Chapter Eighteen: Jedi In Love

Star Wars + Harry Potter Crossover

A/N: Like usual, chapter 17 review responses are in my forums. Thank you all for reading and reviewing.

Chapter Eighteen: Jedi In Love

Harry gave a deep sigh of relief when the ship landed in a now magically-reinforced field south of the warded colony circle and saw fields of healthy-looking crops growing, a large warded pen on the edge of the colony containing dozens of the bipedal herbivores, and finished apartment homes in neat rows framing either side of the crops.

Most encouraging of all was that the ward stones of the new school appeared to be in place, placed at the far corners that would make up a central keep and the dormitory towers. Magic fundamentally altered the nature of megalithic construction, because granite with the liberal use of runework did not just absorb and store magic well, but in fact served as a battery to fuel the intent of future castle construction. With the four corner ward stones down, the castle itself would be far easier to build going forward.

An impromptu street market had appeared near the crops in the centre of the colony, with hastily transfigured carts clumped together haphazardly. The trade goods consisted mainly of Earth items, and most of the business was bartering. It was a start, though.

When Harry made his way over to the Civic Centre, he was thrilled to see the neural interface chairs in use, with a queue of people waiting their turns. The operator waved at Harry, who waved back. He finally made his way into the expanded space reserved for the Wizenmeet, and found all the members, the Wookiee Elder and Charlie, and several community members talking about land distribution beyond the warding circle.

Rather than interrupt, Harry conjured a chair just inside the door and sat to listen. He knew Rosmerta and Jorge both noticed, but most of the others in the room did not. It proved to be a surprisingly civil discussion since land was not in short supply. Rather, the concerns were on security and warding resources. Land dragon attacks were steadily increasing just because more people were venturing beyond the warding circle.

The Elder, through Charlie, confirmed that the Wookiee colony was doing well and that they were more than happy to trade wood for grain since the Wookiees were not farmers. Grain was a much smaller part of their diet than meat, but they nonetheless appreciated bread when available.

Charlie added on his own that, like the Sasquatch of Old Earth, Wookiees had an almost instinctive understanding of forest ecosystems. They would not over-harvest trees, so wood would not flow as fast as it might if they were logging indiscriminately, but as a result the forest would remain a resource for centuries on.

Finally the meeting was adjourned and colony members got up to leave. Some started in surprise to see Harry there; he smiled and nodded greetings to them as they left. When they were gone, Harry walked to the table where the Wizenmeet members remained.

"General Potter," Rosmerta said with a smirk. Harry knew she just loved calling him that. "Did you have a successful mission?"

"Yes we did, on two accounts." He removed a few flimsiplasts and handed them over. "This is a list of supplies that represents our share of the booty received in a raid against the Empire. The big one is a water treatment plant. I estimate it'll take at least fifty people to levitate it, and that's with feather weight charms on it, but it is large enough to service a population of a million people easily. Conjured water is great in an emergency, but we all know long term consumption has its own problems."

"What is 'bacta'?" Rosmerta asked as she looked through the list.

"It's the galactic version of a panacea. It's a chemical made on only one planet in the galaxy, and has replaced almost all other medicinal treatments galaxy-wide," Harry said. "It's the most effective non-magical healing agent I've ever seen, and the amount we have is worth a lot of money in the Empire. I'd recommend we keep some to analyse—perhaps we can use it in potions. But the rest we could probably sell or trade to the Alliance or their allies for other materials. For instance, if we wanted to introduce electronics we could use it in trade for power generators."

The Elder voiced his support for that idea, which Counsellor Melo dutifully recorded. "This is good, General," Rosmerta said. "I don't understand half of what this is, but it's very good. What else?"

"Housing for the conscripts," Harry said. "As you know, we have thirty Muggles who chose to stay with us. They're valuable crewmembers because of their training. They are also all young. I'd like to establish a barracks for them inside the compound, and resources to make sure they have food and clothing. If and when we have a currency, we'll owe them back pay."

"Quite right," Jorge noted. "We can do that."

"I also have a new…immigrant," Harry said. "During our first mission, where we obtained the new ship, I encountered a space wizard. They come in two types—Sith or Jedi. The attack you felt while we were casting the Fidelius came from a Sith. Dark Lords, you'd say. Jedi are, for lack of a better term, the Light Lords who have historically opposed them. I managed to win against the Sith I faced, but only by cheating and blowing him out into space. Otherwise, he would have taken my head off. So I went out to find a Jedi teacher. He's on the ship now. I'll transfigure up housing for him, but I wanted to let you know he was here, and would be training any who can learn the Jedi arts."

The councilors absorbed this in silence, until Rosmerta said, "Harry, I've seen you fight. How could anyone possibly be that good?"

"Their weapons can cut through anything," Harry said. "They have wandless magic that they are trained to use instinctively, and they have a real-time precognitive sense. They can predict when and where attacks will come, and that makes it really hard to get a curse on them."

"And this teacher you found?" Jorge asked.

"He's a 900-year-old Jedi Master, used to actually be the greatest of the Order before the Sith wiped them out. He'll probably not have many needs other than food and shelter. Just don't get in his way. He could probably level the whole colony if he had reason. And whatever you do, don't call him an elf."

"Why would we?" Rosmerta asked.

"Because he looks like a little green house-elf."

Half an hour later, Harry discovered that the Wookiees adored Yoda.

When the Elder saw the diminutive Jedi master for the first time, he stomped toward the creature with a happy roar of greeting.

"Hello, Quagga," Yoda said. "Good to see you, it is!"

"Quagga?" Harry asked.

Charlie, a constant presence with the Wookiees now, shrugged. "That's his name. You never asked, remember? Kind of rude, but he just figured you were a little slow."

"Slow, yes, yes," Yoda agreed with a cackle.

It was a quick matter of transfiguring earth to form a simple barracks complex for the conscripts. He, Maria and the magical crew of the Redux managed it in just an hour. Harry insisted each get their own room, and ensured that some of the captured materials were given over to their individual comfort. Fortunately, this included cots and portable sonic shower stalls. They had to rig a solar power generator to help with the power cells, but after only a day the conscripts had their own home off the ship. Each of them was given lines of credit with local artisans to get essential supplies like clothes or toiletries, such as were available, anyway. And given the fact that the largest part of the population of Avalon consisted of teenagers, they fit in surprisingly well despite the lack of magic.

There was one disappointment regarding Yoda's arrival for Harry, however. Harry had it in his mind that Yoda would be able to teach all of his fellow magicals how to use the Force. He had visions of an army of lightsaber wielding Jedi-Wizards riding herd over the Empire to exact revenge for their lost world.

That hope was dashed when Yoda looked at Teddy Tonks and shook his head. "No, train this one I cannot."

"Why?" Harry asked. "We all have magic, and if the Force can replenish my magical core, why can't it do the same with them?"

"Closed, they all are," Yoda said.

He stabbed Harry in the chest with his irritating stick and said, "This core, you call it. Jedi have it not. Jedi do not hold the Force within them, but become one with it. Different, you are. Forced open, yours was." The old Jedi's eyes narrowed as he considered Harry. "Died, you did," he said.

Teddy coughed at that. "Well, looks like you won't be needing me after all." He then walked quickly away.

Harry didn't even notice his godson's departure. He was too surprised by the Jedi's devastating insight. "Yes," he admitted. "Twice, in a way. Once as a child, and then later as a teenager. And then my magical core merged with some powerful artifacts called the Deathly Hallows that has changed my magic. I haven't aged since then."

"Death, yes," Yoda nodded. "Like an old friend, Death hovers around you. A benign, peaceful darkness I sense in you. Not like anything I have seen before. This is why the Force you can touch. And why others of your kind cannot."

They eventually made their way to the northern edge of the city that looked over a distant river valley. Given the obvious trauma of the flood plain, Harry and his crew wisely chose to build up and away from the violent river. As they approached the cliff, they passed by a few dwellings that were started before the troubles but left unfinished. Harry could only describe them hovels, which were 'finished' off with roughly hewn wood and unbaked mud-daub that would fall apart with the first heavy rain.

A young man in worn, ragged clothes stepped out of the hovel with a distrusting expression. "I don't have anything left for you to take," he said angrily.

A squib, Harry realized sadly. Judging by the hard expression, the young man wasn't having a good time of it, either.

"I'm Harry Potter, I'm not going to steal from you," he said.

The man visibly relaxed, though he didn't take his eyes off them. "What are you doing here?"

"Touring the city," Harry said with a shrug. "Looking for a site for my friend's home. This is Master Yoda, a Jedi. Space wizard, you might say."

Yoda hobbled forward toward the young Squib, and then abruptly reached up and stabbed him in the stomach with his stick. "Train this one, I can," the old Jedi said. "No core does he have. Nothing to stop the Force. More like him, are there?"

"What's he talking about?" the Squib demanded.

"You wouldn't believe me," Harry said with a grin. "What's your name?"

"Tim. Tim Jacobs."

"Tim, are there are other Squibs here?"

"Just Carrie and Peter."

At their names, two scared kids emerged. Harry guessed their ages at nine and ten respectively. Carrie was a beautiful girl with mocha-colored skin, while Pete was as pale as a sheet with a head of bright red hair. It was a different shade than the Weasleys. Yoda surveyed the two kids with a nod. "Yes," he cackled. "Yes, train them I will. Good to start young, the training is."

"Mr. Potter, what is this elf talking about?" Tim demanded.

A second later, staring at the now upside down Tim Jacobs, Yoda said, "Elf I am not. Master I am. And a Jedi will you be."

"Congratulations, Mr. Jacobs," Harry said. "You're about to learn a completely alien way of magic that no other wizards or witches can learn. Except for me ... I'm special, after all. And now, so are you!"

~~Revenge~~

~~Revenge~~

Harry built Yoda's home a hundred feet from the edge of the cliff. He charmed the soil itself into walls tall enough for a human of average height to move about comfortably, but only then. Instead of the traditional beamed roof, he finished it over with domes of more charmed soil similar to how Rosmerta's people were finishing the temporary housing. He then summoned a magical fire and glazed the walls into a hard, water-proof, glassy surface. A series of runes at the base ensured it would remain unbreakable for at least twenty years.

Yoda did not bother to hide his glee that the entire process took less than an hour. He then began ordering Harry to conjure various bits of furniture for his comfort. The three confused Squibs followed them into the hut.

When they were done, Yoda ordered the three young people to sit in the middle of the living room and walked around them. Harry noticed how Carrie shied into Pete's arms and wondered just how bad things had been for the Squibs. While he was pleased about many things Rosmerta and the Wizenmeet had done, being non-magical in a magical community was never easy.

"So, wizards without magic you are," Yoda said when he settled down in a child-sized conjured chair Harry made. "Filled with anger, you are, Tim Jacobs. Let go this anger you must, if a Jedi you are to be."

"I don't understand what a Jedi is," Jacobs said.

"They're a type of wizard," Harry explained. "Instead of using magic from their core, they pull it from the ambient magical fields around them. A Jedi can't do transfiguration or charms, but they can move objects without a wand, make themselves physically stronger and faster than others, and have precognition. A Force-strong man took off an Auror's arm and came damned close to killing me, and I'm Harry Potter."

"We'll be able to use magic?" Pete asked with wide eyes.

"Strong in the Force you are," Yoda told her. "A good heart you have. A Jedi will you be."

~~Revenge~~

~~Revenge~~

That night, the Prime Minister and other members of the Wizenmeet hosted Yoda for dinner. Quagga the Wookiee Elder joined them, making it the most diverse dinner Harry had ever been to. The fact that Quagga was almost seven hundred years old and Yoda was over 900 also meant it was the most life experience Harry had ever been exposed to.

Even Lady Sofia joined them, though she had to walk with a cane and her granddaughter shadowed her every movement. Straining one's magical core at her age created a permanent condition that would stay with her until she died. She would never be able to use more than a quarter of her magic at any time before magical exhaustion set in.

Fortunately, she was skilled enough that she could do more with what she had than most could do with the entirety of their core. The discussion soon grew into profoundly technical grounds as Lady Sofia brought her century of experience as an educator up against Yoda's nine centuries of experience as a Jedi.

"It's true that ancient witches and wizards on Earth did not use foci for their power," Sofia said. "There are legends of Atlantis where the witch-kings used neither wand nor staff. They performed great feats of magic, according to legend, but nothing that we would identify as wand-specific magic."

"The first foci were the Sumerian staffs," Adriana Melo said. "It is well documented that the En priest kings of ancient Sumer used staves to focus their power. Despite the myth that most magic originated in Egypt, in fact the first true post-Atlantean magical charms were developed in Ancient Sumer around 3,000 BC and did not migrate to Egypt until several hundred years later when the first magical Pharaohs gained power. The first Egyptian dynasty was completely magical, though I understand they bred themselves out of magic. Pureblood ideals taken to an extreme, if you will."

"Is it possible that using staffs changed us?" Harry asked, genuinely curious.

"Oh, it is a certainty," Melo said with an excited gleam in her eye. "Every aspect of magical civilization developed foci of some kind or another over the eons. From the totems of the Native American peoples to the phallic wands of the Ancient Norse, all witches and wizards eventually developed a means to focus their magic. The ICW Department of Mysteries even did a study about it when they discovered a tribe of magicals in the Amazon that did not have wands. They followed the tribe from when they were discovered in 1867 to 2008. They found that three generations after being introduced to wands the tribal children could no longer perform any type of intent-driven, wandless magic."

Yoda listened in contemplative silence as he ate the occasional nut or berry. He seemed to thoroughly enjoy the buttery bread and nibbled on one roll on and off through the meal. When Mela finished speaking, he said, "An expression of the Force, your magic is. For almost forty thousand years, the Jedi and the Je'daii who were our ancestors, studied the Force. On many worlds, found we did primitive peoples using the Force as magic. Once contacted, learned the Force as Jedi they did. Why Earth was never found, I know not. Never have a people gone so long without guidance."

"You make it sound as if we are wrong, Master Yoda," Lady Sofia said archly.

The old Jedi merely chuckled. "Wrong? No. Different you are. A strange, new way of using the Force, have you found. Foolish would I be to say wrong. But changed you, your wands have. Harness the Force you cannot, because within you captured the Force you have. Those of you born without magic, though—those I will teach."

"No more Squibs," Rosmerta said with a happy smile. "I've been trying to check in on those poor kids, but Squibs have always had a hard time. I'm happy to know you can teach them a different magic."

"An evolutionary reversion," Yoda said. "What you call a squib is one born as you all were originally. Much potential do I sense in your people. Stay here I will, to train those I can. Until one with the Force I become."

"You're welcome to do so, with our thanks," Rosmerta said.

"Indeed," Lady Sofia said with that arch, high-born manner that irritated both Harry and Rosmerta. "It's so nice to have intelligent conversation."

Yoda looked right at Harry. The little troll smirked. "Of this, no doubt do I have."

~~Revenge~~

~~Revenge~~

"So how is your training coming?" Leia asked two months later.

The time had passed in a blur of missions and training, so much sometimes Harry had trouble keeping track of whether he was coming or going. At the moment they were returning to Avalon, which could not receive signals due to the Fidelius charm.

"I'm ready to shove that stick up Yoda's tight little ass," Harry said.

Leia laughed. "Obi-Wan said he remembered being hit with Yoda's stick when he was a kid."

"Thing is, I'm not a kid." Harry laughed at himself and rubbed his latest bruise. "I shouldn't complain too much—I never thought I'd be learning an entirely new branch of magic at my age."

"You sound like you're ancient," she said with a dismissive laugh.

Harry smiled, but felt a pang of regret. "Leia, I'm forty five years old."

Her laughter faded, but she didn't frown. "I know," she said at last. "It's easy to forget when I look at you, until I look into your eyes."

"I just…sometimes I think whatever this is between us is a mistake," Harry said. "I may look young, but I'm old enough to be your father."

"Maybe," Leia said. Her face had gone blank, but he could see the hurt in her eyes. "Should I stop calling, then?"

Cursing himself, he said, "I'd really miss you if you did. I told you I'm an idiot, right?"

"Maybe, but your Commander Maria mentions it to me every time I talk to her," Leia said. Her lips curled. "Besides, I haven't seen you in almost six months now. I'm not sure talking on the holonet counts as a 'thing'."

Staring at her image, projected from across the stars, Harry admitted something openly for the first time to them both. "I would like to see you again, Leia."

"That's too bad. Attachment is forbidden to Jedi."

"Says an asexual little troll," Harry said.

Leia laughed again, a free sound of delight. "I'll have to tell that to Obi-Wan. You should have seen Luke's face when Obi-Wan mentioned that to us. Luke's been getting close to a well-endowed Zeltron girl working at the base. It looked as if someone had shot his pet Massiff!"

Harry rubbed the back of his neck. "Well, we're having a spate of pregnancies here and it prompted a long talk with Yoda about magic, the Force, and genetics."

"And?"

"We'll have to say we respectfully disagree. He's worried about love turning to hate and leading to the Dark Side of the Force. This is what Occlumency is for, really. My concern is that Force inheritance has a genetic component, and if you turn all the Jedi into sexless monks, you're weakening the pool of available future Jedi. You and Luke are living proof that Jedi kids are powerful."

"Maybe," Leia said. "Obi-Wan was also afraid that the Jedi would become so insulated that only Jedi children would ever get trained. I told him the old Order was already insulated, since those from the galaxy they did train were taken as children anyway. He actually conceded the point."

"Smart of him. I don't care how wise you think you are, it's never smart to argue with a politician."

She stuck her tongue out. "It's my birthday in a few months, by the way."

"Really? Hmmm, what should I get you?"

"A lightsaber crystal?"

"Er, okay. Where do I get one?"

Leia laughed again; it was nice to see her able to after all she'd been through. "Well, Luke and I will be going to a planet called Adega in the Moddell sector for ours when we turn twenty. We've been practicing with Obi-Wan's and our father's old Jedi blades, but Obi-Wan feels we should have our own and he thinks we'll be ready then."

"Hmmm, it would be pretty neat to own a laser sword," Harry said. "It'd be able to cut up vegetables for my soup a lot faster!"

"Do you take anything seriously, Harry?"

"You, maybe," Harry conceded. "And Quidditch. And maybe tea. I think I'd kill for a good cuppa. And don't get me started on treacle tart. Beyond that, not much. Can you send me coordinates and when you might go there? I'll check with the troll to see if there's a chance I can join you."

"That would be nice," Leia said, no longer laughing. "I miss you, Harry. I'm sorry we didn't have long before this blasted war separated us. That last night, and the next morning…" She smiled wryly. "I've stayed up nights, wishing I'd stayed longer."

"You and me both, Space Princess."

She smiled at him, slipping unconsciously from a happy young woman to the elegant, strong-willed princess he met on the station. "I hope to see you soon, Harry. I must go now."

"See you soon."

The ship was currently a day out of Avalon after another week-long mission providing interdictor-support to Rebel raids. The missions were easier now that Harry and his crew placed the ship itself under the Fidelius. It made it difficult to communicate with the Alliance, until Akallaah rigged a hard-wired communications buoy they were able to drag behind them outside of the Fidelius field that allowed them to hook into the holo relay network.

As the buoy was reeled back into the ship, now that his call was finished, Harry rubbed his face before looking around his empty quarters on the Phoenix Redux. He felt an intense pang of loneliness. "I do hope to see you soon," he whispered.

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Author's Note: Once again I just wish to stress just how much I appreciate Teufel1987, JR and Miles for beta reading yet another of my stories. As always, they make everything better.