A/N: I don't really know why I had to sketch this after reading the X-wing series again, except that I know someone who resembles Antilles pretty much… Here's to you, friend.
AU, one-shot, Wedge's parents are alive and so he joins the NR forces later than in canon.
Disclaimer: not my, though who would not fly with Rogue Squadron?..
'Wow. An X-wing. That's real class, isn't it?'
Corran jumped a little, but the man who addressed him - or was he speaking to himself? - did not seem to pose any danger. Still, he allowed himself a glance to assess a possible threat. Force of habit.
Male, human, late twenties, around five feet and a half, dark hair, brown eyes, confident manner, worn flightsuit, observant, probably educated, likely a civilian. Definitely Corellian.
''S not on sale.' For another week, at least. His hand tightened on the ladder he'd just hopped off.
The stranger smiled. It was an open expression, not one generally associated with backstabbing traitors. Still, he could not let his guard down, it would mean presenting his own head to Loor on a platter.
'I don't have a king's ransom to think of buying.'
'Good for you.'
Corran scowled at the guy. So yes, his T65 was a bit out of place here. He could swear that all those ancient freighters were not as innocent as they defiladed to seem. Pity he'd have to reveal his status to act on this hunch; he could smell smugglers around him.
'I'm Wedge,' the guy said sunnily, hands in pockets.
'Good for you,' he repeated in a dull voice, stressed out with all this standing in the open. Five cycles without a decent night's sleep, and who knows how much more of that before he's caught.
'You're a freelancer?'
'Listen...' Why did people keep assuming he was out for their blood when all he was doing was surviving, jump by jump? The floor smoothly lurched sideways in a shallow arc. His arm was gripped above the elbow. He waited for a blaster bolt, somehow not scared enough to tear away.
'Sit down, Mr. Good-for-you. MIRAX!' Wedge sure could yell.
'What!'
A female voice, young and annoyed. Attention was to be avoided at all costs, but he was tired. Maybe he could play a mental case. If these two were not Loor's, he could escape; if they were, he would at least have his laugh at their expense.
'C'mere.'
'Not again, Veggies.' The female was approaching, though his view of her was obstructed by the busybody's legs.
Corran sagged against the crude ladder, defeated.
He did not know that Mirax was Terrik, and if this were happy coincidence, he'd choose poetic justice every day.
He did not know Wedge Antilles was an architect with a hobby of flying starfighters. Wedge had just convinced his long-time friend that they side with the Rebels, even had his folks' blessing for it. And Corran Horn, late of Corellian Security, was their first more-than-a-ticket-to-Kessel cargo.
He did not know he'd end up in Republic Intelligence, nor that he'd quit after the infamous Celchu affair. Using an honest officer and a good man as bait for Imperial agents cost general Cracken a promising operative.
He certainly could not anticipate becoming a sworn enemy of Ysanne Isard, discovering his true inheritance, or actually getting to trust Thyferrian Intel. Okay, trust might be too strong a word, but he never did come around to shoot this Jace character for the greater good. (He held that Thyferrians were odd, until he met Adumari.)
He would race death when they battled a pandemic on Coruscant.
He would be saved by a Gand pilot, interrogated by an actor, plot with a Gamorrean, decline an offer to become a Jedi...
...That evening, he woke up aboard the Pulsar Skate, alive and literally kicking, already in hyperspace. There was stew, and even some caf, and he wasn't asked to pay for the transport.
'You guys rock.'
'We're what?' The not-architect absently asked.
Horn, for once blissfully unaware of invoking his impending doom, tried for light-heartedness.
'Rogues. Like those guys who flew with Skywalker, you know?'
'Yeah,' Mirax grumbled, smacking the table with a dishrag. Passengers were bad for business, everybody knew that. 'Just like those guys.'