Jabba was never one to not celebrate the deaths of his enemies and so he decided to make the execution an occasion. As such, he had his sail barge readied to ferry him and his guests across the Dune Sea.
A sail barge is a ship - typically a yacht - fitted with an enchanted keel of solid silver. The runes cut into the keel are similar to those on a sandsailer's or sand skiff's tin plated outriggers in that both rune inscriptions allow a vessel to sail through something other than a liquid. Instead of sand though, the silver keel lets a sail barge float over any surface as far away from it as a man is tall while never straying from level. This provides the smoothest journey possible. The materials needed to build a sail barge make it prohibitively expensive to all but the wealthiest in the world.
The Pit of Carkoon was located west-northwest of Jabba's palace, about an hour's travel by sand skiff or sail barge. There were no permanent landmarks to navigate by, instead it was necessary to follow both maps and the tracks left by migrating bantha herds. One such herd watched with bewilderment as Jabba's sail barge and three sand skiffs moved past as upbeat music thumped out of the barge's mid deck shutters.
Artu had seldom felt more ridiculous than he did at that moment. The "special duty" that the supervisor automaton had assigned him was effectively a cocktail waiter. The drinks tray carrier and tap that had been fitted over his head and shoulders restricted his movement and several of the partygoers had already spilled their glasses over him.
Leia stared out the open shutter at her friends on one of the skiffs. They had been released from their restraints, but were surrounded by armed guards. Han had opened his shirt to try to stay cool and Luke's black Jedi robes rippled in the wind. Leia shook her head. How was Luke going to manage to get them out of this one?
Jabba jerked on her chain and she shot him a look with such venom that, for the briefest of instants, the Hutt was gripped by a primal fear. He opted to let her continue to look out the shutter for the time being.
Han gave a halfhearted "ha" and leaned in the direction that he believed Luke to be in. "I think my eyes are getting better. Instead of a big dark blur, I see a big light blur."
"You're not missing much," Luke replied. "Nothing but sand in every direction. I actually used to live here, you know?"
"You're going to die here, you know? Kinda convenient."
"Just stick close to Chewie and Lando. I've taken care of everything."
"Oh. Great."
Jabba changed his mind and yanked Leia away from the shutter. She yelped and fell sideways onto the mass of pillows surrounding the Hutt. He dragged her to her feet and pulled her close. "(Soon thee will learn to appreciate me.)"
Artu squawked in frustration and alarm as someone bumped into him, sending his drinks tray and the glasses on it tumbling to the floor. He turned around and was surprised to see Threepio, himself turning around.
"I'm terribly so- Artu? What are you doing here?"
Artu dryly beeped a response about serving drinks.
"Yes, the tap on your head made that obvious, but this place is dangerous! They're going to execute Master Luke and, if we aren't careful, us, too!"
Artu chirped and blipped.
"Hmmph! I wish I had your confidence."
The sail barge and skiffs slowed to a stop at the rim of the Pit of Carkoon. From a distance, it had looked like a steep walled hole in the sand, but up close one could see lashing tentacles, a snapping beak, and a toothy gullet at the bottom.
This was a Sarlacc, an enormous sedentary being that wasn't quite a plant and wasn't quite an animal. Sarlaccs form deep burrows in sand and other soft material and lay in wait for passing fauna to fall in or be nabbed by their tentacles. Once every thousand years or so, clouds of spores called sarlacci erupt from their maws and wind carries them far and wide. No one truly knows how long a Sarlacc can live, but one in Felucia large enough to swallow an upended Imperial Star Destroyer has been spoken of in native oral legends dating back 50,000 years and still lives to this day.
Luke was forced to the side of the skiff as the guards extended the gangplank over the edge of the Pit. He glanced down at the Sarlacc's mouth and speculated based on the beak size that the largest thing this one could eat at once was an adolescent bantha. It was only an idle thought as he waited for all the pieces of his plan to fall into place.
Lando on the other hand, looked at the Sarlacc with dread. A chill ran down his spine as the tentacles writhed almost expectantly towards the skiffs. Chewbacca murmured to himself with worry.
Luke shot his eyes to the shutters of the sail barge as the silhouette of Jabba appeared. Threepio translated the Hutt's proclamation.
"Victims of the almighty Sarlacc, his Excellency hopes that you will die honorably. However, should any of you wish to beg for mercy, the Great Jabba Desilijic Tiure will now listen to your pleas."
Unnoticed by almost everyone, Artu made for the top deck of the sail barge. The only one who did notice was Boba Fett, who hadn't expected to have to work for the rest of the day and had imbibed more than a bit of his favorite liquor at Jabba's insistence. In his state, he didn't see anything odd about the nautomaton's actions.
Han faced in the general direction of where the proclamation had come from. "Threepio! You tell that rotting sack of fly-blown screerats that he'll get no such pleasure from us!" He looked to his friends. "Right?"
Chewbacca roared defiantly.
Luke, meanwhile, had his eyes fixed on the top deck's railing. He nodded when Artu appeared. "Jabba, this is your last chance. Free us or die."
Laughter from both Jabba and his guests erupted from the barge. "(Move him into position.)"
The guard behind Luke put the haft of his pike in the small of Luke's back to urge him onto the gangplank. Luke walked to the end of the plank and looked at the maw below him. He turned his head just enough to see Lando out of the corner of his eye and nodded. Lando returned the nod.
Artu beeped, ready to play his part. Han looked around, unsure of what was going on. Leia bit her lip in anticipation. Luke gave Artu a little salute. It was time.
Jabba was tired of waiting. "(Push him in.)"
The guard pointed his pike at Luke and slowly moved towards him. Luke stepped off the edge of the gangplank and about faced as he fell. He grabbed the end of the plank and as it sprang back up, he coupled the momentum with the Force to launch himself upwards.
It was at this moment that Artu carried out his orders. Luke's silver Lightblade hilt shot out from one of the little doors on Artu's head and arced towards the skiff.
Luke landed behind the guard and raised his arm. His hilt landed perfectly in his hand and he ignited the green blade. He ducked a thrust from one of the guards next to Han and Chewbacca and slashed upwards.
The Jedi's motions were a blur as he alternately cut down and kicked away his former captors. Men, both living and dead, tumbled into the waiting beak of the Sarlacc below. Jabba roared in anger as his men fell like dominoes to the one they were meant to execute.
Chewbacca picked up one of the pair of guns that had been dropped and took cover behind the skiff's railing. Lando grappled with the last remaining guard.
The barge crew sprang into action, opening a hatch near the barge's railings and pulling out the Puckle gun held within. They mounted the pintle into its socket on the rail and opened fire.
The first Puckle shot hit the guard Lando had been fighting. The sudden loss of resistance in his opponent made him overbalance and he and the corpse went over the skiff's railing. Lando caught himself on a loop of rigging rope that Luke had inadvertently cut and he twisted and swung over the hungry Sarlacc as he yelled for help.
Boba Fett was in no condition to fight, but he had a job to do. He staggered topside and spread the enchanted beskar wings that had once been his father's. The Mandalorian's flight was clumsy, but he landed squarely on the deck of the skiff.
Luke spun to face him and cut through the barrel of Fett's carbine as he took aim. Boba jumped backwards to avoid Luke's followup swing. A shot from a Puckle gun hit the skiff, making it roll and the bounty hunter stumbled on landing. The small rocket that he fired from his knee plate subsequently missed its intended target.
Chewbacca dove from his cover and grabbed Han as he reeled from the sudden shifting. So focused was the Wookiee on saving his friend that he failed to notice Fett's rocket hitting him. Chewbacca growled as the pain finally registered. Han held the Wookiee as he gripped Han's shoulder for stability.
"Chewie, are you hit? Where?"
A bolt of anger went through Luke upon seeing blood drip onto the skiff's deck. Boba Fett extended his right arm towards Luke and a weighted cord shot forth. It wrapped around Luke's torso and arms before he had a chance to react.
Chewbacca whined and clutched his bleeding thigh. Han tore his shirt off and offered it to him to make a tourniquet. Luke meanwhile struggled against the cord.
The Puckle gunner fired again, aiming for the ensnared Jedi. Luke flicked the tip of his Lightblade and deflected the shot into Boba Fett's chest where it bounced off the beskar with a loud clank. Fett grunted as the force of the shot turned him around and knocked him onto his face.
"Han! Chewie! Somebody!"
Han looked around, still only seeing a blur. "Lando!"
Luke finally disentangled himself and leaned to avoid a Puckle shot from an approaching skiff. With a Force-assisted leap, he cleared the distance between the two skiffs and landed on the front of the attacking one.
Boba groaned and stood, swaying woozily. He regretted those drinks. The sight of the Jedi and his green Lightblade cutting his way through another skiff's worth of guards reminded him that he still had a job to do. He raised his left arm to aim his wrist rocket.
Han had been groping around for one of the skiff's boat hooks when Chewbacca roared a warning.
Han glanced around. "Boba Fett? Where?" He stood and turned, the metal head of the boat hook pulling out a substantial number of the green enameled feathers on Fett's left wing.
Boba's aim was thrown off and his rocket went wide. No matter though, he had other weapons in his arsenal and a washed up, half blind smuggler was far from his biggest problem at the moment. All he needed was to get closer to the Jedi. He ran towards the front of the skiff and spread his wings.
It was when he jumped and fell like a stone that Boba Fett realized just what had happened when Han had hit him. Everything went sideways and he hit the sandy slopes of the Pit. Boba's tattered wings wrapped around him protectively as he rolled. The last thing the legendary bounty hunter saw before his vision went dark was the Sarlacc's beak craning towards him.
Jabba roared, horrified that his best chance of escaping the disaster that this execution had become had just vanished. Leia took advantage of the Hutt's distraction and grabbed a large and doubtlessly very expensive bottle of wine. She smashed it against Jabba's control console, mangling the runes.
The barge's shutters slammed shut and Jabba dropped the end of Leia's chain in a panic. Rather than immediately escape though, she gripped the chain tightly in her hands and wrapped it around the gangster's throat from behind.
Channelling the rage she felt towards him not just for how he had treated her but towards her friends and love as well, she pulled with an inhuman strength. Jabba's eyes bulged and his leathery hands fumbled at the chain. Leia pulled it tighter as he thrashed.
Han laid down on the skiff's deck and lowered the boat hook towards the Lando shaped smudge dangling below. "Lando! Grab on!"
"Lower!"
"I'm trying!"
Luke spun and kicked a guard in the side of the head, sending him into the eager mouth of the Sarlacc. As his spin finished, his Lightblade bisected another guard.
A slight chill came over Leia as she tightened the chain again, but she attributed it to what she was wearing. Jabba's movements were weakening and his slimy tongue hung from the corner of his mouth. Leia suddenly heard a muffled pop in Jabba's neck and he went limp. For several seconds, Leia stared panting at the Hutt with her teeth bared making sure he was really dead.
Bib Fortuna and several of Jabba's guests independently took it upon themselves to flee. They practically crawled over one another in a frantic attempt to board one of the woefully few escape balloons.
Another Puckle shot hit the skiff in one of the outriggers and a section of runed tin tore away. The entire skiff jolted as the sand around the hull went from acting like a liquid back to a solid. The loop of rope that Lando clung to loosened and he dropped to the steep wall of the Pit. Han began to slide off the deck and was only saved by Chewbacca's quick thinking.
Han held the boat hook while Chewbacca firmly grasped his ankles. "Come on Lando, grab it!"
Lando started to drag himself up the sandy slope as grit worked its way into his guard armor.
Luke grimaced as another lead ball turned the base of the skiff's mast to splinters. The shock of the impact caused the beskar feathers that Han had pulled from Boba Fett's wings to slide off the deck and into the Sarlacc's mouth.
Luke leapt from the skiff he was standing on and grabbed onto the top of a shutter on the sail barge's lower deck. A guard opened the shutter next to him to see what was happening. Immediately, Luke grabbed him by his shirt collar and flung him towards the Pit. The shutter closed before Luke could crawl inside and so he started climbing the outside instead.
Lando heard the guard that Luke threw scream as a tentacle dragged him in. The boat hook was almost within reach, though, so Lando tried to ignore what waited below.
"Come on, Lando," Han urged. "Almost... You almost got it."
The Puckle gunner punched another hole in the skiff's deck and cursed at his constant misses, blaming them on undersized shot. A hiss and a flash of green to his right startled him. He had no chance to react to Luke's sudden appearance and the Jedi cut him down.
Other deck crewmen opened fire on Luke with whatever guns they had but their morale was breaking. Luke deflected or dodged each of the shots as he worked through the dwindling number of guards.
The blood rushing to Han's head was starting to make his temples throb. "Okay, Chewie. Gently, now." He adjusted his grip on the boat hook. "All right. Easy. Hold me, Chewie."
A single thin tentacle wrapped around Lando's calf. He screamed and let go of the rope in surprise. Lando yelled Han's name and pawed at the sand as the tentacle slowly dragged him downwards.
A trio of Gamorreans ran to the barge's top deck to bolster the flagging crewmen. Limbs and bodies littered the deck. Many of the guards who had decided to cut their losses had leapt over the railing to take their chances in the desert.
"A gun," yelled Han. "Chewie, give me a gun."
Chewbacca used his foot to kick a revolver to within arm's reach. He passed it down to Han while holding onto his ankle with one hand.
Han pointed the gun down. "Don't move, Lando."
"Wait! I thought you were blind!"
"It's all right! I can see a lot better now." He paused. "Kind of," he muttered under his breath. "Don't move!"
Lando looked at the wandering muzzle in horror. "A little higher! Just a little higher!"
Han could hardly discern the thin tentacle from the sand behind it and the gun's sights were so blurry as to be nonexistent. He trusted his gut and pulled the trigger. The bullet whizzed over Lando's head and hit the tentacle dead on, severing it.
Lando scrambled up the sandy slope as Han dropped the gun and both men grabbed their end of the boat hook with both hands. "Okay, Chewie," Han called. "Pull us up."
Artu returned to the mid deck to look for Leia to find her still chained. He spun his tool drum and deployed his cutter. Leia held out her chain and looked away as the white-hot flame did its work.
When Leia felt the links separate, she looked back to Artu as he extinguished the flame. "Come on. Let's get out of here."
A familiar posh voice called out to them as they neared the steps to the top deck. "Help! It's got my eye! Help!"
Artu rolled over to his counterpart, who lay in a pile of pillows with Jabba's monkey-lizard attempting to pry one of his eyes out. He deployed his cutter again and ignited the tuft at the end of the creature's tail. It screeched and jumped away.
Han, Lando, and Chewbacca abandoned their ruined skiff for the one that Luke had cleared off. Everything was working well enough to get them away, but they still had to collect Luke, Leia, and the two automata first. Lando took the wheel and sailed the skiff to the far side of the barge.
The barge's stern housed a heavy twin barreled cannon for holding off any attacks by sand pirates at medium and long ranges, but it couldn't be aimed quite low enough to be of use in the fight. Or rather, not low enough to be of use to the crew and guards on the barge. While waiting for Leia and the automata, Luke had devised a strategy to finish the fight.
"Leia," Luke yelled as he beheaded a Gamorrean. "Get to that cannon! Aim it at the deck!"
Leia sprinted up the steps and hopped into the gunner's chair. She traversed the cannon around and depressed the elevation.
A lucky shot from a crewman hit Luke in his steel hand. He yelled in pain and shoved his assailant over the railing with the Force.
Threepio stood at the deck's edge and looked at the chaos unfolding around him. "Artu, where are we going? I couldn't possibly go-"
Artu shoved the gold automaton, who yelled as he tumbled to the sand below. Artu whistled excitedly as he followed suit.
Luke sprinted up to the gun deck and cut one of the rigging ropes to swing to the waiting sand skiff. He grabbed onto it and beckoned Leia over. Once she wrapped her arms around him, Luke reached his hand out and tripped the cannon's flintlock firing mechanisms with the Force.
The two cannon shells punched through the top and mid decks before exploding in the lower deck. The massive reserve of strong alcohols went up in an instant and flames ripped through the sail barge.
Luke and Leia swung to the sand skiff as smoke and fire poured out of the barge's shutters. Luke released the rope and looked to Lando. "Let's go, but don't forget the automata."
"On it."
Lando brought the skiff around and Han and Chewbacca hauled Artu and Threepio out of the sand with boat hooks. Seconds after they set off, the flames reached the barge's magazine. A catastrophic blast ripped the sand ship apart and broke its silver keel.
Han cheered, knowing he was finally rid of Jabba, even if he couldn't make out much of the details of the explosion. Luke meanwhile set to work cleaning the sand from Threepio's joints.