21D2-AN excavation droid

The 21D2-AN excavation droid, also referred to as the 21D2-AN excavator unit, was a boxy model of excavation droid. During the Clone Wars, Count Dooku of the Confederacy of Independent Systems requisitioned two of the droids for a mission to the Expansion Region planet Diso. The count used the two excavator units to dig up the Temple of Diso, which was buried beneath hundreds of tons of salt under a salt flat. The work was completed in a matter of hours, but the temple heavily damaged the two 21D2-AN excavation droids when it reacted to its exposure, as the structure was vergence in the Dark side of the Force.

The two droids were heavily damaged but still mobile enough to be moved away from the temple by B1-series battle droids. Their parts were later collected by the local shaman Ensoor-Koda-Za and one of the excavator droid's claws was converted into an altar in his cave.

Description

The 21D2-AN excavation droid, or 21D2-AN excavator unit, was a model of huge and boxy excavation droid with massive scoop-claws. It was slow, but capable of moving hundreds of tons within a few hours.^[1]

History

Salt shovelers

During the Clone Wars, the Sith Lord Darth Sidious ordered his Sith apprentice Count Dooku, leader of the Confederacy of Independent Systems, to retrieve an artifact from the Temple of Diso on the Expansion Region planet Diso. As Sidious informed Dooku that he would need to dig during the mission, the count requisitions two 21D2-AN excavation droids and transported them to a salt flat outside a shaman's cave on Diso, which he had learned about from the locals.^[1]

Once the shaman, Ensoor-Koda-Za, revealed under duress that the temple was beneath the salt flat, Dooku ordered the excavation to begin, and the two droids emerged from the transport at a slow pace that Dooku found infuriating. Once B1-series battle droids had marked out the dig positions on the salt, the 21D2-ANs unfolded their claws and began digging. The droids uncovered the temple in a matter of hours, excavating hundreds of tons of salt and piling it mounds around the dig site and raising huge, jagged slabs to reveal the stepped pyramid structure underneath. Based on the results, Dooku was impressed by the excavators' capability and speed but when he realized that the artifact that he was to recover was the temple itself he decided the excavators lacked the meticulous attention to detail that would be required to dismantle and transport the entire temple for Sidious.^[1]

A building fights back

Its exposure having awoken something in the temple, which was a vergence in the Dark side of the Force, the structure began to react and one of the 21D2-AN excavation droids was lost when the north side of the temple collapsed. When the south side began to buckle, the remaining excavator tried to use its scoop-claws to stabilize the structure. The droid was then caught in an avalanche when the temple's outer wall began to slide and the heavy metal of the machine was wrenched apart, producing an earsplitting groan. Dooku managed to quickly calm the vergence, leaving the shattered remains of the two excavator droids scattered around the salt flat.^[1]

Despite their heavy damage, the two 21D2-AN excavation droids remained mobile and the battle droids accompanying Dooku were able to shift them off the salt flat when the Sith ordered the area around the temple cleared. The temple was then extracted using a combination of Dooku's Force powers and the tractor beam of an experimental transporter vessel produced by the Techno Union. Once the structure was safely in the transporter's hold, Dooku's battle droids began a rudimentary clean up around the excavation site, but the count was tempted to order them to only take what could be salvaged and leave the rest, as he doubted anyone else would ever visit the now empty site.^[1]

Parts repurposed

The Separatists did leave behind droid parts, including both pieces of B1-series battle droids and 21D2-AN excavation droids. Ensoor-Koda-Za gathered up these pieces and used them to create a shrine in his cave, using a fractured fragment of one of the excavator droid's digging claws as an altar. When the Sith Lord Darth Vader and a squad of Royal Guards, all also in service to Sidious, arrived at the cave^[1] in 19 BBY^[2] in search of the shaman, the Royal Guard commander, Colonel Halland Goth, recognized the altar as a droid part, initially having thought it was stone.^[1]

When Vader questioned Ensoor-Koda-Za about the source of his power, the droid parts around the cave, most of which were mounted on straw panels, began to shudder and then launch themselves at Vader. Despite being struck by many of them, Vader used the Force to choke Ensoor-Koda-Za, causing the remaining droid parts to freeze in mid-air. A straw effigy on the floor of the cave then caught alight, with the flames quickly spreading to the rest of the cave and forcing the guards to flee as Vader and the shaman were engulfed, although both escaped alive.^[1]

Behind the scenes

21D2-AN excavation droids appeared in a flashback in the 2025 novel Master of Evil, which was written by Adam Christopher.^[1]

Appearances

• Master of Evil (First appearance) (and audiobook) (In flashback(s))

Notes and references