Whee, after a not very short break, I am back again! Ah, there's just no getting rid of me. Fun news, I'm teching for my school production of The Tempest! Yay for pushing buttons in the dark!

This week's shout-outs go to the following: random reader w/o a profile, Beatlefan110, ArtistsChild93, sarahmichellegellarfan1, Captain Cynthia (this update's for you), Notquiteafangirl (times two), Lilyssy, Shannyrox101 and Concrete63. Thanks for all your reviews guys, much appreciation!

Disclaimer: I do not own Star Wars or any of its characters. Only Alice is mine.


"Where are we?" Han said, feeling around blindly. His words were met with an enthusiastic roar and Chewie suddenly came barrelling out of the dark and caught his friend up in a fluffy hug.

"Chewie, is that you?"

"Well, of course it is," Alice said, rolling her eyes, "who else do you know who's seven feet tall and covered in fur?"

"Good question," Han said, his words muffled by Chewie's fur, "Alright, calm down, buddy. Hey, listen, I can't see pal. Take it easy."

Chewie gave a distressed moan, and Alice laid a hand on his arm, "It's temporary. At least, I think it is…"

Han shot a sardonic look in completely the wrong direction, and Alice stifled a giggle, "Way to reassure the blind guy, Alice. Now will somebody tell me what's going on here?"

Chewie answered, and Han raised his eyebrows, "Luke? Luke's crazy, he can't even take care of himself, much less rescue anybody."

"Hey," Alice snapped, raising a hand. Then she paused, "Meh. Fair point." Chewie growled, a little reproachfully, and Han raised his eyebrows. "A Jedi Knight? I tell ya, kid, I'm out of it for a little while and everyone gets delusions of grandeur."

"Psh," she said, dismissively, "you can talk, oh wonderful Captain Solo who got himself frozen."

"Well, that was hardly my fault, was it, kid?"

"Oh really?" Alice said, raising her eyebrows, "Remind me, who was it who didn't pay off their debt to Jabba the Hutt?"

"Well," Han said, "if you all had just let me leave when I planned to, I would have paid off my debt to Jabba, and none of us would be in this situation."

"Yeah," she said, indignantly, "because you wouldn't have come back to us if you had!"

Chewie gave an anxious growl, clearly keen to shut them up before this could turn into a real argument. Alice wanted to glare at Han, but given that he was blind and wouldn't be able to tell, she decided it probably wasn't worth it. Instead she sighed, and sat down in the corner, carefully avoiding the large puddle in the middle of the floor.

Han sat down right in the middle of the puddle and cursed loudly. Alice snorted and reaching out, helped him to shuffle over and sit next to her with his back against the wall.

"So how is his mightiness Luke Skywalker anyway?" Han asked, brushing water off his trousers. Alice lifted one shoulder in a shrug, making sure he could feel the motion against his own arm, "He's…fine. He's a general now."

Han raised his eyebrows, "Well. I can't say I'm surprised. In the eyes of the Rebellion, there isn't a single thing that boy could do wrong."

Alice smiled/grimaced, "Too true. I think it's hard for him to be back here on Tatooine though. I mean…it was his home planet."

"I understand where the kid's coming from," Han said, a little gruffly. Alice glanced at him, then, cocking her head on one side, asked, "Where are you from, Han?"

"Corellia," he said shortly, "half a galaxy away, kid. Not a nice place to grow up."

Alice blinked, and wisely let the subject drop, "Oh."

He turned his face towards her, his eyes unfocused, "And you, sweetheart?"

"What?" Alice said, a little nonplussed, "Where am I from or how am I?"

"How are you?" He said, in a 'duh' tone.

"Alright, I suppose," she said, "I've been Jabba's slave girl for the last two days. So."

He made a face. "Nice."

"Yeah…"

When sitting in a damp cell, conversation dried up surprisingly quickly. With nothing else to say and with the twin suns making no sign of rising any time soon, Alice snuggled up next to Han's shoulder and fairly promptly fell asleep.

When Alice next opened her eyes, it was to find that they were still, disappointingly, sitting in the cell. Han was still out of it, snoring softly beside her, and Chewie was curled up in the corner. Alice smiled, suddenly feeling obscenely cheerful for a prisoner, and getting up, ruffled her hands playful through Chewie's mane.

The wookiee made a yawning rumbling noise that sounded a lot like Alice's pet cat back home, if her pet cat had a baritone meowing voice. "Morning, darling," she cooed. He chirruped indignantly and poked her in the stomach with one massive paw, practically winding her. "Why would you do that?" She wheezed.

"Alice?" Han sounded extremely worried all of a sudden. She turned and saw him feeling around for her, clearly concerned that he couldn't find her. "I'm here," she said, dropping to her knees beside him, "and how are you this morning, sunshine?"

"Still blind," he said drily, "and still imprisoned. You?"

"I'm grimy, cold and I haven't had a proper shower in three days. I'm doing alright – I knew there was a reason I completed the Duke of Edinburgh Award Scheme."

"Well, it's lucky we have you then, isn't it," he grumbled, getting slowly to his feet.

"You know," she said, smiling, "it is." She meandered over to the centre of the cell, where bright sunlight fell through the grate in the roof, "Huh. The suns are pretty high in the sky. I'm surprised they let us sleep this late."

"Hey, you!"

"You were saying?" Han grimaced as he stretched, "That sounds like a guard to me."

Alice turned to the door to find a grumpy looking human guard standing there, in the act of inserting a large set of keys into the lock. "You're to come to Jabba's throne room at once."

"Well, hooray," Alice said, with faked enthusiasm, "isn't that wonderful. I did miss him."

The guard stared at her in disgust, and the awkward silence from behind her suggested that Chewie, and possibly Han, were also giving her strange looks.

"I was being sarcastic," she said, with a shudder, "as if I'd actually enjoy being around him."

The guard shook his head and pulled the door open, "Come on, get out here."

"Gladly," Alice said, taking Han's arm and guiding him out into the corridor. The guard, backed up by some big, rhinoceros-esque cronies, separated the three of them at once, and dragged them together through the palace.

They rounded a corner and Alice jumped in surprise as they came face to face with a familiar figure dressed in black. "Luke!"

"Luke?" Han repeated, staring around desperately, "Where?"

"Here. Are you alright?"

"We're okay." Too caught up in making sure he wasn't bleeding or missing another hand or anything drastic, Alice almost missed the slightly owlish look Luke was giving her. When she finally clocked it, she realised he hadn't seen her in her slave girl get-up yet. She blushed and cleared her throat uncomfortably.

"Han," Luke said, raising his voice a little, and sounding a little shaken, "you alright?"

"Alright," Han said, oblivious to the complications seething between Alice and Luke, "together again, eh?"

"Wouldn't miss it," Luke replied.

Han grinned slightly, "How're we doing?"

"The same as always." They were pushed down several steps, past a group of gawking aliens and back into the throne room again – Alice had only spent two days in the room and she already hated it.

"That bad, huh? Where's Leia?"

"I'm here." Alice winced. It seemed Leia had taken her place at Jabba's side – her friend was wearing an outfit even more degrading than Alice's, and worse still, was chained by the neck to Jabba's throne. It was obvious from the tense expression on Leia's face that this was the worst possible punishment that could have been devised for her.

Jabba was as ugly as ever, his huge mouth caked with slime and dirt, his rust-coloured eyes sparkling dully. Alice curled her lip as he spoke, his deep voice rumbling through her chest in an extremely unpleasant way.

Threepio, standing almost apologetically at the Hutt's side, stepped forward slightly to translate: "His high exaltedness, the great Jabba the Hutt, has decreed that you are to be terminated immediately."

"Good," Han said, "I hate long waits."

Um… Alice thought, glancing at Luke, I really hope this all works out the way we want it to…

"You will therefore be taken to the Dune Sea," Threepio went on, "and cast into the pit of Carkoon, the nesting place of the all-powerful Sarlac."

Han jerked his head dismissively, "That doesn't sound so bad."

"In his belly, you will find a new definition of pain and suffering as you are slowly digested over a thousand years…"

"Oh," Alice said, glancing around at her chums, "well, that doesn't sound great, does it."

"No," Han said hurriedly, "on second thoughts, let's pass on that, huh?"

Luke however, looked as cool as the proverbial cucumber, and all of a sudden, Alice remembered that this was a good thing – they were being taken exactly where Lando had predicted they would be, and that meant that Artoo would be on standby with Luke's lightsaber…and Lando was still undercover and that all was well. She hoped.

"You should have bargained, Jabba," Luke said as they were shoved off, presumably to their doom, "it's the last mistake you'll ever make."

Jabba laughed raucously and together, Alice, Luke, Han and Chewie were dragged up some steps, down a corridor and into the open air of a huge courtyard, where a large, bronze barge-type ship was sitting. Next to it was a smaller, open-topped ship, with an extremely ominous diving board/ plank on one side, which Alice seriously doubted was for diving. Then again, if she had to pick how she was going to die, walking the plank was pretty cool – not into a massive creature called a 'sarlac' or whatever though.

"What do you think, Chewie?" Alice said, turning to the wookiee, "Are we going to get out of this one, or not?"

He whined, and Alice nodded, "My thoughts exactly."

She felt a nudge at her back, and Lando's voice murmured, "Get in the hover car. We're leaving straight away."

"Right-o," she said, taking Chewie's arm, "let's go, buddy."

They climbed on board, and were clustered in the middle of the ship with guards surrounding them. With a groan, the ugly craft lifted off the ground and with a high pitched whine, sped off out of the palace gates. Lando stood at the other end of the ship, steering it as they skimmed over sand dunes. About ten minutes later, Jabba's sail barge caught up with them, lumbering along behind them like an elephant, snatches of music drifting across the air to them whenever it came alongside them.

It was a shame really that they were going to their doom – otherwise it would have been quite a pleasant ride, with the wind from their speed taking away some of the oppressive heat. Alice glanced over the side and watched the changing patterns of the hills of sand beneath them. Lovely, she thought, somewhat wistfully. She started to hum absentmindedly to herself, smiling amicably at the glaring guards, who clearly thought that someone being transported to their execution should be a little less flippant.

"Hey," Han said cheerily, "I think my eyes are getting better. Instead of a big dark blur, I see a big light blur."

"Good for you, honey," said Alice, equally brightly.

"Don't worry, Han," Luke commented, gazing out across the sand, "there's nothing to see. I used to live here, remember."

Han stared ironically in Luke's general direction, "You're gonna die here, you know. Convenient."

Alice rolled her eyes, "Good one, Han."

"Silence!" The guard next to Alice snapped with unnecessary force, "Helmsman! We're approaching the Pit!"

"The Pit of Doom," Alice couldn't help repeating in her Batman voice.

Luke leaned forward and murmured in her ear, "Get ready to fight."

"I was born ready…to fight," she replied eloquently.

The ships slowed, and manoeuvred into a small circle around a large dip in the rolling hills of sand – in the centre of it, a large number of unpleasant tentacles writhed and squirmed. "Hang on," Alice said, peering closer, "that looks like the plant from 'Little Shop of Horrors'. Please tell me we're not going to be eaten by a plant?" No one answered her, and in the absence of anything else to say, she asked, "So, who's going first?"

Luke rolled his eyes at her, and stepped up towards the plank. "Good man," Alice said, resisting the urge to clap him on the back, just in case she accidently hit him too hard. She had a bit of a history of doing that.

Appropriately at this point, Threepio's voice echoed from the sail barge, "Victims of the almighty Sarlac, his excellency hopes that you will die honourably. But, should any of you wish to beg for mercy, the great Jabba the Hutt will now hear your pleas!"

Alice snorted as loudly and derisively as she could and shouted across the gap, "Ha! As if! We have more dignity than that – let me tell you something that you probably don't know. I'm British! Yeah, that's right, and we never beg for mercy, especially from criminal scum like you! Rule Britannia!"

Luke raised his eyebrows and Han said, sounding impressed, "What's happened to you, kid?"

"I will take that as a compliment."

"Jabba!" Luke called, "This is your last chance – free us, or die!"

Meh…short and sweet, but I think it lacked the conviction of my excellent speech.

Luke's threat was met with amusement, and he was shoved onto the gang plank, until he was standing directly over the pit. Alice watched him with apprehension – everything had seemed fine up till now, but now Luke was standing right on the edge of a really big hole with a really big freaking monster in the middle. As in, there was a strong possibility of him dying.

He won't though, will he. There isn't even any point in worrying.

This was confirmed a moment later, as after a cheeky little salute to Jabba, Luke jumped off the plank, turned one hundred and eighty degrees mid-air, grabbed the edge of the board and somersaulted back through the air and into the skiff. See? Told myself so.

"Alice!" She snapped back into the present to find her beau shouting at her, "Get down!"

Ah! Alice turned, fully prepared to drop to the deck, only to find herself face to face with one of the guards, who looked very displeased indeed. She gave a little shriek, and shoved him hard. He staggered backwards, struck the side of the ship and toppled, screaming into the pit below.

"Alice," Lando's voice came from behind her, sounding awed, "what was that?"

"That…is what is generally known as improvisation, my friend."

He shook his head, then suddenly yelled, "Get down!"

Alice squeaked as a laser blast struck the side of the skiff directly beside her, and threw herself onto the deck. Well, this is an awkward position to find oneself in…aha! From her new vantage point of lying on the floor, she could see a blaster, presumably dropped by one of the guards, resting just in front of her.

She grabbed it, and crawled across the floor to the edge of the skiff; poking her head over the low wall, she assessed the situation. The second smaller ship that had been carrying more guards was attacking them – the men on board were aiming stubbornly at Luke, throwing him off balance as he struggled with the suddenly present Boba Fett. Jeez, that man's like a bad penny. He just keeps turning up. Furthermore, there were two large cannon-type guns on the roof of the sail barge, which though they weren't manned yet, probably would be soon. Great.

Alice could hear Han and Chewie somewhere behind her, along with Lando, whose voice sounded strangely distant. She looked down, and groaned. Just beneath her, Lando was dangling from a wire over the Deadly Pit of Death, wearing a look of sheer panic. He spotted her and yelled loudly, "Alice! Help!"

"Hold on!" She shouted at him, grabbing the rope and starting to vainly tug at it. Phew, this is hard. "Chewie? Han? A little help here?"

"Boba Fett?" Han shouted randomly, "Where? Where?" Alice glanced over her shoulder to see him standing just behind her, holding a pole and staring blindly in completely the wrong direction.

"Good grief," Alice said, rolling her eyes. "Han! Get over here now!"

He jumped in surprise, spun and somehow managed to smack the aforementioned bounty hunter squarely in the back with his metal stick. This had a rather more spectacular effect than Alice was expecting – the jet pack Fett was wearing ruptured, sparked dramatically, and sent the man flying out of the ship and through the air. Alice followed his progress with her mouth open in vague surprise. He hit the side of the sail barge, fell to the floor and rolled into the pit. Damn…

"Help!"

"Whoops – don't worry, Lando, we'll get you out! Han!"

"Lando?" The smuggler dropped to his knees beside Alice, "Where is he?"

"Just beneath us – here give me that stick." She wrenched it from his hands, "Lower me over the edge."

"What? Ally, are you crazy?"

"The jury's out. Come on, it'll be fun!"

Looking extremely unhappy about it, Han grabbed one ankle, Chewie grabbed the other, and together they lowered Alice through the gap in the railing and out into space. Well, she thought, as she dangled precariously above a giant carnivorous plant, it sure beats the monkey bars at the playground.

She extended the pipe to Lando, who was scrabbling furiously at the sand, trying not to slip any further, "Here! Grab this!"

He winced, and made a wild grab for the stick – it was just beyond his reach. "A little lower!" Alice called up to Han.

"She is crazy," she heard Han mutter, as they let her slip a little further over the edge. She was stretching out to Lando when suddenly one of the stupid snarfblatt or whatever it was called wrapped one slimy tentacle around his ankle. Ah, crap.

Lando let out a very girly scream, that in any other situation would have made Alice want to laugh. She looked up at Han and Chewie again and called, "Give me the blaster!"

"What?!"

"Just give it! Lord, why is it so difficult for people just to give me deadly weapons all of a sudden?"

Han passed the gun down to her. Alice took a deep breath. Right, now all she had to do was to take a clean shot whilst hanging upside down, swinging back and forth over a pit and being shot at. No problem. She narrowed her eyes, raised the blaster and squeezed the trigger. The first time she missed, and a tiny pocket of sand exploded as the laser burst hit. Whoops.

"Alice!" Lando yelled, clearly terrified.

"Chill," she called back, "I've totally got this."

Alright, come on, Alice. Both eyes open, breathe, and…shoot. Her laser burst flew cleanly through the air and cut the tentacle in two, allowing Lando to start shimmying his way back up the sandy slope and back into the reach of the pipe.

He grabbed it, and yelled, "I've got it!"

"Alright," Alice said, cheerfully, "pull us up, guys!"

She heard a good deal of grunting from the side of the ship, and rolled her eyes as Han and Chewie hefted first her, then Lando back into the skiff.

"Phew," she said, shaking her hair out of her eyes and waiting as all the blood started to drain away from her head and back to other parts of her body, "good one."

Lando, apparently over his fright, ran to the controls of the skiff and brought them around to the sail barge, just in time for Luke and Leia to swing, Tarzan style, into the ship.

"Let's go," Luke said, releasing Leia, who immediately ran to embrace Han, "and don't forget the droids."

"Which droids? Hang on…are these the droids that everyone was looking for earlier in the movie?!"

With everyone happily ignoring Alice, they dipped lower over the sand for a moment, and two large magnets lowered slowly from the base of the skiff. The big black things hovered over the sand, and suddenly, Artoo and Threepio came zooming out of a dune, stuck to the magnets with a dull clunk and were lifted up towards the base of the ship. "Ohh…those droids."

She looked around, and saw everyone else (apart from Han) staring back towards the sail barge – she followed their gazes, and watched as the gun that Luke and Leia had presumably activated, proceeded to blow up the barge in a huge, fiery explosion that was really quite satisfying. Alice stared at it happily, and said, "Well, all in all, a very good job I thought."


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