Work Text:
“I can do it, master.”
That had been Dooku’s litany these two years he had been a padawan. Everything he set his hand to, he succeeded at. When he did not, he persisted until his task broke or he did.
It tended to get him into trouble.
One such time was the day Master Yoda summoned Dooku to one of the training salles. At the exact time given in the message, Dooku entered the hall usually reserved for sparring and was greeted by the sight of half-dozen boulders and a few dozen smaller rocks drifting through the air. They moved in easy orbit, deliberate and steady in the natural light like some model planetary system. Dooku stopped on the threshold, surprised and more than a little impressed. The smaller rocks drifted into an asteroid belt arrangement, and the motion carried his eye to the center of the fencing mat where Yoda sat, head bowed, gimer stick cane across his knees. The tranquil eye of the storm.
Yoda had not seen him. Not wanting to interrupt his master, Dooku turned his attention from wonder to the more technical details of the display. Rate of turn. Orbital speed. Spacing of each stone. Then, the rocky planetary system slowed and contracted and drifted to one side of the hall where it arranged into a neat pyramid. A lone boulder landed on the floor by itself and rested there.
Master Yoda got to his feet and finally looked at his padawan. “Ah, Dooku. Early, you are.”
“I am on time, master.” Dooku crossed the room so Yoda would not have to come all the way to him. “Are you going to teach me to do that?” He was gifted at telekinesis. Remarkably so in that his teachers often remarked on it. It would be a logical progression to his training, and if he could command that kind of precision—
“Wish to learn, do you?”
“Yes, master. I thought we would be sparring today, but this would be interesting.”
Yoda got to his feet and gestured for Dooku to walk with him, so the padawan fell in pace with his master as they strolled to the pile of rubble.
Master Yoda tapped one of the boulders, the one by itself, with his cane. “Move this, you will. Here...to there.” He pointed to the other end of the room, a distance of twenty-five paces. The boulder looked to weigh three times as much as Dooku himself. He glanced at the pile, assessed. There had to be a half-ton of material piled up, maybe more with the smaller rocks. How had they gotten in here?
Yoda tapped the lone boulder again, drawing Dooku’s attention. “Do this, can you?”
“Of course, master.”
But how to do it? Dooku walked around the boulder, hands folded behind his back as he evaluated the irregular and ugly mottled stone. Moving the single boulder would be a feat of brute strength his Wookie friends might not be able to perform. Perhaps not even a full-grown Wookie. For Dooku, the Force would be required. Or a crane. With no crane in sight and no clear way of requisitioning one, the Force it would be. Moving one, he could manage.
His gaze skipped past the boulder to the pile beyond. Where had they all come from? Moving them at once was beyond even his abilities. He’d have to move them one at a time.
“How long do I have?”
“As long as you need, padawan.”
“I can do it.”
Dooku stood for a long time considering his task, and Yoda was summoned away for Council business by a harried-looking junior knight. But before he left, he tilted his head and gave one last adage. “Think too hard, you should not. Come to me, if questions you have.”
Then he was gone, which gave Dooku time to mull over the boulders and to realize in blessed solitude that the problem was even more complex than he’d first realized. Master Yoda had stacked the boulders and smaller stones in such a way that removing one of them risked collapsing the whole structure. He would.
Dooku crouched and rested his chin in his palm. If he supported the other boulders while he moved them one at a time... but that would split his concentration. This would be harder than he thought.
That was how he found himself at the library, bothering Jocasta for texts on advanced telekinesis. She gave him a dry look but put the holobook in his hands without drilling for more information. A mere loan of time before he owed her the story, which he promised to pay back with interest--tea.
Looking at the title, Dooku realized he had seen the older padawans reading it in the canteen and complaining about the complexity of their exam tasks like it was a rite of passage. Complaining was a luxury Dooku could ill afford, so he completed his other training and chores, and, finding his master still away as evening approached, retreated to his room to read the telekinesis text.
Slow, deliberate reading was required. It was not so difficult to warrant the senior padawans’ griping, but it was not quick reading. The evening ticked by until he noticed his master’s presence approaching the apartment. Dooku put the text away and turned off his lamp seconds before the front door hissed open and Yoda shuffled into the apartment well after midnight. A bad council night then.
Dooku had comprehended most of the text on his own, so there was no reason to bother his master with questions when it had been a long day for both of them. So he lay down, pulling the blanket over his shoulder and the Force around him to hasten himself to sleep. Outside the bedroom door, the sound of Yoda about his nightly routine—the tea and light dinner Dooku had laid out for him, a brief meditation.
Yoda shuffled tap-step down the hall but paused in front of Dooku’s room. The shadow stretched beneath the door. Waited. The Force curled around Dooku, a barely present check gone the next moment. As long-lived as Yoda was, Dooku wondered if the octo- centenarian didn’t feel a compulsion to check if people were still breathing. Dooku might. He hadn’t noticed it his first few weeks as a padawan, the Force gentle as a breeze on the face, gone the next moment, but now he was used to it.
Yoda’s shadow shuffled on. Dooku shut his eyes and pushed himself deeper into sleep.
The next morning, the padawan rose early and found his master already gone. He read the text again, careful to absorb as much information as he could before returning it to the archives on the way to his first class.
After class, he declined Sifo-Diyas’ invitation to spar. It wouldn’t do to be distracted until he’d finished his assignment. He returned to the training hall and visualized the steps, one boulder at a time, attention split. Then, he took a solid stance and reached for the pyramid with the Force. It shuddered, and dust drifted from the top to the floor. Taking a deep breath, he raised his other hand and focused on one of the topmost boulders, eased it a few inches.
The entire tower shuddered, shifted, slipped. Dooku cursed and threw out both hands to catch it. The stones groaned closer together in a sort of collapse, and he held the Force as tight as he could. Finally, thankfully, the sliding stopped. He dropped his arms to his sides and caught his breath. The pyramid looked more like a pile now, and dirt and dust coated the floor around it. A pebble rolled against his boot.
Damn it.
Master Yoda was late again that night.
By the third day, the salle and its boulder problem had become the bane of Dooku’s existence. From waking to leaving the apartment to sitting in class, he turned the problem over and over like a worry stone. Carrying the boulders wasn’t possible, so he would need to use the Force. If he wasn’t perfectly precise in moving the individual boulders one at a time, what little structure remained would crumble and break his concentration. If he moved the whole structure at once, it would fall like a house of dejark cards once he let go, so he would need to rearrange it in the air to something more stable, which would be the most complex use of telekinesis he had attempted to date, and it still might end up falling apart at the finish line.
And there was the lone boulder taunting him every time he entered the room. Was he supposed to integrate it into the main structure? Mirror its exact position across the room?
It couldn’t be just a rock. Nothing was just anything with Yoda. Everything was an object lesson, a test to prove or fail. Dooku half-wished there was anyone else still living who had endured Yoda’s tortuous apprenticeship to counsel him. Then again, they would probably be just as bad.
He scowled at the boulders for another hour before his commlink chimed. He ignored it, but the training bond at the back of his mind, usually so quiet, gave an inquiring tug. He answered.
Yoda’s face appeared, lined and solemn, tension lines easing when he saw Dooku. “Padawan. How are you today? Well, have your classes gone?”
Dooku blinked. “Yes, master. I am keeping busy.”
“Hmm, good. Gotten in trouble, I thought you might have since last I saw. you”
Dooku snorted. He had not had time for trouble. “Not currently, master.”
“Cheeky, you are. But late tonight, I will be. Wait for me, you should not.”
“Understood, master." Did Yoda suspect his late-night studying? "Shall I bring some dinner for you to the council chambers? I can leave it with the attendant.”
“No, thank you. Rest you need. Late nights, you have been keeping.”
Of course, Yoda knew. Dooku hadn’t been trying to hide it, exactly, but still, it felt like being found out. He bowed his head. “Studying, master.”
“Hmm. But tell me. Succeeded, have you in your task?”
Dooku suppressed a sting of frustration. “Not yet. I need another day.”
“As long as you need, padawan.” Yoda smiled with patience so infinite it was nearly fondness. “Remember my instructions, you do?”
“Of course.”
Someone off-holo said Yoda’s name, and the grand master glanced away. “Hmm. Go, I must. Good night, padawan.”
“Good night, master.”
It was midnight before Dooku left the training hall.
The next morning, Sifo-Diyas followed him from class. Dooku tried to outpace him, but tall as he was, Sifo was mostly leg after his recent growth spurt and kept easy pace into the training hall. He paused at the sight of the stacked boulders that had lost any pretense of arrangement. He whistled. “Oh, Master Yoda hates you for sure.”
“Shut up,” Dooku said pleasantly.
Sifo grinned and jumped up on the boulder that sat by itself. The damned lone boulder that had started all this. He balanced on one leg. “So how are you going to do it?”
Dooku folded his arms. “I am going to crush them all and sweep the mess to the other side of the hall.”
“Do you want help?”
“Thank you, but no. Master Yoda gave this task to me. I’ll do it.”
“Suit yourself. Can you not… line them up?” When Dooku gave him an exasperated glare, Sifo threw up his hands. “Sorry, forgot everything has to be perfect to count for Yoda’s padawan.”
“It is not about being perfect, Sifo; it’s about being right.”
“Why don’t you just ask—“
“I can do it!” Dooku shouted. “I just need a little bloody quiet!”
Hurt flickered crossed Sifo’s face, and Dooku bit his tongue. He should apologize. He wanted to apologize.
But Sifo hopped off the rock and shrugged. “Sure, Doo. Figure it out on your own.”
“Sifo, I didn’t mean…”
“Yes, you did. Call me when you’ve found your way out of Yoda’s rock conundrum. We’ll go spar or something.” Then he was gone, and Dooku was left alone.
Stupid. He needed to finish this and go properly apologize. He could line them up across the room. Admit defeat and bow out gracefully. But to take such a half measure now, when he could taste real success… it would be an embarrassment. All that reading, all the failures. For nothing.
The door chimed, and Dooku whirled with a barb to fire off at Sifo. Master Yoda stood in the doorway instead.
The grand master surveyed the room, the misfortune of stones scattered against the wall where they had begun, and he had the audacity to smile. “An avalanche you have had. I hope carried away, you were not.”
Dooku bristled at the joke almost to exploding, but he bit his tongue hard and bowed. “No, master.”
Yoda crossed the room, cane loud on the tile portion of the floor. He tapped the lone boulder, not so lone anymore. “For the delay, I am sorry. Ready to see, I am, if ready you are.”
Dooku dragged a breath to steady himself against the rising tide of frustration. “I can do it, Master Yoda. I said I would do it.”
The master of the Order folded his hands over the head of his cane in an expectant posture. He would wait all day if needed.
Dooku extended one hand, then the other. The Force rose to his call, and as one the boulders lifted into the air, pebbles and dust and stone all. They hung suspended in the air, not as elegant as they ought to be, but Dooku turned, buoyed them over the mat and to the opposite wall. He lowered his right hand—already trembling. Control it—and half the stones lowered in response. He crooked his fingers into a claw, and the boulders scrapped across the ground and each other to form the circular pyramid base.
The Force slipped from his grip, and Dooku grasped after it, but the pyramid collapsed inward with a definite thud. He doubled forward and caught himself on his knees, shuddering. He glanced at Yoda, who looked solemnly at the ruin. Dooku gritted his teeth. “I’ll do it again.”
Yoda shook his head, expression inscrutable. “Completed the task, you have. No more, must you do.”
Somehow, the compassion felt like more of an insult than the failure. Dooku straightened. “I’ll do it again. I can do better.”
“Tired, you are. Did what I asked, you have.”
“You asked me to move the boulders, and I can!” Dooku threw out his hand, and the boulders shifted and rose as one into the air. Hand shaking now, he pushed them through the air. They clattered and groaned, knocking against each other as he held them in rigid formation, scattering a trail of dust and rubble across the floor. Slowly, carefully, he moved the rocks in the air, turning them from a tower to a pyramid. He set them down at the finish line together, and the towering pile of them trembled and groaned then settled. It stood.
He exhaled and folded to one knee, arms shaking as he leaned forward. “There, master. I told you.” He wiped at his forehead, but his wrist only smeared the sweat.
Yoda regarded the moved boulders then looked at the trail of rubble across the mat. It was impossible to know what he was thinking, but then he sighed. The defiant pride in Dooku’s chest withered.
“Completed the task, yes.” Yoda hummed. “One thing I asked of you, but all of it at once, you see. More than I asked, did you do.” Overwhelmed, you became. Angry, you are.”
“I am not angry—“
“Angry, you are. Angry you have been! See it, I can.” Yoda smacked the top of Dooku’s knee with his cane then pointed to the lone boulder that had been integrated into the new pile, that miserable mottled brown piece of slag. “Move that one, I asked you to. Not all. Too much, have you done. Hurt yourself, you could have.”
Frustration lanced like a boil, Dooku blinked. “What? No, you said—“
“‘Move this, you will.’” Yoda tapped the floor and shook his head. “Listen, you do not.”
Rage roiled up in Dooku. Four days frittered away on a task he could have completed before Yoda left the hall that first day. A youngling could lift that rock. Maybe if Yoda had been paying attention, had warned—no. No, Dooku didn’t need to throw blame. This was a victory! One even some senior padawans could not claim. “I did more than you asked. I exceeded the assignment. You should be proud of my determination.”
Yoda sighed, ears dipping as he lowered his head. “Hmm. My fault, this is. Underestimate your stubbornness, I did. And your skill.”
Dooku raised his shoulders, bit his tongue.
“Powerful, are you, Dooku.“ Yoda gestured cane-point at the path of the rubble. “Far will you go. But go alone, you need not. See what could be and what must be done, you do. Yes. But always more to do, there will be. Everything, you cannot do, and carry it all you need not. Bitter it will make you. Angry.”
Dooku’s face grew hot, and that was almost as humiliating as the reproof. This was about what? Asking for help? Yoda would not always be there to help him. He hadn’t been there for four days. To be Jedi was to be alone, unique in the galaxy, to carry the problems no one else could. Why should he not be praised for overcoming?
Yoda rested his hand on Dooku’s shoulder. “Alone, you are not.”
Dooku nearly shrugged him off, but his words rang true. He hadn’t been alone, had he? Jocasta had found him the book. Sifo-Diyas had offered to help. Even Master Yoda could have helped him if Dooku had not pretended to be asleep every night. If he had only asked one more question at the outset.
Mortifying.
He had no one to blame but himself and his own arrogance. He exhaled hard like he could force the anger out of his lungs. Then he crossed his legs and bowed his head. “Sage Aeschylus says wisdom comes through suffering to the unwilling.”
“Yes. But not only through suffering.” Yoda smiled and leaned with both hands on his cane. They were at eye level like this, master standing, student seated, though if Dooku went through another growth spurt he’d be looking down at Yoda even from the floor.
Dooku sighed, curling forward without his anger to prop him up. “Now what? Now that I’ve ruined the lesson.”
Yoda tapped his shin gently with the gimer stick, a motion to pay attention rather than a reproof. “Ruined nothing, you have. Show me what you have studied, you should, and help you, I will.”
“Yes, master.” Dooku moved to his feet and took a steady stance, hands raised. “I’m ready.”
“Well done it was. Someday, better than me, you shall be.” Yoda thumped his cane on the ground and chortled. “If enough sleep, you get.”
Despite himself, Dooku smiled. Yoda raised his hands, and together they began again.