▸ Column · Star Wars — Yoda's Dagobah swamp exile; a contested inheritance over a Naboo lakeside homestead, adapted into the galaxy.
YODA replies.
Replied to by Yoda, with a rebuttal from Darth Vader.
The letter
Master — my father joined the Force four months ago. He left his entire homestead, the lakeside holding on Naboo worth near three hundred forty thousand credits, to my younger brother Dominic alone. My sister Renata and I were each left eighteen thousand credits from his accounts and nothing more. The will gave no reason. Dominic swears he knows nothing of why, yet grows strangely quiet whenever I press him. In Father's last year, Dominic was his sole caregiver and held his power of attorney — and lived under his roof, with hours of private talk none of us shared. Renata wants to challenge the will, claiming Father was unduly influenced at the end. I cannot honestly say his mind was gone; sharp he stayed until nearly the last. But I cannot shake the thought that nearness gave Dominic the chance to shape this outcome. Join the challenge, and I likely destroy what remains of us as a family, in a legal war that may cost more than we recover. Refuse, and I swallow a result that feels engineered and deeply unfair. How do I even begin to choose?
Yoda replies
Four months gone, your father is, and already the war you weigh. Hmm. Beneath the house, the true wound I sense — not credits, no. Fear that loved you less he did. That chosen, you were not. Cut deep, such a thing does, when written in a will it is.
Trace it, you must. From the fear, to anger at your brother — Dominic, the whisperer you have made him in your mind. From the anger, to the suit. From the suit, to suffering — years of it, credits poured into a fire that warms no one. And certain, are you? No. "Not sure," you say yourself. Sound, perhaps his mind was. The whispers you picture, watch them you did not.
Nine hundred years have I lived, and a quiet schemer, missed I once did — yet condemn a man on a feeling alone, even then I would not. Grip the suspicion too tight, and crush what is left of your family in your fist you will, while justice you believe you hold.
Justice, seek you may — calmly, in the light, if true cause there is. But the grudge, the fire of it, set it down. Not for Dominic. For you, my friend. Mmm.
— Yoda
Darth Vader weighs in
The little green one counsels you to set down your suspicion. Of course he does. He never sat in the room while a dying man was spoken to. I did — beside a master who used nearness and patience to bend a frightened soul to his purpose. So do not let Yoda soothe you with "uncertain." You are not uncertain. You know what proximity buys.
But hear the rest, because it is the part he leaves whole. Win the holding, and the thing you truly want — to have been your father's chosen — no deed will grant it. I seized everything I was denied. The room stayed empty. Name the theft plainly. Then weigh it against the only family you have left. That question, I answered wrongly.
— Darth Vader
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