. I've always found it beautiful, even as a kid, and despite knowing how dangerous space travel is, and how inhospitable it can be, I still think that it is our destiny to leave this planet one day and sail the sea of stars."

Intrepid stayed silent for a long while, and I wondered if I had gone too far if I'd let my geek flag fly a little too high for a moment. Then, she allayed all my fears with what she said next. "That's…a really beautiful sentiment."

"Th-thanks," I stammered, feeling my cheeks flush. "Sorry if I-"

She didn't even give me the chance to finish. "No, no!" she exclaimed, holding her hands up. "Don't apologize, I think that's a noble dream to have, I just…didn't know this about you."

"Well, we've only known each other for a day," I quipped with a grin. "Wouldn't expect you to know something like that about me so soon. That, plus the fact that it's something I don't think I've never told anyone on base before."

I could hear the surprise in her voice. "You haven't? Why not?"

"Never came up, for starters," I said before I gazed back up at the sky and sighed softly. "That, and honestly, I've been so busy that I don't have time to think that far ahead. You don't think about where humanity will be in fifty, a hundred, or five hundred years from now, you're too busy trying to think about where you'll be in the next five minutes, let alone the next hour. So focused on surviving that you forget to…look up."

I felt a gloved hand rest on my shoulder and I looked over to see Intrepid beside me, her soft smile barely visible. "Glad I could help, Commander. Er, John."

"Thanks," I smiled back as I placed my hand on hers. "Didn't mean to bare my soul there. What about you? Why do you love space?"

Her eyes turned skyward as she answered, and I watched the way her smile changed. "Part of it, I'm sure, is my hull's history. I recovered Mercury Seven and Gemini Three crews, and after my career was over, I became an air and space museum. But I also find space to be so…beautiful. You look out there at the twinkling lights in the sky, the nebulas that the big space telescopes have seen, and it's just so…breathtaking. I want to be able to go out there and explore, to see all of those strange new worlds, even though I know it will take years and years before we're ready."

"That's something I'd love to see," I admitted. "I can already imagine the look on your face as you explore the galaxy."

"Ah, go on," she grinned, but I could hear the bashful tone in her voice. "Gonna make a gal blush like this. But yeah, I think it'd be fun to sail the stars with you, John…"

We glanced over at each other and smiled again, no further words needed, before we turned our gaze back up to the sky.


We stayed out there for another hour, just watching the stars, before packing it up and calling it a night. By the time I crawled into bed, I was out like a light and awoke feeling better than I had in…well, a long while. Nightmares didn't plague me much during my stay in the Northern Parliament, but the bitter cold made it hard to get a restful sleep. And apparently, it was more than just me who noticed how much better I slept.

As soon as I walked into her office, Bremerton smiled up at me and said, "I take it the stargazing went well."

I had to admit, I was surprised at how quickly she picked up on it. Granted, it was her job to read people like that, but I didn't realize she was that good or I was that easy to read. So I decided to just ask. "How could you tell?"

"You look well-rested, for starters," she began as she gestured to the couch. "And also, you've got a pretty big smile on your face. So, you wanna talk about it?"

I plopped down on the couch and nodded. "Sure! Where do you want me to start?"

Bremerton stepped around her desk as she moved to the chair next to the couch, her notepad already in hand. "How about where we left off last night? I take it you two managed to meet up without too many problems?"

"Yeah," I nodded, "And we took your advice and swapped numbers. Juustagram accounts, too, just to be safe. After we met up, it was a quick walk up the hill to where Intrepid could set up her telescope so we could get to stargazing."

Her pen flew over the paper as she was already making notes. "And how was stargazing? Any hesitation or feelings of anxiety."

"Both," I answered honestly. "While she was setting up, Intrepid told me to turn off my flashlight and look up, and for a moment, I was afraid to do it. I kept flashing back to that fight and that endless void and I was worried that if I looked up, that would be what I saw."

She finished writing, then leaned forward. "And what changed your mind?"

I smiled faintly before answering. "Intrepid did. I realized if she was there with me, then I wasn't alone, that if I looked up, everything would still be there, still be okay."

A broad smile crossed her face as she leaned back and made a few more notes. "And what did you see when you looked up?"

"The stars," I answered with a smile of my own. "And I saw them in a way I hadn't seen them in years."

"Like I said," she grinned, "Sounds like you two had a good evening. Are you planning on doing this again?"

I nodded, then shrugged when I realized we'd never discussed that. "I hope so. She hit on a good idea, for me to try and find time to relax, take some 'me time' each day. We never discussed stargazing specifically, but I would definitely go with her again in a heartbeat."

"Good!" Bremerton beamed as she jotted down a few more notes. "I think she's got a good idea about you taking a break every once and a while. I understand there's a war on and you're needed ten different places at once, Commander, but if you don't give yourself a rest every now and again, you'll burn out, and that won't help anyone."

"Yeah," I agreed, "I'm going to start trying that out. Intrepid's helping with that, too. We're going to see Casablanca tomorrow night."

A strange, playful smile broke across Bremerton's face as her eyebrow arched. "Oh? That was fast."

"You have no idea," I chuckled as I shook my head. "She offered and before my brain could engage my mouth just agreed to it."

"Sounds like you should follow your instincts," she smirked. I wanted to ask what she meant by that, but we were interrupted by a knock on the door. Essex opened it a second later and popped her head in.

"Sorry to interrupt, Commander, but High Command is calling for you, priority one," she announced.

I nodded as I got back to my feet and adjusted my uniform. "I'll be right there, Essex." As soon as she shut the door, I grinned ruefully at Bremerton. "Ten different places all at once," I quipped, much to her amusement.

"Indeed. Go on, then, Commander, and good luck," she smiled as she playfully shooed me out of her office.

I waved goodbye and headed down towards the CIC, unaware of the changes looming on the horizon…

A/N-Well that went well! I'm sure this call isn't anything important. What could it be, I wonder… In any case, until next time, fair winds and following seas!