Skirmish aboard the Eravana Thirty years after the Battle of Endor , during the cold war , a skirmish occurred in the Western Reaches aboard the " Eravana " , a freighter belonging to the smuggling duo of Han Solo and Chewbacca . Shortly before the skirmish Han Solo and Chewbacca managed to recover their lost starship , the " Millennium Falcon " , which the First Order fugitives Finn and Rey had escaped from the planet Jakku on . Their joy was short - lived however , as parties of the Guavian Death Gang and Kanjiklub boarded the freighter to collect the debts owed to them by Solo . While Han tried to talk the boarding parties down , Rey accidentally released a trio of vicious rathtar s from the cargo hold . The rathtars stormed through the freighter , killing several gangsters and giving Han , Chewbacca and the fugitives a chance to escape on - board the " Falcon " . Launching away from the freighter at lightspeed , they managed to escape the freighter and kill a rathtar that had attached itself over the cockpit . Prelude . Han Solo and Chewbacca , at the point where they found their old ship , were undertaking a contract to transport three rathtars , hideously dangerous beasts , to King Prana , who was hoping to upstage a rival . Having lost most of his crew when the rathtars ate them , Han ' s situation was further complicated by the arrival of the Guavian Death Gang , a criminal group who had loaned him 50 , 000 credits for the job . Telling Rey and Finn to hide below , also keeping BB - 8 with him as leverage so they didn ' t try and run off , Han greeted the Guavian representative Bala - Tik and his escort , who were seeking their investment back after learning that Solo had also cut a deal with Kanjiklub . Despite Han ' s attempts to deny this , Kanjiklub themselves showed up and things began to turn sour . Bala - Tik , noticing BB - 8 , recognized him as the droid the First Order was looking for along with two fugitives and began searching the freighter . Rey , in the vents below , formulated a plan to stop both gangs by closing the blast doors in the corridor . Unfortunately , she hit the wrong fuses ; instead of closing the doors , she inadvertently cut the ship ' s power and opened everything that was previously closed , including the pens holding the rathtars . The freed beast ' s horrible cries echoed throughout the freighter , to everyone ' s consternation . The skirmish . Bala - Tik , hearing the roars , decided to simplify things by simply killing the two smugglers and taking the droid by force . Right before they could shoot , however , the Guavians were suddenly attacked from behind by one of the rathtars , which announced its presence by howling and seizing two of the soldiers whilst the rest of them scattered or ineffectually tried to shoot it . At the other end of the corridor , Kanjiklub were in the same predicament with the second rathtar , while Han and Chewie took the opportunity to flee while being pursued by the rathtar that had been attacking the Guavians . They managed to shake the creature , however , by tossing an unfortunate Kanjiklub member into the creature ' s maw . Meanwhile , Finn and Rey emerged from the vents and ran through the corridors seeking safety . As Rey inquired as to what rathtars looked like , having never seen one before , they rounded the corner to find one in the middle of devouring three gangsters and quickly fled back the way they had come , only for the third rathtar to seize Finn and drag him off . Rey briefly gave chase , but quickly realized that she stood very little chance against the creature even if she caught up to it and instead managed to free Finn by closing a blast door on the tentacle holding him . Meanwhile , Han , Chewie and BB - 8 were trapped against a blast door to the hangar by some Guavians , who managed to injure Chewbacca with a shot to the arm before they were dispatched . Using Chewie ' s appropriated bowcaster to blast open the door , they met up with Rey and Finn and boarded the " Falcon " in order to escape . While Finn attempted to tend to the injured Chewie , Han and Rey prepped the ship for take - off , which was complicated somewhat by a rathtar that had latched itself onto the cockpit window and was attempting to bite through it . Deactivating the compressor preventing the hyperdrive from engaging , the " Falcon " then made a jump to lightspeed from within the hangar ( a feat generally regarded as impossible ) , the extreme acceleration literally ripping the unfortunate rathtar ( which was still clinging onto the ship ) asunder . Witnessing the escape , Bala - Tik informed the First Order that the droid they sought was with Solo .