“Chewie! It’s an Imperial ship! We gotta get outta here! Plot a course quick – just get us outta here!”
“Rrrroowwrr rrroorrwrrorr!”
“Ok, ok, I’ll drop the shipment. You get us back online. Quick! We don’t have any time to lose. This stuff is hot and we don’t want to be sitting ducks!”
“Rowwrrowrr.”
As Chewbacca worked as quickly as he could to repair the hyper drive on the Millennium Falcon, Han Solo dumped the cargo they were transporting. They were facing being boarded by Imperials and carrying illegal goods was not a smart thing to do at this particular juncture.
“Rrrwworr,” Chewie roared.
“Ok! Hit it!”
Without a second to spare, the Millennium Falcon shot into hyperspace, leaving not only the Imperial ship in its wake, but also, unfortunately, the sizeable shipment belonging to Jabba the Hut. Jabba, one of the most ruthless beings known, who takes pleasure in torturing sentient and non-sentient beings alike and who spends countless hours coming up with new and inventive ways of doing so.
“Chewie, we’ll make a couple of jumps, lose ‘em, and then double back and pick the shipment back up. It’s brilliant! They’ll never think of it and they’ll never find us. I know we’ll use a lot of fuel doing it, but we’ll make it up with completing the shipment.”
“Rrwwr. Rrroooorr.”
“It’s me. What could go wrong? Trust me!”
“Rrr.”
Three jumps later, Han Solo and Chewbacca return to Tatooine space only to find their worst nightmare facing them. The Imperials are still there.
“Rrrwoooorrrr!”
“I know! I know! Ok, fly casual. They won’t realize it’s us.”
Or would they? As the Millennium Falcon’s communication system began letting them know that the Imperials were hailing them, Han had a sinking feeling overcome him.
“Unidentified ship, prepare to be boarded for a health inspection. Any attempt to resist or evade will be met with lethal force as dictated by edict of the Emperor.”
Han replied, “We’re all ok here. No health inspection required. Thank you for your concern…How are you?”
“Unidentified ship, armed health inspectors are boarding now. Prepare to receive them.”
“Understood,” said Han. “Chewie, get those ‘health docs’ we ‘obtained’ last week, quick! Looks like we need ‘em.”
Half an hour later, the Imperial health inspector handed Han’s forged “health documents” back to him, the plastic hardly set, yet effective.
“You can go about your business, Mr. Solo. Watch out for pirates and smugglers. They’re thick in this part of space.”
“Gee, thanks, Sir. I will,” replied Han.
With that, the Imperials left and Han breathed a sigh of relief.
“Chewie, let’s go see if our shipment’s still there. It better be or it’ll be my neck.”
Han and Chewbacca veered the Falcon back toward where they had jettisoned what they knew to be illegal goods. Although, the Falcon had been equipped with smuggling compartments ideal for concealing such illegal cargo normally, this particular shipment was so sizeable, it was not possible to compress the load into the compartments, thus leaving him no choice but to take his chances and drop the shipment into space when faced with the prospect of being boarded by the Imperials. He hadn’t intended to do so initially, but when Chewbacca informed him that the hyper drive system was temporarily offline, he needed to make a split-decision.
“Any sign of it, Chewie?” asked Han desperately.
“Rrowrr rrwworrrr.”
“I was afraid of this. Either those Imperials picked it up or someone else did. We have no choice now but to get back to Mos Eisley, since we used most of our fuel making those jumps. Damn! Ok, here’s the plan. We’ll get to the cantina, scope out another job and pay Jabba back his money. Easy. Right?”
“Rrrrowr. Rrrrowwr?”
“I don’t know. I’m making this up as I go.”
The Falcon turned around and headed toward the planet, Tatooine as Han hailed Mos Eisley Space Port Authority.
“Port Authority, this is the Millennium Falcon requesting permission to land.”
“Permission granted to land at docking bay 94.”
“94. Thank you. Falcon out.”
As the Falcon landed and Han and Chewie disembarked, Han had a nasty feeling he was being watched.
“Chewie, let’s be careful. I have a bad feeling about this.”
“Rrrowwn.”
They began making their way through the bustling streets of Mos Eisley space port toward the cantina, a favorite hang-out of theirs. On the streets were many vendors selling their wares. Most were wary of approaching a pirate such as Han. One particularly bold individual, however, stepped right up to him and offered to sell him his fine Nubian Ducks, to which Han replied, “Now what in the Nine Corellian Hells would I want with ducks? I don’t have time for this!” Han stormed off toward the cantina with Chewbacca right behind him, chuckling.
They finally made their way to the cantina and found their favorite table in the corner empty. Han sat down, while Chewie went over to the bar to scope out a potential job.
Within two standard hours an old man and a boy came into the cantina. They really looked out of place, especially with their droids following them. Didn’t they know droids weren’t allowed in here? What were they thinking?
Friday, July 14, 2006
Lost Cargo
Posted by Hansgirl3 at Friday, July 14, 2006
11 comments:
A few grammatical problems, and I think that Han's character is a little off.* But other than that, nice job!
**The above was constructive critisism. No offense intended.
No offense taken, Yoshi. That's what this is supposed to be about, right? :)
Can you give me more imput about what you mean about his character being "off"?
Can you give me more imput about what you mean about his character being "off"?
His character (in your story) in my opinion is a little too "happy". The grammatical problems I am speaking of are in the first paragraph.
"We gotta get outta here! Plot a course quick – just get us outta here!”
____________________________________________
And, as Vicomte said, you need to incorportate more of your own dialogue, instead of using dialogue from the movies. :)
Thank you!
Thank you!
No problem!
okay, so Vicomte wants constructive crit huh? here goes.
I have to agree with YY that hans charater was off. Much to happy and over the top crazy. Saying "gee" to an imperial doesn't seem to fit. Everything was very fast, I was not sure where I was in the beginning. I think your idea was great, but could use some work.
I did like the thought.
Good stuff. But:
Your second duck reference (selling Nubian ducks) was a bit redundant. You already had one, so it seemed unnatural.
I tend to agree with the people who say Han's character is slightly "off", which mostly has to do with dialogue not being spicy enough. And perhaps a lack of action.
Personally, I feel you could expand on your descriptions. Lots of things were touched on briefly, but most of them not very deeply. For example:
Three jumps later, Han Solo and Chewbacca return to Tatooine space only to find their worst nightmare facing them. The Imperials are still there.
I'd rather have you describe the number of ships, their size, how threatening they looked, and what impression they really made on Han and Chewie.
I realise this is a personal preference, but I think it adds more depth to the story, and more involvement.
But, like I said: It's good. Don't be discouraged by me! :)
1. Too many phrases from movies kept popping up, and that made Han's dialogue seem simple. As if he repeats the same phrases over and over. Han needed to be more of a smartass than a "gee thank you sir" type of character. He's a scoundrel, that's why we love that character.
2. Why would Imperials do a "health inspection" at an Outer Rim world such as Tattooine? I was confused by that subplot of the story. We know from the movies that the Imperials were at Tattooine because they had pursued Leia there, and that they were looking for the DS plans. Imperials strike me as the sort that would just board a ship and not even bother explaining why. "Prepare to be boarded" would be all Han and Chewie would be told.
3. I would think that Han would be sly enough to realize that the Imperial ships would still be around Tattooine even after he did all those hyperspace jumps, and that Imperial ships would immediately gather up any cargo he had jettisoned.
4. Good use of the Docking Bay 94 reference, and it leads into your ending very well. For some reason the insertion of a vendor trying to sell Nubian ducks to Han Solo was really out of place for me.
Overall, it could use some work, but the concept for the story is very good.
I haven’t read any other comments posted here, so forgive me if I’m repeating what others have said. I prefer to read these alone, without...bias.
Overall, this story was fun to read. It’s a great concept, and makes a good lead-in to the movie. However, there were some problems in execution.
The major issue I see with this is Han constantly quoting his movie self. Throwing in the odd “I’ve got a bad feeling about this” is fine, but a story needs original dialogue. A movie quote may fit the situation, but I find it very distracting, as if I’m supposed to pause because there’s an inside joke in the text. Original dialogue will help the overall flow of the story, and make your work unique.
The way Han speaks seems a bit off to me. When we see Han in the cantina shortly after this story takes place, he has a very calm and laid back smuggler attitude. He doesn’t appear to be worried in the slightest when he is confronted by Greedo, and later by Jabba. In this story, Han appears to be constantly babbling in a nervous frenzy. In the movies, Han is very abrupt. He wouldn’t have these long streams of dialogue, since he doesn’t think usually think aloud to the extent that we see in this story. Also, Han seems to be constantly justifying his plans and ideas to himself in this story, which contradicts the movie Han, who simply says “don’t tell me the odds,” and goes through with it. This could probably be solved by breaking up Han’s dialogue into smaller chunks, so it doesn’t seem like he’s rambling.
Another problem that arises from Han having long streams of dialogue is Chewie’s lack of personality in this story. You did a great job of helping the reader make sense of what Chewie is saying though Han’s dialogue, but the problem is that Chewie doesn’t say anything of substance; it’s Han that does all of the talking, while Chewie only agrees or states the obvious. Give Chewie a more important role in the story.
While the dialogue does a good job of telling the story, perhaps a bit more description would help to develop a real sense of danger as the Falcon keeps making these narrow escapes from the Imperials. Most of the description in this story is background information, and it would be nice to see some descriptions of what’s going on. Also, the paragraph that starts “Han and Chewbacca veered the Falcon back toward...” becomes a bit redundant, since we already saw them drop the cargo. There is no need to tell us again, so describe what’s going on instead of putting background information in this paragraph.
Other than that, make sure you watch your verb tenses in the story and make sure they are consistent. For example, in this paragraph:
Three jumps later, Han Solo and Chewbacca return to Tatooine space only to find their worst nightmare facing them. The Imperials are still there.
It switches from past to present. So it should be “the Imperials were still there.”
Overall, I liked this story. It was a fun read, and it was nice to see Han and Chewie prevailing against all odds through cunning, and to a greater extent, sheer dumb luck, though never completely out of trouble and inevitable heading straight into another dangerous situation. The docking bay 94 reference was a great idea, tying this story to something recognizable in the movie. And that last paragraph was a great way to end off the story, leading into the Cantina scene, and showing Han’s first impression of his soon-to-be passengers.
Nice one!
As far as criticism goes, I agree with Marvy's critique.
I like the Docking Bay 94 reference, and the way the story leads in to "A New Hope".
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