Yoda was mindful of the force. Always. He knew like no other Jedi that the Force worked in absolute but difficult to perceive ways. The irony of this thought was not lost on him. After all, he was most likely the only Jedi left alive at this point: the others were slaughtered by the Empire, like unwanted cattle. If he had any colleagues left at all, they must be hidden as well as he was. And several months ago, Kenobi had died. He had felt it in the Force, like a fist clutching his heart.
Last night had brought little sleep. Normally, the daily routine of getting water from the well and preparing breakfast was soothing, but the phantom of gloom lay over him this morning. Sighing, he stood outside his little dwelling, staring at the swamp but not really seeing it. There was still some hope for the Galaxy, he knew, with Skywalker's children still alive. But what were two untrained youngsters to accomplish against the terrible might of the Sith? How could they succeed where ten thousand trained Jedi had failed? He had failed. He could have - should have - seen it all coming. Laboriously, he plowed his way through the fog towards the well.
It all seemed so far away sometimes. He had once been an important player in the history of the Republic, of history itself. But sometimes those memories seemed to be from a previous life, from some figure in a history book. Was he that Yoda? No. Not anymore. Now he was nothing more than an old, banished Jedi Master, close to death. He could feel this; foresee it somehow in the Force. And when he was dead, the Jedi Order was gone completely, and all he had worked for the last nine hundred years would have been for nothing. He cursed his longevity. No one should live long enough to see himself and everything he lived for be forgotten.
For ten thousand years, the Jedi Order had guarded the peace and security of the Republic, but in less than ten years they were reduced nothing but a memory. A bad memory, the kind you want to get rid of. The Empire had scapegoated them, had accused them of planning to crush the Republic. Ironically, it had been the Empire that had crushed the Republic.
The water from the well smelled and tasted like poison. This entire planet was a swamp. He had chosen to live here because it reminded him of his home world, where he had been born in anonymity. It seemed to him fitting that he would die here.
In an attempt to rid himself of the gloom, he spent the next hour after breakfast meditating in his little hut. It had started to rain. He knew this would continue for at least the rest of the day. Reaching out with the Force, he connected to the spectacle of life around him. Life was abundant on Dagobah, but it was all overshadowed by a planet-wide distortion of the Force. Some huge catastrophe had caused a permanent scarring of the Force on this world. It was this distortion that hid Yoda from the outside world more than anything else possible could. But it also caused him to feel depressed sometimes and it gave him bad dreams regularly. It also sped up his ageing process, but after twenty years of living with such terrible knowledge as he had, Yoda did not mind that anymore.
Suddenly, he felt the Force converge not far away. Startled, he opened his eyes and walked towards the window as fast as his little old legs could carry him. By the time he got there, he did not have to hear the chuckle to know what was going on outside his little hut.
Obi-Wan had come to visit him, from beyond the borders of death.