Chapter Eleven: Some Sunny Day
Another arrow zinged through the open door just as Alexei yanked the first one out of his chest. Seconds later, the archer himself charged into the room.
Surprised, oxygen-deprived, and relieved, Yuri couldn't help laughing. "Raven?!"
"Hey, kid! See the mess ya get yourself inta without me?"
"Schwann," Alexei spat. "I was expecting to get rid of one cretin today, but I'll happily bring you back to the afterlife with me as well."
"Oh, yeah? I feel bad for whoever this Schwann fellow is, then." He converted his bow into a pair of blades and faced Alexei with a deadly glare.
Alexei unsheathed his sword and made his move. Raven met his attack with a clank of swords, while Yuri limped to his Mom's side and dropped to his knees.
"Kid," Raven grunted between blocking Alexei's attacks, "take your lady friend and get out of here. I'll catch up."
"What, and leave all the fun to you?" Yuri didn't even both looking up for that comment, his attention focused on his mother. He wanted to touch her and comfort her, but his hands were still bloody. In a low voice, he said, "Mom? Are you all right?"
Her pained eyes opened, and she reached for her head. It was still twisted at an angle that made Yuri's stomach squirm, but she gripped the sides of her head tightly and popped it back into place with a crunch. "Sweetheart, I'm fine," she whispered, though she was obviously still in pain. "You should have run."
"Sorry. Guess I didn't grow up accustomed to following orders from you."
"That's your friend Raven, right?" She sat up, one hand still on the side of her neck for support.
"Yeah. You need to get out of here, and I'll help Raven. Then we'll all make a run for the exit."
Mom gave him an annoyed look. "What help do you think you're going to be, sweetheart? You only have two functioning limbs."
Behind him, Raven grunted as one of Alexei's attacks grazed his shoulder. Raven said he'd fought Alexei in a duel once and was soundly trounced. Alexei was going to win this fight, and as much as Yuri hated to admit it, his mom was right. He wasn't in any condition to be a valuable reinforcement. Whoever stayed behind to hold Alexei up while the others escaped was bound to be killed, but without that defence, Alexei would chase and kill them both. They couldn't outrun him, they couldn't defeat him, and even if by some miracle they did overcome him, he couldn't die. The hopelessness of the situation sank into his chest.
"It's up to you, Yuri." She rested her other hand on his shoulder. "You can banish Alexei. He's only here because you allow him to be."
Yuri punched the floorboards. "It's not that easy!" How could he simply stop feeling bad about the people he killed? He'd done the job no one wanted to do, and wishing it away wouldn't clean the blood from his hands. From monsters who'd deserved death like Cumore and Ragou, people who forced his hand like Yeager, and those who asked for it like the Don, he'd killed too many people to just push it aside. "I made the choice to become this person."
"I know you've killed people, but that doesn't make you invariably a killer."
"What, you want me to say it's in the past? It doesn't matter if they're dead because there's nothing I can do about it anymore?" Behind him, Raven was struggling to hold Alexei off. If Raven died, that would be on him, too.
"No. Accept the past, learn from it, take responsibility for your actions, but don't define yourself by it. You said you and Flynn were on different paths, but I don't think life works like that. Our lives aren't locked into established paths of light or dark - they're fluid. Being a person who gets his hands dirty doesn't mean that's all you can ever be. Things you do don't define who you are. You told me that yourself, didn't you? I am not a whore, and you are not a murderer."
Alexei and Raven were getting closer and closer. Raven was clearly losing ground and within a minute or two, Alexei would be on them. Yuri considered grabbing Mom, making a run for it when they still could, and hoping Raven took the hint and joined them.
Mom flung herself at him, wrapping her arms around his neck and pulling him tightly against her. "If you look in the mirror and see a killer, and fear that that's what everyone else sees when they look at you, then know that you're wrong. No matter what you do, you will always be my precious son. Whatever choices you make, you're still my Yuri and no amount of dirty work will ever change that. I will always love you."
Yuri closed his eyes and leaned against her. For a moment, he didn't hear the raging fight only yards away. He took breaths so deep they hurt his lungs. Unconditional love was not something he was familiar with. Never having a family of his own, he'd had to earn the one he'd made through being a good friend and mutually supporting each other. If he let himself become a bad person, they would abandon him, just like foster families had passed him off to someone else as soon as he became too difficult as a small child.
But that wasn't the case here. Mom would probably still love him even if - heaven forbid - he did outright become a villain. It was because she was truly his family, but Yuri felt the same way about Flynn. He tried to consider if there was anything Flynn could do that could make Yuri stop loving him, and came up short. Even when he was furious with him, he still loved Flynn. Estelle, Flynn, and the others were so much more than just friends - they were his family. If they thought of him even close to the same way he saw them, then maybe unconditional love wasn't such a new concept to him after all.
That was why he'd been so worried about crossing the line into being a bad person. Unconsciously, he'd framed it as a question of whether he'd get to keep his family. Mom hugged him tightly against her, silently reminding him the love wasn't a game of subtracting bad actions from the good and sticking around only if the result was a positive number.
Good? Bad? He'd done a lot of things in his life, and he'd be better off letting his friends worry about whether they still wanted to stick around. It was true that there was a lot of blood on his hands, and it would never wash off because the lives he'd taken could never come back. But if he had the love of his friends and of his mother, he realized it didn't matter.
Light glowed through the window. The sudden brightness made Raven stumble, giving Alexei and opening. Yuri shouted in alarm as Alexei slashed his sword at Raven, but the blade swiped harmlessly through him.
Alexei dropped the sword with a clank, and then stared at his translucent hand in alarm.
Yuri pulled away from Mom and then gripped her hand with his now-clean one. "Sorry, Alexei. Consider your invitation revoked."
As the room got brighter, Alexei grew fainter. Fury written on his face, he strode toward Yuri, hands outstretched. "You impertinent…" He faded from existence before finishing the threat.
Yuri breathed a sigh of relief. He wasn't sure how long he'd be able to keep his dark thoughts at bay, and knew that it would probably be months before he eliminated them completely, but for the moment, he felt lighter than he had in years.
He also felt more sore than he had in months. Both his ankle and shoulder were on fire, his throat hurt with every breath, and countless other aches littered his body. Raven slumped to the floor next to him, looking similarly pooped. He had more than a few bleeding cuts from narrow-misses with Alexei.
"Good work, kid. I dunno what ya did, but thanks."
"I should be saying that to you. I hate to admit it, Old Man, but you really saved my neck back there." He massaged his throat, and gingerly swallowed. He'd been hoarse already, and a second attempt to strangle him hadn't done him any favours.
"Any time. Here, let me help you out."
"With wha-"
Raven grabbed his left arm in one hand and shoulder in the other, and with a loud pop snapped his shoulder into place.
Yuri shouted a startled curse, and then massaged his aching shoulder. It hurt considerably less now, but the relocation had hurt like a bitch. "Hell, warn me next time before you do that."
Raven just chuckled. "Sure thing, kid. Now, who is this lovely lady with you?" He gave her his signature grin. "I don't believe we've met, darlin'."
"Knock it off, Old Man." Yuri rarely minded Raven's flirtatious behaviour, but this was one case he wouldn't stand for. "This is my mom."
"Oh!" His eyebrows almost disappeared under his hair. "I see, yeah, that's how it is, I get it. Nice ta meet'cha, Ms. Lowell."
She shook his hand. "Hello. Any friend of Yuri's is a friend of mine."
Raven turned to Yuri. "So what are ya doin' here, anyway?"
"I followed Mom up," he explained. "Alexei tried to kill me, then he attacked her, then I realized who she was… long story. What about you? How'd you find us?"
"I was talkin' with Casey, and then suddenly everything got dark. She said someone else musta come up and I figured it was one of you guys, and it was startin' ta look pretty spooky so I figured I'd better go find ya. She loaned me her bow and then I searched the rooms until I saw ya runnin' in the distance. I tried ta call, but I guess you didn't hear."
"That was you!" The first stalker had been Alexei, but it seemed he might have avoided a lot of trouble if he'd slowed down and let the other one catch up with him.
"I lost you after a swamp, but then I spotted Alexei and figured he'd lead me straight to ya."
"Thank you very much," Mom said. "We owe you our lives, and I'm pleased that Yuri has such loyal friends."
"It was my pleasure, darlin'. Now, I'd like ta find Casey again if ya don't mind. Barely talked ta her for ten minutes before you barged in and ruined everythin'."
That… didn't add up. Yuri frowned, a flicker of uncertainty lighting in his brain. "What do you mean, ten minutes? Didn't you follow her up here?"
"Sure. I followed her up, we talked a bit, and then you showed up."
The uncertainty turned to worry. "Old Man, how long have you been here?"
Raven shrugged. "Couple hours, maybe. Like I said, you showed up only 'bout ten minutes after I arrived."
Yuri's heart skipped a beat when the implications of Raven's statement sank in. "When I followed Mom up, you had been missing for over a week."
Raven stared at him. "What? Nah… it'd been ten minutes, tops."
Yuri looked to Mom in alarm. She stared back with wide eyes, and then shook her head. "Oh, no. I knew time moved differently between the worlds, but I had no idea it was this severe."
Yuri jumped to his feet, wincing, and then helped Mom up. "We need to go. If ten minutes here is over a week back home…. They must be worried sick about us."
"Follow me. Getting to the exit will be very simple now that you've banished the darkness."
This time, Yuri didn't stop to say goodbye to the room he was born in. There was no use pondering the family he might have had, since he'd found a different one that was just as good. In the next room, they found a broad, grassy field with rolling hills in the distance. Fluffy clouds drifted across the sky-blue ceiling and he could even feel the heat on his face from the false sun.
Mom and Raven walked briskly forward, while Yuri limped behind. He was entirely certain that the amount of stress he'd put on his still-healing ankle tonight was not medically recommended and the more he relaxed from the fire of the fight, the more it slowed him down. Raven pulled Yuri's arm over his shoulders, and Yuri reluctantly used Raven as a crutch to hop across the field.
From there they crossed a beach, where Yuri struggled across warm, white sand. Salty water lapped the shore, even though he could tell that the endless ocean was actually a mural on a wall thirty feet away. They crossed a living room filled with flowers, and then entered a stairwell. They stopped on the landing, under a crystal chandelier heavier than Yuri himself. Light glinted off the tiny pieces of crystal and on the tiled floor of the landing. To the left and right, marble stairs led up or down into darkness.
"This is the exit," Mom said. "If you go up, you will enter the afterlife. If you go down, you'll return to the mortal world. This is where we must part ways."
As eager as Yuri was to get home and reassure his friends he was ok, it seemed like he'd just met his mother. There was still so many more things to say to her. "Are you sure you can't come with us?"
She shook her head. "My time is over, Yuri. I'm happy to move on, and I don't want you to waste your life lurking in that old empty house just to see me. Besides, this isn't the end. I'll see you again someday."
Yuri pulled away from Raven so he could hug her. "Yeah. Hopefully not for a long, long time. Then you can introduce me to my grandparents."
"I'll look forward to it. But, you're right: a long time from now. I can't wait to hear how many more adventures you'll have had when we meet again." She squeezed him tightly and whispered in his ear. "I love you so much, Yuri. Never forget that. No matter what you think of yourself or what others might call you, you will always be my little boy and I love you more than anything."
Yuri pulled away and kissed her forehead. "I love you too, Mom. Thanks for everything."
She smiled, fighting back tears. "Now go on. Your friends are worried about you. I'll see you again some day, and until then… have a fantastic life, sweetheart."
Yuri grinned and nodded, and then turned away before he found some excuse to stay longer. Raven said nothing as they descended the stairs, and Yuri didn't give in to the temptation to look back. As they got lower, the shadows loomed like a fog. As they stepped into darkness, Yuri couldn't even see his feet in front of him. Just as he wondered how far down they would have to go, his foot came down on empty air. He had only a second to think, shit, before he toppled into darkness.
Yuri opened his eyes slowly. He felt like he'd slept for years. Then he remembered where he'd come from, and bolted upright. Shit, it hadn't been years had it?
Next to him, Raven sat up and rubbed his head. "Geeze, how's that for a rude awakenin'? Couldn't just walk out, could we?"
They were in the silver room, lying right on top of the human-shaped stain Cyril had left on the floor. When Yuri noticed that, he scrambled away. "Looks like we made it back, though."
"Sure does. Wonder how long we've been gone?"
"Better find out." He stiffly got to his feet. The world they'd been in might not have been entirely real, but it seemed injuries carried over. After two strangling attempts and not doing anything to preserve his voice in the aftermath, any amount of talking aggravated his throat. He could only imagine how red his neck must be. As they headed to the door, he said, "Hey, Old Man… sorry about interrupting your chat with Casey."
"Nah, it's fine. If ya hadn't of come, I mighta been missin' for months."
"Let's just hope we haven't been."
They hiked up the stairs and out of the basement. When Yuri stepped into the kitchen, the first thing he saw was a woman with her back to him, pouring a glass of milk. For a moment he was confused, but then recognized the orange hair. "Sodia?"
She jumped, dropping the pitcher of milk and splashing it across the table. "Yuri Lowell?!"
Yuri waved after she spun around. "Yo. Long time no see."
"Where did you come from?"
Yuri jerked his thumb behind him. "From the basement."
Her shock morphed into irritation. "That isn't what I mean. When did you…? Oh, come with me."
Yuri and Raven followed her out of the kitchen. Sodia looked the same as always, which Yuri took as reassurance that not too much time had passed. At the most, it could have been a couple of years. He'd been half-afraid they'd find all their friends grey-haired and the world had moved on without them. When they reached the entrance hell, Yuri heard a familiar shout.
"I'll get the recordings! Meet me there in five minutes!"
At the top of the stairs, Rita disappeared around a corner a second before Yuri had a chance to call out. She looked the same as always, too, bringing him more relief. They left the house and stepped into sunshine. The lawn had been slashed down and Knight tents littered the field.
"What are all you guys doing here?" Yuri asked Sodia.
"Just a moment. Commandant!" Sodia ran ahead, leaving Yuri and Raven standing near the front steps, at what was now the beginning of a road through camp.
A minute later, Flynn ran around the side of a tent, armour clanking. He paused when he spotted them, and then the brightness of his smile challenged the sun. "Yuri!" He cleared the distance to them in seconds and pulled Yuri into a bear hug. His armour crushed Yuri's sore muscles and cut off his air.
"Ack!" he coughed. "Easy, Flynn, I've nearly suffocated three times in the past few hours already."
Flynn let him go immediately. "I'm sorry, that was unprofessional of me." He kept one hand on Yuri's shoulder, looking him up and down like he thought Yuri would vanish if he let go.
"Hey, calm down," Yuri said. "It's really me, in the flesh."
"Yes. I'm sorry. It's just…" His smile wavered and his fingers tightened around Yuri's shoulder. "I thought you were dead."
Yuri's chest tightened. Fearing the answer, he asked, "How long have we been gone?"
Flynn raised an eyebrow. "You don't know?"
"It's a long story. How long?"
"A little over three months."
Damn. He'd feared worse, but… damn. The pain had been clear in Flynn's face when he'd said he thought they were dead. If their places were reversed, he couldn't imagine the grief of days passing and still no sign of his best friend, hope gradually dying.
"How did you get hurt? Where have you been?"
"Hold your horses," Raven said. "Maybe we oughta sit down first."
"Yes, of course. Follow me." He pulled Yuri's arm over his shoulders to help him limp to the largest tent, thankfully close to the door. Inside, Flynn gave Yuri the one chair and Raven sat on the desk. He was clearly itching with questions, but restrained himself and fetched a pitcher of water from the corner first. "Here," he said, pouring a glass. "You sound terrible."
Yuri downed the entire glass in one big gulp. "Thanks."
"I sent Sodia to find Lady Estellise and the others. She should be here in a few minutes to heal your injuries." Flynn looked between them, concern etched into his face. As an experienced soldier, he could tell when people had been through some shit. "What in the world happened? You've been missing for over three months, and now you just show up in the basement?"
"That's a really long story," Yuri rasped.
"The short version is that were in some alternate dimension full of ghosts," Raven supplied, which only deepened Flynn's confusion. "We'll give ya the full story when the others show up, capeesh?"
"Very well."
"What's going on here?" Yuri asked. "When did you get here?"
"I came as soon as I got your letter. I knew that if you were actually asking me for help, the situation must be quite serious. I informed Lady Estellise I was going to Dahngrest, and she immediately insisted on coming."
Yuri smiled in satisfaction. Called it.
"She and Miss Mordio accompanied me here. When we arrived, your friends explained the situation. You had been missing for about a week and a half at that point and they were getting desperate. Miss Mordio examined the door and eventually called in a team of researchers to help the study. I brought reinforcements from Zaphias to protect the field laboratory they established here, as well as scour the house and forest for any sign of you."
"Any luck figurin' out how that door works?"
Flynn shook his head. "So far, no. I believe they've reached some hypotheses, but when she tried to explain I didn't understand a word of it."
Yuri chuckled. "That's Rita for you."
Raven started to ask another question, but then the tent flap burst open and Estelle tore into the room. "Yuri! Oh, Yuri, I was so worried about you!" She hugged him even tighter than Flynn.
He wheezed, "Ah, Estelle, ow, loosen up a bit…"
"Oh no!" She pulled away with fear in her eyes. "Oh, you're hurt! Where are you injured? I'll heal you."
Behind her, Karol, Repede, Judith, and Rita smiled at them. "I'm so glad you guys are back," Karol said. "I was really worried."
"Where did you go?" Judith asked.
"Through the door," Raven explained as Estelle diligently healed all Yuri's bumps and bruises.
Rita's eyes lit up. "You were seriously back there? You need to tell me everything."
"Yeah," Karol said. "I want to know where you guys were all this time!"
Raven explained. Even after healing, Yuri's vocal cords were inflamed and Estelle forbade him from talking unless necessary. He supplied additions when needed, but most of the things only he knew were parts he'd rather keep private anyway. Raven had gotten enough of an explanation for how the door worked from Casey to satisfy Rita.
At the end of the story, his friends gathered around and unloaded affection on them both. Flynn was going to want to talk to him later about his mom, but for now he was happy to just appreciate all the love overflowing from them. His mother may have been his last living blood relative, but it would be wrong to say Yuri didn't have a family.
A few days later, Pavel met with Brave Vesperia in their office. Yuri hadn't been to the house since they left the day he and Raven returned, and he had no interest in returning. For now, he was pretty sure he had his thoughts under control, but being around that door again was too risky. The last thing he wanted was to give Alexei another invitation in.
"I'm sorry it turned out like this," Pavel mumbled at the table. "I didn't want anyone to get hurt. I'm really sorry, Yuri."
"Don't worry about it," Yuri said with a wave of his hand. "When a guild takes a job, they accept the possibility of getting hurt on it. Lots of our missions involve fighting monsters - this was nothing out of the ordinary."
"Yeah, don't feel bad," Karol said. "Yuri's had way worse."
"Well… if you insist. Still, I'm giving you fifteen percent of the sale."
There was nothing they could do to get rid of the door. Flynn had tried using a battering ram on it when he arrived to no avail. Rita eventually had all the walls around it torn down, until it was just a lone wooden door in the middle of empty space. Even then, it wouldn't open. Yuri hadn't been up to see it, but Flynn had said it was very odd. Even though both sides of the door were exposed, only darkness could be seen under the crack. The ghost problem had disappeared while Yuri was in the other world, but with a door everyone claimed was cursed, there wasn't much chance of selling the house to a family. Luckily, Pavel had found another buyer. The association of mages purchased the property, and Rita claimed it would be the site of otherworldly research for years.
"Thank you very much." Judith accepted the money before Karol could protest the extra five percent.
"You really shouldn't pay us that much," Karol said. "We hardly did anything. The situation isn't solved, and it turned out most of it was caused by us anyway."
"I promised, didn't I? Besides, you did figure out what was causing the haunting, even if it turns out we can't fix it. You figured out what happened to Cyril, too."
"But, come to think of it…" Karol said, frowning, "I'm confused. You came to us because you thought the house was haunted the night you spent there. But, if the ghosts didn't show up until we got there…."
"Actually, uh, I think I figured that out on my own," Pavel said. He rubbed his fingers together and inspected a whirl on the table. "You said the door brought in the spirits of people you miss, right? Like… people you can't get out of your heart. I thought, maybe, when I was there… it was my parents. They only died recently, and I've been kind of lost since they died. I think they were trying to talk to me."
"That's probably it," Yuri said. "Don't tear yourself up over it, though. Ghosts find it very hard to actually vocalize in this world. You would have had to go into the world beyond to speak to them, and I don't think you'd want to do that."
Pavel shuddered. Yuri hadn't told him very much about what was back there, but he'd said enough. "You're right."
"It's just as well you sold the house to the mages," Yuri said. "Even if we got rid of the ghosts, it would be hard to sell a house where people died like that. No one would ever want to use Melanie's bedroom, and I don't have a clue how to clean that stain in the basement."
"Yeah… good point." Pavel bobbed his head. "I'm glad Melanie is at peace now. I never knew her, but she was still family."
"She's been at peace for a while, though," Judith said.
"That's right, you said it wasn't her after all. You didn't mention, though, who was it?"
Karol and Judith looked to Yuri to answer. He shrugged with a practiced air of coolness. "Who knows? Some woman who drifted through the gap, I guess." There were just things he didn't want to talk about with strangers. It had been an emotional meeting, and he didn't feel like sharing it with others. His friends knew, but that was different. They were family. "The important thing is that your great-aunt has been in peace ever since Cyril died. Leaving her body unburied apparently wasn't causing her great distress."
"I still think that's weird," Karol said. "Like… she led him to his death. Didn't she want him to live? Why would she encourage him to follow her into death?"
"Maybe she saw how unhappy he was," Judith said. "His grief must have been monumental to summon a doorway to the afterlife. She probably saw that he was taking no steps to deal with his grief, even after decades, and thought it would be best if he joined her in the next life."
"It's amazing she still wanted him after all that," Karol said. "Leaving her body in her room, pretending she was still alive, and locking himself up in that house was really creepy."
Yuri crossed his arms and leaned back. "Sometimes, love really is unconditional."
Yuri sat in his window when the door knocked. Since he'd seen Flynn walk by on the street below, he called, "It's open!"
"Hey." Flynn stopped halfway into the room and smiled at him.
Yuri scowled. "What? Is there something on my face?"
Flynn shook his head. "No, you're fine. It's just… I'm really happy to see you. I'd almost convinced myself finding you again was just a dream."
Flynn had left Dahngrest the day after Yuri and Raven returned from beyond the door. Now that Yuri was found, he didn't need to keep bullshitting an excuse about needing to oversee the security for breakthrough scientific research. Yuri had taken a short break before heading out on another mission with the rest of the guild and generally getting back to life. It had been two months since they reappeared, and he was finally in Zaphias again.
"I told you I was fine."
Flynn sat in the chair by the window. "I know that for you, you were gone for a night. But for the rest of us… Yuri, you were missing for three months. That's more than twice the length of your disappearance after Zaude. I really thought…" He hung his head.
Yuri lightly kicked Flynn's shoulder. "Ah, come on, I wouldn't die in a silly way like that." He didn't mention how much of a close call it had been.
"We all thought you and Raven were dead. Even Estelle and Karol, who insisted we'd find you alive whenever the subject came up, started doubting by the end. My biggest concern was whether your body would ever show up to give us something to bury."
Yuri sat silently as the sun streaming through the window practically made Flynn's blond head glow. It was difficult to conceptualize that three months had passed without him. When they'd first gotten out, he kept finding himself referencing comments made "the other day" to find that Karol barely remembered the conversation from so many months ago. For him, it had been a frightening few hours. For his friends, it had been three months of worry and dwindling hope. "…Sorry."
Flynn pulled his head up. "It's fine. I know it wasn't your fault. Actually, that makes it twice now that Alexei has done this to us."
Yuri was about to comment that it wasn't Alexei's fault he had gone missing after Zaude, but quickly held his tongue. That was a conversation for a much later day. "I'll be happy not to face that bastard again. You think he was bad when you last saw him? Try covered in blood and immortal."
Flynn winced. "I don't envy you. I never did get a chance to talk to you about what happened, though. Estelle wouldn't let you talk to me."
"Excuse me for getting strangled - twice. My throat was a bit sore."
"You know I'm not upset with you."
"Heh, yeah. When you're actually upset with me, you let me know."
Flynn gave him one of his looks. "You've given me a lot of reasons to get experienced with it."
"And yet you still think yelling at me will change anything? What's that saying about true idiocy being trying the same thing and expecting different results? Anyway, what's there to tell?"
"Well…" He leaned back and folded his hands. "You said you met your mother. What was she like?"
Yuri watched a bird preening itself on the windowsill next door. "I don't know what to say. She was my mom. She was… nice. Kind. She helped me a lot. It was almost surreal, this woman I've never seen before loving me so much. A nice kind of surreal, though." He glanced back at Flynn, who seemed to be forcing a smile. "What's with that face?"
Flynn's face went through a series of contortions before finally settling on a frown. "It's dumb. I know what you faced in that world was terrible and I have no interest in seeing something similar. But, I can't help but feel… well, I miss my mom, too." He quickly added, "I'm really happy for you, Yuri. You deserved to meet her. It isn't fair that I had mine for ten years but you only had yours for six months."
Yuri shook his head with a slight smile. "You idiot. Don't worry about offending me; of course you'd want to see yours again, too."
Flynn smiled, relieved that Yuri wasn't mad at him for being petty. "And you know… my mom loved you like a son as well."
"Yeah. I know. Your mom was really great, and I appreciate everything she did for me. It was nice to meet my own, though."
"Of course, I wasn't trying to say mine should be good enough for you. Just, I heard you say something about not having a family before you found all your friends. You know, you're practically a Scifo as far as I'm concerned."
Yuri snorted. "Why would I want that? Yuri Scifo? That sounds dumb. What's with the C standing in for an H anyway?" The brief eye contact explained his true feelings on the matter loud and clear.
"You're ok with everything then? I can only imagine that meeting your mother for the first time would be overwhelming."
"Really, I'm fine." In the two months since getting out, any lingering emotional issues he had over his mother were settled. "There are a few things I wish I'd had time to ask her, but if I'd stuck around talking about everything, I wouldn't be coming back until next year."
Flynn scooted forward on his seat. "Things like what?"
"Like… well, I know she got sick, but I've never really known the circumstances behind that."
Flynn smiled, which wasn't the reaction Yuri expected to saying he was sad he didn't know how his mom died. "I have good news," Flynn said. "I did a little research for you in the castle archives."
"What kind?"
"Well, actually Lady Estellise did most of the research… anyway, I'm pretty sure I can answer your question. In the summer after you were born, there was an outbreak of cholera in Zaphias. A lot of people in the lower quarter died. I think it's pretty likely it took her life as well."
"Oh." He couldn't think of anything to say. He was glad to know, but also it seemed weird to get excited when talking about his dead mother. "Not necessarily, though, right? She just said she got sick, and I'm sure people had more than just that disease that summer."
"That's what I thought, but Lady Estellise said it made the most sense. Usually if there's a disease in a house, a baby would be most likely to catch it and die, since their immune systems are weaker. Cholera is only spread through contaminated water, though, so as long as she nursed you, you would have been fine even while she was deathly ill."
Yuri nodded slowly. "So she was saving my life even while she was dying. I really owe her a lot. I owe her everything, actually. Same deal with you, I suppose?"
Flynn shrugged. "I don't think either of my parents had the disease, but in general. Infants that were fed formula that might have had contaminated water would have likely died that summer. We were lucky."
"So did your research say where victims of the outbreak are buried?"
Flynn's face fell. "Ah… actually, yes. It said the bodies of the victims were burned, and the remains buried in a mass grave. There's a plaque in the cemetery; I checked."
Yuri sighed at his knees. That stupid bird across the road had started singing. "She deserved better."
"Yeah."
"You know she was younger than Estelle? It's weird to think about. I don't feel nearly old enough to be a dad yet, but if she hadn't died, she'd already be the mother of a five year old by my age. She seemed so much more mature than I was at eighteen."
"I don't know if you were a good standard of average maturity."
Yuri kicked him again.
"Stop that. Anyway, I suppose having a kid can do that to you. It forces you to grow up."
"I'm really proud of her. I hope she knows that."
"I'm sure she does."
"She said she wanted to meet you, by the way. Not sure what that says about her judgement, but…"
Flynn punched his knee.
Yuri listened to the bird sing for almost a full minutes before he brought the next subject up. "She said some other things, too. I don't remember exactly how she phrased it, but I've been thinking about that night at Aurnion. Remember?"
"Of course," Flynn said carefully, eyeing him questioningly. "What about it?"
"We said we were on different paths, but that we would always be friends despite that. I've been thinking lately, but maybe that whole view is wrong."
"What do you mean?"
"We see ourself as walking on separate paths, right? Like we were together as kids, and then we hit a fork and we're going separate ways now. Mom said she didn't see lives as being on paths of defined light and dark. And you know, I think she's right. If you were really on a 'path', then doing the lawful thing would be your only option."
Flynn frowned, not fully embracing the concept yet. "But it is my only option. As the commandant, I have to-"
"No, it's the option you consistently choose. The option to be a massive dick is also always there. You and I are on the same path, we're just making different choices along the way. I think people like Alexei happen when they think they'd chosen the path of being a righteous saviour, and therefor anything they choose along the way is all part of the righteous saviour path. Alexei never realized he kept picking the massive dick options, because he didn't believe those options were there."
Flynn nodded, confusion fading from his face. "I think I see what you're getting at. If we limit our thinking to a narrow path of good or evil, we blind ourselves to the potentials we could become. Someone might do horrendous things but justify it because they think they're on the 'good person' path. Likewise, someone could do noble things but brush them aside because they think they're on the 'shady person' path." He gave Yuri a pointed look.
Yuri was good at ignoring Flynn's looks. "So, let's stop thinking of ourselves as following different paths. We're on the same broad path leading to a brighter tomorrow, and even if we handle different burdens along the way, we'll walk it together."
"I think I like that."
Yuri hopped down from the windowsill. "I want to check out that plaque."
"Do you want me to come?"
"Of course I do. Maybe you guys never met, but you shared your mom with me, so I think I can share mine with you. She'd love you, I bet. She kept nagging me about tying my shoes properly."
"See! She agrees with me!"
"That's why I said you guys would get along."
Yuri led Flynn down the stairs, still grinning. Wherever Mom was now, he hoped she was smiling too.
