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OK, folks... now that the NDA is lifted, the rest of you can see this story I wrote. It's based on a bug in Beta a while back, that listed some creature mounts as options for putting in your ship's droid socket. One creature mentioned was a lesser plains bol... so my warped mind came up with the Legend of Sparky!

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(Told in an 'old-crusty-miner' type voice)

Heya... what brings ya t' Dantooine? Not much out here since th' mines started t' die out. No sir... not like back in th' heyday of the mining rush. That reminds me of a story.. pull up a chair & have a listen...

There's a tale about a smuggler... used to operate out o' an old outpost near here, back in the Clone Wars days. He'd run shipments of minerals out o' there t' get 'em past th' Trade Fed tariffs. Had a modified Z-95 witha small shieldedcargo hold... would run small amounts of high-value stuff.Pretty good at it, he was... til disaster struck.

See, this fella had himself a pet... a lesser plains bol. Now, this little fella was named Sparky, and he was th' runtiest runt of a bol litter y' ever saw. Not even th' size of a R2 unit, he was... tiny little thing. Strong, though.. they say he could drag a disabled swoop 200 meters without th' thing's repulsors being online. Tough little beastie. Loyal, too... he'd be followin' his master around all over th' place, and would get right upset when th' fella would go off on a smugglin' run & leave him behind.

Anyway, things was good... until th' day when this smuggler decided to upgrade his ship with a droid interface, & got himself a R5 droid. Well, Sparky didn't know what to make of that droid at first... but then his master started spending a lot of time with th' droid, workin' on his ship... and the final straw was when th' droid got plugged into th' droid socket & went along with Sparky's master on his runs.

Well, little Sparky was havin' none of that... so one day, he got his revenge. This smuggler fella had a hatch on the bottom of his Z-95, and th' droid would get lifted up into place by a couple of hoists in the ship, kinda like th'ol' N-1 jobs they flew on Naboo. Well, the droid was locked into the socket, and Sparky's master was in his house workin' out final details with some customers. Sparky saw the hatch wasa little loose, so he pulled it open. There, over his head, he saw the central support leg of that R5 unit he hated so much. Sparky grabbed hold of that leg and started pullin' for all he was worth. The droid's screams didn't carry to th' house... and little Sparky managed to pull on that leg till the whole innards o' that R5 just popped clean out. Sparky dragged 'em off & buried 'em behind the hangar. Folks say all they found afterwards was th' droid's guts.. th' shell, battery & interface arms all were still plugged into the ship.

Anyway, Sparky runs back to th' hanger & crawls back up into that hatch... he's up inside th' shell of that R5, snufflin' around, and trips th' control that closes th' lower hatch. Well, that spooked Sparky... he started thrashin' around in there, and managed to bump th' danglin' droid battery against th' droid's arm stump that was plugged into th' ship's computer. Th' power spike started th' preflight sequence.

Anyways... Sparky's master comes out, sees his ship ready to go, climbs in & takes off. Now, this woulda been bad for little Sparky... except this ol' Z-95 had an air leak in the cockpit, which leaked right into th' droid compartment. Sparky was snug as a mynock next to a power cable. He could also just hear his master's voice from th' cockpit. A happy l'il bol was he.

Now, his master had a shipment t' sneak into Dathomir... so he sets up his nav computer, makes the jump to lightspeed, and they're off. A bit later... BAM! They're jerked out o' hyperspace by a Trade Fed cruiser runnin' a grav field generator! Droid fighters started swarmin' outta that cruiser's bays... and it looked bad for Sparky & his master. Th' smuggler started yellin' at th' R5 he THOUGHT he had back there... and this upset Sparky, so he started buckin' & thrashin' around... that battery started hittin' this interface & that... and wouldn't ya know it, each time it made contact, it gave th' smuggler just what he needed! Shield boosts... more engine power... first thing y' know, little Sparky & his master were well clear of the Trade Feds and free 'n' clear to head on to Dath.

Well, th' smuggler gets all excited, starts cheerin' & stuff... and little Sparky heard th' happiness in his master's voice, and started squealin' & jumpin' around inside that droid carcass...

... and smacked that loose battery right into th' hyperdrive controls!

Off they went, on an unprogrammed blind jump to nowhere.

Now, this all happened many years ago... but y'know, time in hyperspace is a funny thing, they say... and old spacers say that sometimes, if yer on a jump from Dantooine to Dathomir... and th' ion levels are low, and your comm is tuned to JUST the right frequency... you can still hear the frustrated shouts of that smuggler, tryin' to control his runaway ship... and the happy squeals of Sparky, the First Bol in Space!