The Empire's Fall (Pt.1)

Chapter Seven: Escape From The Death Star

Leia grabs Luke's blaster and fires at a small grate in wall next to Han, almost frying him.

"What the hell are you doing?"

"Somebody has to save our skins. Into the garbage chute, flyboy."

She jumps through the narrow opening as Han and Chewie look on in amazement. Chewie sniffs the garbage chute and growls something.

"Get in there! Get in there you big furry oaf! I don't care what you smell! Get in there and don't worry about it."

Han gives him a kick and the Wookiee disappears into the tiny opening.

Luke, Han, and I continue firing as we work our way toward the opening.

"Wonderful girl! Either I'm going to kill her or I'm beginning to like her. Get in there!"

Han's comment makes me roll my eyes, before I jump into the chute. Safe to say, the smell isn't that great.

Luke tumbles into the garbage room, and almost right on top of me at that! Then Han tumbles in, unfortunately, he doesn't land on my brother.

"Oh! The garbage chute was a really wonderful idea. What an incredible smell you've discovered! Let's get out of here! Get away from there."

"No! wait!" I yell. Course, Han doesn't listen to me, so I just wasted my breath.

Han draws his laser pistol and fires at the hatch. The laserbolt ricochets wildly around the small metal room. We all dive for cover in the garbage as the bolt explodes almost on top of us. Leia climbs out of the garbage with a rather grim look on her face.

"Will you forget it? I already tried it. It's magnetically sealed!" I say. Wishing that Han would just listen to me.

"Put that thing away! You're going to get us all killed," Leia says. She's sassy, I like her.

"Absolutely, Your Worship. Look, I had everything under control until you led us down here. You know, it's not going to take 'em long to figure out what happened to us!"

"It could be worse..."

A loud. horrible, inhuman moan works its way up from the murky depths. Chewbacca lets out a terrified howl and begins to back away. Han and Luke stand fast with their laser pistols drawn. The Wookiee is cowering near one of the walls.

"It's worse."

"There's something alive in here!" Luke says, starting to panic. So am I, I saw it too.

"That's your imagination."

"Something just moved past my leg! Look! Did you see that?" I ask.

"What?"

An eyeball pops up out of the water. Then suddenly a tentacle wraps around my leg, and I'm suddenly yanked under the garbage.

"Kid! Leeda! Leeda! Leeda!"

"Lee!"

"Leeda!"

All I can see is garbage and murky water. This is terrifying. My first time underwater. I hate it. I come up to the surface for a minute, all I can do it try to get the thing off me, while trying to catch my breath. Which certainly isn't made easier by the tentacle wrapped around my throat.

"Lee!"

Leia extends a long pipe toward me.

"Leeda, Leeda, grab a hold of this!"