Conversation Between Yoda and Mace

By

Alice J. Capen

 

 

~

Old Republic

Time frame:  Two years before TPM

Author's comment:  Much of this conversation would have already been delved into by Mace and Yoda years before.  Ethics spoken of would have been taught to padawans.  But this conversation is more for the benefit of the reader rather than for Yoda and Mace.  As I wrote this, I kept in mind what people in each generation of Americans attempt or propose to do to the United States Constitution.  To bend it and shape it whenever or however current social perceptions dictate, which could end up destroying our Constitution and the Freedoms it protects.

Author's note:  My good friend Season Irwin helped me with Yoda's syntax.  Without her, Yoda would not have sounded quite right.

Disclaimer:  This story is based on characters and situations created and owned by Lucasfilm.  No money is being made and no infringement is intended.

 

~

 

 

 

            The early afternoon sunshine flowed through the large window of Mace's living room.  It made a cheerful, bright pattern on the floor, and crept up to the large, comfortable chairs that seemed happy as they dutifully kept their occupants cozy.  Their occupants each were holding a cup of tea.  The last Council meeting had ended about fifteen minutes ago.  The Temple now had an additional tenant; a sickly tamatoo -- a small, furry six-legged animal, semi-intellegent.  Obi-Wan had thought it was better to let it die.  Qui-Gon thought otherwise and brought it home to be nursed back to health.  The Council, as usual, disapproved, but the Temple was stuck with the tamatoo anyway.

            "You know --" said Mace, "we're using the idea that if Qui-Gon breaks this Code, or that Rule, then he forfeits his seat on the Council for a time.  But the problem is, is that the threat doesn't work.  He doesn't care if his actions -- that he deems as necessary -- prevents him from being a member of the Council."

            "Believes, he does," said Yoda, "that his actions directed by the Living Force, over a prospect of a seat on the Council, take precedence."

            Mace sighed.  "I respect that.  He is a good man.  I can't always agree with what he does, especially on an official stance, but I hold him in high regard."  He sighed again.  "I've been thinking....." He smiled with rueful humor, "....that perhapssssss -- we should threaten to force him to join the Council next time he does something we don't approve?"

            Yoda giggled.

            Mace, smiling, continued.  "That may put a stop to his brashness."

            Yoda giggled some more as he stirred his tea.  "Picture the scene, I can.  Standing in the Council Circle Qui-Gon and Obi-Wan are.  Being reprimanded Qui-Gon is, for taking on a project not assigned to him."  Yoda did his best to imitate Mace's voice, ""No choice but to make you a Council member," you say.  Falls to his knees Qui-Gon does, and beats his chest in agony.  Then say you, "For yourself, what have you got to say!", and whimpers, Qui-Gon does."

            Mace laughed at Yoda's imitation of his voice.  "It would put a damper on Qui-Gon's adventuring."

            "Happy it would make Plo Koon."

            "Poor Koon.  He expects his friend to join him on the Council.  I had expected Qui-Gon to have become a Council member long ago.  When we were children, I knew back then that he had a good soul.  I could feel a strong sense of Presence within him as I do now.  I had assumed, back then, that he was going to be a Council member.  At an early age at that."

            Yoda's thoughts focused on memories.  "Always headstrong, he was.  Full of questions.  "Why this?  Why that?  Difficult, he was not.  But a handful, he was.  So different from Obi."

            Mace agreed.  "Qui-Gon and Obi-Wan are like night and day in some respects, but their bond is so strong.  They work well together.  Their differences compliment each other."

            "When I introduced Qui-Gon to three-year old Obi, germinated that bond was.  As if their souls recognized one another.  Always asked for Qui-Gon, Obi-Wan did."  Yoda sighed and his voice softened.  "The beginning of Xanatos' hatred toward Obi-Wan, it was."

            "A hatred that culminated into the attempt of murder."

            "Ironic it was, that the attempt on Obi's life is what sealed the bond between Qui-Gon and Obi.  Not at all what Xanatos had planned."

            Silence followed as Yoda and Mace contemplated events.

            Mace offered Yoda more tea, then poured more for himself.  He looked deep into the rich amber liquid as if to see visions there.

            "It is difficult." spoke Mace at length.  "How does one punish someone for doing good for someone else?  There isn't much we can do to punish Qui-Gon.  Denying him a seat on the Council is all we have, and that's not much of a deterrent.  If we go much further than that, then we could end up shaking hands with the Darkside."

            "To uphold the Code, the purpose of the Council is. To keep the Jedi on a narrow Path, their purpose and boundaries defined to prevent abuse and misuse of the power which they had acquired as Jedi.   The latest example of inappropriate ambition of one who wields the power of the Force, Xanatos is. The insatiable desire for power that fuels the Darkness, it is."  Yoda smiled

in a sleepy sort of way.  "Fortunate it is that Qui-Gon has not this kind of problem.  Above and beyond the line of duty he goes to help those in need outside the mission's purpose."

            "He rescues critters and brings in lost waifs." said Mace with dry humor.  His smile broadened.  "Poor Obi has adopted the habit of referring to any person or creature of his master's renegade projects as 'it', regardless of species or gender."

            "Poor Obi." smiled Yoda.

            "It's an exercise in patience." said Mace.  "Something that Obi needs, anyway."

            More silence followed.

            After a while, Mace spoke.  "The problem of disciplining Qui-Gon still remains.

            Yoda looked at Mace contemplatively.  Humor sparkled in his eyes.  "Threaten to take his dessert away from him, we could."

            "That's it!  No dessert for you tonight!" exclaimed Mace.

            "No gelatin surprise for you!"

            "Yeah......that'll scare him." said Mace sarcastically.

            "Ever have gelatin, did you?" asked Yoda.

            "No.  Have you?"

            "No."

            "Maybe we ought to ask the chef to make some tonight."

            "An interesting picture that is." said Yoda.  "A room full of Jedi with wiggly gelatin."

            Mace guffawed.

            "mmmmm...." grunted Yoda.  He cradled the tea cup in his hands and enjoyed the aroma.

            Silence.

            Some movement cut shadows through the sunlight.  The two Jedi masters looked toward the window and saw a droid washing the outside.  The cheerful afternoon sun invoked feelings of peace.

            About ten minutes of quiet contemplation passed before Mace spoke.

            "Something we should consider:  Qui-Gon keeps breaking the narrow boundaries of the missions that we send him on.  But if we place him in the Council, he would no longer be sent on missions, which means he would not have the opportunity to break the Code."

            "Thought about that, I did," said Yoda.  "A dangerous precedence would it not make?  To place a Code-breaker -- matters not how good a person is he -- in the Council, when the primary reason it is for the Council to uphold the Code?"

            "You're right." spoke Mace softly.  "But what if our Code is too narrow?"

            Yoda's eyes were unfocused as he thought about Mace's question, and his own master, long passed away.  "Logical, it is, that you would ask that question.  Asked many times, it has, during my lifetime.  Answered by my master, it was, asked her that same question when young was I.  Many changes during my life, I saw.  The older and more experienced I was, more understanding to me her answer then became.  Established our rules have been, not to stifle creativity or to prevent enjoyment in life -- exist they do to keep Jedi focused on their purpose; to set boundaries, to prevent, as much as possible, abuse of Force power.  The Code it is that makes the Jedi, Jedi.  If change or alter the Code we do, to fit some fad or popular new thinking, that subject it is to change whenever fashion or vogue decrees, or when any given generation demands it, then no respect for the Code there ultimately would be.  Often there is change, of political or social attitudes.  But change, there never is of basic personality and nature of sentient beings."

            Mace nodded his head.  "But the abuse of power doesn't define Qui-Gon.  His problem is that he's more in tune with the Living Force rather than the Unifying.  It makes him more empathic and connected with souls he meets."

            "The risk of altering the flow of destiny, it causes.  That which should have occurred does not because of interference.  A glitch -- a bump, and something can go 'out of whack', as it were."

            "What if his interference is supposed to happen?" ventured Mace.  "What if it was the hand of Destiny for Qui-Gon to be in certain places at certain times?  Maybe he's not supposed to join the Council because of it."

            Yoda closed his eyes in speculation, and after a short pause, spoke.  "Profound judgment of what Destiny may or may not have planned is not within any one person's ability to make.  Cannot do that, even I," Yoda smiled effacingly.  "The power to determine the outcome of Time and to decide for other people how to get there, our limited minds have not the capability.  Adverse affects it would surely create, if attempted.  Too easy, it is, for a despot to attempt to shape the outcome of the Grand Plan of Destiny by destroying those he deems unworthy or dangerous to his narrow vision."

            "Societies controlled by despots lose most of their creative and talented people." said Mace.  "People of intelligence usually leave while they are able, and go to other worlds that benefit from their genius.  The loss of, or imprisonment and death of, creative and gifted people contribute toward the collapse of that despot's dream of what he thinks is a perfect society."

            Yoda nodded.  "'Perfect' only as defined, erroneously, by that despot.  To implement his version of 'perfection', a lifetime of murder and savagery, he must employ, to weed out anyone who fits not his ideal.  Then what happens, after all that?  Finally dies, he does.  Collapses and turns to dust, it does, that which he had striven for.  A bad memory, he becomes.  A dark and embarrassing blot in history.  A heavy weight his soul will carry."

            "Many despots make it easy for themselves during their lives by thinking they could outwit the Supreme Being.  They think of themselves as either knowing better than the Creator, or convince themselves that the Creator doesn't exist through limited physical "proof".  Their minds usually think in linear terms rather than depth.  They usually smugly identify themselves as "individual thinkers" and use their atheism as proof -- but in reality, their thinking is actually limited and one-dimensional."

            Yoda nodded as he lowered his cup from his lips.  "If over time, writings about God, limited, appear to be, they mistakenly see that as "proof" of no God, rather than understanding that to contain God, no mere writing can ."

            "There are also those despots who use religion to justify killings and abusive control, and unfortunately, there are so many people willing to follow them, maybe because of fear, ignorance or even murderous glee.  The idea of killing communities of people is attractive to some, and they attach a cause to it to displace blame from their heinous acts."

             "Sometimes accent 'The Cause', the murderers do, by laying blame on the

victims themselves." said Yoda.

            "Yes.  A displacement of blame."

            Yoda smiled, and almost giggled.  "But to do with Qui-Gon, none of this has."

            Mace laughed.  "We did go off on a tangent, didn't we?"

            Mace uncrossed his legs, then crossed his ankles.  A slow smile formed on his face.  "I know -- next time he acts against the Council's wishes, we could lock him in a room full of lovesick Zeltrons.  That'll cure him."

            "Cure him, it might," smiled Yoda.  "but want to do something naughty, other Jedi might, just so to have the same punishment, they hope.  To do what we've been doing, I think is best.  Really work, it does not, I know, but as noted, matter of principle it is, and not really for punishment to keep him off the Council. 

            For the protection of the Galaxy and of the Jedi, breached the Code must not be.  For  whim, changed it must not be.  If to do so, someday the best interest of the Galaxy's future Council members may not have in mind, and change the Code to suit their purposes, they would."

            "That's the point!  Our Code as it is and always was, for twenty-five thousand years, would not allow nefarious people in.  But if the Code were changeable -- malleable...."

            "Right, that is.  For so long, the Order would not have lasted.  Bend the Code we cannot for that reason, even a little, to allow to sit on Council our sweet Qui-Gon, a man of integrity."

            "Bend this, take away that -- in little pieces, incrementaly, in a malleable Code, we could lose our integrity over time.  The Code needs to be the Code.  Steadfast.  The Foundation of what we are."

            More silence.

            Mace's eyes sparkled with humor.  "He was your padawan.  I'll leave you with the task of naming that tamatoo he brought home."

            Yoda giggled.  "'Fluffy'.  Like everything else."

            "I better not let you name my next padawan."