Authoress' notes: Thanks for all the reviews and all the people who had favourited and watched this story. I'm really flattered. :D This chapter is significantly longer than the last chapter… It's twice the length, actually. Maybe I should be less descriptive? Anyway, I got a review saying that Yuri should be less... enthusiastic. So, I went to youtube and watched the first few gameplay videos and what do you know? That person was correct. So this time I did my homework and studied Yuri's character. I just hope he's in character this time… Not sure about Estelle, though.

I just realized something; I really love Flynn. Even more than I love Yuri.

Excuse any spelling mistakes. I do not have a beta reader.

Disclaimer: I do not own Yuri Lowell, Flynn Scifo or any of the characters mentioned in this fanfiction. Nor do I own Tales of Vesperia. If I owned ToV, Flynn would have been a playable character from the start.

Way to Live

Chapter 2

"-And that's how I managed to get that book!" Estelle finished, clasping her hands together in front of her chest, smiling one of her sweetest smiles at the knight in front of her. The pink-haired princess bobbed her head to the side a bit, making her hair sway lightly. Said knight perked up at that statement and slowly moved to get around the pink-haired lady.

"That's really… wonderful, Lady Estellise. Now if you would excuse me, I need to finish checking all the jail cells and make sure none of the convicts escaped…" he saluted, trying to step to one side, but Estelle stepped sideways at that exact moment, blocking his path. Estelle smiled good-naturedly as the knight tried to move, only to be blocked by the girl. He tried it again, but still Estelle would block his way. The knight sighed, his eyebrows creasing underneath the helmet that he was wearing.

"Excuse my rudeness, your highness," he started, "but what, exactly are you doing? I should be returning to my post."

"Uh- nothing! I just… Wanted to talk with someone… about…"

"Yes?"

"About- err, about…"

Estelle was starting to feel a bit desperate. Yuri was still in Flynn's office and the poor girl had no more reason to obstruct the duties of the knight. The poor girl had talked about practically everything she could without bringing up a topic about Yuri or Flynn. She took a deep breath as sweat began to form on her forehead and blinked the sweat away from her eyes. It was her request for Yuri to meet his blond friend. In broad daylight too! But she could not just sit around and do nothing… Even if she did go to Flynn by herself, she wouldn't know what to say to the blond. Yuri was her last resort.

'Oh, Yuri… hurry up, I don't know what to do anymore…'


Last week, Yuri got arrested for picking a fight with some of the knights in the royal quarter, and Estelle had requested to meet him. At first, her request was denied, seeing as she was requesting to meet a 'convict', as the knight had put it. It was really a very simple ordeal, actually. All she had to do use her status as the Empire's princess and she would be let in. However, she was still a girl, and the knight deemed himself to be responsible for her safety and that he would accompany her to meet Yuri. Estelle was not pleased and her long-haired friend noted that when she met him.

After that, Estelle had been sneaking in to the dungeons just to talk to Yuri alone, bringing a sword with her to convince the guard that she would be armed; therefore there would be no need for him to worry. With Flynn being too busy to even talk to her, Yuri was a bit like a substitute to that and Estelle almost despised herself for thinking that.

Last night, Estelle saw Flynn through his slightly opened door. What she saw startled her. Never had she thought much about how Flynn's work would affect his health. Seeing Flynn still reading and signing official documents while getting ready for bed made her worry. She saw the dark circles under his eyes even in the dimly-lit, extravagant room and she saw the way Flynn would rub his eyes and yawn every few seconds. He lacked sleep and rest. Slowly, Estelle shut the door to Flynn's room, taking care to not make any noise as she retreat to her own room, each step heavy with worry.

The next morning, she confronted Yuri, alone, with the issue and Yuri promised to talk to their friend about it. Estelle smiled; Yuri really was reliable, if not a bit proud. He would act like he doesn't care and that wouldn't be good. Flynn would just get annoyed. As such, the princess made him promise that he would appear as cheerful as possible.

"Yeah, yeah… be cheerful. Got it."

Of course, since Yuri was in jail, he would need to break out. And since the ever-vigilant knights that guard the premises would do their patrols every few hours, they had to think of a way to let Yuri roam the castle corridors unnoticed. For the first part, Yuri suggested that they should just knock out a few knights and steal- borrow their armor. Estelle immediately shot down that suggestion, as it would not help in their situation if the knights realize that one of the prisoners escaped, knights knocked out and the castle was infiltrated. The black-haired man had to agree that it would not be good to cause a full-scale riot in the castle like he did last time.

"Then you'll have to be the distraction," Yuri suggested, "You up for it?"

"Distraction? Yuri- what-"

"Just keep the guards busy while I sneak out to find Flynn. You've seen Judith do it before," he said. Estelle blinked, trying to remember the details. The extremely sexy bunny-girl suit… The pink-haired girl blushed.

"Y-yes, but in the end you knocked the knight out too!"

"…Then just try to keep him busy. I'll try to get back as soon as I could."

"…Okay, then. Oh, there's a knight coming now!" she was nervous. It was one thing to see someone else do it, but doing it yourself is a completely different matter altogether. She bit her lip, trying to stand up straight. She turned around to face the knight, a smile gracing her lips. The knight stopped and saluted her way, acknowledging her presence. She bowed her head a little; running up to him in a way that she hoped looked enthusiastic. The knight stopped in his tracks.

"Yes, Lady Estellise? May I help you?" he asked, quite politely.

"Get his keys!" she heard Yuri whisper urgently and Estelle had to fight down a blush as she rammed the knight onto the ground, slipping her fingers through the key-loop on the knight's belt that hold the keys for the jail cells. She carefully but swiftly tugged it away, tucking it under her dress, careful to act like she did not mean anything by knocking the knight down. She moaned lightly, holding her head in one hand and sat up. She apologized to the knight sheepishly, finally letting the blush flood her face. It was more of a pretense than anything, but if it would help Yuri get out of his cell… The knight shook his head and stood up, his armor clinking with every small move he made. Then he held out a hand to the kneeling princess on the ground, silently giving her a helping hand. Estelle smiled slightly and took the hand offered, careful to not drop the key as she was being hoisted up.

"I-I'm sorry, I should have looked where I was going," she pretended to brush dirt off the skirt of her dress, to cover the act of slipping Yuri the key. The knight shook his head, brushing it off as a mere accident. Estelle thanked him and waved as the knight excused himself. When the knight was out of hearing range, she turned to Yuri, who was already picking at the lock.

"Didn't think you were that good," he quipped, a smirk on his lips. Estelle huffed, a blush gracing her cheeks.

"Judith gave me lessons once."

Yuri decided that he did not want to know about the 'lessons' after seeing the look on Estelle's face and after thinking about how Judith 'persuaded' the guard back then.

"Now just stay here till I get back and stop anyone from looking into my jail cell," Yuri said before leaving her there to deal with the possibility of the knight coming back.

The knight really did come back and Estelle had to distract him before Yuri could come back, and Estelle did her best to distract the guy. It was, in short, a disaster. Estelle thanked whatever deity was up there that the knight was too much of a gentleman to push a lady away. Luckily for both Estelle and the knight, Yuri finally came back and slipped into his jail cell, acting as if he was there all along. Estelle sighed in relief.

"Um, Lady Estellise, may I…?"

"Uh? Ah- yes, I'm sorry for keeping you, Mr. Knight, you may go," she said, smiling. There would be no need for her to talk randomly anymore. The knight's shoulders seemed to slump in what Estelle would assume to be relief. Then he saluted her and walked away.

Estelle sighed, sitting down next to Yuri's jail cell. She had been standing and talking for a great deal of time and her nerves were fraying all the time she was talking to the knight, so it was only natural that she would feel tired.

"What did he say?" she asked after realizing that Yuri won't be starting a conversation anytime soon. Estelle heard Yuri give a low hum, maybe to think about what to say. Estelle was quite patient, she didn't mind the wait, but if it was anything about her friends, she could not say that her patience wasn't thinning.

"Well, he said he's too busy, and he said you're nice for thinking about him."

"And?"

"And…I said we're going to go on a picnic tomorrow," the pink haired princess's face lit up at that. She turned around to face Yuri so suddenly that her hair whipped behind her. Her eyes shone as her smile grew wider and Yuri could not help but smile a little. Estelle had said before that she wanted to get out of the castle again; it was just a matter of time before she asked Flynn to go with her anyway. And now Yuri would be joining them. Could it be any more perfect?

"That's wonderful!" she clasped her hands together, truly looking happy, "but you're in jail…"

"I'll get released later tonight for good behavior," he shrugged, looking out the small window of his jail cell, "not sure when… but definitely tonight. Just be ready before noon tomorrow."

"I'm sure we'll have a great time!"

"Mm-hmm."

With that, Estelle bounced off to where Yuri presumed to be her room with a lighter bounce in her steps. And Yuri did the only thing he could think of doing in a jail; lay down on the absurdly hard bed and try to get some sleep. For some reason, he had a feeling that he won't be having much sleep that night. He might as well catch some sleep while he still can. Before that, however, he decided that he should kick the key to his holding facility as far away as possible. He did just that.

A particular blond frowned, eyes shut tight as he tried to finish his work, trying to suppress the oncoming migraine. There were only a little of the official documents left, he had skipped lunch to work on them, and his head was pounding harder than ever. His finished paperwork was piled like a mountain on one part of his desk while his unfinished paperwork was only forming a small hill. It was refreshing to finally be able to see his desk, but with his muddled head, he could not really make out the wordings on his paperwork, let alone see the top of his desk clearly. He shouldn't have skipped lunch after all.

The curt rapping on his door that resounded through the whole room did not ease his headache at all and he had to bit his lip to stop him from lashing out at whoever it was that knocked on his door. Taking a deep breath, the Commandant put on his friendliest expression he could muster at that time and told the person to come in. The huge doors opened slowly to reveal one of his subordinates, Witcher.

"Sir, I'm here to report that the prisoner Yuri Lowell was released from prison today due to good behaviour," she said, saluting him, standing as straight as a flagpole. Flynn saluted her back.

'Good behavior my arse, his behavior today was awful,' he thought bitterly, remembering how said ex-prisoner broke into his office earlier that day. It did cross his mind to give Yuri one more week in detainment, but he decided against it. Shaking his head to rid of the thought, he nodded in Witcher's direction, telling her that she may go. She saluted again with a curt 'Sir!' and promptly turned around to get back to her regular duties when the Flynn remembered something that she had wanted to ask someone about.

"Wait, Witcher," at the mention of her name, Witcher stopped dead in her tracks, turning to look at her superior. She looked surprised. Flynn deemed it appropriate for her to feel so as he had already dismissed her, but that question was bugging him all day. He had to ask it, but he could not find the words to the question.

"Sir?"

"Er- yes. Never mind, you may go," Flynn mentally kicked himself. He was not such a coward to not be able to ask a mere question, but that question he was going to ask did not feel like a question he should ask any random person.

Now who should he ask about the way his stomach seemed to flutter, the way his head spin and his chest contract, when he thought about Yuri?

Maybe the old man Hanks would be happy to answer his question. Smiling, he set down his paperwork, grabbed a blank piece of paper and write down a note to Sodia about where he was going and when he would be back. Then he set down his pen and made his way down to the Lower Quarter.

Flynn thought that Hanks' expression when he saw him was really priceless and he almost laughed out loud when Hanks told him to sit down. They were near the Aque Blastia, so that would mean sitting on the stairs. It certainly had been a long time since he saw the old man, and he it was certainly nostalgic to be back in the Lower Quarter again. The armor he was wearing really felt out of place, though. He should have thought to change his clothes or at least to leave his sword back at the castle. As he thought, it was easier to talk to Hanks. The blond haired Commandant find it hard to listen sometimes though, since the topic of their discussion always came back to the subject of Yuri Lowell one way or another. When he offered some sandwiches to Hanks, the man gladly took one but he almost spit it out right after taking one bite. Flynn was not exactly surprised.

"What did you put in this!? It tastes weird…" said the old man, setting the sandwich down. He knew that Yuri said Flynn's cooking was horrible, but a sandwich that tastes like sugar and anchovy paste mixed together? Hanks could not imagine how his more complicated dishes would taste like.

"Does it matter if it tastes weird?" Flynn asked, taking a bite of his own sandwich. It tasted fine to him.

"If you want me to taste it, yes," he replied, "wait, I already tasted it. Never mind. So tell me the truth, what brings you here?"

Flynn took his time to munch, chew and swallow his piece of food before answering, "Well, I- I want to ask you something."

"What is it?"

"It's about… Y- I mean," somehow, he couldn't bring himself to say Yuri's name, "A-a friend." Smooth, Flynn. Really smooth.

"You mean you and that Lady Estellise? I heard from Yuri that you two were seeing each other."

"NO! I mean, no," Flynn's face heat up, "It's about someone else."

"Oh, who is it?"

"I can't exactly tell you…It's complicated."

"Well then, I can't exactly help you with that, can I?"

"No, just listen," he said, biting his lower lip, running his fingers through his blond locks, "It's like this, whenever I think about this person, I- get a feeling, a weird feeling. Here, right over here," he motioned with his index finger to the general area of his abdomen up to where his heart would be found, "And my head seems to spin and I sort of feel like fainting when I get close to hi- that person." He finished lamely, not really knowing if Hanks understood all that or not. Flynn sure hoped he did; the blond did not feel like spilling his guts out again. One time was embarrassing enough.

Hanks took a moment to contemplate Flynn's words, rubbing his white beard thoughtfully.

"Well, sounds to me like you really like this person," he started and Flynn chocked on the sandwich he was eating.

"What?"

"Don't tell me you have never liked someone before?"

"Of course I have."

"That's not what I meant, and you know it," Hanks' expression was serious, and the younger of the two just had to agree with him. Yes, he did know.

"…"

Flynn was thoroughly happy that Yuri didn't hear that conversation as it might get the wrong ideas across to that oddly confusing mind of his.

Please review. Constructive reviews are much appreciated. :D

Preview for Chapter 3:

"Who said we're going on a picnic inside the barrier?"