Pristi was never what one would consider a 'compliant' lad growing up. He always had questions, questions, QUESTIONS! His parents, simple folk who enjoyed peace and quiet. Alone among his 4 siblings, being the middle child, Pristi was an anomaly to his parents. Unsure what else to do, they took him to Kushiba, the city built by the Republic when Kushibah joined it several thousand years ago. The city was the main trade city on the planet, populated more by outsiders than Kushiban, nevertheless there were Kushiban like Pristi there.
However, unknown to his parents, the Empire had taken over the city. Living with distant relatives in the City, Pristi all but consumed every scrap of knowledge he could, never settling on one thing for more than a few weeks before moving on to another bit of knowledge. He was also fascinated by the technology and ships of the Republic now Empire.
Kushibah was a backwater rim planet, and there Empire's presence wasn't huge, but it was just as bullying and misanthropic as it was in the core, and the local Kushiban rapidly began to loathe the Empire, and humans in general. Pristi was soon part of the local Kushiban Resistance, and happily began scavaging tech and stealing ships from the Imperial forces and generally making their lives a living hell.
Along the way, he stole and reprogrammed an R3 unit the imperials had just gotten in. Putting the casing from an old beat up and burned out R2 unit in place of the shiny new R3 casing, he tinkered with it and reprogrammed it multiple times until he got it the way he wanted it, or until it got him the way it wanted him, which is which is a good question.
When the drive to go off planet came over him, Pristi had spent several years annoying Imperial forces, and it was relatively easy to get himself off planet. He put himself and R3A5 into an old T16 Skyhopper that was being trans-shipped through Kushiba, and rerouted it to the new planet. Once it was stored in the open field, as the routing instructions said, it was simple enough to start it up and fly it out toward where he was being drawn.
