Saga of the Bridgers-Year 6

Chapter 4: Lost Brothers

There was a moment of lull. Both sides seemingly caught by awkwardness as they looked at the Tanis brothers simply staring at each other for too many seconds. Ezra held his grip on his lightsaber. He didn't intend to barge in as he knew very well how long the two brothers had waited for a moment like this, yet they seemed completely oblivious to the fact that they were each leading a team of soldiers that were at war.

Ezra was especially focused on the man wielding two red lightsaber on the opposite site and who was staring grimly at him with his irises that sometime showed signs of red.

"I don't like that fella." Kyle whispered referring to the Sith, or whoever was that guy supposed to be.

"Let's just stay calm." Ezra replied. "Maybe there won't be any more bloodshed, today."

In fact, a few seconds later, it was Iulius who finally broke the silence.

"What are you doing here?" he asked quite coldly.

Darvos made a defying jolt with his chin. "Saving your Lordship butt, I guess."

The Death Trooper made one of their scrambled noises and seemed about to blast that smug face out of the universe, but the Lord-Protector made a gesture and forced him to stand down.

"I hoped that becoming Colonel and getting married would make you more respectable, but I see you still come up with stupid answers." Iulius answered quite annoyed.

"I'll take being a buffoon over serving an Empire that blows up planets full of innocent people." Darvos replied with frustration.

"I assume you are here to investigate these aliens yourself?" Iulius said, ignoring the accusation.

Darvos held back his anger. If that was actually anger. Ezra could feel that the two souls were in a tumultuous state.

"Yes. Some colonies aligned with us in this region have recently disappeared. According to what we had, we anticipated this might be the next target. And if you are wondering why we decided to defend an imperial colony...well, I thought you guys simply don't care about the most remote of your dominions."

Iulius huffed amused. "Still thinking we can't change?" he quipped if with a sarcastic face.

"Still thinking you can change it?" Darvos replied.

"I prefer try bettering my civilization than serving an invader."

The tone was getting much more aggressive, with both brothers now almost touching each other's nose and staring angrily into the other's eyes.

"If I didn't need your help I would force you to eat those words back." Darvos said, surprising everybody except his brother with that phrasing.

Iulius put his back straight again and delivered his answer. "Luckily for you, I agree that right now we can't afford to be enemies."

Confused looks came across even if most of the other people spectating that conversation were wearing full helmets. For being on opposite sides, Iulius and Darvos seemed oddly on the same page. Ezra was probably the only one who could understand it.

He knew that Darvos had wanted to at least try to mend the relationship with his brother, even though they had seen each other two times in the last years: first on Mykapo, through holograms before battling as commanders of their respective sides, then on Atollon, where they pointed their blasters at each other.

Still, they expected to run into imperial forces when the Normandy signaled that two Star Destroyers and their escorts had just arrived in the system, but he himself would have never expected to run into the Lord-Protector himself.