Chapter Three
Breakfast around the Dursley house was always an eventful time of the day. This morning was no different. It began calmly enough. Harry came downstairs at around seven in the morning and started breakfast. Dudley was still supposed to be on the diet that Smeltings had strongly insisted upon the previous year, however, Harry was certain that he never stuck with it. If anything, Harry thought he was now so large that if by some miracle Dudley were to fall in love, he'd probably break it with his enormous mass.
Breakfast this particular morning consisted of three eggs for Uncle Vernon and Dudley with several strips of bacon and a half dozen slices of buttered toast each. Aunt Petunia claimed that this was definitely a diet for her Dinky-Dudleydums, and if that horrid school had a problem with the diet, they would just take him away from that awful place. Petunia herself could hardly manage to put away a single egg and a piece of toast. Harry idly wondered why she could not eat more. After all, she must have plenty of extra room in her exceedingly long neck to store as much food as that eaten by Uncle Vernon and Dudley.
And still things continued normally. Not five seconds after Harry had gotten the last of the food off of the stove and on to plates, the foundations of the house began to shake. Harry wasn't alarmed though. Sure enough, the doors of the kitchen opened enough to admit Dudley. Pushing and grunting, he managed to force his whale-sized carcass through the doors to the kitchen and waddled as fast as he could to his place at the table. Dropping himself in to the thrice-reinforced steel frame of the chair, he began to berate Harry loudly for his food. Harry wordlessly brought it over and plunked it down in front of him.
His uncle's entrance was slightly less noticeable, but only slightly. His aunt on the other hand might not have even existed so little sound did she make on her way to the table.
They had almost finished eating when the normality of the morning was shattered by the sound of the mail being dropped off in the slot.
"Get the mail, Dudley," Vernon Dursley grunted without looking up from his morning paper (Harry had learned early on to make sure that his uncle had the paper at his spot when he arrived in the kitchen).
"Make Harry get it," the whale of a boy replied.
"Get the mail, Harry."
"Make Dudley get it," Harry replied, inwardly grinning as he remembered a similar situation nearly five years ago.
Then, however, the conversation changed from what had happened before.
"Boy, you will get the mail and not complain again or there'll be trouble," his uncle spat at him, hitting him in the face with a bit of chewed egg as he sprayed his mouthful in his anger.
Harry had had enough. He wasn't so much angered at his uncle's attitude toward him as he was fed up with it. At this last statement by his uncle, accompanied by the offending egg, something inside Harry changed. He felt a sense of determination to make his uncle see that he would not put up with it anymore.
Not knowing what he was doing, Harry raised his hand, moved it in a slight side to side motion, and stated matter-of-factly, "you will make Dudley get the mail."
Vernon's reaction to this could not be more of a shock to his nephew as the man swiveled toward Dudley and said, without emotion, "you will get the mail this instant, Dudley."
And Dudley went. He was so shocked by this attitude from his father that he forgot even to fake some tears to get himself out of it. Petunia, too, was nonplused.
Not knowing what had happened and not wanting to stick around for his relatives' wrath, Harry fled the kitchen, retreating back to the relative safety of his bedroom.
* * * * * * * * * *
'Did I just do that', was Harry's first confused thought after he slammed the door to his bedroom? His heart was racing as if he'd just run a marathon and his hands were shaking as he picked up his quill and, to distract his thoughts from the morning's odd events, began to write thank you notes to all of his friends.
Soon enough, however, he was finished with that and his mind had nothing to do but to continue to think about what had happened.
He hadn't felt much different. He felt no more or less helpless than usual as his aunt and uncle treated him like particularly vile dirt. Only his determination to not be bullied and bossed by them anymore had been different. He had felt that if he gave in this one more time, he would be lost to himself forever. There was no better explanation than that.
* * * * * * * * * *
{Decided, it is then?}
Harry was back in the same place as the night before. It was the same black void, the same voices, and seemingly the same argument picking up right where it had left off the last time.
{It is apparent that we have no choice anymore. You saw what happened with his relatives this morning. The boy's powers are starting to emerge on their own.}
This was the older rich voice again, the one that had been called Master Windu.
{But who will train him, Masters,} the one called Anakin wanted to know.
{Master Yoda,} the voice of Master Windu was speculative.
{Assist, I will, if necessary. However, the primary training of young Potter I think should be left to another. What think you, Master Qui-Gon Jinn? Able to take on this challenge is Kenobi?}
Harry's mind was in a whirl. What did they mean, train him? Who were these people with names that sounded like they belonged in some foreign court of royalty? Before he could answer any of these questions, a deep voice resonating power spoke.
{It is as I said all those years ago, My Master. Obi-Wan is as ready as he will ever be. He has much to learn of the living Force, but he is ready and able to take on this assignment.}
{Then, if certain you are, Master Jinn, introduce the two of them we shall.}
And then, there was light. It was not bright at first, nor could Harry detect its exact color. It seemed to take several moments before the light became bright enough for him to see any of his surroundings. The light was a pale blue light, yet it seemed to radiate power, more power than Harry had ever seen in a person. Eventually, the light became so bright that Harry had to raise his hand to block out its intense glow. And then, it was over. The light peaked in its brightness, then seemed to implode, leaving behind a dull afterglow.
Finally, Harry decided it was safe to lower his hand. What he saw pushed all questions of the phenomenon he had just witnessed from his mind.
A man was standing there.
He was neither tall nor short; he was muscular without appearing bulky; lithe and graceful as the fiercest predator yet with eyes gentled by wisdom and a deep loneliness. Harry stared at him for what seemed like ages, feeling himself drawn to the man as he had been to none save Dumbledore. Yet not even Dumbledore seemed to possess the inner confidence that seemed to radiate from the stranger.
Harry opened his mouth without realizing he had any intention of doing so. What came out was also not anything he would have expected. {Cool haircut.}
The man's auburn hair was neatly cropped to a short military style with only a single braid hanging down behind his ear. To Harry, this made him look all the more like a mythical character come to life. He was wearing a brown non-descript robe that looked slightly frayed around the edges and was held shut by a wide belt of some make Harry had never seen before. Attached to this belt there was a short tube that seemed to be made of some metallic substance and made Harry think of the mysterious handle he had received earlier that day.
{I'm glad that I meet with your approval, young Mr. Potter.}
The voice was more elegant than any voice Harry had ever heard. He thought he could probably live his whole life and never encounter another voice that could soothe, command, and promise all in the same breath.
{Yes sir}, was all that Harry could mumble back.
{We begin tomorrow night, young Padawan. A Padawan is the name for an apprentice to a Jedi. For now, it is time for you to wake up. Your assignment which begins tomorrow, but is a continuing assignment, is for you to try to remain calm at all times. Peace and tranquility is the first step to becoming a Jedi. It does not mean you can not feel emotions like fear, anger or anxiety, or any other emotion for that matter. It means that you must learn to recognize these emotions, then fight them off. I will show you how.}
Harry had no time to ask questions before the scene faded abruptly, and he sat up groggily in his bed at Privet Drive.
* * * * * * * * * *
Harry could not believe his luck. The Dursleys had gone up to see Aunt Marge for two whole days and steadfastly refused to take Harry with them. Aunt Marge had never set foot in Privet Drive since the horrible incident where she had been blown up like a balloon after making Harry too angry to realize what he was doing. For this reason, the Dursleys obviously refused to take Harry with them. Since Mrs. Figg, the old lady who usually watched over Harry while he was home for the summer and the Dursleys had to leave the house, wasn't home and they could find none of their other friends who would agree to watch their nephew, the family had grudgingly left him alone to fend for himself for the next two days.
"Boy," Uncle Vernon had said before leaving the house. "This is your last chance here. You do anything---anything at all involving your funny business or freaky friends---and when you return to that freak school of yours it'll be without your eyeballs." Vernon Dursley had been so close to Harry when he said this that Harry could see a bit of meatloaf from last night's dinner lodged between two of his back teeth. Vernon had then raised his fingers and made a gouging motion towards Harry's eyes before spinning on his heel and storming out the front door, slamming it behind him with a decisive thud.
Scarcely had the Dursleys' car left Privet Drive heading out of town then Harry abandoned his chores for some entertainment. He was hardly ever allowed to watch TV or do anything else while his relatives were home. If it involved anything Harry wanted to do that wasn't sit in his room, then Uncle Vernon, Aunt Petunia or Dudley would be sure to put a stop to it at once.
With the skies promising rain, Harry decided that perhaps a movie was in order. Shrugging to himself as he perused the Dursleys' wide variety of films, he finally shrugged and chose one at random. Sitting back in Uncle Vernon's chair (Uncle Vernon would surely have ripped Harry's head from his shoulders if he had seen this) he started the movie and was immediately entranced. It was something called "Star Wars- A New Hope".
He was thoroughly enjoying the plot about an evil empire trying to bring rule to an entire galaxy while a small outnumbered group of beings fought against them. The similarity to the situation with Lord Voldemort was quite striking. Substitute stormtroopers with Death Eaters and the resemblance would be uncanny.
The name should have given it away, he would think later. However, it was not until ten minutes later that he saw something that made him sit straight up with a muffled cry of surprise. The young hero, Luke Skywalker, had just been overpowered by a couple of strange alien creatures called Sand People. They had then been busy looting his land speeder when a quivering cry had broken out. The Sand People, who looked quite intimidating to Harry, broke and scattered without a second's delay. Harry had watched eagerly as a shadow grew on the horizon of the planet with two sons (how cool is that, Harry had thought when he first saw the picture) and resolved itself in to the form of an old man.
That was when Harry gasped.
The man was older, hair much different from the vision he had seen him in, but when he first spoke "hello there", Harry was sure.
It was Obi-Wan Kenobi.
TBC
Breakfast around the Dursley house was always an eventful time of the day. This morning was no different. It began calmly enough. Harry came downstairs at around seven in the morning and started breakfast. Dudley was still supposed to be on the diet that Smeltings had strongly insisted upon the previous year, however, Harry was certain that he never stuck with it. If anything, Harry thought he was now so large that if by some miracle Dudley were to fall in love, he'd probably break it with his enormous mass.
Breakfast this particular morning consisted of three eggs for Uncle Vernon and Dudley with several strips of bacon and a half dozen slices of buttered toast each. Aunt Petunia claimed that this was definitely a diet for her Dinky-Dudleydums, and if that horrid school had a problem with the diet, they would just take him away from that awful place. Petunia herself could hardly manage to put away a single egg and a piece of toast. Harry idly wondered why she could not eat more. After all, she must have plenty of extra room in her exceedingly long neck to store as much food as that eaten by Uncle Vernon and Dudley.
And still things continued normally. Not five seconds after Harry had gotten the last of the food off of the stove and on to plates, the foundations of the house began to shake. Harry wasn't alarmed though. Sure enough, the doors of the kitchen opened enough to admit Dudley. Pushing and grunting, he managed to force his whale-sized carcass through the doors to the kitchen and waddled as fast as he could to his place at the table. Dropping himself in to the thrice-reinforced steel frame of the chair, he began to berate Harry loudly for his food. Harry wordlessly brought it over and plunked it down in front of him.
His uncle's entrance was slightly less noticeable, but only slightly. His aunt on the other hand might not have even existed so little sound did she make on her way to the table.
They had almost finished eating when the normality of the morning was shattered by the sound of the mail being dropped off in the slot.
"Get the mail, Dudley," Vernon Dursley grunted without looking up from his morning paper (Harry had learned early on to make sure that his uncle had the paper at his spot when he arrived in the kitchen).
"Make Harry get it," the whale of a boy replied.
"Get the mail, Harry."
"Make Dudley get it," Harry replied, inwardly grinning as he remembered a similar situation nearly five years ago.
Then, however, the conversation changed from what had happened before.
"Boy, you will get the mail and not complain again or there'll be trouble," his uncle spat at him, hitting him in the face with a bit of chewed egg as he sprayed his mouthful in his anger.
Harry had had enough. He wasn't so much angered at his uncle's attitude toward him as he was fed up with it. At this last statement by his uncle, accompanied by the offending egg, something inside Harry changed. He felt a sense of determination to make his uncle see that he would not put up with it anymore.
Not knowing what he was doing, Harry raised his hand, moved it in a slight side to side motion, and stated matter-of-factly, "you will make Dudley get the mail."
Vernon's reaction to this could not be more of a shock to his nephew as the man swiveled toward Dudley and said, without emotion, "you will get the mail this instant, Dudley."
And Dudley went. He was so shocked by this attitude from his father that he forgot even to fake some tears to get himself out of it. Petunia, too, was nonplused.
Not knowing what had happened and not wanting to stick around for his relatives' wrath, Harry fled the kitchen, retreating back to the relative safety of his bedroom.
* * * * * * * * * *
'Did I just do that', was Harry's first confused thought after he slammed the door to his bedroom? His heart was racing as if he'd just run a marathon and his hands were shaking as he picked up his quill and, to distract his thoughts from the morning's odd events, began to write thank you notes to all of his friends.
Soon enough, however, he was finished with that and his mind had nothing to do but to continue to think about what had happened.
He hadn't felt much different. He felt no more or less helpless than usual as his aunt and uncle treated him like particularly vile dirt. Only his determination to not be bullied and bossed by them anymore had been different. He had felt that if he gave in this one more time, he would be lost to himself forever. There was no better explanation than that.
* * * * * * * * * *
{Decided, it is then?}
Harry was back in the same place as the night before. It was the same black void, the same voices, and seemingly the same argument picking up right where it had left off the last time.
{It is apparent that we have no choice anymore. You saw what happened with his relatives this morning. The boy's powers are starting to emerge on their own.}
This was the older rich voice again, the one that had been called Master Windu.
{But who will train him, Masters,} the one called Anakin wanted to know.
{Master Yoda,} the voice of Master Windu was speculative.
{Assist, I will, if necessary. However, the primary training of young Potter I think should be left to another. What think you, Master Qui-Gon Jinn? Able to take on this challenge is Kenobi?}
Harry's mind was in a whirl. What did they mean, train him? Who were these people with names that sounded like they belonged in some foreign court of royalty? Before he could answer any of these questions, a deep voice resonating power spoke.
{It is as I said all those years ago, My Master. Obi-Wan is as ready as he will ever be. He has much to learn of the living Force, but he is ready and able to take on this assignment.}
{Then, if certain you are, Master Jinn, introduce the two of them we shall.}
And then, there was light. It was not bright at first, nor could Harry detect its exact color. It seemed to take several moments before the light became bright enough for him to see any of his surroundings. The light was a pale blue light, yet it seemed to radiate power, more power than Harry had ever seen in a person. Eventually, the light became so bright that Harry had to raise his hand to block out its intense glow. And then, it was over. The light peaked in its brightness, then seemed to implode, leaving behind a dull afterglow.
Finally, Harry decided it was safe to lower his hand. What he saw pushed all questions of the phenomenon he had just witnessed from his mind.
A man was standing there.
He was neither tall nor short; he was muscular without appearing bulky; lithe and graceful as the fiercest predator yet with eyes gentled by wisdom and a deep loneliness. Harry stared at him for what seemed like ages, feeling himself drawn to the man as he had been to none save Dumbledore. Yet not even Dumbledore seemed to possess the inner confidence that seemed to radiate from the stranger.
Harry opened his mouth without realizing he had any intention of doing so. What came out was also not anything he would have expected. {Cool haircut.}
The man's auburn hair was neatly cropped to a short military style with only a single braid hanging down behind his ear. To Harry, this made him look all the more like a mythical character come to life. He was wearing a brown non-descript robe that looked slightly frayed around the edges and was held shut by a wide belt of some make Harry had never seen before. Attached to this belt there was a short tube that seemed to be made of some metallic substance and made Harry think of the mysterious handle he had received earlier that day.
{I'm glad that I meet with your approval, young Mr. Potter.}
The voice was more elegant than any voice Harry had ever heard. He thought he could probably live his whole life and never encounter another voice that could soothe, command, and promise all in the same breath.
{Yes sir}, was all that Harry could mumble back.
{We begin tomorrow night, young Padawan. A Padawan is the name for an apprentice to a Jedi. For now, it is time for you to wake up. Your assignment which begins tomorrow, but is a continuing assignment, is for you to try to remain calm at all times. Peace and tranquility is the first step to becoming a Jedi. It does not mean you can not feel emotions like fear, anger or anxiety, or any other emotion for that matter. It means that you must learn to recognize these emotions, then fight them off. I will show you how.}
Harry had no time to ask questions before the scene faded abruptly, and he sat up groggily in his bed at Privet Drive.
* * * * * * * * * *
Harry could not believe his luck. The Dursleys had gone up to see Aunt Marge for two whole days and steadfastly refused to take Harry with them. Aunt Marge had never set foot in Privet Drive since the horrible incident where she had been blown up like a balloon after making Harry too angry to realize what he was doing. For this reason, the Dursleys obviously refused to take Harry with them. Since Mrs. Figg, the old lady who usually watched over Harry while he was home for the summer and the Dursleys had to leave the house, wasn't home and they could find none of their other friends who would agree to watch their nephew, the family had grudgingly left him alone to fend for himself for the next two days.
"Boy," Uncle Vernon had said before leaving the house. "This is your last chance here. You do anything---anything at all involving your funny business or freaky friends---and when you return to that freak school of yours it'll be without your eyeballs." Vernon Dursley had been so close to Harry when he said this that Harry could see a bit of meatloaf from last night's dinner lodged between two of his back teeth. Vernon had then raised his fingers and made a gouging motion towards Harry's eyes before spinning on his heel and storming out the front door, slamming it behind him with a decisive thud.
Scarcely had the Dursleys' car left Privet Drive heading out of town then Harry abandoned his chores for some entertainment. He was hardly ever allowed to watch TV or do anything else while his relatives were home. If it involved anything Harry wanted to do that wasn't sit in his room, then Uncle Vernon, Aunt Petunia or Dudley would be sure to put a stop to it at once.
With the skies promising rain, Harry decided that perhaps a movie was in order. Shrugging to himself as he perused the Dursleys' wide variety of films, he finally shrugged and chose one at random. Sitting back in Uncle Vernon's chair (Uncle Vernon would surely have ripped Harry's head from his shoulders if he had seen this) he started the movie and was immediately entranced. It was something called "Star Wars- A New Hope".
He was thoroughly enjoying the plot about an evil empire trying to bring rule to an entire galaxy while a small outnumbered group of beings fought against them. The similarity to the situation with Lord Voldemort was quite striking. Substitute stormtroopers with Death Eaters and the resemblance would be uncanny.
The name should have given it away, he would think later. However, it was not until ten minutes later that he saw something that made him sit straight up with a muffled cry of surprise. The young hero, Luke Skywalker, had just been overpowered by a couple of strange alien creatures called Sand People. They had then been busy looting his land speeder when a quivering cry had broken out. The Sand People, who looked quite intimidating to Harry, broke and scattered without a second's delay. Harry had watched eagerly as a shadow grew on the horizon of the planet with two sons (how cool is that, Harry had thought when he first saw the picture) and resolved itself in to the form of an old man.
That was when Harry gasped.
The man was older, hair much different from the vision he had seen him in, but when he first spoke "hello there", Harry was sure.
It was Obi-Wan Kenobi.
TBC