Another early morning on D'Quarr started the same as others. Rose awoke alone in her quarters (her room, really) to an alert on the holo that there was already a technical emergency with Poe Dameron's X-wing. Muttering curses her mother had taught her under her breath, she got dressed in the maintenance overalls, but still threw on her father's old yellow jacket he wore in his Rebel Alliance days. She could feel him in that jacket. She could smell the forests of Yavin IV and could feel his arms around her-one warm, the other cool and metallic under his black glove-but so very welcoming.
She hurried out into the barely-lit walkways, and glanced at the sun, a mere glimmer on the horizon. She let herself smile sadly, remembering her mother taking her to see the sunrises, her father to the sunsets, and her cousin to the Stars. She let herself remember in the dark, let herself slip. Then she continued on to the workshop for the day.
The lights flickered on, the caff began to brew in the old machine that only ran right if Rose started it, and she took a beginning look at Dameron's X-wing. Despite being freshly built out of the workshop, he'd managed to damage it already in a practice run. She sighed, and got to work. She liked fixing things. The galaxy needed a little fixing. Besides, it let her think over some things.
It let her remember that she was more than the quiet engineer that remained unnoticed by all. It reminded her of when the sky was hers.
Five years ago, she would have flown the x-wing. She loved flying. Her favorite memories were of being ten years old and her father showing her how to pilot his ship, Artoo whistling and beeping his encouragement. She felt invincible in those moments.
By this time now, she should have been a Jedi Knight, going on missions across the galaxy, lightsaber in hand. She should have been diffusing conflicts, rescuing innocents from pirates and finishing the last remnants of the Empire.
But instead, she was here, fixing an X-wing before the sun rose, ignored by everybody. And it was all because of her cousin.
She remembered that night all too well. Force, she was too young. She was too young to hear her classmates screaming, she was too young to have to hide, using the Force to mask her presence in hopes that her cousin wouldn't kill her, too. She was too young to pick up her mother's lightsaber, covered in blood. She was too young to be told to run, to fly away.
She was fourteen. Fourteen was too young to have to start again.
No one thought that Rose Skywalker had survived. So she told them she was Rose Exile. Because she was the Exile, awaiting her father's signal that her sentence would end. So she would sit in the workshop, becoming a last hope. She would sit, waiting for someone to call for Angel Blue.