You Never Lose By Loving

She knows, Vivio lamented.

According to all her friends and her parents, Vivio was quite obvious in her crush. Maybe it was blushing whenever she looked at Vivio during mission briefings. Or how Vivio would bolt down the stairs faster than Fate-mama in Sonic form if Vivio heard her distinctive knock on the Takamachi-Harlaown house. Or maybe it was when Vivio had declared at age ten that she wanted to marry Hayate when she grew up.

…

It must have been her ten-year-old marriage proposal.

That was probably when everyone decided to label Vivio's feelings as a "first crush", with all the cuteness and transience that such a label carried.

"Isn't Hayate-san, like, our aunt?" Caro had said to Vivio once. "She and Fate-san and Nanoha-san practically grew up together."

Both of Vivio's parents had that annoying habit of exchanging amused grins whenever Vivio stumbled over her tongue as she tried to talk smoothly to Hayate whenever the brunette came over to visit.

Which, to Vivio's giddy delight, was quite often.

However, it also meant that Vivio was in a perpetual state of blushing and awkwardness and mortification. That part wasn't as fun.

Still, Hayate was always so kind and boundlessly patient during Vivio's stammered conversations. Those conversations took quite a while, as Vivio kept repeating her words and correcting herself in embarrassment.

But Vivio was sure, and she had her Nanoha-mama's guarantee on this, that Hayate truly did like talking with Vivio. Even despite Vivio's tongue-tiedness.

To Vivio's aggravation, everyone had called it "cute".

Vivio fervently hoped that Hayate didn't think of it that way.

The only time Hayate had shown any kind of unease to Vivio was when Vivio had stopped calling her "Aunt". When Vivio had seen that brief flicker of confused disappointment as a nine-year-old Vivio had said "Hayate-san" for the first time, she had nearly broken down and backpedalled to familiar territory. But Vivio had perservered—and now, at fifteen years old, Vivio was glad of it.

There would be no way anyone could take her seriously if she called her crush "Aunt".

…No one even took her seriously now.

As Vivio grew older she tried to be more subtle. She had been tired of all the condescending teasing —not that her family and friends meant to hurt her feelings—about her crush. But damn, Vivio must have inherited in some behavioural inheritance fashion Fate-mama's inability to prevent herself from blushing every time she looked at the person she liked.

So despite her efforts, Vivio's attempt at subtlety was about as obvious as the sexual tension between her mamas. (Considering that the entire TSAB had a betting pool about her mamas' suspected love affair before they announced their wedding, it was pretty damn obvious.)

"So, got your girl yet, Vivio?" Corona often cracked at Vivio at school.

"You're not old enough for Vivio to be interested," Lio would jokingly warn Vivio's classmates whenever a boy or girl confessed to Vivio.

Sometimes, Vivio wished that she had the guile to lie about being over her crush. But being raised as an earnest and honest child, Vivio could never quite get the lie out in her own defense.

"Do you have a girlfriend yet, Teana?" Hayate would often grin at Teana whenever they all met for parties—especially if Subaru was in earshot. And after Teana's fervent denial, Hayate would repeat the question to Subaru and would promptly receive an affirmative as the energetic cyborg would glomp Teana in response. (Hayate used to do the same to Erio and Caro, before the two of them ruined the joke by openly admitting their relationship.)

And yet, Hayate never asked Vivio that.

Vivio wasn't sure if she should take that as a rejection or a glimmer of hope.

When Hayate smiled at Vivio—causing Vivio's heart to flop around erratically—and called her "my favourite niece", Vivio's hopes would plummet into a hole. However, the little worried frown Hayate got whenever Caro mentioned one of Vivio's many school admirers made Vivio's stomach flutter with longing excitement.

Hayate never frowned at mentions of anyone else's admirers, after all.

"Do you want me to just ask Hayate-san?" Lutecia once said to Vivio after the purple-haired summoner had to listen to yet another moping session from her younger friend.

"NO!" Vivio had yelled, her ears burning hot.

"But then at least you'd know!"

"Don't you dare!" Vivio sulked, dropping her cheek onto the countertop. "Hayate-san can never know!" What if Hayate also saw it as nothing but a silly crush? Vivio could take the condescension from anybody but Hayate.

"I think she already does," Lutecia had grumbled exasperatedly. At which Vivio had promptly burst out in tears.

Vivio remembered Lutecia frantically trying to assure her that she had been kidding, but Vivio knew that her friend had been trying to placate her.

Vivio…liked Hayate.

"Maybe you just admire Hayate?" Yuuno had once suggested.

That was definitely true, but Vivio admired lots of people. Like her Nanoha-mama, for instance, or Grandma Lindy. After factoring out admiration for a beautiful, confident, funny and kind woman, Vivio knew that she felt something different and kinda special for Hayate.

Once Vivio had grown past puberty, she became pretty certain that it was definitely at least some kind of strong crush instead of admiration. A person wanted to shake the hand of someone they admired, not take any excuse she could find to give that someone a tight hug. Vivio always got tingles up her neck and stomach whenever she got a hug from Hayate.

At least her parents were supportive, in their own way. Vivio could recall a particular charity bachelorette auction where Caro, Lio, Corona and Subaru had jokingly pooled their money to bid on Hayate as a gift for Vivio once the bidding price had gone above $400. And Vivio had refused to acknowledge them the whole while, her cheeks fiery red as Caro elbowed her and said cheerfully, "Since you're too shy to bid at all, we thought we'd get an early birthday present for you?" (As a matter of fact, Vivio only had $235 with her, while the bidding for Hayate had started at $300.)

And although Vivio had affected not caring at all, she knew that her heartbreak must have shown on her face when a big-breasted, red-haired supermodel had consistently topped the previous bids on the brunette commander. So when Fate-mama had put in $750 to win the auction (and keep Hayate out of that big-chested, gorgeous, tall and adult competitor's hands), Vivio had to give her mama a covertly grateful hug.

To Vivio's eternal gratitude, Fate-mama hadn't brought up the possibility of letting Vivio go on the "date" with Hayate she had bid for. The fantasized delight of such a date could not outweigh Vivio's fearful anxiety of the fantasy actually coming true. She needed something like a few weeks to mentally prepare herself for something that mind-breaking. And so Vivio had watched hungrily as Hayate had showed up at their door, dressed to kill and laughingly flirting with her old friend. (Yet Hayate had said hello to Vivio first, even though Vivio and Fate had been standing in the doorway at the same time. This had thankfully distracted Vivio from embarrassing herself by staring too much the moment the door had opened.)

The tabloids just about exploded over the highly publicized date between the new combination of Aces, to Fate-mama's chagrin.

Nanoha-mama still kept copies of the tabloid covers in her desk drawer for when she needed a good laugh.

"Hasn't your daughter grown out of her little crush by now?" Nanoha's middle-aged coworkers often asked, not knowing that Vivio's hearing was better than they had assumed. To which the less-obtuse-than-people-thought Nanoha would give some chirpy non-answer, neatly easing the sting out of the question.

Sticks and stones, Vivio repeated to herself. But it still stung.

It wasn't until Vivio was fifteen that one day the teasing had made her snap.

"Why are you guys making such a big deal about it?" She yelled, barely holding back angry tears. "It's just a silly crush, so why don't you join in the speculations of why Hayate-san is still unmarried or something? Who cares about what I think—I'm just the kid!"

Teenagers don't know anything about love, all the adults say.

Some days, Vivio felt sick at the thought that they might be right.

Seeing most of her peers make fools of themselves over their crushes and girlfriends and boyfriends didn't really help. Not. At. All. Vivio liked to think that she was a little smarter than the love-sick swains at school, but she didn't kid herself that she was that different, in the teenage-hormonal and melodramatic way.

Thank god that Hayate was so busy she never seemed to have a love life at all. Yet at the same time…if Hayate had taken a lover at some point…would Vivio have learned once and for all just what she felt for the other woman? Thinking about it always tore at Vivio's mood, sending her in wild roller-coasters of eager yearning and depression.

"If you've only liked one person your whole life," Nanoha-mama had tried to discuss with Vivio on one of Vivio's mopier moments, "then you might not have, er…experiences to compare your feelings to, when you're trying to figure out how much you l…like someone."

"You and Fate-mama only loved each other since you were kids," Vivio pointed out, and effectively ended that awkward conversation.

It wasn't fair, that Uncle Chrono and Aunt Amy had been taken seriously when they first started going out. Or that her parents' feelings for each other were never considered anything less than genuine. Even Erio and Caro weren't belittled when it was obvious that they had crushes on each other as kids!

"Just forget it," Vivio had ground out waveringly when her friends had tried to apologize.

Vivio took a breath as she looked through the office door, standing silently behind the door frame at Hayate as the older woman worked obliviously at her desk. The brown Ground Forces uniform didn't look as good as the Navy ones, but being the CDC Commander meant that Hayate got to wear the blue uniform with the yellow epaulettes, which looked a lot nicer. Being accepted into the elite Ground Forces squad had placed Vivio in the position of working out of the same branch as her longtime crush, and walking by Hayate's office every day never diminished the warm feeling that just looking at Hayate raised in Vivio's chest.

It didn't matter what people thought. It didn't matter if no one, not even Hayate herself, really took Vivio's feelings seriously. That wasn't something Vivio could control.

She could only take responsibility for her own actions.

Her footsteps caused Hayate to glance up from her work. "Vivio?" She brushed a lock of hair behind her ear as she put her pen down, turning her undivided attention on her visitor. That small consideration was just one of the many things that Vivio held close to her heart about Hayate.

Blue eyes widened as Vivio put a single red rose down on the pile of papers in front of Hayate, and Vivio didn't bother hide the trembling in her fingers as she swallowed deeply.

For the first time, Vivio fought to get the words out, using every ounce of her courage to hold onto Hayate's gaze.

"I…I really like you, Hayate-san."

**O**

"You never lose by loving. You always lose by holding back."

– Barbara De Angelis

Author's Note: I never used to be a Hayate x Vivio shipper ^_^, but after reading a delightful crack fic by Extrinsical, I grew interested in this crack pairing.

I don't actually believe that this could ever happen in canon, but that's what fanfiction is for, right? ^_-

EDIT: There is a companion piece called "Lose By Holding Back" now posted. As for future fics…well, that's to be seen ^^.