Inheritance


9.


"It's not a first class accommodation, but the steward has issued us a private cabin," I inform the two newcomers.

The spaceport is unending cacophony, a paroxysm of disorder. The Skywalker boy is peering out into the clamor, awe-struck. I doubt he heard a syllable of what I said; but his master nods once, a corner of his mouth twitching upward. He understands that the beleaguered ship's steward intends to show us the maximum degree of respect possible without compromising the profit margins of his company; the free berths assigned to us reflect his painstaking tabulation in which the loss of a first class cabin fare was weighed against the potential displeasure of two Jedi. "Well," Kenobi remarks, "At least it's not the cargo hold."

I don't miss the subtle nudge he gives his Padawan, to reel the boy's wandering attention back to the present moment – but I pretend not to have seen. Skywalker starts a little and immediately looks up at his teacher, carefully folding his hands into opposite sleeves and adopting a slightly swaggering gait as I lead the way up the wide passenger ramp into the ship's interior. It's strange to see Kenobi trailed by his own personal shadow; not so long ago, it was Qui-Gon Jinn who was perpetually attended by a gangly and hero-worshipping echo of himself, one that imitated his every gesture and habit with profound dedication to form and detail.

Force, I suddenly feel old.

A porter droid importunes us halfway down the interior corridor. ""Luggage, good sirs?" it inquires politely, tugging an already heavily laden trolley behind it.

"No, thank you," Kenobi replies. Seldom would a Jedi bring more than he can carry, and that in a small satchel. We flatten ourselves against the bulkhead as the porter drags his trolley past, the precarious stacks of valises and travel cases wobbling comically atop its hovering platform. The luggage droid is followed by another, this one pushing a food cart down the narrow aisle, heading for the first class cabins on the starboard side.

Skywalker tugs at Kenobi's cloak as we move on, blond head craning over one shoulder in the direction of the disappearing droids. A savory aroma mingles with the scrubbed tang of 'cycled air.

"Patience," Kenobi tells him, a soft line appearing between his brows.

Our cabin door is battered and the pressure pistons emit a discordant shriek when it slides open, but the space within is clean – by Galactic spacefaring standards – and comfortably outfitted with cushioned acceleration couches, the sort that can be converted to bunks for longer journeys.

The Skywalker boy knows enough protocol by now to wait until his elders are seated before flopping unceremoniously down beside his master. His feet swing a few centimeters off the floor. "When's breakfast?" he whispers in Kenobi's ear.

"At lunch, if you mention it again," the latter person warns him, casting me an apologetic look before turning a severe eye back upon his apprentice. Skywalker's gaze flits from his mentor's face over to mine and then back again, before he subsides into a sullen knot of oversized cloak and bristling gold-tipped hair.

A little patience would do the Padawan some good. I decide to overlook this first display of less than perfect comportment. Even I was a growing and famished boy at one time. Old Yoda could tell the stories, if he ever desired to publicly humiliate me – and though I've not given him occasion to exercise his magisterial rights in any number of decades, I would be foolish to say that he never would. Yoda is nothing if not unpredictable.

And we do not always see eye to eye, whatever common Temple opinion might dictate.

Yesterday's private conversation regarding Kenobi and Skywalker was a paradigmatic example. My old master was in one of his moods.

"Defiant, the boy is," he chuffed at me. "Defiant, too, the master. Reap the fruits of a shared flaw, they do. Speak not to me of leniency, Mace Windu. Hear you I do not."

I prepared his favorite tea. Such cantankerous statements are nothing more than the dross of his displeasure, a hedge of thorns and barbs erected against the faint-hearted. I learned long ago to push through such psychic obstacles. Besides, he does not frighten me. Not with his needling words.

"Sweet-cane in your tea?' I offered. Yoda hates the stuff.

"Vile. How drink such filth you can, I know not." he snorted back.

"So you do hear me." Ha. And no, he did not acknowledge the hit, but I had his real attention at that point. This is the only way to speak to him when he's in a snit. I should know.

All I received in reply was a wave of the hand and a wrinkle of his nose. But I know what that signifies. I sat down opposite, like any youngling ready to receive instruction, and leaned forward earnestly. "It's not right that we should so burden any one Jedi with the training of that boy. He's… unique. Possibly in history. Obi-Wan deserves the benefit of the Council's wisdom, the experience of centuries. He can't be expected to reinvent Jedi training single-handedly, when he's barely completed his own."

And that's when the old one caught me completely off guard. He can do that, even now. "Underestimate him, perhaps you do," was his laconic retort.

Fierfek. There are things about Yoda I will never comprehend, vast canyons and abysses lying deep beneath the ocean of his long experience, places deep in the Force where I have never yet penetrated. Some of it concerns the future, the great balance, the shifting of Light and Dark. I hope I have the wisdom to know when to back away, however.

I bowed my head. "I merely plead the cause of compassion, master."

He can never resist that. Fifty years ago – yes, a full half-century – I was already taller than he is. We both had more hair then. And I called him master, morning noon and night, and developed the first foundations of Vapaad while dodging playful strikes at my shins from that infernal gimer stick of his. He won't turn a deaf pointed ear on an appeal to such a hallowed bond.

He grunted at me, crosser than ever. "Very well, youngling. Interfere at will, you may. Perhaps learn something also, you will." One blunt claw was thrust under my nose, and then he lapsed into peevish silence, wrinkled lips pursing as he sipped at his revoltingly bitter, unsweetened tea, green eyes regarding me sagely over the bowl's rim.

And maybe I will indeed learn something. But Yoda's threats to that effect don't frighten me, any more than the Force itself would. I decide that none of us – neither Kenobi nor Skywalker, nor myself – should embark upon such a profoundly educational venture on an empty stomach. I summon an attendant from the outer corridor and watch in amusement as my two traveling companions' blue eyes widen in surprise at my demand that the droid bring us the most extensive breakfast available on the shipboard menu.

"Wizard," the Skywalker boy reverently intones, and for once, Kenobi omits to reprimand him for it.