TheForce.Net - Completely Unofficial Star Wars Encyclopedia

Dashta Eel

Description

Additional Info

Related Entries

Sources

Images

Legend

native to the planet Ord Cestus, these unusual, blind eels were generally classified as non-sentient, despite the fact that they had an incredible affinity to the Force. This combination of non-sentience and Force sensitivity made the dashta unique in the galaxy, as the level of Force sensitivity rivalled that of many humanoid races. Millennia before the Clone Wars, during the early history of Ord Cestus, the dashta eels fled the surface to live in the grottoes beneath the mountains, finding the gruesome struggle to survive a distasteful series of events. They remained hidden for millennia, until they were discovered by the settlers who began making their homes in the caves of the Zantay Hills. The Cestians believed that the dashta eels were given the gift of Force sensitivity by the Guides, those few eels which were fertilized and grew to maturity. The unfertilized eggs grew, but never reached maturity. The dashta eels were believed to have been named for their only known habitat, which consisted of underground pools and lakes found beneath the Dashta Mountains. In reality, they were named for their discoverer, Kilaphor Dashta. Because the eels were hard to raise anywhere else, the supply that was available for use in producing JK-series security droids was exceptionally small, being formed only from the numbers of unfertilized dashta eel eggs. The Guides gladly gave the unfertilized eggs to the Cestians, as a gift that would help the Cestians gain wider acceptance in the galactic community. This made the JK-series almost prohibitively expensive. When Count Dooku offered Cestus Cybernetics a supply of Gabonna memory crystals in addition to speciallized cloning facilities to produce neural tissue that matched the native Cestian dashta eel, Cestus Cybernetics readily agreed to supply JK-series droids to the Separatists. Unfortunately, the deal was all a sham, as cloning the dashta proved virtually impossible. Instead, the deal was maintained in an effort to draw the Old Republic and the Jedi Knights to Ord Cestus. Unknown to the Separatists, however, was the fact that the immature dashta eels used in the JK-series droid would go insane when placed on the battlefield, rendering the JK-series droids useless. The Guides, upon learning of the plans to use the JK-series droids in combat, lost a measure of trust in their Cestian companions. In the wake of the destruction of the Five Families, the Guides fled into the deeper caverns with the dashta eels, and were not seen again.