When you hear the words "Isekai Protagonist", you tend to think one of two things.

The first is "lucky bastard" because their nerdy minutia and niche talent gives them an insanely competitive edge over whatever fantasy world they happen to find themselves in and the green light to form whatever kind of niche harem they desire.

The second is "oh fuck" because they're completely unprepared and underequipped for the rough-edged world they landed in, which means they're completely and utterly screwed as soon as the first real obstacle presents itself.

When I died and got reincarnated by, derivatively, a vehicular impact... I fell into the latter category.

Not only did I not reincarnate with any sort of "encyclopedic knowledge" of this far, far away galaxy, but by the time I was able to find out when I was in relation to the occurrence of the Battle of Yavin, it was already far too late for me to make any sort of difference with what little "meta-knowledge" I did have; Palpatine had already won, the Jedi Order no longer existed, and the Galactic Empire already held the universe in its fascist stranglehold. It'd be a decade, maybe more before any sort of "turning point" in the Galactic Civil War were to occur, which meant until such a point, I was nailed down by my toenails into the Empire's oily black shadow.

And as if matters couldn't get any worse, not only had I reincarnated into one of the worst eras of the Star Wars mythos to reincarnate inro, I had also reincarnated as the exact same "vanilla human" I had been when I'd died; completely "Force Insensitive", with a skillset that was almost completely obsolete in a galaxy dominated by space travel.

So you might be asking yourselves... Given my present circumstance, just what the hell did I do with myself?

I did what I did before I got reincarnated, because that was all I could do.

I took what I had acquired as a Blue Collar worker and turned as much of that into a "tradeable kill" as I could. I endured a soul-crushing job and a shitty apartment for who knows how many years, and eventually, I gambled my entire future on being able to make a better life for myself in the space lanes with a second-hand light freighter; a beat-up old YT-1000 that could've just as easily fallen apart the moment I'd set foot on the damn thing.

My light freighter, rechristened the "Not Yet Dead", needed a lot, nay, a metric shitload of TLC, but with the help of a sassy, beat-up Astromech I found in a junkyard somewhere and a contact I'd made in Mos Eiley, and I was able to install some after-market upgrades. Nothing military-grade at the start, but if there was one thing I became good at in this far, far away galaxy, it was running like hell at the first sign of trouble. Looking as beat-up as I did actually worked in my favor at times, because when I did finally decide to get the lead out with the Star Wars equivalent of Nitros, most times they were so-shocked by the sudden burst of speed from my flying scrap heap, that I was able to get enough spacing between us for a quick Hyperspace Jump to the next star system.

And sure, the Empire wasn't "one-hundred percent evil", there were plenty of logistical jobs I could've signed on for without ever having to do anything morally questionable... But even if I was desperate to make end's meet for a long time, I wasn't nearly desperate-enough to stomach the idea of working for Palpatine's deformed lovechild. Even if the quality of life in the Mid and Outer Rims was far higher than during the Republic Era at the height of the corrupt Senate's power.

Plus, knowing my already-shitty luck, I'd be sniffed out by an Inquisitor or a Moph and violently executed in an obscenely-public venue so as to be made an example out of. And if not that likely scenario, I'd be one of the background characters that Darth Vader kills for no reason because Anakin Skywalker turned into a huuuuuuuuge dick after his little "weenie roast" on Mustafar.

That or I'd, unironically, find myself stationed on the Death Star, a posting reserved for the best of the best in the Empire, right as the Rebel Alliance swooped in and Luke Skywalker "Luke Skywalker-ed" it all to hell with that Photon Torpedo to an exhaust port with strangely vacuum-like properties.

Putting those thoughts of hypotheticals and what-ifs to the wayside, I did all I could do; I kept moving forward, because no-one was going to do it for me.

I looked out for "Number One", avoiding any sort of superfluous attachment, keeping my head down, taking the shitty courier jobs no-one else in the Courier's Guild wanted as long as it kept the money coming in. All the while, hoping beyond hope that I could ride out the storm, maybe live long-enough to see the end of the Empire and eke out a modicum of comfort for myself before whatever the hell came next.

If I had reincarnated into the original "George Lucas Continuity", I'd have to weather the Yuuzhan Vong War and the technophobic hordes therein, amongst other cosmic horrors.

If I had reincarnated into the "Disney Continuity", I would have to sidestep the rise of the First Order, the Darth Vader wannabe Kylo Ren, and Palpatine's bullshit resurrection story, which the books did much better by the way.

All that changed one day when ten, normally-insignificant words, met my ear…

*STAR WARS*

"Spare any credits…" a weary, dejected voice pleaded, the clinking sound of metal on metal in a bucket reaching my ears. "Help a veteran get a warm meal…"

Mechanically turning my neck toward the splash of color in my peripherals, the dread that was welling up inside me swiftly turned to sadness at the sight that greeted me.

Slouched against a dirty wall and surrounded by detritus, helmet barely held in hand with a few dirty Credits glinting inside, was a man clad in battered Mark II Clone Trooper Armor bearing the colored stripes of the 501st Legion, a filthy green cloak that was more dirt than cloak hanging around his shoulders. Though he had borne the face of Jango Fett once upon a time, that face before me had since then become aged and weathered, topped by an unkempt mane of hair and a long, tangled beard that was starting to gray. His eyes, originally bright and full of purpose, willing to fight and die for his brothers if not the Republic, were dull and defeated, their owner going through the motions in a parody of life as he tried to endure "one more day".

He, who had been cast aside by the Republic he had once served, wasn't all that different from I who had been cast aside by my own universe, adrift with no safety net in place. And seeing this once-proud soldier brought so low… beaten, battered, and bruised by a world, an entire universe, that no longer cared about him with no place left for him to belong… It completely and utterly broke my heart, tears which I had thought were long-since exhausted falling down my cheeks anew…

Then, for the first time since reincarnating into this armpit of a universe, I did something for someone other than myself.

"Come on," I said taking a knee and holding out my hand to him; the helping hand no-one had offered me, of which I had wanted so-desperately to receive. "Let's get you cleaned up, put some hot food in your belly. After that… I could always use an extra pair of hands on my ship. What do you say?"

Maybe it was a little selfish and self-aggrandizing of me, wanting to stick my nose where it didn't belong for the self-satisfaction of helping a Clone Trooper who so-desperately needed it. But damn it, even a nobody like me wanted to do something that "mattered".

Even if the only person who would ever know it was a clone well past his warranty.

*STAR WARS*

"I'm hooome~" I called out in the familiar greeting as I returned to my ship, the Clone Trooper trailing behind me with what meager possessions he still had; his armor, helmet, cloak, a fistful of credits, a hobo bag, and a holdout DC-17 Blaster Pistol.

Sure, the only person other than me in here wasn't even a person, but even I longed for the simple joy of having someone to "come home to" after a long day at the sawmill. Something I'd had as much luck with here as in my home universe.

" . . . Why?"

"Why what?" I asked, turning to the Clone, shutting the door behind him.

"Why do you care so much?" he asked as he eyed the room from left to right, assessing for any ambushers.

"Why did you come with me if you didn't think I was being genuine?"

" . . . Because I knew there was good in you. That you genuinely cared about what happened to me," he replied after a moment. "Hardly anyone else... ever shed tears for a clone," he said looking down at himself, at what he'd been reduced to, before lifting his eyes back to mine.

" . . . You could say I grew up watching the Clone Wars unfold," I replied in a most-truth, the original animated series on Cartoon Network, the CGI animated series following the flagship movie, the books on audio, the YouTube videos on all the hidden lore, and the Prequel Trilogy movies coming to the forefront of my mind as I answered. "Even though the 'Boys in White' were on the other side of the universe from me... I was still rooting for you guys. More than anything, I wanted to see you all succeed, and yet... You deserved better. Better than what you were 'given' at least."

And it really says something about the storytelling that George Lucas pioneered "in a galaxy far, far away", that I was able to care so-deeply about a formerly-fictional character living on a street corner, when in "real life" I'd become so jaded and inured by fake pan handlers on street corners looking for hand-outs. People who probably had nice cars parked around the corner and an apartment filled with consumer electronics waiting for them at the end of a long day doing nothing of worth. People I by and large tended to ignore because I actually believed in a hard day's work, the sweat of my brow, and getting as much out of life as I was willing to put in to it...

" . . . I think the boys would've liked you," the clone said to me. "The generals too."

"That's... That's very high praise... Thank you...~" I reply, a small smile tugging at my lips and my chest swelling with pride; though it quickly soured when I remembered one of them had fallen to the Dark Side, the other was a sand hobo, and another "the other" was Force Gods-knows-where. "So... You got a name?"

"CT-6294. My... brothers... called me 'Max'."

"Well, Max. It's nice to meet you. Hey! Clank!"

An electronic trilling coming from around the corner, a familiar C1-series Astromech with matte gray coloring, dark-gray trim, and green optic lenses wheeled around the corner. As soon as he saw the dirty hobo standing next to me, the little droid yowled in shock, his head spinning at what I assumed was the feedback from some kind of olfactory receptor designed to detect potentially-dangerous changes in air quality.

"This is C1-4NK; 'Clank' for short. He'll show you to the refreshers while I prepare for liftoff."

" . . . Thank you. I really mean it," Max replied after a moment. "I don't know how much time I have left... but I'll make sure to pull my own weight."

His stomach growling like a hungry Rancor a moment later, Max averted his eyes slightly.

"You just focus on getting clean and getting fed," I said holding out my hand to him. "And welcome aboard the 'Not Yet Dead'."

"Not Yet Dead~... What's the story behind that?" he chuckled, returning the gesture.

"Get me drunk-enough, and maybe I'll tell you~"

Which while unlikely, wouldn't take very much. Even in a far, far away galaxy rife with space travel, alcohol was still "alcohol"; and my alcohol threshold before I became "buzzed" was still the 9-to-10 of those little "church-sized 'shots'" of flavored moonshine from that specialty store in the mall.

God... When was the last time I went to one of those...?

"Heh, I might just hold you to that," Max replied, a smile tugging at his bearded face before he followed Clank to the refresher, leaving me to my work.

Making my way into the cockpit, since I wasn't in any immediate danger of being attacked by a boarding party, I consulted the after-market Intra-Ship Security measure to see if anyone had placed a tracking device on my rig while I was out. Once I was satisfied I was "clean", I secured the five-point harness I had had installed so my first head-on collision wouldn't break my neck against the transparisteel windshield, and ran the pre-flight checklist. Once I was satisfied everything was in working order and no-one had siphoned the fuel out of my tank while I was out, I primed the Not Yet Dead's repulsorlifts and rose out of the shipyard before taking to the skies and plotting my course off-world.

Sure, the cargo holds were technically empty at the moment, and there was no shortage of work to be had on Daiyu... but my gut feeling told me it might not be a good idea to stick around. And given how-often my "gut feeling" had gotten me out of the building in time to avoid Imperial raids, barroom brawls, and all manner of life-threatening, time-wasting shenanigans, I was inclined to listen when my intestinal tract told me to get moving in lieu of my completely nonexistent Force Sensitivity.

Achieving escape velocity and leaving the atmosphere moments later, as soon as I'd finished plotting my Hyperspace Jump, the diode below to the Hyperspace throttle telling me I was still in Daiyu's gravity well changed from red to green. Nodding to myself after one final mid-flight checkup, my hand went to the throttle and slid it forward, after-market upgrades humming to life in the Not Yet Dead's engine bay and causing a familiar thrill shot through me.

"To infinity... and beyond...!"

. . . What? I might be trapped in a far, far away galaxy, but I can still be a huge nerd when I want to~

Most days, it's the only morale-booster I have...

*STAR WARS*

AN:
Seeing that homeless Clone Trooper in the second episode of Obi-Wan Kenobi, being the son of a military man myself, it completely and utterly broke my heart, and that sadness was swirling around inside of me so much, I just needed to… get it out of my head, you know? That scene kept me up at night, and it takes something really powerful to do that to me nowadays with how much I've learned from "Adulting 101".

When it comes to the sorts of stories I write, once I got out of writing Naruto crossovers in my earliest days, I tended to shy away from convention because "conventional" stories have been done-to-death so much that they aren't interesting to me anymore, and more often than not "blended together" to the point that I could scarcely tell one apart from the other.

If I were to be "reincarnated" into A Galaxy Far, Far Away, the likelihood is quite good that I'd be Force Opaque with nearly zero Encyclopedic Knowledge in one of the worse-off time periods to be alive in. People fantasize about Reincarnating because of "Survivor's Bias", only because they rarely stop to consider how things would be for them if the odds weren't "in their favor". While I'm a fan of Star Wars to be sure, my knowledge of the topic is not encyclopedic; hence if I were to write a Self-Insert faithfully instead of purely as "wish fulfillment power fantasy", I'd only "have" the knowledge I "know" for certain at the time I began penning the story.

This "story" is only intended as a one-shot; and only an explosive surge in popularity (read: Reviews) would convince me otherwise. If I were to continue, it'd likely be a "slightly depressing slice-of-life" story where I and the formerly-homeless Clone simply try to keep living and give ourselves meaning and a sense of purpose; "ride out the storm" as it were until the First and Second Death Stars got blown out of the sky. Maybe we'd get involved with the Rebel Alliance, meet some familiar faces from between the Original and Prequel Trilogies, but that's still up in the air until all of you, the readers, decide whether this story is a Hit or a Miss.

I mainly wrote this (possible) One-Shot as a little pick-me-up for myself because I really needed one at the time (middling June, 2022), but I hope you'll tell me what you think, and maybe check out my other works as well. They aren't nearly as depressing as this, for the most-part, but my more-recent works are a bit more mature, with a bit more nuance than when I first started writing FanFiction. And I like to think that I've come a long way since my earliest days as a recreational writer who just-then started to seriously delve into the internet in high school after I learned how to type proficiently.

So until I see you all again… My allegiance is to the Republic, to Democracy.