A/N: In creating the description of the Vomanor family's physical characteristics, I drew inspiration from both the 1928 movie 'The Man Who Laughs' and the 1961 movie 'Mr. Sardonicus'.

It would've been faster to get back to the Falcon and fly it onto the royal property, but Han also knew that was a good way to get shot down and they couldn't waste anymore time or resources on repairs right now. Instead they headed back the way they came, took a right at the fork in the road, and walked up to the palace.

"Why are we doing this?" Gwynplaine asked curiously.

"We're going to seek an audience with the royal family," was all Han told her.

"But why?"

"Have you ever heard of the Vomanor family?"

She shook her head, "I don't think so."

"So you've never seen them."

She shook her head again, "Uh-uh."

"Well you're in for a real treat then," he said cynically.

"Are these the people you owe money to that you were talking about?" she asked.

"No."

"Then I don't understand," Gwynplaine said as they trekked up and down several hills following the road to the castle, "why are we going there?"

"Trust me, you'll have to see it to believe it," he told her.

Chewbacca chattered his own response to this idea.

"Hey, I've got a plan," Han told him.

They got close enough to reach the outer gates separating them from the property. The gates appeared to be some kind of reinforced carbon and were twice as tall as Chewie, and on the inside various landspeeders and hovercrafts made their rounds. Han looked through the bars and spotted a few guards on foot nearby. "Hey! Open the gate."

Some of the guards were dressed in white armor resembling imperial troopers, others wore black armor of a similar build and others wore a bronze colored armor that looked like scaly reptilian skin. They all carried blasters and rifles, and three of them approached the gate, their weapons drawn.

"State your purpose," one of the guards in black said, his helmet distorting his voice to sound more ominous than it probably really did.

"We're here to see the royal family," Han said simply, with an air of authority.

"On what business?" another guard asked.

"They'll know it when they see us," he answered.

"Who are you?"

"That is irrelevant," Han told them. "Tell the grand duke and duchess that their presence is required out here right now, or take us in to see them."

"Your request is denied."

"That's no request," Han shot back, "That is an order. We're not going anywhere until we see the royal family."

One of the guards came close enough to the gate that Chewie was able to reach through and grab him and try to pull him through the bars, the guard let out an excruciating scream of pain and immediately the three of them found themselves surrounded.


"So I didn't think that plan all the way through," Han replied to Chewbacca's comment as they sat in the palace dungeon, "I still got us inside the castle, I got us that much closer to the Vomanor family. That's still progress."

The wookiee snorted disagreeably in response.

"I still don't get it," Gwynplaine said from where she sat by one of the dungeon walls. "Why'd we have to come here? What's so important about this royal family?"

Han hadn't actually planned to tell Gwynplaine the truth until they'd confronted the Vomanors, he figured by then everything would fall into place. But since it didn't look like that was going to happen for a while, he didn't see the problem in telling the kid the truth. She had a right to know about her legacy, that finally, they had found where she came from, where she belonged, and he'd be damned if he didn't see her take her rightful spot at the throne.

Still, it was a lot to hit her with all at once, so he started slowly.

"A long time ago the Vomanors did something they shouldn't have, and I'm going to see that it gets righted once and for all."

"What?" Gwynplaine shrugged, "What did they do?"

He breathed in a sigh and started to explain, "They had-"

A sudden noise interrupted him and got their attention. A guard came to the cell door and announced curtly, "The Vomanors will see you."

"See? I told you I'd get us to them," Han said as the door was opened and the three of them were led out of the cell.

From there, they were escorted at weapon point by several guards through a long dark corridor in the subsection of the palace, up an elevator to the main floor, and along a vast corridor full of double doors ten feet high. Along the way, Han felt a by now familiar sensation of Gwynplaine grabbing the back of his belt and clinging to him, this time he didn't force her back. He himself was starting to wonder just what he'd gone and gotten them into, but he wasn't about to admit that.

They were brought to a set of doors that opened, and they stepped into a massive room, he tried to look around and get a good look at the place but it all seemed to pass in a blur, before he knew it the three of them stood in the middle of the room, the kid was right behind him and Chewie stood behind her to block the guards from trying anything, and Han found they were surrounded by Vomanors, who were seated on their thrones on all sides of the room. He'd seen them from a distance years ago, seeing all those faces with those huge inhuman sneering grins, it was an unnerving experience.

"Great," he murmured to himself, "A room full of ventriloquists."

"State your purpose here."

He looked around, feeling Gwynplaine match his every move, turning every time, every inch, that he did. Nobody had moved. He was almost certain it had been a man's voice, the members of the royal family looked pretty evenly matched, half of the people on the thrones were men, the other half wore long dresses, and every single one of them wore that same sardonic expression, like staring at a bunch of hideous masks from a masquerade party. Gwynplaine's hands gripped his belt tighter and he felt her body pressed right up against his. Han's mind was reeling, this kid had actually been born looking like these people?

"Uh...I'm sorry," he turned and looked one way and another, "Who said that?"

"I did," he followed the voice to one of the men who stood up from his throne. "You address the Grand Duke Lucreto. You sought an audience with us."

"I did," Han said, feeling dumbstruck by the almost zoetrope effect of the same ghastly grinning faces staring back at him from every corner of the room, it felt like the walls were spinning.

"Who are you and what is your business here?"

"Uh..." he had to force his eyes shut to block out that image, for some reason it was making him feel lightheaded, he forced them back open as he said, "My name is Han Solo. My business here is...is..."

Gwynplaine about knocked him down pressing herself even harder against him as she said in a half whisper of terror, "They're monsters."

Han definitely understood the feeling, he had seen every kind of life form imaginable, or he thought he had, but none of the species' with tails or scaly skin or 50 eyes or two heads or tentacles or the ones that left a trail of slime behind them when they slithered, none of them, no matter how bizarre they might look, could compare to the monstrosities he was looking at now. Somewhere in him he was aware that their physical appearance only had about half to do with his disgust, he knew the truth of what kind of monsters they were, who'd pay some butcher to maim one of their own, a damn infant, and get rid of her like a piece of trash.

"Who said that?" a voice shot out from across the room. Han looked back and forth again but he couldn't figure out who had said it. Everybody stood stone still and there was no way to indicate where the question had come from.

It was one of the women, she stood up from her throne and demanded, "I demand you show yourself, this instance."

Han felt Gwynplaine's hands loosening their grip on him, very slowly, very timidly, she stepped out from behind him and moved forward to face the Vomanor family.

An ear splitting scream filled the room, Han saw the woman they were coming from and he guessed that this must be the grand duchess he'd heard so much about. That unsightly grin never moved, none of the muscles in the lower half of her face had moved, but her eyes had become balls of fire. He didn't know what had happened but he knew one thing, that was a scream of terrified recognition, somehow that women knew this was the child she'd thrown away years ago, and was very well aware of the threat her presence presented now.

"Infidels!" she screamed loud enough that Han thought his ears were going to bleed. She pointed a long finger towards them and commanded the guards, "Execute them!"

Chewbacca grabbed the two guards nearest him and slammed their heads together hard enough that even through their helmets the fatal crunch could be heard before their bodies slumped to the floor. Han stole the blaster off of one and started firing at the ones remaining.

"Come on!" he told the others when he saw nobody was watching the doors.

Gwynplaine made a beeline for the door but was caught before she could pass through. She was spun around and came face to face with one of the Vomanors, a young male who looked about her own age. He gripped her by the shoulders hard enough that something was about to break. Through those massive teeth in that unmoving grin, he hissed at her, "Die infidel scum."

With a strangled scream, Gwynplaine raised one hand enough to ram her knife into his throat. He made a choked sound as he left go of her, both hands instinctively going to his throat, she tried to extract the blade but it was stuck. His whole body was jerked forward as she tried again to pull the knife out, finally it gave way and she was able to run away from the ghoulish grin on the face of the dying man sprawled on the floor as he bled out.

Han and Chewie had made it into the hall and were looking for a way out, encountering guards every time they turned a corner. Sometimes shooting them with a blaster worked, sometimes Chewie had to grab one and throw them into the wall with enough force to fracture their skulls through their helmets. He collected a rifle off one of them and fired at other approaching guards. Han paused right beside a huge window as he heard someone else coming, he waited until he saw them, and he fired at them. He missed, they fired, they missed him, but only because he saw it coming and threw himself back and out of the way. Unfortunately he threw himself against the window at the same time the blast hit it, the glass exploded into a million pieces and Han fell through and hit the ground down below.

Time seemed to stand still, Han wasn't aware of anything, it didn't even dawn on him that he wasn't breathing, until he finally sucked in a pained inhale that came back out as a groan. He opened his eyes and was looking up at the sky, for a second he didn't remember anything. Then he heard a familiar wookiee howl and saw Chewbacca jump out of the window and saw that massive furry body coming right at him, but he didn't move, he wasn't even sure if he could move, it hurt like hell just to breathe. To his relief, Chewie landed a few feet away from him, wookiees always seemed to land on their feet, and he did, then he grabbed Han by the arm and pulled him to his feet, chattering.

"I'm okay," Han forced the words out, not really sure if he was or not, "I'm okay." He found he could turn his head, and did, and asked Chewbacca, feeling more than a slight sensation of panic starting to run through him, "Where's the girl?"

He heard her yelling and she sounded far away, he looked up and saw her appear in the giant hole that was the window a minute ago. She had a rifle slung over her shoulder and had a blaster in each hand she'd apparently taken off some of the dead guards along the way, and as a blast just missed her, she jumped out of the window.

Luckily for her, Chewbacca caught her about five feet before she hit the ground, and set her on her feet.

"Now what?!" she screamed at Han.

"Now we get back to the Falcon," he answered.

"How?!" Gwynplaine demanded to know.

Good question. Han looked around and saw the remaining guards and sentries were coming for them. He fired his blaster at one who was driving a landspeeder built for four right towards them, the vehicle crashed as the driver crumbled in the seat. As soon as that threat was eliminated, 20 more popped up and the smuggler and the wookiee had their hands full.

Gwynplaine ran over to the landspeeder and paused when she actually saw the driver. The shot from the blaster had taken off part of his helmet as well as part of his head, the remnants of it were still smoking and a gruesome sight. She grimaced in horror and disgust at the sight of it, but she pushed past it to try and figure out what to do. Reluctantly, she stepped in, set the rifle and blasters in the back seat, reached over and pushed the fresh corpse's body over the side, the top half toppled over the edge, she had to put her weight into it to upend the lower half of his body so his legs spilled over as well as the torso they were attached to. Once the dead body was finally out, she put herself in the driver's seat and looked at the controls, trying to figure out how to operate it. Having next to no idea what she was doing, she tried to get the vehicle moving, and in doing so it slammed forward so quick that she was almost thrown clear out of it. She got it to stop, and tried again, going slightly slower this time, but fast enough to pull up on the scene of Han Solo and Chewbacca slowly but surely working their way through the guards, but they were still vastly outnumbered.

Han was getting off shots left and right, his mind was in reaction mode instead of actually thinking, but he snapped back to his senses when he felt some of the hair on the side of his head get singed off by a blast. He stopped and stood there wide eyed for a second, then actually reached up and felt where the hair had been blasted off, it took a few seconds to realize his head hadn't been hit as well, and he looked around trying to figure out who was responsible, and his eyes widened even more when he saw Gwynplaine in the front of the inert landspeeder firing a rifle at the guards.

"Come on!" he told Chewie as they made their way through the fighting.

"Oh boy am I glad to see you," Gwynplaine said as they approached the landspeeder.

"Move over!" Han bellowed as he stepped over the side and took the controls, Chewie stepped over the opposite side into the back seat as Han got them moving.

"What about the gate?" Gwynplaine asked.

One of the guards got off a shot that about took both their heads off.

"We gotta get to it first," Han pointed out as he got the speeder moving, "hold on!"

Another shot nearly hit the landspeeder, Gwynplaine let out a curse Han wasn't overly familiar with and she grabbed the rifle, half threw herself over the side of the speeder and fired back at the guards. Han did a double take when he realized how accurate her shot was.

Compared to the Falcon a landspeeder was kids' stuff, Han was able to handle it with such ease he realized they were coming upon the gate a lot faster than he originally thought.

"Chewie, grab her!" he said, realizing they were about to hit the gate head-on, "I'm gonna try something!"

Chewbacca howled as he grabbed Gwynplaine and pulled her into the backseat with him and shielded her body with his. There was a sickening deafening noise to match the jolting impact of the speeder hitting the gate. By some miracle Han had hit it with enough force to knock the doors open, the front of the landspeeder was all smashed up, but it was still operable, for now. Unfortunately he knew there were more guards behind them, and it wouldn't take them long to catch up. He himself needed to catch his breath and when he did it felt like his insides had been as smashed up as the front of the vehicle.

The sight of the Millennium Falcon coming into view as they approached it, was the most glorious thing Han could ever remember seeing. He hit the brakes and the three of them piled out and ran for the boarding ramp, Han knew the guards would be closing in on them soon.

Han took enough time to risk one glance back and he told Chewbacca, "We gotta get going, we're about to have company."

"Let's hope the hyperdrive actually works this time!" Gwynplaine said as they entered the ship.

"Get strapped in!" Han ordered as he ran for the cockpit.

They had just started to leave the ground when he saw the royal family's armada show up, which promptly opened fire on the cruiser. Han got a few blasts off from the laser cannon before they finally exited the planet's atmosphere. Even for how disciplined Han Solo was in knowing the right moment to activate the hyperdrive so as not to collide with a black hole, he also couldn't wait to put as much distance between himself and everybody on Alavak as was possible.