Star Wars is the property of George Lucas and LFL. No profits were made and no disrespect is intended with this fic.



Midnight Snack
by Paula


It was not an uncommon sight to see Wes Janson sneaking through the halls at night as if he was working for Airen Cracken and not Admiral Ackbar. There were a variety of reasons for this, not least of which was that Janson was a fun-loving soul with a penchant for the dramatic.

No, the main reason was simply that he always liked to sleep in his own bed, no matter what he had done before hand. Even when what he had done before hand involved a woman, which it always did.

He looked around a pillar. Tonight had been particularly nice. Not that every night wasn’t, but Wes had found himself so heady during the climax of the whole event, glit-biting wasn’t even comparable.

Seeing no one, Wes ducked out from behind his post and moved cautiously down the hallway towards the quarters he shared with Hobbie Klivian.

All went well until he moved silently past the room Wedge had designated for Downtime. The light was on, which proved that someone was up and about, despite the fact that the entire squadron was currently off-duty and should have been in bed. Wes fought down a temporary urge to go in and pull rank, just to rankle whoever it was, but he knew that that would raise question about why he was out of bed and he wasn’t sure that he wanted to go down that road.

So, he did the only thing he could do in the situation. He stuck his head around the corner and tip-toed very quietly past the entry way.

"Sithspawn!" came a shout from inside the room, and two large cans of tomato soup came flying out of the cabinet.

Wes, relying solely on pilot reflexes, ducked as both cans sailed over his head and clattered against the wall of the hallway.

Assuming commando pose, he looked towards the direction the gourmet projectiles had come from and saw a large purple rump rummaging through the cabinets, cans of soup flying out behind it.

Wes immediately recognized the purple robe as Hobbie’s, as well as the furry slippers with little stuffed wookie heads on them. What his roommate was doing out of bed, Wes had no clue, but he was sure that he would find out soon enough.

"All I want," Hobbie muttered to himself, his voice muffled because it was still deep inside the recesses of the cabinets, "is some sith-forsaken, plain-old, everyday, chicken soup." Another can went flying behind him. "I don’t want any bloody-awful mushroom!"

Yet another can of offensive mushroom soup went sailing past Wes’ ear. Wes fought his way to his feet, ducking instinctively when another can flew past his head. "You know," he said, leaning up against the wall, "you could try the ‘fridge."

Hobbie’s purple-clad rear whirled around, two more cans of soup clutched in his hands, ready to be turned into weapons at the slightest provocation.

The sight of his room mate, bare-chested, slipper clad, in full battle pose, clutching soup cans to his breast, was too much for Janson to take. He started to laugh.

"Oh, it’s just you," Hobbie said sullenly. "There are some twenty-odd people who use this damned room, and there isn’t one can of chicken." He slammed the cans down on the floor in frustration.

Wes laughed even harder. "Sorry, I saw Tycho take the last can this afternoon."

Hobbie’s face took on the same look a two-year-old’s got when denied candy by a parent. "That’s because no one likes bloody tomato and mushroom. The superiors are supposed to stick up for their underlings."

"That sounds like a cry for revolution. ‘Damn the Soup!’" Wes stabbed the air with his fist. "Imagine how that would go over in the history holos: ‘Mutiny led over shortage of chicken soup.’"

His roommate made a face. "You’re a little off tonight. Kill any braincells recently?"

Wes spread his hands in mock-innocence. "All the time."

Hobbie snorted and moved towards the ‘fridge. As he did so, something fell out of the pocket of his robe. He didn’t seem to notice as he leaned down to peer at the contents within. Wes, curious, and suspicious as to what it was, took this opportunity to pad silently over and pick up the datacard.

"Sithspit," Hobbie said from the ‘fridge, "all there is, is jello."

Wes turned the card over in his hands, looking for a label. "What kind?" he called back, stalling so he could see what his roommate was carrying around with him during his foray for food.

"Bloody strawberry."

"Aha," Wes said as he noted the tiny label penciled in at the top of the disk. He squinted so he could see it better. He let out a snort.

Hobbie looked around. "What are you laughing at?"

Janson held up the datadisk. "Mom, I Blew a Rod?" he asked incredulously. "Come on Hobb's, I gave you credit for better taste then that."

Hobbie's pale complexion had darkened a little. He stuck out his bottom lip. "You should know; I got it from your collection."

Wes grinned and padded over to his wingmate. He held out the data disk as a peace gesture. Hobbie took it warily. "I know," Wes said, reaching past Hobbie and into the ‘fridge for a bottle of mineral water. "I have plenty of others, if you want to, you know," at this he waggled his eyebrows, "trade off."

His roommate looked wary. "What do you mean?"

Wes opened the top half of the refrigerator and rummaged around for the gallon of vanilla ice cream he knew was in there. "Hell, Hobbs, do you think that you really managed to keep your stack of ‘recreational holos’ a secret?"

"I thought they had been touched," he said reluctantly.

Wes started laughing. "Force, are you that possessive about your porn?" He finally found what he was looking for and pulled the tub of ice cream out. "Score. I knew that Myn still hadn’t found it."

Hobbie clasped his hands behind his back and glared at Janson. "Of course you’d recognize the trait. Do you remember the time you thought that Tycho had walked off with your copy of Salt, Sweat, and Sex on Kessel?"

Wes did remember that incident and he still blushed internally at the thought of it. But he was not about to be out-done by Hobbie. "Yeah, well, there’s always that incident with you and Two Big Barrels."

"Show Girls," Hobbie shot back.

"Corellian Babes Are Easy!"

"Unscrewed!"

"Road Trip!"

"Blown Out of the Sky!" Hobbie finished triumphantly and hurled a handful of jello right at Wes’ head. It smacked him in the eye.

Wes stood there open-mouthed for a moment as another handful of jello came flying at him. Then his shock was replaced by pure gut instinct and he ducked behind a couch, still clutching his tub of ice cream. Another handfull of jello came flying his way. Wes pried the lid off of the ice cream and reached in with his fingers. He stuck his head up quickly to garner where Hobbie was and hurled the sopping mess of vanilla at his wingmate.

Hobbie dived behind the refrigerator door, but not before Wes saw the ice cream smack him fully on the chest. Janson’s aim was just as good without a blaster as it was with one. He was reluctant, however, to use all of his hard-won ice cream as amo. He glanced around him and located one of the many cans of soup Hobbie had tossed over his shoulder. Luckily it was one of the instant open ones.

He reached for it and pried the top off. He sneaked a look around the corner of his impromptu hiding place and was immediately splattered with more red jello.

Sensing his chance, Janson gave a war-whoop and tossed the contents of his cans at his roommate and was rewarded with a cry of indignation.

"Aha!" Wes crowed. "Do not fight with the master!" He started doing a victory dance, but before he could finish the first line, an open container of some Mirax’s ryshcate landed on the top of his head. He staggered back over the couch, knocking over a table as he tried to regain his footing on a floor that was slippery with jello and tomato soup.

"Ha!" Hobbie yelled. "I win - "

" - Kitchen duty for a month," finished a voice from the doorway.

Janson grabbed hold of the couch to steady himself and turned to face his commanding officer. He winced.

To say that Wedge looked pissed, would be putting it lightly. Homicidal was probably more accurate. Wes glanced at Hobbie out of the corner of his eye. His roommate was eyeing the protection of the ‘fridge door with something akin to a Hutt eyeing a fresh shipment of glitterstim.

Wedge cleared his throat and stuck his hands into the pockets of his green and blue robe. "What the hell are you two doing in here?"

"Um…" Hobbie tried.

"Uh…" Wes elaborated.

Wedge glanced around at the massive mess caused by their foodfight. His eye caught on a forgotten datadisk. He raised an eyebrow and Wes saw a flash of recognition flick across his face. He leaned over and picked it up. He stood glaring at his subordinates, trapping the disk absently on the palm of his hand. "Wes, don’t you have the equipment to view this in your room?"

Hobbie snickered. "He wishes."

Wes opened his mouth to say something back to his roommate, but he was beaten to it by a very irate Wedge. "I wouldn’t be too cocky, Major," he said icily, addressing Hobbie, "you don’t either."

Hobbie turned red, but stayed silent.

"Now," Wedge continued in the same calm voice that made Wes’ hair stand on end, "I want to see this cleaned up by morning." He glanced at his chrono. "You currently have three hours until Nawara shows up. I expect it to be spotless."

Both of them nodded and Wedge turned on his heel and marched out. Wes looked around him in dismay. He hadn’t realized a can of soup and a container of jello could make such a mess.

"Wes?"

Wes looked up from his dismal survey of the nightmare cleaning job they had ahead of them. "What?"

Hobbie’s usually mournful face was curled into a smirk. "He took the datacard with him."


Finis


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