A/N: As I didn't want to be known as a one-shot wonder, here's another one-shot (good god that was a terrible joke). So here it is! Sorry for being late for Valentine's!
Link VRAINS is normally always busy, with duels occurring left, right and centre. There are the casual duelists and competitive duelists. And there are those who want to try out the newest decks. But one thing that's common among all of them, is that Link VRAINS is a safe haven of Dueling.
Well, for the most part.
Somehow, someway, the Knights of Hanoi always manage to slip in through whatever crack they can find. And if there's no crack, they'll make their own, with the all-powerful Cracking Dragon. But recently, Link VRAINS has been relatively safe, without an attack. Maybe it's because they want to leave everyone alone during Valentine's Day. Or maybe they're busy with their own Valentine's event. Either way, Link VRAINS is at peace, and the virtual duelists can Duel to their heart's content.
Deep within the system, the Knights lurk, waiting to spring an attack. But just as they found one, they themselves were attacked. A firewall? No, it's much more potent than a simple firewall. It's the work of someone who's specifically keeping the Knights away. But who? The Knights, try as they may, couldn't find a single way of getting into Link VRAINS. Lest they find some way of bypassing the defences, their attack would fail.
Restlessly, in the real world, Yusaku and Shoichi are hard at work in Shoichi's hotdog van, stopping the Knights' attempts at getting into Link VRAINS.
"Hey, how long before you think they give up?" The ever-annoying Ignis, Ai, spectates the pair as they type away at their keyboards.
"It'll be some time, the Knights definitely aren't finished. Because first, they're relentless in their own right. Second, they have nothing better to do. And third, they haven't brought out Cracking Dragon yet."
"Oh right, that dragon."
"They're testing the waters. To see if they can find the quickest way in that requires the least amount of effort." But Yusaku is just as relentless as the Knights, in that he won't stop hunting them down.
"But Yusaku, even if one were to get in, you'd be there immediately and beat them, won't you?" The purple-haired friend gives a light chuckle after his question, to which Yusaku merely nods. "You have school in a few minutes, don't you?" Yusaku nods again. "Hey, say something would you? Sometimes I think you're the AI around here!"
"I'm trying to focus."
"Yeah, yeah, alright. So I take it I'll have to hack the attendance files?"
"I'll be done soon." A few button presses and Yusaku initiates a program. "Done, this program repeats the process of looking for any cracks in the system's firewall and patches it up."
"If you could make a program do all your work for you, then you'll have time to go to the event on Wednesday."
"What event?"
"Come on, you know. The Valentine's Day event. The festival at your school."
"Not interested." Yusaku hesitated before answering. It was a brief pause, but Shoichi picked it up and smiled.
"Oh, Yusaku." Shoichi chuckles.
As quiet as she is, Aoi Zaizen receives a lot of (unwanted) attention from her peers. Many a time, it's because of her brother's position at SOL Technologies. Never has she met someone who genuinely cared about her as a person, as an individual, as Aoi, and not as the sister of Akira Zaizen. Her lack of true friends left her feeling lonely and sometimes depressed.
However recently, she's been getting requests of a... different nature. See, the school organized a Valentine's Day event for couples and friends to attend. But the student population is two-thirds boys and one-third girls. Which leaves many boys left behind. And some of these boys have a couple of traits, namely desperation and greed. Never before has Aoi had to react to boys asking her out, let alone attend a Valentine's Day event of all things. You'd think that Valentine's Day is meant to be cherished with someone you genuinely love, and not something to fulfil man's lustful desires. Regularly, Aoi gets approached by a single boy, who's looking for a date from a single girl. Naturally, anyone in their right mind would reject, offering the reason that they don't know the person well enough to accept. But as time goes on, and the event draws near, people become more desperate and pushy, and it becomes much harder to reject someone outright. Especially for Aoi.
"P-Please, go out with me for the event?"
"I'm sorry, but no."
"Please! I'll do anything! I-I'll buy you a rose, do your homework, boast about you, anything!" Aoi always gets taken aback if they reply after coldly rejecting them. She never expects them to not give up. Well, she does, it's just that it becomes frustrating at that point. But what she's completely unprepared for, is for physical contact of any kind.
School is relatively uneventful compared to the usual fighting digital crime that Yusaku and Shoichi deal with almost daily. Nothing ever happens. Well, except when fate decides to put a spin on a normally mundane day. Yusaku was walking through the hallway (an empty hallway, which is uncommon during a normal school day), minding his own business until he heard a shriek, a cry for help, of fear and helplessness. Slowly, Yusaku peeked around the corner to see a strange boy grabbing Aoi's arm, much to her shock and fear. Swiftly, Yusaku rips out a page from his notebook, writes something on it, and hides it behind his back. Then, he steps forward.
"Leave her alone!" The boy stopped his rough acts and both him and Aoi look towards Yusaku.
"Stay out of this, fool." The boy turns his attention away from Aoi, and to Yusaku, and steps towards him. "I don't think you know who you're messing with."
"Don't know, don't care." Yusaku circles around to where Aoi is standing until he stands between the boy and Aoi. "You okay?" Yusaku, with his left hand holding the torn page behind his back gestures for Aoi to read it. Aoi glances over and reads Yusaku's note.
"While his back is turned, run. Don't worry about me. I'll handle this."
Aoi gives a silent nod, which the boy took to be a reply to Yusaku's question.
"She'll be okay, but you won't."
"Oh really? I doubt that." Yusaku once again circles around the boy, until the boy's back is turned towards Aoi.
"Hah, what can you do against me? You can't win!"
"I already have."
"Don't try to bluff me!"
"Take it as a bluff if you want, doesn't matter if you believe me or not. It's actually better that you don't believe me, then when you find out later that you've been had, you'll realize just how much of an idiot you are."
"What do you mean?! I've been had? As if!"
"Look behind you." The boy makes a quick glance behind him.
"Hah, there's nothing there!"
"Exactly." The boy, now realizing the full extent of what Yusaku meant, turns around to find that Aoi is gone, ran away while his back was turned. In doing so, his back was turned to Yusaku.
"Damn it!" The boy turns back to Yusaku, only to feel a sting in his stomach area as Yusaku gave a quick jab to him. As the boy doubled back, Yusaku slid his foot behind the boy's leg, and thrust his elbow into the boy's face while dragging his foot backwards, the combined force of both actions toppling the boy onto his back, incapacitated and unable to continue fighting. "Damn... it..."
"Sorry, but I have more important business to attend to."
It wasn't really that important, but Yusaku had to get to class. Getting into a fight is the least of his worries. And so is class. Yusaku managed to enter the lecture hall just in time, mere moments before the professor arrived. And so the mundane task of sitting and listening to an egghead talk about irrelevant information begins. Everything is returning to Yusaku's previously planned plan of the day. But one thing that he didn't plan on, is managing to find a seat next to Aoi without even realizing it until she spoke.
"Hey, you."
Yusaku turned to look at the girl, not expecting to see her so soon after he saved her. Aoi, in turn, was surprised to find Yusaku emerged unscathed, still looking as charming as he did before the fight. Outside of a high tension situation, however, Yusaku seems to look much more charming, to the point where Aoi could do nothing in place but blush and turn away.
"W-What's your name?" The first thing Aoi tried to say, and she stuttered wildly. She felt so embarrassed.
"Yusaku. Yusaku Fujiki."
"Aoi... Z-Zaizen." Yusaku extended his hand.
"Pleasure to meet you." Aoi took his hand and blushed madly.
The rest of class went by quickly, with Yusaku spending his time helping Aoi where she needed it. In the end, the two became close friends. When class ended, Yusaku went to take his bag. Taking a look inside, he sees his AI friend grinning away. Yusaku dropped his voice down to a whisper.
"What are you grinning about?"
"Oh nothing, just thought that you should maybe ask her out."
"Fat chance. I'd accept if she were to ask me though."
"Yusaku! You coming?"
"I'll be there in a sec Aoi."
Just then, Yusaku's phone rang, he picked it up and heard Shoichi's voice on the line.
"Yusaku, I heard you picked up a date for this Wednesday? Care to explain how you managed such a feat?" Yusaku silently glared at his bag with Ai inside.
"I haven't asked her yet, nor has she asked me. And since I might be busy dealing with..."
"Oh don't worry about it Yusaku, I'll handle the Knights. You just have to handle your date."
"It's not a date, it's..." Yusaku looks towards Aoi, as she blushed upon hearing the word "date" making him blush in response. "It's nothing. Anyway, I gotta go, call you back later."
"Gotcha, have fun with Aoi." As Shoichi mentioned the name of the girl next to him, Yusaku glanced over at a nearby camera, which he could sense was how Shoichi saw him. But before he could offer a retaliation, Shoichi hung up, leaving the two in silence.
"Well, don't worry about that, that was just someone I know teasing me about asking someone out for a date," Aoi said nothing and stared at the ground in embarrassment. "Hey, Aoi?"
"Well, Yusaku, I kinda wanted to ask you, but I know it's way too quick, but time is short. Will you go out with me on Wednesday?" Aoi blushed again.
"Sure."
"Huh? R-Really?"
"Yes."
"Is it like a date?"
"If you want it to be, I'm fine either way." Aoi's eyes lit up with happiness upon hearing that.
"Great! It's settled, then. Our date will be on Wednesday." Yusaku merely chuckled.
"In that case, why not go somewhere before the grand event? Like a proper date." Aoi gasped
"R-Really? That'd be amazing Yusaku!"
"Great. Anyway," Yusaku looked at the clock "I gotta go now. It's getting late."
"Wait!" Aoi pulled out her phone and offered it to Yusaku. "I haven't gotten your number yet." Yusaku took it and gave Aoi his own, both of them entering their numbers into each others' phone.
"Here Aoi, I entered mine in."
"Me too. I guess I'll see you on Wednesday then, Yusaku."
Aoi smiled and waved goodbye as she parted ways with Yusaku to return home. Yusaku took a look at his phone, and right there, Aoi entered her contact with a heart emoji next to her name. He merely smiled and put his phone away.
Wednesday came fast. Even though there was no school on the day of the grand event, Yusaku was hard at work in the hotdog van with Shoichi.
"Hey Yusaku, don't you have somewhere to be today?" Ai asked.
"I know, I just have this last thing I need to do, then I'll leave it to you." Ai sighed a robotic sigh. He went back into Yusaku's Duel Disk and started fiddling around. "What are you doing in there?"
"Don't worry Yusaku, I gotcha covered. Take your time, but don't take too long." Yusaku wondered what Ai was up to, but brushed off the curiosity and got back to work.
"Done!" Yusaku pressed a button on the keyboard, activating a program and running it through the system.
"We've had enough of this! Bring out the Cracking Dragon!" The Knights have decided to launch a full-scale attack, breaking into the system themselves. Just then, they encountered what could only be seen as a security drone.
"Hah, is that all they have now? Blast it!" Just then, the drone opened up, and six arms extended from its core, each brandishing a different weapon, and among them, an arm holding a purple sword, one holding a white shield, one with a green energy claw protruding from it, and one with a red armament attached to it sprouting a blue claw, and two other arms in the shadows that the Knights can't see.
"Exterminate."
"Ahhhhhh! Run!" Too late, the drone used its various weaponry to eliminate the Knights, putting a stop to their attacks.
"There, the program will now run loops throughout the system at 10 revolutions an hour, non-stop." Shoichi looked at the program work in amazement.
"Non-stop, you say?"
"It's a program, it doesn't need maintenance or rest."
"Interesting." Yusaku picked up his Duel Disk and headed for the exit.
"Hey Yusaku, have fun, will you?"
"I know that."
Yusaku, returning home, is strangely greeted by Roboppy.
"Good morning sir, your attire has been prepared for you, by order of the great Ignis." Yusaku silently thanked Ai and went to his room to collect his attire and change quickly.
Previously, Yusaku and Aoi had agreed to meet up at the cafe where they'd have tea and chat. Yusaku arrived, despite the earlier encounters with Hanoi, 10 minutes early. But Aoi was already there, waiting patiently for her date to arrive.
"Aoi! You're early."
"So are you, Yusaku."
"Well then," Yusaku extended his hand. "Shall we?" Aoi took his hand, and the pair entered the cafe, and quickly found a seat.
"I came here early so I could reserve a table for the both of us."
"Thank you, Aoi. I appreciate it." Yusaku smiled.
The pair took a menu each and ordered their respective pastries and drinks. Notably, Aoi was hiding her face behind her menu, blushing as red as ever. "So, Aoi, how're you today?"
"I'm good, thanks. Excited for later today?"
"Definitely." Aoi smiled, as the waiter returned to give the pair their orders.
"Hey Aoi, you got a little cream on the side of your lip." Aoi looked up in surprise. "Here." Yusaku took a handkerchief and gently wiped away the cream, evoking a huge blush from Aoi.
"T-Thanks."
"Don't mention it."
The pair chatted for a bit longer, and soon after, they paid their bills and left the cafe satisfied.
"Yusaku, let's go to school, the event's starting soon."
"Sure." Hand-in-hand, Yusaku and Aoi made their way to school. As they got closer, they started to see more couples. Some of them gave curious stares in the general direction of the pair, which elicited a blush from both of them.
Soon enough, they reached the entrance of the school, which had been decorated to meet with the theme of a Valentine's Day event. Everywhere, couples and pairs can be seen, each paying little attention to anything but each other. The aura of romance was thick in the air, which would have made Yusaku scoff had he not been a part of it. The main entrance had a red carpet lined up, for couples to walk through, and at the entrance, a teacher stood, to check for student identifications.
"Ah, Yusaku and Aoi. Quite a rare pair if I do say so myself. May I see your IDs?" Yusaku and Aoi both presented their IDs, and the teacher let them pass. "Have fun tonight." The event was packed with game booths and other fun activities.
Including a photo booth.
"Hey, Yusaku! Let's take a photo together!"
"Oh, sure." The pair got into the photo booth and sat next to each other. There was a beeping sound to act as a countdown, and in the last second before the shot, Aoi wrapped her arms around Yusaku's and held tightly, much to Yusaku's surprise.
"What the...?" Aoi didn't answer, she just smiled. Yusaku, in response, smiled too and patted her head gently.
When the pair looked at their photo,
Yusaku and Aoi continued to try out the activity booths, until the end of the day, when there was to be a dance in the hall. The two decided to go, despite Aoi's little skill with dancing (and Yusaku's lack thereof). Before the dance, food was available in the hall. A small snack or two to keep everyone from getting too hungry, nothing too lavish.
"Well, well, if it isn't Aoi and Yusaku. What a rare pair." The pair turned to see a couple they have never seen before. Classmates of both Yusaku and Aoi.
"Heh, someone said that exact same thing earlier today," Yusaku responded.
"Well, enjoy your day together. You two deserve it the time together."
"Thank you."
"No problem. Might I also add that you two make a cute couple." This elicits a blush from Aoi.
"You too."
"Alright then, like I said, enjoy your day." The classmates waved and disappeared into the crowd.
Soon after, music started playing, and as if on cue, the crowd dispersed to make room to dance. Yusaku and Aoi joined in, and with what limited skill both of them had, they followed the other dancers to the best of their ability. The dance went smoothly, except for one hiccup where Yusaku bumped into a neighbouring couple. At the end of it all, Aoi and Yusaku looked at each other and smiled, having had their first dance together.
The day ended quickly after the dance, and Yusaku and Aoi were ready to leave the school grounds.
"Well, Yusaku, I had fun today. How about you?"
"Me too."
"I'm glad I spent this day with you." Aoi took Yusaku's hand as they walked the red carpet.
"It was nice to spend time with you too. I'm glad you asked me out." Aoi giggled happily.
"Thank you, Yusaku."
"No need to thank me, Aoi. Genuine care doesn't require thanks."
"Care?" Aoi blushed, and this time, Yusaku noticed. "You care about me, Yusaku?"
"Of course I do Aoi. We're friends. Or maybe we're a couple now since we spent a day like this together."
"C-Couple?!" Aoi gasped and blushed, looking at Yusaku, right in his eyes. A moment passed where it was just the two of them, then Aoi hugged Yusaku tightly, crying tears of joy and happiness. "Yusaku! I love you!" Yusaku lightly stroked her hair.
"There, there, I love you too." Yusaku gently kissed Aoi's forehead.
Aoi looked up at Yusaku, and gently tiptoed, placing her lips on Yusaku's, and the pair shared a blissful moment they will remember forever.
End