From all appearances, it seemed that the night would be an ordinary, calm night at the castle... until Kit decided to log onto IRC, and was immediately sent a file from Andrea - her latest fan art, which she assured Kit that she would love.

Her eyes widened as the image loaded: Flik in the baths at the castle he'd once lived in with one of his armies. Completely unclothed except for his trademark blue bandanna, he closed his eyes and leaned back in the water that just barely covered what needed to be covered. Sparing a moment to type back "WOW", Kit went about setting the image as her wallpaper, never noticing the girl looking over her shoulder until she heard a loud shriek right in her ear.

"OMGOMGOMG!!!" Astala squealed. "Flik! He's so hot!"

Kit jumped, and was about to tell Astala to be quiet, but it was too late, for the girl had already turned to call over her shoulder. "Hey everybody, come look at this sexy picture of NAKED FLIK!"

"What?!" Flik's shocked exclamation from another room was just as loud as Astala's.

Syl, Selphie, and Marie gathered by the computer almost instantly, drawn by the loud invitation, and Selphie and Marie immediately began giggling. Syl just raised an eyebrow, grinning. "Mmm... I'd like to climb into that bath with him and... mmmm."

"What?!" Flik repeated, looking over the tops of the girls at the image on the computer. His jaw dropped. "Where did that come from?"

"Andrea drew it," Kit told him sheepishly.

"Too bad she drew the tub so full," Syl said, giving Flik a sly wink. "A little less water, and..." His face began to turn bright red.

"Hey!" Another male voice called from the hallway, and Flik cringed as he recognized it. "What are you all looking at?"

"Viktor!!!" Astala shrieked. "You're gonna love this, come see!"

"No!" Flik exclaimed desperately, his face turning redder still.

Unfortunately, Viktor was already standing at his side, looking down at the picture. He raised an eyebrow, a wide smile crossing his face, and he nodded. "Nice, huh? Definitely gets my seal of approval."

Flik stared at him for a moment, then turned his back on Viktor and the girls and slunk off to his room, muttering something under his breath. "Hmm..." Viktor pondered, looking after him. "Don't think it gets his. Heh, think I'll go talk to him..." He winked at Syl. "Or maybe not talk, after looking at that pic, huh?"

Syl nodded and winked back, sharing his devious grin, and Selphie and Marie nearly collapsed in giggles again as he turned to follow Flik. Kit sighed a little, but couldn't help laughing herself. "He's probably never going to look any of us in the eye again..."

"...This is so embarrassing," Flik muttered, refusing to look at his friend.

From where he stood across the room, leaning against Flik's closed door, Viktor chuckled. "You're cute when you blush," he teased.

"How could you let her draw... me... like... like that?" Flik exploded, sitting down on his bed and burying his head in his hands.

"Let? I asked her to!" Viktor told him cheerfully as he entered, starting to sit down next to Flik.

"Viktor!" Flik exclaimed, looking up at him and stopping him in his tracks.

"Hey, she was playing our game earlier and kept having stupid cookoffs with Hai Yo instead of coming to the mission briefings with me and Shu! She had to make it up to me somehow!" Viktor explained, grinning. Suddenly Flik jumped up and reached an arm back, ready to throw a good punch, and Viktor widened his eyes. "Oh, come on... it's just a picture! ...And I asked her to draw something else too, but she didn't," he added with a wink. "From the way you're acting over this, maybe that's a good thing."

Flik took a swing at Viktor. "You... are so... dead!" he huffed. "I'm never going to hear the end of this!"

"Darn straight!" Viktor agreed, ducking the wild punch. "I wanna frame it!" Flik took another swing at him, and as he jumped backwards to avoid it, he tripped over a chair. "Hey! ...Domestic abuse is seriously wrong, Flik!"

"So is asking Andrea to draw lewd pictures of me for the whole castle to see!" Flik exclaimed, taking another swing.

Viktor couldn't escape that one. "Ow! Come on, what was so lewd about it? Nothing was showing... cept your nice pecs and cute little hips," he smirked.

Flik blushed again, taken off-guard. "I am not some kind of object... to be... to be... ogled..." Finally, he stopped throwing punches and stalked out to the balcony.

"Not by the whole castle, no. Just by me." Viktor considered just ogling for a moment, as Flik's back was turned and he had a rather nice view, then shrugged and followed him out hesitantly.

Flik sighed. "You, I don't mind so much... I just..."

"...According to what Sydney told me the other day, half the people in the castle are checking you out already," Viktor informed him, grinning.

Flik turned to look at Viktor, a befuddled expression on his face. "I don't understand that..." he muttered. "Vik... growing up I was this gangly gawky kid... Hair hanging in my face, shy and shuffling feet, more skin and bone than muscle and finesse," he admitted, smirking slightly. "I was a shy little dork..."

"Oh, come on - you're cute!" Viktor told him. "Like you didn't figure that out when Nina showed up? A kid half your age? You're gorgeous."

"Nina's a kid," Flik said dismissively. "Odessa was the first person to ever really be interested in me..."

"Yeah, teenagers go for the pretty ones - so face it, Flik, you're pretty."

Flik shrugged slightly and turned back to look out over the ocean. "Me, pretty? Never thought of myself that way..." he sighed, his gaze lost in space.

"People like to look at you. Or you think I'll just look at anyone who comes along?" Viktor asked, raising a curious eyebrow. "Is my taste that bad?"

Flik turned to look at Viktor over his shoulder. "I didn't mean to imply that... But I always thought girls went for the well muscled bear-like protective manly men... guys like you. You were the type who had them all," he said with another shrug, looking back at the ocean, and leaning his chin to rest on his hand, his elbow on the railing of the balcony.

"And how many girls have you ever seen chasing after me, huh?"

Flik laughed softly. "More than your oblivious eyes seem to realize."

Viktor was honestly surprised. "Wha...?"

"Rina. Nanami. Anabelle. Countless many women in taverns whose eyes followed you around the room." Flik laughed at the expression on Viktor's face.

"Nanami?!" Viktor growled incredulously. "Are you kidding? She was constantly griping at me!"

"Girls do that when they like you," Flik pointed out.

Viktor wasn't completely listening, still thinking about what Flik had said, and he sighed faintly. "Ana's a given, yeah... Rina... hmmm."

"I was always jealous..." Flik murmured. "But now I start to wonder... if I was jealous of their attentions on you, or yours not on me." He smirked again, but still didn't look back at Viktor.

"Jealous of what, Nanami?" Viktor said in disbelief. "Man, you could have her and Nina, and they still would barely be old enough for either of us!" Flik laughed loudly, but Viktor quieted a little. "And.. Flik, my attention wasn't on anyone back then. Especially the brats. Okay, so I pinched a few barmaids' butts in my day..." he admitted. "It was just what they expected of a guy like me. ...And it was fun." He chuckled. "The way they squeak... hilarious."

"Yeah, your attention was on nothing but your beer... and your sword."

"Well... considering we could be attacked anytime, yeah," Viktor agreed. "Had to have the sword close at hand... and the beer to keep me from constantly gripping it," he added with a grin. Then, recalling the weapon he'd had back when they'd fought in the wars, the grin vanished. "...Or strangling it."

"I don't know," Flik mused, smirking and turning to look at Viktor again. "If I didn't know better, I'd start to think you and that sword had something going on."

"Yeah, something like the worst luck known to mankind." Viktor leaned upon the balcony railing as well, looking out into the night. "...I wonder where it ended up?"

Flik shrugged, and there was a long, thoughtful pause before their silence was broken. "...Now I need beer again," Viktor grumbled. "I'm scared it might come back."

"Mm... I have some liquor in the mini fridge in the corner," Flik told him, starting to head back inside.

Viktor turned back to watch from the doorway. "...You're not still mad at me, are you?" Flik shrugged and headed across his room to the fridge. "I wouldn't want you to, say... put a little rat poison in a shot glass..." Viktor continued. "'Here, Vik - I invented this new cocktail! Tastes a little funny, but sure does have a kick!'"

Flik pulled a beer from the fridge and tossed it to Viktor. "Now why would I do a thing like that to my best friend?"

Viktor caught it easily. "Cause I make a snide comment about how I like it when you're hot and wet?"

Flik blushed again and crossed the room to stand just a few feet from Viktor. "You are just asking me to slug you again..." he said with a slight smile.

"Or not..." Viktor glanced down at the bottle. "Hmm, 'Rat Poison' brand. Sounds tasty!" He grinned and sat down on the floor, leaning back against the wall as he opened the bottle. "So I take it you'll still kill me if I commission a little something else?"

Flik sighed. "Depends on if you let the whole castle see it."

"It wasn't my fault they saw it this time, either," Viktor reminded him, grinning.

"Oh?"

"Yeah, Andrea just sent it to Kit, y'know... though I'm not complaining, your reaction was priceless," Viktor snickered.

"Yeah, but in this castle, anything deemed 'secret' seems to immediately become public knowledge..." Flik paced around the room restlessly. "Viktor... about the other night..."

"...Yeah...?"

"...I never meant to hurt you... or make you think I don't care. I know sometimes I confuse you..."

Viktor interrupted him with a chuckle. "Oh, I know you care... that at least I do know..." He paused, chugging half the bottle, before speaking again. "...Truth is, I've been thinking of asking for some time to think myself... so it's all right."

Flik stopped in mid pace and looked at him carefully."I'm sorry I kicked you out again the other night..." he mumbled softly. "Have you... had enough time to think...?"

Viktor hesitated. "I guess the truth really is, I'd already been thinking. Just wasn't sure you wanted to hear it."

Flik flinched, already fearing the worst. "I... you know I always... appreciate honesty..."

Viktor fiddled aimlessly with the bottlecap. "Okay, well... just a second, okay?" Tilting the bottle back, Viktor chugged the rest of it. "I need this first."

Flik winced again and plopped down on the floor, legs Indian style, and gave Viktor a badly masked worried expression.

"...All right, it's like this," Viktor began finally, setting the bottle down next to him. "I've been having some doubts myself. So when you were obviously having doubts too, I thought maybe we really should just give this up."

"...Just give up? What exactly are we giving up, though?" At Viktor's grim look, Flik shut up and gestured for him to continue.

"But see Flik, what I overheard the other night from you showed me something. No offense, but..." He hesitated. "...Your doubts are stupid."

Seeing that Flik didn't respond, he went on. "It's not your fault Odessa died. Do you think she was too dumb to realize that founding a rebellion would make her a target? And it wasn't your sword that went through her, and you weren't the one who told her to protect the kid, and you weren't the one who sold us out to the soldiers..." Viktor sighed. "And I'm always doing something stupid, you know that. If anything, I'm more likely to get you killed. Remember the trip we made through the wastelands?"

Flik smiled slightly as he nodded in recollection. "If anything, you've kept me from getting myself killed a few dozen times over..." Viktor finished, exasperated. "So even if you're going to stay all guilty about Odessa, at least leave me out of that particular neurosis... 'kay?" Realizing he must have sounded harsh, he reached over and touched Flik's face gently. "As if I don't put you through enough just being me."

Flik smiled again, reaching a hand up to touch Viktor's hand. "Sometimes I feel like you just deserve better than me."

"Hmmph. Ana told me pretty much the same thing, the night she died. Probably less than an hour before."

Flik raised an eyebrow; Viktor had never told him that before. "Really? She was an amazing woman, though... as amazing as Odessa, and you know that kind of compliment does not come from me lightly."

"If she was shorter, prettier, whatever..." Viktor muttered, "she might have made a good girlfriend for me, she said. Like any of that mattered to me... I figured I wasn't good enough for her - just a common mercenary." He glanced away, reliving the memory of the last moments they'd shared. "We might have gotten together with time, but we didn't have that option. But... just like with Odessa... it was war."

Flik nodded. "Sometimes it seems like the fates conspired against us... or maybe for us," he pondered, smiling as he reached his free hand toward Viktor's other hand.

"Well... maybe." Viktor sighed. "Flik, I'm not so sure. ...This thing we've got going... I can't help but think you're more serious about it than I am. I mean, not just the fact that you're more serious about everything than I am," he clarified. "But..." He paused for a moment, apparently thinking hard. "...I don't know how to say it without you taking it the wrong way. But okay, if nothing else, you've got to understand... you are the best friend I've had in my entire life, okay?" he said finally, his voice tight with frustration. He wasn't used to being so open about these kinds of things. "You're the only person since Daisy I could actually be around without feeling like I always had to be on top of everything... But when this thing started up, well... it wasn't really like I intended it to get too serious. It was just... friends," he said simply. "Sharing everything."

Flik nodded slowly. "And what do you think I think it is?"

"Well..." Viktor began, "I've heard you use the l-word a couple times. But, I mean, I've never thought of myself as... gay. And I don't know, I guess we've kind of gone beyond a point where we can say literally we just like girls anymore... heheh, right?" he asked, looking a little more like his usual self as he nudged Flik. A little, but not much.

Flik wasn't cheered by the gesture at all. "...I don't know. I've never really looked at another man besides you."

"Yeah, likewise," Viktor agreed. "Despite that thing with Hardin, which was just me thinking of you anyway. And screwing it up... but yeah." He shrugged. "Maybe I'm just petty, or narrow-minded or something. But if we're in a relationship..."

"...We can stop this and just be friends," Flik said with a shrug of his own, as he climbed to his feet. "No big deal."

Viktor looked up at him, mildly concerned. "...Flik, don't get me wrong. I've been having a great time. But you know, at the start that was all I thought we were going for, really."

Flik nodded. "A great time," he agreed, crossing the room to stand at the door to the balcony.

Viktor watched him go, and the conversation lapsed into an awkward silence. "...Flik..." Viktor said finally, "this is one of those times I can't tell what you want."

Flik nodded slowly again. "Maybe I don't know what I want... but does that matter?"

"It does to me, since you're the most important person in my life. Like I said, whatever else we are, you're the only one I trust with everything..."

"Likewise..." Flik shrugged. "I don't want to scare you off by being my too serious self..."

"You're not," Viktor told him immediately, then hesitated. "Well, I don't know, maybe you are," he admitted, sitting back against the wall and helplessly looking down at the empty bottle.

Again, there was a long and uncomfortable silence, neither of them knowing what to say, until Flik admitted it. "...What's the real problem here...?" he asked.

Viktor thought for a minute, and chuckled softly, picking up the beer bottle and fidgeting with it. "Probably just me being an idiot. Not sure in which way though..." Flik said nothing in response, much to Viktor's dismay. "...Will you at least tell me what you think about this?" he pleaded. "Honestly? I hate it when you go silent."

Still Flik said nothing. "It means I have to babble on and on, and then you just get annoyed anyway." He paused again, giving Flik another chance to speak, but he did not. "Like I'm sure you are now," Viktor observed. "Or will be soon. Right?"

Finally, Flik sighed softly. "I'm not at all annoyed, Viktor... Maybe we're just different kinds of people."

"Well, I could have told you that." A hint of mock arrogance was in Viktor's voice, but he still refused to look away from the beer bottle in his hands.

"I..." Flik began, then realized he wasn't sure how to finish.

In the sudden silence, Viktor smirked vaguely, wishing he could see Flik's face, to see what his old friend was really thinking... but he knew he was too afraid to look up and find out.

After a moment, Flik walked back over to Viktor, kneeling down in front of him with an earnest look. "Yes, maybe I am more serious than you. Maybe it's my nature. Is that such a terrible thing?"

"If you were anything other than what you are, you wouldn't be the same," Viktor muttered. Bracing himself, he raised his eyes, taking in Flik's perfectly open and anxious expression. I've never wanted to cause him pain, damn it, he thought. "So of course it's not terrible," he assured Flik.

Flik leaned forward and touched his lips lightly to Viktor's. "I care about you... I don't want to give up on that... I'd never forgive myself."

"Yeah, you never do," Viktor reminded him with a forced smirk. Despite the attempt at levity, Flik still looked too serious for his liking, though he smiled slightly, and Viktor sighed. "Aw, Flik... c'mere, okay?" he said, holding out his arms.

Winding his arms around Viktor's neck, Flik climbed into his lap in an almost childish manner. It was exactly what Viktor had expected, and he smiled faintly as he hugged Flik close. "I knew this was what you'd want... I know you too well..."

Flik hugged him back, tightly. "I... you do know me better than anyone..."

Though Flik seemed to relax in his arms, Viktor grew tenser still; though he was trying to be comforting, he squeezed Flik as if he were holding on for dear life. "...I don't know what I'm doing... Flik..."

"What do you mean?" Flik asked, startled by the uncertainty in his friend's usually confidant voice.

"I've tried to step outside myself and look at this objectively..." Viktor muttered. "It's what you'd try to do, isn't it?"

"Sometimes..."

"What I see is what I usually see - me being a complete ass."

Flik laughed softly. "And you wouldn't be you if you were any other way..."

"Well, true," Viktor conceded, calming a little, "but I don't like being that way about the important stuff."

Flik nodded. "Well, you're not right now."

"Aren't I?" Viktor asked him. "I mean, first I start something that turns into way more than I meant it to... then I put you through this crap..." He shook his head in exasperation with himself. "I don't know, it's such a dumb thing to worry about. I should have just kept my mouth shut, I guess. Not like I've got anything else lined up, or am looking to start..."

Flik laughed softly again. "I would hope not..."

"Flik..." Viktor murmured. Grinning a little, he reached up to ruffle the light brown hair playfully. "Flikflikflik..."

Flik turned his head and smiled. "Yes, Viktor...?"

"Sorry."

"For what?"

"Messing with your head like this," Viktor told him. "Especially when I still don't know what I want. Maybe I don't want to end this... to be honest, I want you bad right now," he said sheepishly.

Flik grinned and leaned to hiss in his ear, "I want you too..."

Viktor shrugged. "But I figured I'd better come out with this before things got even more... concrete."

"Do we need a label on it?" Flik asked him, growing serious again.

"I've always said we didn't," Viktor muttered. "Guess that makes me a hypocrite."

Flik paused. "...Do you want a label on it, Vik?"

"I don't know what kind of label I'd be comfortable with..." Viktor shrugged again, still a little nervous. "I guess if I want you this bad, I better get accustomed to... being like this," he chuckled. "I always was a little slow, huh?"

Flik smiled. "I don't know, you had to do a lot of convincing to get me to this point to begin with."

"Yeah, and without even figuring it out myself? Bah..."

Flik laughed softly, but Viktor sobered again. "...I'm so confused. Okay, I want you, but I don't know if we should be doing that if I can't admit to myself that this is what I want... but I'm sitting here talking about how I want it..." Viktor leaned back and knocked his head lightly against the wall. "Maybe I shouldn't have had that beer. Or maybe I should have had a few more." As sudden inspiration struck, Viktor grinned. "Or maybe I shouldn't have asked for that picture."

Flik shook his head. "Why are you thinking so much? I thought that was my job."

"Like I said, I haven't had enough beer," Viktor said with a smirk. "Why do you think I always drink so much? Keeps me from thinking. Otherwise I'd be like this all the time... sucks, doesn't it?"

Flik laughed. "Normally I wouldn't mind... Right now I have other things on my mind."

"Ah..." Viktor suggested, "maybe another kind of sucking?" As Flik snickered, Viktor leaned down to taste his neck. "Hmm, good thing you like turtlenecks."

Flik couldn't help laughing again at Viktor's antics. "I like this even more..."

"Oh, in that case you won't mind if I get rid of the one you're wearing..."

"Please, be my guest," Flik invited him.

Viktor grinned and did so. "So I guess neither of us is breaking it off, huh?"

"No."

"Good."

Flik smiled and leaned over to kiss Viktor again. "I feel better."

But as always, he was a little startled when Viktor simply picked Flik up and carried him over to the bed, without so much as a warning. "Yep, me too..." Viktor agreed, lying down beside him. "Though a little itchy..."

Flik smirked. Though plenty of times Viktor drove him absolutely crazy with his thoughtless behavior, at the moment he was grateful that Viktor's serious moments tended to be short-lived...