AN: Thanks for the reviews!
"The Play's the Thing"
By EsmeAmelia
Chapter 8
"The only way to destroy the Death Star is to fire an exact shot at this tiny exhaust port," the Dodonna actor was saying. "It's only two meters long, but somehow hitting it will cause a chain reaction that will destroy the entire station – isn't that convenient? Why, you'd almost think it was an inside job, but we'll probably have to wait almost forty years before we know that for sure."
"That's impossible!" shouted the Wedge actor.
"No it's not!" said the Luke actress. "I used to shoot womp rats on Tatooine and I'm sure that's EXACTLY like hitting a tiny exhaust port on a giant space station!"
Meanwhile, the Han actor was downing his drink and swaying side to side. "Why'm I even here?"
"Hey, do you think it really was an inside job?" the real Luke whispered.
"Don't know," said the real Leia.
"Unlikely," said the real Han.
"Yes indeed," said the real 3PO, "in fact, the odds of that would be approximately . . ."
"I don't care!" Han quickly shouted as his actor started packing up and the Luke actress approached him.
"So that's IT?" the Luke actress wailed. "You get your reward and you just LEAVE?"
"Yeah," said the Han actor. "Why wouldn't I? I owe a shit-ton of money to Jabba the Hutt and even if I didn't I wouldn't stick around here to get myself killed."
"You COWARD!" the Luke actress yelled. "Don't you care about these people?"
"Well excuse me, Mister I Don't Care About My Dead Guardians!" the Han actor snapped. "Pardon me for not just throwin' away my life on the off-chance that someone'll hit that teeny-tiny target!"
"Well FINE!" shouted the Luke actress. "We don't need you anyway – I could hit that target with my eyes closed!"
"FINE!" the Han actor snapped back.
"I kind of did do it with my eyes closed," said the real Luke. "Well, I was letting the Force tell me where to aim, anyway."
To the real Han's surprise, they actually showed the Death Star battle . . . sort of. At least, they showed actors running across the stage holding up toy X-Wings and TIE Fighters while dramatic music played.
"PEW! PEW!" shouted the Rebel actors.
"PEW! PEW!" the Imperial actors shouted back.
Luke, Leia, Han, and Chewie all rolled their eyes.
"I'm hit!" shouted one of the Rebel actors before running offstage.
Han shrugged. "Well, guess there are worse ways to die than . . . running offstage."
"This is Red Five!" said the Luke actress. "I'm going into that dangerous trench! You know, it's amazing that they're letting me fight in this battle seeing as how I just showed up yesterday and I have no fighting experience whatsoever, but I have the FORCE, so I think I'll totally be the one to blow this thing up! PEW! PEW!"
"I'm going to help the fighters," said the Vader actor from somewhere offstage. "Cover me! PEW! PEW!"
Several minutes went by of the various actors running around holding their toy ships and pew-pewing each other and running offstage to die. "Is this always how they do starship battles in plays?" Han asked no one in particular.
"Well, sometimes they just stand still," said Lando. "Some of the bigger theaters use holograms for effects, but some people don't like that cause they wanna, you know, use their imaginations in the theater."
"LUKE!" The Obi-Wan actor's voice was suddenly booming over the speakers.
"Obi-Wan?" the Luke actress exclaimed. "Is that you? Are you talking to me from the dead?"
"Yes," said the voice over the speakers.
"Wow, this is awesome! I can talk to dead people!"
"Yes, yes, very cool," said the Obi-Wan actor voice, still over the speakers. "Now listen, you must USE THE FORCE to destroy the Death Star, and for that you must turn off your targeting computer."
"But can't I use both my targeting computer AND the Force?" the Luke actress asked.
"NO, it doesn't work like that!" said the Obi-Wan actor's offstage voice. "You must TRUST YOUR FEELINGS and LET GO. Otherwise everyone will blow up and it'll be all your fault."
"Uh . . . okay, Ben." The Luke actress swallowed. "Targeting computer off! Use the Force . . . use the Force . . . use the Force . . ."
"I have you now!"
The Vader actor came swooping onstage, toy TIE Fighter raised over his head. "Pew pew pew! You won't destroy this station!"
"Yes I will!" shouted the Luke actress.
"No you won't!" shouted the Vader actor.
"Yes I will!"
"No you won't!"
Suddenly the Han and Chewie actors came running onstage, the Han actor holding a toy Millennium Falcon over his head in one hand and his ever-present bottle in the other. "Pew pew pew pew PEW!" he shouted.
"Oh NOOOOOOO!" the Vader actor screamed as he started spinning around, spinning and spinning until he was offstage.
The real Luke rolled his eyes. "Well that was . . . comical."
"All right kid!" said the Han actor. "Let's blow this thing and go home!"
With a large grin, the Luke actress stretched the arm holding the toy X-Wing over her head, pointing it at the audience. "Pew . . . pew . . . pew . . . PEEEEEWWWWWW!"
A loud BOOM sounded over the speakers, shaking the floor under the seats.
"So . . . I guess the Death Star just got destroyed?" the real Luke whispered.
"Yeah," said Leia, "but they really could have done it better."
"They could've done a LOT in this play better," muttered Han.
Meanwhile, the Luke, Leia, and Han actors were all group hugging and the Leia actress was (of course) sobbing loudly before the R2 actor came limping on to the stage.
"Beep," he said in a low voice. "Beep . . . beeeeeeepppp . . ." He collapsed.
"Oh dear!" shouted the 3PO actor, running onto the stage. "Poor R2!"
"What does he mean 'poor R2'?" asked the real 3PO. "The actor merely said that he wishes to dance with a mechanic from Naboo, though I do not understand exactly why he would say that."
The medal ceremony proceeded pretty much how it had in real life, except the Chewie actor shouted out some foul words in the Wookiee language, which the real Chewie suspected was because he had been denied his own medal.
Finally, the lights came back on and a voice announced over the speakers that there would be a fifteen minute intermission.
"Oh boy!" exclaimed Lando. "I can't wait to see what they do next!"
The others didn't share his sentiment.