Disclaimer: I own nothing involved in this story unless I invented it myself. This is written for fun, not for profit. All forms of feedback eagerly accepted. Concrit is loved the most, but everything is welcome.
Fandom: Yu-Gi-Oh Zexal
Title: That Word
Characters: Vector, Yuuma
Romance: Vaguely alluded to possible post-canon Vector x Yuuma
Word Count: 500||Status: One-shot
Genre: General||Rated: G Challenge: Written for the Diversity Writing Challenge, A92, write a fic with at least two dividers; Zexal Flash Bingo, #200, kattobingu
Summary: Vector hates Yuuma's favorite word with every morsel of his being.

Vector put a lot of effort into being Shingetsu Rei. He smiled until his face hurt. He laughed until his stomach ached. He didn't care how much of a fool he made himself, because every time he did, he knew that it led to the day when Tskumo Yuuma would make even more of a fool himself by trusting him.

Part of that meant that he had to listen to Yuuma going on about 'kattobingu' far more than he would've ever liked to – which in all fairness was never at all.

Yuuma's determination to try no matter what brought him more than one victory. Vector told himself that it wouldn't do anything in the end; what could his determination do in the face of the treachery Vector teased him so innocently into?

He didn't even bother telling himself that he wouldn't enjoy the moment when Yuuma realized that everything he'd done couldn't be put back into order with a cry of 'kattobingu!' and a cheerful grin. Nor did he try to tell himself that he wouldn't enjoy never hearing that word again.

Vector could lie to everyone except himself.

He'd done it. Somehow, in a way that Vector could not even begin to understand, Yuuma had done it.

He'd overcome everything Vector threw at him, overcome the burning hatred shining in Astral's heart – wasting it, and Vector had gone to such trouble to create it, too! - and they'd become something more!

This wasn't going to be the end of Vector, not at all. If Yuuma could be that determined, could turn absolute bitter defeat into blazing victory, then so could he.

Granted, his way of achieving victory wasn't so much 'kattobingu' as it was 'being too full of hate himself to let this slide away into ignominy' but Vector didn't think calling it by a different name meant that much.

He also wasn't going to let Yuuma know this was in any way similar. It would just make his enemy that much happier and Vector would go out of his way to avoid that. Far out of his way.

Hadn't he suffered enough? Even now, when the burning rage to destroy everything and anyone banked itself in him, he couldn't stand the sound of that single word. It had spelled the end of so many of his plans.

Yuuma still caroled it out as if it carried the breath of life itself.

Maybe for him it did. Vector could stand being around Yuuma more than he wanted to admit to anyone – especially Yuuma – so that unfortunately meant he had to deal with that word more than he wanted to.

Maybe he'd take the trouble to introduce Yuuma to a few other words, ones that he found much more interesting. With any luck, no one would object to Vector's name falling from Yuuma's lips instead of that ever-present 'kattobingu'. Not that he'd care if they did object.

At least now he didn't have to worry about keeping it from Astral.

The End

Note: Thank you for reading and I hope that you enjoyed the story. Please let me know what you thought of it if at all possible.