A perhaps needed clarification here, since so much of this part is inferred from the SWTOR storyline. The kind of “hurting” Brant did to Vette was using a shock collar as a punishment for disobedience, as is common among the Sith in this era, and not anything sexual or torturous (though granted, Kellaro is probably thinking that’s what happened).
Author’s Note
Kellaro and his team returned late in the evening, almost exactly two weeks later, or so Brant guessed by the ship’s main timeclock. The interior lights dimmed and brightened in accordance with the standard Republic day cycle, but being a military ship, with officers awake at all hours, the emergency lights were always on, and Brant had a hard time telling the day and night cycles apart.
He could see it all now at least, if in a blur. So when Brant met him fresh from landing, his twin’s face was a mix of uncomfortably familiar brown skin, black hair, and shockingly blue eyes. Brant startled when the brown was interrupted by white as Kellaro beamed when he saw him, and startled again when Kellaro went to hug him.
“You’re in a good mood,” he said sardonically when Kellaro finally detached.
The white grin disappeared, but Kellaro’s eyes remained bright. “And you are not,” he quipped.
“Nonsense. I’ve been having the time of my life,” Brant answered sarcastically.
“You boys done yet?” Vette’s voice sounded from behind a crate coming down the gangplank. “Because if you are, I could really use your help with this!”
Kellaro hurried over. Brant followed boredly after him, letting him struggle with the crate for a few minutes before lazily flicking it into the air with the Force. That earned him a glare, but it also allowed him to see Vette, just behind it.
“Your collar is gone,” he realized out loud.
“You really think I’d keep it on?” said Vette with a scowl.
“What collar?” said Kellaro. Brant and Vette exchanged glances, then swiftly looked in opposite directions.
“Its an old joke; that’s all,” Vette offered, but she was wincing.
Kellaro’s face twisted, and Brant could imagine what he was thinking. “Not that kind of joke,” he said quickly.
“Yes, well… you’re Sith,” said Kellaro.
“Really? I hadn’t noticed.”
Kellaro awkwardly left it there.
The three moved in silence out of the docking bay, Brant guiding and then depositing the crate among a bunch of others that looked similar. “Did you have a good time while we were gone at least?” Vette asked cautiously, sensing the brothers were silently spitting sparks at each other.
“Oh, yes, as nice as it can be when I’m all alone and blind.”
“Hey, I did a lot to make sure you were treated well,” Kellaro protested. “I can’t it help if half the ship is scared of you for choking out the soldier who released you from carbon-freezing!”
“Then maybe he should have been trained better.” Brant sneered. “He should have known not to approach a Sith without warning.”
“Oh, I’m sorry. Next time I’ll remember to send him in with an invitation written in gold ink so you don’t murder–”
“Stop!” cried Vette, and when both brothers glared at her, she grimaced her way through saying, “Please. Don’t fight. We only just got back.” She turned to Brant. “At least save it for day two, right?”
“Day two of what?” Brant asked, grudgingly backing down.
“I assume we’re headed back to HQ,” said Vette, glancing at Kellaro.
Kellaro didn’t meet Brant’s eyes. “Yes, assuming something else doesn’t go wrong.”
“Something else? What went wrong the first time?” growled Brant.
“Not your business…”
They were about to go at it again, and Vette bravely stepped between them. “It was a hard mission on Zakuul, that’s all,” she said quickly. “We’re all tired, and Brant’s still sick. Why don’t we relax for a while or something?” When Brant looked grumpily away, she elbowed into him and grinned. “Hey, remember that orange drink I liked so much on Nar Shadda? Turns out they have it on tap here, too…”
“Oh. Wonderful,” Brant grunted.
“Come on,” Vette wheedled. Brant looked at her with a sigh. “It’ll be fun?”
“I can’t,” said Kellaro abruptly. “I’ve got reports to make.”
“Oh, yes, wouldn’t want to keep you away from your beloved Republic bureaucracy,” Brant snarled.
“Oh, stop,” said Vette with a stamp. The brothers looked at each other without meeting each other’s eyes, and then Kellaro silently walked away. “You could at least try to get along!” Vette yelled, rounding on Brant once his twin was out of sight.
“Sith don’t ‘get along’,” Brant said dismissively.
“Why? Because you like killing everyone? Or you can’t stand to be halfway decent to your own family?” Her tone was almost vicious.
Brant stopped. “What’s with you today?”
Vette broke away, putting distance between them with an outstretched arm. “What’s with me? I’m not–I’m not your servant anymore, Brant, that’s what’s with me. And yes, I’m going to call you Brant, not Darth Merce, not ‘my lord’, none of that nonsense anymore.”
Brant stared, emotions like the wings of shyracks beating on the insides of his ribs.
“I’ve decided something,” said Vette. “When you came back, everything was a scramble, and no one really knew what to do. Then I had time on Zakuul to think, really think, and I realized… I didn’t want to go back to what we were. Not ever, Brant. Do you understand?”
Brant clenched his fists, even as his stomach dropped. He was surrounded by Republic enemies, and he was losing an ally…
…a friend?
Vette kept backing away, holding up both hands. “I know you’re upset, but you can’t take it out on other people like you once did. And you can’t shock me anymore. No collar, as you noticed.”
“I could reach you from here with my lightning.”
Vette glared at him between her raised palms. “Do it.”
Her voice was flat and low: a threat. She knew that he knew the Republic soldiers would descend on him if he tried. Sure, he could hurt her, and hurt her badly, before they reached him, but what then?
Vette then abruptly lost her nerve, face screwing up as she dropped her hands. “I don’t like this,” she said. “I don’t like fighting with you, and I don’t like all the reminders of the bad times. The thing is, Brant? I… I loved you. In a way. Not like, you know, lovers, but brothers and sisters. Almost maybe? Kind of, sort of… I didn’t realize how much until I met your brother, and everything he did reminded me of you. And you were lost forever, and that really hurt.”
Brant didn’t like hearing it. He usually swam like a fish in such distress as this, turning it to his own ends in the Force, but this time, it intimidated him. He took a step back as Vette’s breath hitched, moments away from crying.
“And the other thing I realized, Brant? We were both broken, really bad. Kellaro is… he’s good. He’s everything you could’ve been, if maybe you had been treated right. I don’t know. I don’t know why you’re… how you are. Maybe it’s the Force, Brant. Maybe being connected to it twists you, twists everybody — the Jedi are kind of crazy too.”
Brant grunted, swallowed, but she was going on again before he could form an answer.
“But either way, Brant? I got better. He made me better. He trusted me, and I-I trust him. You… I really care for you too, Brant, but if you choose to remain in that dark place, I — I can’t do it anymore. I can’t help you.”
Now the tears really came. She looked up at him.
“I’m not your slave anymore, Brant. I need you to understand that…”
He blew out a furious snort, knuckles white. She shied away from him; she had no courage. She wouldn’t resist him. She was weak. He hated her.
No, no…
Hated…
That.
Brant reeled back. He couldn’t hate her, and that baffled him most of all. He hated what was happening. He hated the feeling.
It made no sense to a Sith. Feelings were his weapons, his power. How could he hate them?
Wasn’t this all her fault? Since when did she care so much?
Since when did he?
Vette was edging away. They both knew he couldn’t stop her, and when she reached the end of the corridor, she took off running, leaving Brant alone.
She didn’t go far before Brant could hear her sobbing, as if some lover had just broken her heart. He instinctually took a step toward her, realized what he was doing, took a step the other direction, stopped again, then stamped around in a circle, swearing bitterly. He let out a blast of lightning at one of the lamps in the ceiling, breaking it with a crack and explosion of smoke. Likely he’d pay for it later, but it seemed to help.
For a second, at any rate. Perhaps scared by the blast, Vette moved further along, now out of earshot.
Brant seethed. He tried to call up a rage: a good, hot rage he could lose himself in and forget. He kept putting out the lights with his lightning bolts, but the longer the game went on, the more he realized it didn’t soothe the feeling.
He was losing something. He wanted to fight; he was ready to kill to keep what was his, but he sensed, this time, that wouldn’t help.
True to the last, Vette had slipped beyond his control. He was powerless, helpless before her loss, and when he was being really, really honest with himself?
That scared him to death.
Vette found Kellaro seconds later in the hall.
“What happened?” he called out to her, his expression dark and deadly, and she stopped short, half believing Kellaro might be capable of shooting lightning at her, too. But then Kellaro’s face softened, and he opened his arms, and she was sobbing on his shoulder, and it was all right. Or near enough.
“Did he hurt you?” Kellaro asked, a faint growl backing up his words.
“No,” said Vette, calming down into hiccups. She was still shaking uncontrollably, and Kellaro gave her a good squeeze of the shoulders, bringing her back to the present. She took a deep breath. “No, he didn’t. You know, I don’t think he could. But I don’t think he understood me, either.”
“You don’t think he could?” Kellaro’s alarmed look was disbelieving. “Vette, he’s– well, he’s a Sith! They murder people every day–”
“Stop calling him that!” said Vette, and Kellaro clenched his mouth shut. “You don’t understand, either! What he’s been through — what they do to people on Korriban!”
Kellaro bit his lip. “Let’s walk,” he said tersely. “Keep you from seizing up. But tell me if you feel faint, okay? Then you must sit down.” He muttered an oath to himself and beckoned her along.
They walked in silence after that. Vette remembered Kellaro had someplace to be, and she considered telling him to leave her and go take care of his job. Looking at him, though, she let the thought go. If Kellaro wanted to be walking with her, then that’s exactly where he would be. She didn’t have to make that decision for him. He was stubborn… just like Brant.
She winced. “I just really thought he’d understand. I guess I was just being stupid.”
“Understand what?”
“I…” Vette couldn’t think of how to say it.
“If you don’t understand it, how do you expect him to?” Kellaro shook his head. “Look, maybe you’re right, and I don’t understand either. I want him to be happy here as much as you do, Vette, but like Father says, sometimes you just can’t help people.”
“Did he tell you that? About Brant?”
“Well, no, but he’s said it about people like Brant. There comes a time when the bad choices people make aren’t just them making fools of themselves, Vette, but when that’s really who they are, deep inside. And you can’t change who someone is, deep inside.”
“But deep inside, you’re the same as him,” ventured Vette. “Aren’t you? As twins? So if he’s really that way, then you…”
Kellaro shook his head. “Okay, so maybe that’s not what I really meant…”
“No, I really think you meant it.”
Kellaro sighed. “I don’t,” he said finally, after taking a moment to think about it. “He scares me. That’s what it is. Because if that’s all it takes to really mess someone up, to make them break and turn evil like that, then what hope can we have against the Emperor? He excels at destroying people like that.”
“So you’re scared it’ll happen to you.”
“Not just me, but yes.”
Vette paused. “He was always different, you know. From the moment I met him. He… gave me advice for how to steer clear of the Master’s rage. Those were his first words to me. Look, he’s hurt bad, Kellaro, but I don’t think he’s broken.” She hesitated and hedged. “Did your dad… say how to handle those people? The ones that are truly bad inside?”
“You kill them,” said Kellaro flatly.
“Huh. I guess I should have expected that of a Mandalorian.”
“Yes… so, what’s your point?”
“I’m not prepared to kill Brant,” said Vette abruptly. “And I think I would be, if I didn’t think he could be saved — if I didn’t think he was good, under all the thunder and spitfire. I’ve…done it before. That kind of killing. He made me do it before. I hated it, but… I understood after the fact why I had to.”
“I’m sorry,” said Kellaro. “No one should have to see that kind of evil up close.”
“No, but as long as it exists, it’s better to know what it looks like.”
They went past one of the offices Kellaro was supposed to be reporting in to, and he paused, hesitating for her sake.
Vette turned to him. “You should go now… Thank you for talking to me, though,” she said awkwardly. “I feel a lot better.”
“Good, because I’m not sure I do,” said Kellaro with a weak smile.
Vette returned the smile waveringly. “It’ll be all right.”
Kellaro nodded. “If it’s not, come find me, okay? I’m not going to make you say it, but I can tell he’s hurt you in the past. I won’t let him do it again. I’d… rather kill him.”
“It’d be like killing yourself,” said Vette with a shudder.
“A part of me that deserves to die, then,” said Kellaro coldly, and Vette couldn’t help a stare. He noticed, and he quickly switched on an apologetic grin, but she was reminded once again how eerily similar the two twins were.
Vette took a steadying breath. “Thank you,” she said simply. He gave a slight bow, and after a nod from her, he stepped into the office. She instead turned down the corridor and forced herself to walk along it.
“It’ll be all right,” she echoed to herself, and she wished she could believe it.