KETTCH ME IF YOU CAN
I decided to take the time to go back and combine the first two chapters, which I discovered should be one chapter (but not until after I'd posted them). This unfortunately means that now there is one less chapter to this fic, but I'll do my best to fix that by writing fast and posting another chapter tomorrow, if we're lucky.
CAST OF THOUSANDS: You mean if we're cursed.
ME: Or you could look at it that way.
Prologue: The Promotion of Lieutenant Kettch
Wedge Antilles opened his office door and froze. A peculiar sight greeted his eyes. A life-sized stuffed Ewok clad in the bright orange jumpsuit of a New Republic pilot was seated behind his desk, arms crossed and leaning back jauntily with its feet propped upon Wedge's desk.
Wedge slammed his door closed before he had to see more. "Wes, this is getting out of hand," he said to what should have been thin air.
Wes Janson suddenly appeared at his side. "Who, me?" he said innocently.
Wedge glared. He hadn't had his morning cup of caf yet. Lieutenant Kettch was not the ideal substitute. "Wes, why is Kettch in my office?"
Janson grinned merrily. "I think the question is, what are you doing in Kettch's office?"
"What?" groaned Wedge in dismay. Janson just pointed at the door, his grin growing wider. Or, more accurately, at the nameplate on it, Wedge discovered as his bleary eyes focused more clearly. When he had left his office yesterday, it had read GENERAL WEDGE ANTILLES. Today, it read GENERAL KETTCH. It looked like the lieutenant had been promoted.
"Yeah, haven't you heard?" Wedge heard a new voice say, almost cheerfully. Hobbie Klivian joined them at staring at the nameplate. "You're out, Wedge, and Kettch is in. Now he's the general, and you're the mascot."
Wedge seriously considered banging his head against the offending door. He reconsidered. It seemed to him that Janson's or Hobbie's would do nicely instead. He narrowed his eyes. "Which one of you did it?"
"It wasn't me," Janson smirked.
"No idea," Hobbie said, moving swiftly away.
Wedge just narrowed his eyes further. "It was you," he said finally, to Janson. Hobbie had never been the prankster type, but this was right up Janson's alley.
"How could it have been me?" Janson said, radiating a thoroughly unconvincing innocence. "Where would I have gotten the key to your office? And Kettch has been touring the Senate for the past week. How could I have gotten him back?"
"I don't know," said Wedge, "and I don't care. In fact, I don't want to know. Just remember that I do get revenge."
Janson's grin faltered momentarily as he recalled the last time Wedge had been forced to take his revenge. Then it returned full blast. "You still can't prove it was me," he said confidently.
Wedge grinned too. Unlike Janson's, his was predatory. "Who says I need to?"
. . .
Wedge closed the door behind him with a bit more force than usual and turned around to face his desk.
He glared at Kettch, who merely stared back from shiny black expressionless eyes. Or maybe not so expressionless. Wedge thought he could detect some glee in those eyes. Yes. It was definitely glee.
To his dismay, Wedge felt his annoyance drain out of him to be replaced with an unholy desire to laugh.
He removed Kettch from the chair behind his desk and relocated him to another. Wedge slumped down in his chair. He pressed a button on the comm built into his desk and requested the janitor. He intended to have the offending nameplate removed as soon as possible.
"I'm sorry, sir," said the pleasant female voice of his secretary. "There is no listing for the janitor's closet."
Wedge bit back a "sithspit."
"Why not?" he managed to grit out between clenched teeth.
"Because—" The secretary's voice cut off in poorly concealed laughter.
"Sithspit!" he snarled, and turned off the comm.
Someone rapped on the door and Wedge looked up, momentarily distracted from his irritation. The door opened and a familiar head poked into Wedge's office.
"Luke!" exclaimed Wedge, standing up. "What are you doing here?"
"Hey, Wedge," responded Luke Skywalker, Hero of the New Republic and all-round Good Guy. "I'm visiting Leia and the kids on Coruscant and I thought I'd drop by to say hi. And anyway, that's what I wanted to ask you. What are you doing here?"
"What do you mean?" Wedge asked suspiciously. He sensed Janson's hand in this, whatever it was.
"I mean, why aren't you in your office?" Luke continued, with an expression that might have been bafflement on his face. Or amusement.
Wedge said grimly, "Show me."
Luke led him out of his office and down the hall to the junior's closet.
Or at least, what used to be the janitor's closet. Now the nameplate on the door read LIEUTENANT ANTILLES. Wedge opened the door resignedly.
The cramped space inside had been emptied of all janitorial items, and the space now housed a desk and chairs and all the stuff one would normally expect to see in an office.
If all the stuff in a normal office were Ewok-sized.
Wedge felt his annoyance returning, mixed with a sense of admiration at Janson's attention to detail, which included a tiny datapad resting on the tiny desk that said:
Yub, yub, Lieutenant!
As you can see, even demotions have their perks.
But mostly he felt annoyance.
Wedge looked irritably at Luke, who was giggling like a drunken Twi'lek bargirl. "How much of this do you get?" he asked sourly.
"None," Luke admitted. "But it's pretty funny even without the inside joke. Perhaps you should explain."
"All right," said Wedge. "As long as you help me get rid of this mess. And get Wes back, of course."
"As a rule, Jedi don't believe in revenge," Luke said, and then he said, "Wait a minute. How do you know this is Wes's doing?"
"It's a long story," Wedge said, "and it's got Wes's doings all over it."
"Shoot," said Luke, getting as comfortable as possible in one of the Ewok-sized chairs.
"Only if Wes is in my sights," responded Wedge.
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