(ω‖)The weird uncle who could have kids himself!
No one knew what Darius and Horus, the supreme commanders of their respective sides, had discussed. In any case, they had certainly reached no substantive agreement. That much was beyond doubt.
The other side's two warships hadn't surrendered.
And their ground forces—at least several thousand Astartes Space Marines of the XVI Legion—showed no intention of evacuating Canopy Star anytime soon.
They were still busy preparing various defensive positions in the town they had occupied earlier and the small, abandoned military fortress left over from the planet's former government. They were clearly prepared to fight to the bitter end.
Of course, it seemed the leaders on both sides hadn't fallen out, either!
The two warships in orbit had taken the initiative to signal goodwill and shut down their engines, drifting along on momentum. Seeing this, Canopy Star's forces left their largest flagship behind to keep watch, while the other Battlecruisers quickly warped away.
The situation clearly showed that although the sides hadn't reached an agreement, they had probably found some kind of understanding or agreed on certain preliminary terms. They would likely have to wait and see how the ships and ground forces on both sides responded before learning the final outcome of the negotiations.
That would undoubtedly be a long process. Whether it was because their differences were too great, because one side was deliberately dragging things out, or because both sides were doing so, remained to be seen.
On the third day after the great battle came to a halt, Darius finally arrived at an underground research facility at the mining base with a troublesome little girl leader he had run into along the way. There, they got a good look at a very tall, naked man. Some kind of blurring