"This is not the cockpit."
"Hey, no peeking!" Wedge Antilles warned, adjusting his hands over the young woman's closed eyes as he guided her down the tiny hallway from behind.
Mala ran her right hand along the bulkhead for balance as they walked.
"Wedge, it's a cargo transport. It's not like there's anything down here I haven't seen before." She teased, but the comment wasn't exaggerated. She knew the ship like the back of her hand; her fingers artfully dodged each raised support strut and rusty bolt.
"You're going to like this." He assured her.
"Oh!" She thought aloud, smirking blindly over her shoulder. "This is something kinky, isn't it?"
He blushed as the thought crossed his mind; she knew him well enough to interpret his hesitation to mean she was completely off.
"It's not that awful holo of my dad's face superimposed on Emperor Palpatine's body, is it?"
"Not quite." He grimaced.
A familiar scent grazed her senses. "Wedge? I smell fire. I think something's on fire."
"That's just the electrical wiring."
Mala elbowed him in the ribs, playfully. She was his mechanic, after all. "No, really. Are you cooking something?"
They stopped.
"We're here."
He gently removed his hands from her face as they entered one of the larger cargo bays of the freighter. As expected, it was packed wall to wall with miss-matched shipping crates, stacked high and close for maximum utilization. The entry where they stood opened up into a small clearing, large enough for an average inventory droid to turn around in.
What was not expected, however, were the tiny holograms displayed at eye-level on every other shipping crate surrounding the clearing. They flickered with a panoramic portrayal of the Coronet skyline at night, tiny city lights twinkling in unison with multiple candles set atop a table for two.
Mala gasped, her eyes widening. "Stang, Antilles."
"I'm sorry. I couldn't leave knowing I'd have to cancel our date, so I rescheduled it." Wedge moved forward and pulled out a chair, taking her hand and guiding her as she sat down. "The ship doesn't leave until tomorrow, so everyone's already gone for the evening. You deserve better, but it's all ours."
The glint in her eyes told him he was on the right track. "You certainly know how to treat a girl."
"You wouldn't believe how difficult it was to get a table here." He jested, taking a half-empty bottle of wine from a nearby crate and filling her glass tumbler. "This place is packed the night before a big shipment."
She groaned at the joke, but beamed nonetheless. He grinned at her amusement as he filled his own glass.
"Wedge," she stirred somewhat nervously, "Something is definitely burning."
Realization dawned on him slowly, and he cursed when it hit him. He politely excused himself and disappeared around the doorway in a hurry; presumably to the nearest service station, where, if Mala recalled correctly, the kitchen devices had been recently replaced with a much more effective models.
Wedge returned shortly after with an apologetic look on his face and two covered platters. "The good news is that dinner survived."
She clapped her hands together in delighted approval as he set a platter down at her end of the table and then his own.
"Unfortunately, dessert did not." He frowned. "It became one with the Force and … left a very strange fog on the window that I'm never going to be able to explain to maintenance."
"It's alright, Wedge." Mala took his hand. "I'm sure we can come up with something else for dessert."
"No, that was a handmade batch of ..."
Mala pulled him down to her level and silenced him with a kiss. When they broke, he stared; confused as to whether or not what she said was to be taken in the context he interpreted. She batted her eyelashes coyly and smiled at him.
"Oh."
Once she settled back into her seat, he proceeded to remove the battered metal coverings from their plates, revealing a well intended, but obviously reconstituted, dinner. She pried at the soggy greens on her plate with her fork and giggled when she recognized the meal as a rearrangement of various MREs.
Wedge sat down and began carving his nerf steak. "What do you think?"
"It looks positively," she searched for the right word, "... edible!"
"Well, I tried."
The two dined in peace, exchanging commentary and news of their day-to-day lives. Wedge and Mala had been dating for a while, but his transport job stole him away to strange places for long, boring amounts of time. Mala, on the other hand, was swept up in the middle of the budding Rebellion and had many exciting tales to regale him with. Wedge was, however, far more interested in the sweeping neckline of her blouse than the current political climate of the galaxy.
Curious, Mala sipped her wine and surveyed the landscape. "Where did you get all this, anyway?"
Wedge swallowed, gesturing randomly with his fork. "It was in those big green boxes your dad gave me."
Mala gaped, the humor evaporating from her features. "Wedge! Those supplies were supposed to go to Dantooine!"
Wedge stared for a moment, contemplating the error of his logic. "He forgot to mention that."
He had never known Rallo to be a gift-giving man, but he'd assumed the phrase 'take care of these' meant 'find them new homes,' and not the intended 'deliver these.' He never understood why the man insisted on being so intentionally vague; directions were supposed to be simple and direct.
He sighed. "He's going to kill me."
"You? What about the people that were supposed to get those supplies?" She glared at him. "I know this whole rebellion thing doesn't mean anything to you, but could you at least pretend to care?"
"Of course I care! It was a mistake!" He defended, grasping for resolution. "It was just a box of holo projectors and some MREs. I'll put everything back where I found it and personally get them to their destination."
Her anger softened. It was impossible to stay mad at him, especially when that ignorant nexu look flashed across his brown eyes. He may not have cared about the war, but he really did want to make things right by her.
He frowned, eyeing his empty plate. "Well, except for the MREs, anyway."
"I should go." Mala set her utensils down and started to rise.
"Wait!" Wedge scrambled out of his chair and reached for her, firmly squeezing her shoulders, pleading. "I'll fix it. I'll work harder. I'll buy them all dinner when I land. I'll ..."
"Wedge." She rolled her eyes and sighed. "My dad's going to kill you."
"Probably, but not tonight. I'll fix this. He'll never know."
"Promise?" She stabbed his chest with finger. "Promise you'll be more considerate of those poor, starving Rebels?"
He grinned. "I promise."