The reason why I revealed that I could use the Force to a young Yoda was because it simply did not matter anymore.
When I first escaped the maximum security prison called the Prism, I understood that my Force powers could have been a dead giveaway. The Prism was a ghost prison designed to hold the darkest secrets of the Republic, and if I had levitated so much as a spoon in a public cantina during those early years, the Jedi Shadows or Republic Intelligence might have connected the dots to the prisoner who vanished. It was a small chance. It was a fraction of a percentage. But it was not a chance I was going to take at the time.
However, time is the ultimate camouflage. Two hundredish years had passed since my escape. The wardens of the Prism were dead. The records were likely corrupted or lost in the bureaucracy of the Republic. There was no chance in hell anyone was going to find out that I, a mere human businessman, had broken my biological limits and lived for centuries. To the galaxy, I was just the eccentrically wealthy heir to the Bee fortune.
The other reason to reveal my ability was an investment strategy.
Even now, young as he was, the Force hummed around Yoda like a heavy gravity well. He would become the most respected Grandmaster of the Jedi Order. That kind of power and connection was always welcomed in my book. It was better to befriend him now in his formative years and watch his power increase. I wanted to be the fond memory in the back of the Grandmaster's mind. I wanted to be the kindly uncle who offered wisdom and sweets rather than a potential threat.
The dinner plates had been cleared, but our conversation had only just begun. The many political questions Yoda had arrived with slowly morphed into questions of the Force. It was a natural progression. Once a Force user meets another outside the rigid structure of the Temple, there is an innate curiosity that takes over.
Both of us had expertise in different Force abilities, and it was easy to gain a little enlightenment in areas I was not naturally inclined to.
"Your telekinesis," Yoda said, watching me as I moved around the living area. "Different it feels. Not a push. Not a pull. A grip, it is."
"It is all about application, Master Yoda," I replied, walking toward the kitchen island.
Yoda had great power in his Force abilities. I had seen him nudge a massive statue in the garden earlier with a casual wave of his three fingered hand. His connection to the Force transformed his Force Push and telekinesis into a battering ram. He was a creature of raw and benevolent power. However, he was still too young to talk about the true balance of the Force. He had only bathed in the Light.
I stayed away from talking about the Dark Side and its benefits. The Jedi were notoriously inflexible about such things. Mentioning that passion could fuel power or that fear was a useful tool would only alienate him. Maybe in a couple of hundred years when the Golden Age of the Jedi was well established and he had seen the gray areas of the galaxy would I talk about it to Yoda.
In the meantime, I talked about my specialty which was Control.
"Show me, will you?" Yoda asked, hopping up onto a floating stool. "This control you speak of."
"Gladly."
I was not a genius in the Force, nor did I have the overwhelming midichlorian count that Yoda possessed. But throughout the years, I had refined my abilities through obsession and repetition. Instead of showing my impressive, darker abilities like my Red Force Lightning or the Doppelganger clone technique, I decided to demonstrate my Domain skill.
It was a technique I had learned from a Force sensitive species deep in the Unknown Regions. It was not about weight. It was about multitasking.
I closed my eyes and reached out. The kitchen came alive.
"Watch," I whispered.
Ten different knives lifted from the block. Four pans floated from their hooks. A bag of flour untied itself, and a jug of water uncorked.
It was one thing to lift tens of boulders in the air as that was just applying upward thrust to mass. It was an entirely different beast to control ten cooking utensils with each doing a completely different task simultaneously.
The knives began to chop vegetables at different speeds and rhythms. The pans danced over the heating elements. One pan sauteed onions while another seared meat. The flour and water mixed in a bowl with a whisk spinning rapidly, controlled not by a motor but by my will.
I was not just lifting them. I was operating them. I was feeling the resistance of the carrot against the blade, the viscosity of the sauce, and the heat of the pan.
Yoda watched with his eyes wide. "Precision," he murmured. "A web, you weave."
"Imagine the mind as a processor," I explained, not breaking my concentration as I plated five perfect meals in mid air. "Most Jedi use the Force like a hammer. I use it like a thousand needles."
With my unique ability to hide my Force signature to a certain extent, this control made me an efficient assassin if I wanted to be. I could pinch a singular artery in a crowded room without anyone noticing. I could stop a heart with the pressure of a thought.
"A hammer is sometimes needed," Yoda noted with a hint of defensiveness in his tone.
"True," I agreed, setting the plates down gently on the counter. "But a hammer leaves a mess. I prefer to leave nothing behind."
I was naturally inclined to secrecy and underhanded methods, and the Force had greatly increased my abilities in that area. But there was always more when it came to the Force. It was a shame that Yoda's greatest feat, or what would be his greatest feat, was in lightsaber dueling. Ataru was a frantic and acrobatic form. It was impressive, but it was loud. I was not great at swinging a glow stick. I preferred the silent kill.
Each day Yoda stayed was filled with talking and Force use. We moved from the kitchen to the outdoors.
We walked through a massive field of ripe Meiloorun fruit. The distinct smell of the fruit hung heavy in the warm air. It was a mix of melon and berry. The orange and purple rinds glistened in the sunlight.
Working the fields were children and teenagers. They were all from the families I had nurtured over the centuries.
"Careful with that crate, Jona," I called out.
A young boy who was no older than ten was levitating a crate of fruit down from a high branch. He wobbled slightly, but a girl nearby reached out with her mind and stabilized it for him.
"Got it, Uncle Bee!" Jona shouted.
Yoda walked beside me with his cane tapping the soft earth. He looked at the children with a mixture of wonder and concern. To him, untrained Force users living together was a recipe for disaster. To me, it was a community.
That is when I asked a question that had stumped me for many years. It was a philosophical itch I needed to scratch, and who better to ask than a future Grandmaster?
"Master Yoda," I said, stopping to inspect a particularly large fruit. "I have a question regarding the philosophy of the opposing side. The Sith."
Yoda's ears twitched downward. "Gone, the Sith are. Destroyed a centuries ago."
"Humor me," I said, peeling the fruit and offering him a slice. "It is purely for academic purposes."
Yoda took the slice. "Ask, you may."
"If the Dark Side users know that the Force is in everything alive," I began, gesturing to the vibrant field around us, "and if they know the Force becomes stronger with more life in the galaxy, then why do they kill so freely?"
Yoda chewed slowly. He was considering the words carefully.
"The power hungry Sith always wanted more," I continued, warming to my subject. "They crave dominion. They crave strength. But by slaughtering populations and by waging wars and by glassing planets, aren't they reducing the total volume of the Force? Aren't they shrinking the very pool of energy they seek to control? It is a contradiction. A parasite that kills its host is a stupid parasite."
Yoda stopped walking. He looked up at me with his expression troubled. He looked at the children playing and working in the field surrounded by life.
"The Dark Side is about consumption," Yoda said slowly, testing the words. "Not flow. The Sith take. Care not for the source, they do. Only the hunger."
"But it is inefficient," I countered, the businessman in me taking over. "If I owned a factory, I would not burn down the supply line to get the product faster. I would cultivate it. The Sith seem to lack basic economic sense."
Yoda did not have a concrete answer. He looked almost sad. He was too young to have fought the Sith in the Great Galactic War, and now the Sith were underground, hiding using the Rule of Two. He knew the dogma that the Dark Side was corruption and cancer and evil, but he did not understand the logic of it.
In the future, if Yoda was unlucky, he might come across them. But right now, he had no interaction with them. He could not explain their madness because he was too sane.
It tickled my funny bone that I was probably the closest thing to a Sith Lord that Yoda had ever met. I operated in the shadows. I hoarded power. I manipulated governments. I used attachments to strengthen my resolve. But I also nurtured life because life was profitable. Life was power.
"Perhaps," Yoda said finally. "Why they fail, that is. Blinded by greed, they are. See the future, they cannot."
"Perhaps," I agreed. "Or perhaps they just need better accountants."
The visit eventually came to an end. A Republic shuttle was hailed to take the young Master back to Coruscant.
When Yoda had to leave, I would like to say he learned a lot from me. I hoped he had picked up a few lessons on subtlety, on the value of community, and maybe even on cooking. But I was not sure. Yoda's species were unnaturally strong in the Force. Their connection was instinctual. What I could offer him in the form of understanding the mechanics of the Force might be nothing compared to his raw intuition.
We stood on the landing pad with the wind whipping at our robes.
"A fruitful visit, this has been," Yoda said, bowing slightly. "Grateful, I am."
"The pleasure was mine, Master Yoda," I replied.
I reached into the pocket of my fat suit and pulled out a small object. It was a heavy coin minted from Aurodium with the emblem of a bee on one side and a stylized tree on the other.
"A token," I said, pressing it into his small green hand.
Yoda looked at it. He seemed confused. "Payment, this is? Need it, I do not."
"Not payment," I shook my head. "Insurance. And a promise."
I leaned down, my voice dropping to a serious whisper.
"I am a private man, Master Yoda. I enjoy my privacy. My technology and my abilities are things I prefer to remain between us. I do not want to appear in the Jedi Archives. I do not want holocrons recorded about the Force wielding businessman of the Grove."
Yoda tilted his head. "Secrets, you keep."
"Everyone has secrets," I said. "In exchange for your discretion, meaning you never mention what I can do or the specifics of my technology to the Council or the Senate, I offer you this token. It represents a single favor in something of your choosing."
Yoda looked from the coin to me. "Any help?"
"Anything," I confirmed. "Whether you need a fleet of ships, a mountain of credits, a safe harbor for a thousand refugees, or just someone to kill a problem that the Jedi Code forbids you from touching. You send this coin to me, and it is done. No questions asked."
Yoda weighed the coin in his hand. It was a heavy offer. For a Jedi who was forbidden from attachments and possessions, a favor from the richest man in the sector was a dangerous thing. But he also sensed my sincerity.
"Agree, I do," Yoda nodded, slipping the coin into his robe. "Your secret, safe it is."
"Good."
I watched as he boarded the shuttle. I did not want too many secrets stored about me in data cubes in the Jedi Temple. The Golden Age of the Jedi had just begun, but it would not last forever.
I stood there until the shuttle was a speck in the sky. My mind was already casting forward and projecting through the centuries.
"Eight hundred years," I muttered to myself.
I did not want the Empire to find small nuggets of info lost in the Jedi Temple when it eventually fell. When Order 66 came down, and when Anakin Skywalker marched into that temple with the 501st Legion, they would scour the archives. If they found records of a man who could control technology with his mind and lived for centuries, Palpatine would come for me.
I shouldn't worry, really. The Empire was almost eight hundred years away. But paranoia was the reason I was still alive.
"Unit 5," I spoke into my comms.
"Yes, Master Bee?"
"Scrub the local sensor logs of the Jedi's visit. And start a background trace on the shuttle's nav computer. I want to make sure he did not record anything on the way out."
"Already done, sir."
"Good Boy."
I turned back to my Eden ship. The game was long, but I had just placed a very important piece on the board.
A/N
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