Disclaimer: I do not own star wars or any of the amazing characters except Eshreal.

A/N: Hey guys thanks for being patient with me. But here's the new chapter. If you are familiar with anime you know what filler episodes are. These next few chapters will kinda be like that as I don't want to give anything away for the Neo Order but I still wanna give you guys something to keep you occupied. Hopefully you will like these looks into the back grounds of my original characters before the met up with Rey and Kylo and even each other.

Now that that's all out of the way please enjoy.

Chapter 8: Conversation

Eshreal

Eshreal had been all alone on Ilum for so long that she had stopped counting the days. Her home had been destroyed so there was no one coming for her. There were days that she wondered if it would have been better to just die with the rest of her people or to be captured and taken to the First Order. Anything was better than being so very alone on this frozen ball of rock.

She had mostly cleaned the CEC YT-2400 Light Freighter other than the engine room which had pretty much collapsed. Once she was done with the cleaning she had begun stripping the hulls of other ships to repair the various holes in the outside of the Light Freighter. She began to repair the ship from front to back. It took years.

On this particular day she was finally able to find the pieces she would need to stabilize the roof for the engine room so that she could finally start repairing the actual engine. She drug the parts behind her on a sled that she had made from the doors of one of the other ship wrecks. She had found stabilizers and enough bolts to attach them, ceiling panels she would have to cut to size to patch the inside and pieces of hull that would work as an outer patch.

As a 14-year-old who had spent the last 6 years all alone stripping parts from the various wrecks repairing the ship she'd been living in she really had no where to go when she did finish. Her people were gone, and she really didn't know much about this galaxy other than the fact that the First Order, the very people who blew up her planet, seemed to rule it.

That made this place very dangerous. So where would she go? With the way the few stormtroopers around here talked the ruling Republic was going to be wiped out any day. There was no way Eshreal was going to go join a society that was about to be taken over by the forces of the Dark side. If that was the case she could just stay here the rest of her life.

No she wasn't repairing the ship because she had somewhere to go; she was repairing the ship so that if she ever wanted to leave this floating ball of ice and rock she could. It was about having the option to leave if she really wanted to. If this ship was going to be her home for the rest of her life she would like it to actually have heat and power and the ability to fly her out of here if things ever got too crazy.

Eshreal was always aware of her environment even when she wasn't really paying attention to what she was doing. Today was no exception either. She had unloaded the parts needed to repair the engine room so that she could use her sled to transport the rubble she would remove from the ship. She was cutting through the rubble with her lightsaber and floating it over to the sled with the Force when something began to glow.

From her knowledge of machines she figured it had to be a droid of some kind trapped under the rubble. This ship had been here for decades by the layers of dust inside and ice outside that had built up so the droid probably wouldn't even function properly. Eshreal worked quickly to clear the rubble from around the light. She was shocked to find a purple and white astro-mechanic droid.

It's dome like head had been knocked off of its body and there was damage to the leg strut. After further inspection she saw that the battery box had also been damaged but she knew she had some of the pieces necessary to fix it. She managed to drag the droid back to her sleeping quarters where all of her tools and extra parts that she had stripped from totally destroyed droids were kept.

"Well lets open you up and see if I can't get you moving again," she said as she opened up the panels on the front of downed droid.

Wires had been disconnected when the panels of the dome had been crushed and separated from its body. The Radar lense was also cracked and both shoulder hydraulics were damaged. The more Eshreal took it apart to fix it the more she found wrong with it. She was glad that she had something to do for fun now.

Eshreal considered clearing and fixing the ship all a part of her Jedi training. Repairing this droid would be just for her. A friend of sorts. She opened another panel and discovered that the droid was a R2-D2 model.

It only took a couple of days before she got the droid online. The head swiveled around and the new radar lense taking in everything around it. It began speaking in the language of the droids almost too fast for Eshreal to understand.

"Hey wait slow down, little buddy," Eshreal said.

The droid still couldn't move around as she didn't have the tools to repair the left leg strut and didn't know where to get them. The droid began frantically beep again and Eshreal caught something about organics in white armor attacking the crew. One in black armor with a deep red lightsaber. The little droid was looking for its friends.

"Sorry, this ship has been here for a very long time. I don't think any of your old friends are around anymore, but I'm here. My name is Eshreal," she said introducing herself officially to the droid.

Eshreal could tell that the little droid was skeptical of her. She would be skeptical too. So, she kept talking to it.

"I found you about a week ago. The year is currently 23 ABY or after the battle of Yavin when the Legendary Luke Skywalker blew up the Death Star according to some old books that I had found," Eshreal said using a clean rag to wipe some of the grime from her hands and the droid.

The astro-mech let out a stream of beeps, boops and whistles that roughly translated to something about the droids known as R2-D2 and C3P-0.

"I don't know. I assume R2-D2 and C3P-0 are still with Master Skywalker. I didn't read anything about either of their destructions," she answered.

Astro-mech let out a whistle that sounded like a sigh of relief. Eshreal wondered if this one knew the Protocol droid or the Astro-mech personally but was too polite to ask.

"What's the last year you remember," Eshreal asked.

The droid seemed to think about it as Eshreal went back to worked on repairing the right shoulder hydraulic. For a moment she thought the droid had gone off line again but then the droid carefully began telling Eshreal everything it could remember. Which was quiet a lot but Eshreal had time. It wasn't like she had anywhere else to be. She had abandoned her training and repairing the ship until she got the Astro-mech up and running.

The Astro-mech explained that it had been on this light freighter since it was built but had never really been a part of the organics' team like those two famous droids but she, the droid referred to itself as a she which Eshreal found very interesting considering the droid didn't vocalize in basic like some droids could, had still found ways to make herself useful to them. She'd even gotten them out of a few sticky situations when fighting the Empire. The astro-mech made it clear that she was not particularly fond of organics and wasn't sure if Eshreal was any different.

"Well seeing as though you are the only friend I've got, I hope you see that I am worthy of your trust and friendship. In the mean time I have to go out and look for some tools, so we can get you mobile again," Eshreal said with a bright smile.

The droid beeped and whistled saying that Eshreal could call her R2-V5 as most of the parts she had used to repair the droid had come from a V5 model. Eshreal smiled even brighter. It was great having someone to talk to that would actually talk back. Many times, she prayed to the Force to show her father to her even if just in a dream. It had been so long since she'd heard his voice, or any friendly voice for that matter. So even if it was a droid who wasn't really sure it even liked Eshreal, she was happy for whatever conversation she could get.

Eshreal threw on her boots and heavy cloak with the hood up. Then she clipped her lightsaber onto her belt. With one final smile at her new friend she used the Force to place an exceptionally heavy piece of steel in front of her resting place so even if Stormtroopers came onto the ship they would never find that someone had been living there.

She stepped out into the frozen waste land that was Ilum and began wading through the snow that always seemed to be falling. After six years you'd think she would have grown used to the bitter wind and freezing temperatures but not yet. Instead she drew power from the Force to keep herself from slowly freezing to death.

She headed toward the nearest wreckage and crawled through the opening. It was one she had been in before and it didn't take long for her to get to the mostly destroyed workshop area. She began grabbing all of the tools she could find and stuffed them into her bag.

Next, she made her way down the curving hall looking for a storage closet or anywhere someone might keep oil and other things for droids. Just as she was giving up, she came a brand new, well very old, but unopen, completely sealed container of oil. Eshreal gave a shout of joy as she put the container in her satchel along with the tools.

"Did you hear that? Someone had to make those tracks and I'm betting they're inside," a voice said.

"It has to be that brat. If we get rid of her maybe the boss will get us off of this rock," another voice said.

"I don't see why Snoke can't come deal with her himself or send that apprentice he's got over on Kamino," the first voice said.

"Yeah," the second voice agreed.

Eshreal only a had a few seconds to decide if she was going to fight them on the ship or out in the open. She decided on out in the open and tightened her bag around her shoulder. She ran toward the opening and slid through it feet first just as one of the stormtroopers was getting ready to climb inside.

She kicked him in the head full force and ignited her blade just in time to slice through the blaster that the other stormtrooper had pointed at her. The one she had kicked shakily got to his feet and went for his blaster. Eshreal jumped over the other man and landed behind him as the first shaky shot was let off.

"Jameson, you idiot watch where you're firing that thing!"

Eshreal recognized the voice as the second storm trooper. She kicked him in the backs of his knees and put out her blade in one motion. She clipped it to her belt and reached out with the Force to rip the blaster from Jameson's hands.

"I can still shoot but I think the bitch may have given me a concussion," Jameson said, not even realizing that he no longer even had the blaster.

"Hey stupid, next time you insult someone make sure you still have a weapon," Eshreal taunted as she threw his blaster into the air, re-ignited her blade and cut it into pieces just as she had the other.

Then she kicked the man in front of her in the back sending him sprawling in the snow. Jameson let out a furious growl through his ugly stormtrooper mask and lunged at Eshreal who dodged him easily. These two were no match for her even on her worst day.

"Hey guys, now that you don't have blasters lets just call it a draw. You can live to fight another day and I can go back to what I was doing," she called with a smile.

"Never," Jameson cried.

"We have to take you down or bring you in," the other said finally get up out of the snow.

Eshreal dodged two punches from Jameson before punching him so hard she cracked his mask and then kicked him in his right knee cap, shattering it. She grabbed his arm and twisted it hard enough to yank it out of the socket. Once she was sure he was disabled she turned back to the other one.

He was holding another blaster and fired before she could react even with her reflexes. The bolt caught her in the stomach. Eshreal had never felt pain like that in her life. It made her angry. Almost as angry as when she had learned that this man called Snoke had ordered the destruction of her home world.

She grabbed the man by the throat and began choking the life from the man with the Force. She'd never felt power like this and immediately knew that it stemmed from the dark side. Before she could act on any of the impulses racing through her mind she tossed the man like a rag doll. She left them both where they lay and headed back for her ship.

She made sure to use to Force to cover her tracks this time. When it came time to lift the steel plate away from the door she was almost too weak to move it, so she moved it just enough to slip through and then moved it back. R2-V5 squealed when she saw the state of Eshreal.

"I'm fine, V5," Eshreal said setting her bag down on the ground and set the container of oil in front of the droid. "Nothing I haven't dealt with before," she said and sat heavily on her pallet before pulling her medical kit over to her.

V5 beeped and squealed at Eshreal.

"Some stormtroopers jumped me when I was trying to find more tools, so I can fix you up. Now I'm the one who needs fixing up," she said.

Eshreal pulled her shirt up and V5 could see the burned flesh and blood from the wound. The astro-mech beeped even more frantically. For supposedly unfeeling being the little droid sure seemed concerned about Eshreal. Essie chuckled to herself.

She took some ointment and bandages from the kit and gently applied it to the wound. She hissed out in pain. V5 whistled again.

"I've been shot before. Just not in the gut," Eshreal said, to which V5 responded with another round of beeps and whistles. "No. Well yes, I technically got shot trying to help you," Eshreal said.

The dome head on the droid began to spin as she let out another stream of whistles.

"Calm down, V5. I will live. I just need to rest," Eshreal said as she used the Force to wrap the bandages around her midsection. "But my dad always told me that friends would do anything for each other. Even take a shot to the gut," she said with a smile.

From that day on Eshreal and V5 were true friends. Once Eshreal got the droid mobile again they began working on fixing the Freighter up together. That wasn't the last time Eshreal got hurt saving herself and the droid but each time it happened their friendship just grew stronger until the droid knew that all organics weren't the same. Eshreal gave the droid a sense of belonging while the droid gave Eshreal her first friend in almost 7 years.

If you enjoyed please leave me a review. Even if you didn't, all input is appreciated.