Dimly, he heard the ringing of boots on metal flooring beyond the door as Thrackan ran away.
“No, you’re not,” Ben told the ungainly assembly of droid components. “Anakin Solo’s dead. He died when I was little.”
The couplings where the droid’s torso units met its arm attachments lifted noisily, a gesture that looked like a human shrug. “Yes, I did die,” it said. “And I became a ghost, and I was eventually drawn here to inhabit this mutated clone body, where I could help my ancestors, the Corellians.”
“That’s not a clone body,” Ben protested. “It’s a droid body.”
The head swiveled so the droid could look down at itself. “You’re wrong, little cousin. Or you’re deliberately trying to confuse me. I suspect the latter. You’re here to sabotage this station, aren’t you? To destroy it, so the Corellians can never enjoy freedom and independence?”
“Boy, have they got you programmed.” Ben took a step forward, his lightsaber up in ready position. With his free hand, he gestured at the droid’s head. If he could use the Force to wrench it aside, he might be out of the droid’s visual receptors, allowing him to jump in and attack without the droid seeing what was coming
Ben convulsed and his vision blurred. He felt his entire body twitch and heard his lightsaber hit the floor and roll away, humming for a moment before its safety circuits switched the power off.
He shook his head and his vision began to clear.
He was a meter off the floor, the air around him shimmering. His legs still twitched.
The droid shrugged again. “I’m sorry about that. It’s an anti-Jedi defensive feature installed by my other cousin, Thrackan Sal-Solo. It constantly monitors brainwave activity in an area. When centers of the brain that tend to become active when Force powers are being utilized are detected, it turns on. Repulsors under the floor hold the Jedi safely above the ground, and electrical emissions-mostly painless-interfere with the Jedi’s concentration. See, you’ve stopped using Force powers, and it has stopped shocking you. Efficient, isn’t it?”
“Yeah, sure, whatever.” Ben reached down to draw his lightsaber back up to his hand … and jerked and jolted again as the defensive system electrocuted him a second time. After a few seconds of recovery, he said, “I guess it really works.”
“It does, doesn’t it? So, what were you going to do here?”
“Destroy the station, or at least disable whatever they’re using to regain control of the repulsor weapon.” Ben looked dubiously at the droid. “I guess that’s you.”
Pounding began on the other side of the door. Ben winced. The guards outside would be calling for reinforcements. And even as badly as he’d damaged the door, it would still be only a few minutes before they had it open.
He’d failed.
Well, not quite yet. “They tell you they’re going to use the station’s weapon to stay independent,” Ben said. “And that would be fine if that’s what it was all about. But it’s not. They’re lying to you. The first, big lie is that you’re Anakin Solo, and that you’re in a living body. You’re not. You’re a droid.”
The droid sighed. “Yes, yes. Of course.”
“It’s true! They needed Anakin Solo’s bio-bio-whatsis-“
“Biometric.”
“Yeah, biometric data to control the repulsor weapon. So they probably got his fingerprints from old records. They would have reconstructed his brain waves from whatever medical recordings they could find. Probably had to adjust them and mess with them until they could affect the station controls. And they installed them all in you, so they’d have an Anakin Solo who would think and behave like a human … but do whatever they say.”
“I’m Anakin Solo. I’m a Jedi. I have control over the Force. See?” The droid extended an arm, and Ben’s lightsaber flew from where it had rolled into its hand.
“That’s not the Force. I would have felt it if it was the Force.” Ben considered. “Since you can’t have repulsorlift vents installed everywhere in the room, it was probably directed magnetics. You grabbed the metal handle of the lightsaber with magnetics.” He tried to keep an expression of dismay and sadness from his face. He didn’t think he was very successful. It wasn’t just that his mission was in jeopardy; there was something grotesque about this situation, about dealing with a droid that honestly thought it was his cousin.
He’d have to find some way to destroy it.
“There are security holocams operating in here, aren’t there?” Ben asked.