As Anakin flew closer, he could feel no sign that Yoda was even in the Dagobah system. He pressed his lips together as he began to approach the planet Luke had told him about.

It wasn't like Yoda didn't have his reasons for hiding in the Force. And it wasn't like Anakin hadn't been responsible for most of them.

The instrument panel went dead as the shuttle dropped into atmosphere. Anakin smiled. "Hello," he murmured as the shuttle fell like a rock towards the surface. He didn't need confirmation in the Force to tell him what had just happened. If Yoda wanted to play fast and loose as ground control, fine. Anakin had enough control over the Force to be able to stop himself from becoming a smudge by a swamp.

But Anakin didn't think he'd flown across galaxies just to be killed. Yoda delighted in lessons. He wouldn't have summoned Anakin all the way here just to drop him from a great height.

Anakin snorted. Not until he'd been yelled at first, at least.

Just like he thought, the shuttle came to an abrupt halt above a dry (well, dry-ish. It was Dagobah, after all) spot of land, then settled gently onto the ground. Anakin took a deep breath, straightened robes that didn't need straightening, and marched down the ramp.

A wizened old Jedi Master was waiting for him. The years…hadn't been kind. Anakin thought he'd covered his shock well enough until Yoda stared up at him. "Not all of us have clones waiting for us, hmmm?" he said sourly. "Look I so old to young eyes?"

"Of course not," Anakin lied.

Yoda smacked Anakin's shins hard with his stick. "Yes I do," he said, chuckling and heading further into the swamp. "When 900 years old you reach, look as good, you will not."

"You have a point," Anakin admitted, trying not to hobble too much as he trailed after him.

"Many points have I," Yoda said over his shoulder, "and hear all of them, you shall." He grunted. "Long enough to work on that list, have I had."

Anakin's back stiffened. "It wasn't like I'd planned for this to happen," he said.

Out came the stick again. Anakin's legs were going to be in trouble. "Never planned anything did you!" Yoda said sharply. "Never listening to the larger Force were you. Only concerned with how you felt, how wronged you were, how unfair the galaxy was to you. Selfish, you were, and disaster it brought to us all."

Anakin stared at the ground. 'I know," he said softly.

"That is because wise I am," Yoda said, nodding. "Far from the only Jedi to go dark were you, young Skywalker." He sighed. "See it coming, I did not."

Anakin sighed too. "I'm not sure it could have been averted," he said. "I was too angry. I was looking for an excuse."

Yoda's eyebrows went up. "First insightful thing you've ever said, I think," he said dryly.

"Thanks," Anakin said, just as dry. "You just never appreciated my other insights."

Another smack with the stick. "No," Yoda said sharply. "Wrap yourself in old hurts, you will not. Take responsibility you will. Trillions of lives did you destroy, Anakin Skywalker, by wrapping yourself in your hurt and ignoring the rest of the galaxy. Slavery. Torture. Murder." Yoda's ears went flat. "See the Temple ourselves, Obi-Wan and I did. Broke his heart, you did."

The ground was suddenly very fascinating. "He mentioned that," Anakin murmured. "At the time it didn't really matter."

"Clouds everything, the dark side does," Yoda said, finally getting around to the heart of the matter. "Insist you do on traveling down that same path twice?"

Anakin stared at him. "What?" he snapped.

Yoda's eyebrows went up. "Getting remarried, Luke says you are," he said, smacking Anakin across the shins again. "Learned nothing have you?"

"This is different!" Anakin insisted, glaring.

Yoda gave him a flat look and coughed. "Always for you, things are different," he commented. "Hold on too tightly, you do. Saw that in you on your arrival in the Temple, I did."

Anakin's angry reaction, and the argument that followed, lasted for more than an hour.

"You trained my son for what, a week?" Anakin screeched at the end of it, "and sent him up against two Sith Lords! How was that possibly supposed to work?"

"Lots of options we had left," Yoda said scornfully, and not for the first time. "Out of Jedi we were. Up to the Death Star was I supposed to go? Appear to Palpatine's better nature?" He laughed humorlessly. "Stupid I am not."

Anakin wasn't about to let this go. "He was my son," he said, "and you sent him out like—"

"--he was a Jedi," Yoda finished sternly. "Important he is, but shielded he cannot be, not if he is to learn. A Jedi faces the darkness. That is who we are."

"And if he had died?" Anakin snapped. "I almost didn't stop that."

Yoda gave him a mysterious smile. "Balance would have been found another way."

"That is hardly reassuring," Anakin said, pulling his robe more closely around him.

"Here to reassure you, I am not," Yoda said, coughing again. "Here to teach you, I am." He paused. "At least for a little longer."

Anakin's eyes went wide. "Master Yoda, you can't die."

Yoda snorted. "Tell me to do anything, you will not," he said, hobbling towards his bed. "Strong am I in the Force, but not that strong. Soon I will I die," he said, the smile back on his face. "Forever sleep."

Anakin pulled the blankets up around the Jedi Master. "Earned it, I have," Yoda concluded, closing his eyes.

"Earned it, you have," Anakin admitted. "I'm sorry to have failed you," he finally whispered.

Yoda's eyes opened one final time. "Forgiven you are," he said, voice raspy. When Anakin looked back down from turning away to wipe, Yoda was gone.

Anakin had no idea how he was going to tell Luke.