10-4TO, also going by the moniker Bug Eyes, was an outlawed TO-series protocol droid. This droid, a protocol droid from the TO-series, was the subject of whispers regarding the critical plans it supposedly held within its memory banks for the Whiplash resistance battling the Galactic Empire. However, the droid and the data it supposedly contained were actually a trap set by Darth Vader to ensnare the Jedi Knight Jax Pavan. Vader's goal was to retrieve a pyronium nugget that Pavan had received some years prior. Subsequently, the droid was intentionally released on the planet of Coruscant, with the expectation that Pavan, known to be associated with the resistance, would locate it. Pavan's mentor initiated a search for the droid. The Jedi Master, after sustaining a fatal injury from Imperial stormtroopers, encountered Nick Rostu, a former Republic soldier. He entrusted Rostu with the task of relaying the mission to find 10-4TO to Pavan, which Rostu successfully did. Later, Vader orchestrated Rostu's capture and tasked him with finding Pavan. 10-4TO's programming allowed it to be controlled by the specific phrase "zu woohama," which compelled it to obey the individual who had most recently uttered the phrase. Furthermore, the droid possessed the capability to unleash potent stunning blasts upon organic beings through a blaster weapon integrated into its left arm.
The alleged significance of its data storage made it a target for Prince Xizor, a crime lord, as part of his final endeavor to attain the rank of Vigo within the Black Sun criminal syndicate. Dal Perhi, the leader of Black Sun, dispatched Xizor with instructions to locate the droid. Nevertheless, Perhi, having detected Xizor's ambition, used the mission to find the droid as a pretext to have Kaird, a Black Sun assassin, eliminate Xizor. This scheme failed, resulting in Kaird's capture by Xizor, who had by then discovered and taken control of 10-4TO. Xizor transported Kaird and 10-4TO to the Factory District, intending to subject Kaird to brainwashing. However, instead, feral droids had decimated his facility.
At this juncture, Pavan and his companions discovered the trio. Despite initial resistance, Rostu, who had joined Pavan's group, utilized the control phrase to command 10-4TO to release him. Xizor regained command of the droid and attempted to use 10-4TO to incapacitate the others before they could escape. The droid fired upon Pavan and advanced on him as he sought cover, only for the Jedi to stab it with a vibroblade. 10-4TO recoiled and plummeted through a transparisteel window, vanishing from sight, where it was subsequently attacked and destroyed by feral droids. Pavan and his group later learned from Haninum Tyk Rhinann, an Elomin defector from the Empire, that 10-4TO and its rumored data were merely a ploy to trap Pavan and held no actual value to the resistance.
Serving Sith Lord Darth Vader in 19 BBY, 10-4TO, also known as "Bug Eyes" because of its insect-like appearance, was a TO-series protocol droid. The Jedi Order was largely wiped out during the rise of the Galactic Empire in 19 BBY, with its survivors going into hiding from the Empire. Jax Pavan, a Human Jedi Knight, was one of these fugitives, hiding in the lower levels of Coruscant, the galactic capital. Vader became interested in Pavan because of a pyronium nugget that Pavan had once received and sought to find him in hiding. As such, Vader hired Haninum Tyk Rhinann, an Elomin aide, to help capture Pavan, though Rhinann was not aware of all of Vader's plan. Vader spread the word that a TO-series protocol droid called 10-4TO had a malfunctioning operating parameter that caused it to wander around Coruscant unattended, and that it was carrying information that could be vital to the new resistance movement called Whiplash that had formed to oppose the Empire. 10-4TO thought it was going to Whiplash headquarters, but its databanks had no such data; the droid's entire purpose was a trick.
10-4TO was released on Coruscant, and Pavan heard about the droid's alleged importance. Nick Rostu, a former decorated Grand Army of the Republic soldier, had found Pavan's former Jedi Master as he was dying after fighting Imperial troops while looking for 10-4TO. The Jedi Master told Rostu about the mission and asked him to tell Pavan to complete it. Rostu succeeded and told Pavan about the mission to find 10-4TO, saying it was his master's last request. Pavan accepted the mission, with the help of several others, including I-5YQ, an emancipated droid, Den Dhur, a Sullustan journalist, Laranth Tarak, a Gray Paladin, and Rostu. Rostu also told Pavan about the control phrase for 10-4TO, which would make the droid obey whoever had said the phrase most recently; the phrase was "zu woohama," a rude Wookiee saying. The ex-soldier offered to help him, but Pavan declined, feeling that he needed to complete his master's dying request on his own. To find the droid, Pavan asked for help from Laranth Tarak, and the two sought out Rokko the Hutt for his services as an information broker to help them find 10-4TO, who was rumored to be in the Yaam Sector of Coruscant. Rokko agreed to work with Tarak and Pavan to find 10-4TO, because the pair had said the droid was very valuable if it was recovered and returned to the Empire for credits.
However, while Pavan was looking for 10-4TO, Rostu was captured by the Empire and Vader, knowing that the ex-soldier had known Pavan during the Clone Wars. Vader sent him to find Pavan, threatening to destroy his family on Haruun Kal if he did not cooperate. Rostu reluctantly rejoined the hunt for 10-4TO, conflicted about his choice to betray Pavan to Vader. He was given the droid's location and sent on his way.
Pavan and Tarak were not the only ones looking for 10-4TO. The criminal organization known as Black Sun had also heard about the droid's alleged value from their contacts in the Imperial Palace. Dal Perhi, an Underlord, sent Xizor, a Falleen Prince who was one of his most promising members and was trying to become a Vigo, to recover 10-4TO, giving him information about the droid, including its control phrase. In fact, Perhi's mission was a trick to have Kaird, a Nediji assassin, kill Xizor, because Perhi saw Xizor's ambition as a threat to his own life. Kaird was also told that recovering 10-4TO would be a bonus if he was able to kill Xizor. Kaird tracked Xizor to the slums where 10-4TO was wandering and tried to take his life, but his aim was off and Xizor escaped. Kaird chased him and the two fought, but an electrical surge caused by a torn power cable weakened their combat abilities. As Kaird approached Xizor, 10-4TO, who was already under Xizor's control, ambushed the Nediji, stunning him with multiple blasts from his arm-mounted blaster.
Xizor ordered 10-4TO to keep firing on Kaird, only stopping to try to interrogate Kaird and find out who had sent the assassin. Kaird refused to talk, and Xizor had 10-4TO start shooting Kaird again. However, they were suddenly confronted by Pavan, Tarak, Dhur, and I-5YQ, who had been found and led to 10-4TO's location by Rostu, who had rejoined them without revealing his obligation to Vader. After a brief standoff where 10-4TO bought time with a crippling series of stun blasts into Pavan's party, Xizor and 10-4TO fled, carrying Kaird's unconscious body. They escaped by taking Kaird's ship, the Surronian assault ship Stinger, which Xizor flew to the Factory District on the other side of the planet. When they landed, 10-4TO asked Xizor why they were not at Whiplash headquarters, but Xizor simply reasserted his command of the droid by speaking its control phrase.
Xizor took 10-4TO and Kaird to an abandoned droid-manufacturing plant, where 10-4TO was ordered to deactivate itself for ten minutes. The droid did so, missing an ultimately failed demonstration of a human replica droid by Xizor. When the droid reactivated itself, Xizor order 10-4TO to accompany him and Kaird to a secret laboratory, where he planned on having Kaird brainwashed to attack Dal Perhi in revenge. Upon arrival at the laboratory, they found that the scientists had been slaughtered by the feral droids that roamed the Factory District.
Meanwhile, Pavan's party had followed them to the Factory District. Splitting off from the group, Nick Rostu located Xizor, Kaird and 10-4TO. Rostu attempted to convince Xizor that Black Sun had sent him to warn him about the approach of Vader, who was ostensibly en route to retrieve the droid. Xizor pretended to believe him, but instead used his Falleen pheromones to influence Rostu, who led the Prince and 10-4TO back to his companions, who were fighting off feral droids. Xizor then had 10-4TO advance and stun Pavan and the rest of his party. 10-4TO fired on I-5YQ, who returned fire in such a way that their beams intersected. The resulting explosion knocked I-5YQ offline while 10-4TO stunned the rest of the party so they could be bound with forcecuffs and restrained Rostu. The Falleen prince was preparing to execute Pavan with his own lightsaber when Dhur used a secret command to reactivate I-5YQ, who emitted a painful screech. Rostu then used his knowledge of 10-4TO's command phrase to command the droid to release him, and unsuccessfully assaulted Xizor. Xizor quickly regained control of 10-4TO by uttering its control phrase and ordered it to stop I-5YQ. The droids fired on each other and 10-4TO's beam was able to override the opposing blast and knock I-5YQ back.
With that opponent momentarily disabled, 10-4TO turned its attention to Pavan, who had temporarily eluded it behind cover. When 10-4TO approached, Pavan lunged at the droid, stabbing it between its thoracic and ventral plates with a vibroblade. 10-4TO staggered back, tripped over a piece of debris, and fell against a transparisteel window that had been weakened in the earlier altercation with the feral droids. 10-4TO crashed through it and fell. It was set upon by feral droids and dismantled. I-5YQ investigated its fate and reported back to the others once they were able to escape from Xizor. Pavan and his party would later learn from Haninum Tyk Rhinann—after the Elomin defected from Vader's service in an abortive confrontation in the Factory District—that 10-4TO contained no vital data and was only a decoy. Vader had pursued Pavan to the Factory District, tipped off by a tracker implanted in Rostu, but the impending destruction of an unstable reactor—courtesy of Pavan's lightsaber—forced him to temporarily break off his pursuit, which allowed Pavan and his party to escape.
10-4TO was a bipedal protocol droid of humanoid design, controlled by a central processing unit. Its chassis had a glossy black exterior, and its nickname "Bug Eyes" came from its large golden eyes, which looked like insect eyes and covered most of its face, as well as containing its photoreceptors. Two ten-centimeter-long segmented antenna joined at the temples of its head made the droid look even more like an insect species. The droid had both thoracic and ventral plating over its torso. 10-4TO was rumored to have vital information about the resistance movement in its databanks. The droid expected to be retrieved by the Whiplash movement, and was surprised when Prince Xizor claimed it instead.
When it was released on Coruscant in 19 BBY, the droid was programmed to blindly obey anyone who said its control phrase of "zu woohama." If multiple people said the control phrase, the droid listened to the person who had said the phrase most recently. 10-4TO was armed with a retractable blaster in its left forearm, which was set on a stun setting, though multiple shots to a target in rapid succession could cause serious injury or death. The droid also had hands that could grip objects, including people, with enough strength that a trained ex-military Human could not break free. It also had sensors that allowed it to detect approaching people and had enough initiative to warn its controller of their presence.
The search for 10-4TO was the focus of Michael Reaves' novel Coruscant Nights I: Jedi Twilight, which was published in June 2008. The search for 10-4TO brought Jax Pavan and I-5YQ together.
The death of Even Piell in Star Wars: The Clone Wars created a conflict over whether Jedi Twilight was canon, as Piell's dying words in the novel cause Pavan to search for 10-4TO. Lucasfilm never resolved the conflicting information. This article treats Piell's actions as canon, but does not explicitly state his identity.