The portal device exploded, and I could feel the rip in the universe. The Force violently stormed around the area, and for an instant I thought I could even feel a strange, Force-less gap, outside the universe. Then the storm in the Force quieted back to its normal placid state, at a lower level than normal, even. With my senses stretched out to try to figure out what was going on, the sudden void was shocking, but it wasn't as if the Force was gone. There was just—less life, less anything, outside my immediate presence.

All this was processed in a split-second in my mind, more in the realms of feelings and concepts than actual thoughts. The first thing I noticed with my physical senses took a bit longer to understand. I was in a poorly-lit room with flickering lights, black walls and floors, and white shapes just visible beyond the darkness. The room was rattling and shaking—earthquake? No, this was more like airplane turbulence—and only my affinity for the Force let me maintain my balance. Indeed, the vague white-clad figures I could see around me were holding onto supports to stay standing. Looking more closely, I noticed they were wearing stormtrooper armor.

There weren't many explanations for why I would be in an airplane with a bunch of people in stormtrooper armor—a promotional event with the 501st Legion, maybe, but I'd never done that before, being too keen on staying out of the public eye whenever possible. But when combined with the shaking airplane (or dropship), and the flickering lights, well…I'd seen this scene far too often recently not to know where I was, and I knew I'd be in trouble if the stormtroopers saw me.

Fortunately, only a few weeks ago, I had finally figured out the Force technique used by the Fallanassi to become invisible. I immersed myself in the current of the Force, letting it wash over me and direct light through me. It was just in time, too.

"What was that?"

"What?"

"I saw someone right over there. Not a stormtrooper." Just then, the lights stabilized and lit up the room completely. A stormtrooper was pointing right at me.

"There's nothing there. Focus on the mission." I breathed a quiet sigh of relief before thinking about what to do next.

Okay. It seems very likely that the malfunctioning portal device dropped me right at the beginning of The Force Awakens. What am I going to do about it? I'll just have to survive and treat this world is real until the device's designer can build a new one and get me back. Okay, first thing that's going to happen will be these stormtroopers attacking the village. I really don't think I can stop this many stormtroopers, so I'll have to keep hiding. Although, Kylo Ren's kind of lame, I bet I could take him in a duel—but I have to remember, he was injured when he fought Rey, and even though he didn't complete his training, I've never had formal lightsaber training either. Anyway, there's no way I could take him and the stormtroopers all at once. So okay, I stay hidden, follow BB-8 until he meets Rey, and then…honestly, I should probably stay hidden, I don't want to mess things up too much and lose my foreknowledge. If I don't interfere, she'll meet up with Finn, and I can sneak on the Falcon with them and just stay there until they get to Maz's cantina. There's no real way I can stop them from blowing up the Hosian system, is there? Oh well, at least I should be able to save Han. I could probably stop Kylo Ren from capturing Rey in the jungle. And yeah, that shouldn't stop the Resistance from blowing up Starkiller Base at all.

So yeah, that's the plan. Stage 1: Stay invisible, follow BB-8. Hopefully we'll be far enough away that Kylo Ren can't sense me when he gets here. I was trying to hide my Force presence, of course, but I wasn't 100% sure I could keep it up while also remaining invisible and running through the sand after BB-8.

Not much later, the dropship landed and the stormtroopers ran out, blasters firing. I could already feel the deaths from the battle in the Force as I followed after them. There was a sick feeling in my gut as I watched the outnumbered villagers get killed by the stormtroopers. I'm a Jedi! I'm supposed to be able to stop this! But no, I need to stay hidden, I can save more people that way. I won't save anyone if I'm dead. But am I really sure I'd die if I fought back? Am I just refusing to help out of my fear of death? It's not 100% certain I'd die if I fought. Although I really shouldn't get cocky, I'm not used to fighting stormtroopers and dark siders. But still, all these people are fighting back against the First Order, for whatever reason, I don't even know why, but they have no chance of victory and they're still fighting. Is my life really more important than theirs? Well yes, probably, but I can't let them sacrifice themselves while I stand here and do nothing.

"Fuck!" I dropped the Force invisibility, pulled my lightsaber from my belt, ignited it, and shouted, "Hey, stormtroopers! Over here, I'm a Jedi! Fight me!" I had to draw them off from the villagers to give them a fighting chance, and this was the best way I could think of.

I felt a burst of violent intent from the nearest stormtrooper and turned to face him, but there was no incoming blaster fire for me to deflect. "Jedi!" he shouted, throwing his blaster to the ground and pulling the electrostaff-thingy from his belt, turning it on, and whirling it into a ready position for combat. Crap, I forgot they had these. I thought maybe I'd stand a chance if I could kill enough stormtroopers before Kylo Ren got here, but if I have to fight them all in melee, there's no way I can do it. Oh well, I'll just have to go down fighting. The stormtrooper charged towards me, swinging the staff in a heavy overhand swing that I had to brace myself to block. As a weapon with actual physical weight, the staff was a much slower weapon to wield than a lightsaber, but when it was swung quickly enough, it became really hard to stop. I had to block the staff close to the hilt of my lightsaber so he wouldn't get as much leverage, and even then he almost knocked the blade out of my hand.

But he didn't, and now that we were engaged in a close-up fight, the staff's weight became a disadvantage. We traded a few blows, and I could tell the stormtrooper was far more physically fit than me, but my Jedi reflexes and lighter blade won out before too long, and I cleaved the stormtrooper in two. Before I could catch my breath, three more stormtroopers attacked with their electrostaffs, but the quickness advantage my Jedi reflexes and lightsaber gave me meant that they weren't much harder to beat than one had been. Evidently, the stormtroopers realized this as well, as I was next faced with only a single stormtrooper once again. I complained, "Come on, are we really going to do this? Are you just going to come at me one at a time until I've killed you all?"

"We don't have to beat you, just stall you until Kylo Ren shows up. This way gets the least of my troops killed." It was Captain Phasma, her shiny silver armor reflecting the light of the fires that raged around the village. "And don't even think of running now that you know he's coming. We've got you surrounded."

I took stock of my options. I could either keep fighting until Kylo Ren got here, or…well, I probably wasn't killing them fast enough to make a difference to the villagers. Plus, assuming I hadn't screwed things up too much already, one of them was Finn, and I really didn't want to kill him. "Why don't we pass on the whole fighting thing? I'll just stand here until Kylo Ren shows up. He's almost here, anyway, and killing you guys doesn't get me anything." I gestured up in the air at Kylo Ren's descending dropship as I spoke.

"Agreed." Glancing around at the stormtroopers surrounding me, I realized that I was still distracting a reasonable number of stormtroopers, so hopefully that would help.