Hey guys, inspiration for this hit me a couple weeks ago, and I've spent most of my freewriting time working on it. Sorry for the slow updates, I handwrite all of my stories first, then type them. I'm a lazy typist, and I've not gotten the gumption to type this until just recently. Yes, it's out of universe. Don't like, don't read.

Credit for my picture goes to Sardiini on DeviantArt.

I don't own Kingdom Hearts.

Criminal Heart

Chapter 1


S

'It's been a year since she hurt Roxas. I've been doing all I can, but he still refuses to cheer up. Not me, not Kai, not Dad… I've almost lost hope. But I can't give up. This is big brother. I can't fail.'

Sora closed his journal with a snap. With a pang, Sora recalled his brother's reaction to seeing his journal, and his incessant teasing about his "diary." In a way, it was, but that was beside the point. Roxas, the cheerful, teasing and, most importantly, the big brother, had been gone for a long time. Sora had thought that he would hate that girl, but he couldn't hold onto his anger like that. He still hadn't completely forgiven her, but he couldn't hate. It wasn't in his nature.

Sora rolled over and turned off his light. Tomorrow is going to suck, and he needs his sleep.

Sora awoke the next day in the same manner that he had for nearly the entirety of the last school year, with Roxas chucking his clothes for the day onto his face.

"Get up, you lazy shit. We've got school today."

Sora groaned. "I know, I know."

Junior year. Sora had been looking forward to it for a whole year, but now that it was here, he wasn't so ready for it. Especially the getting up part of it.

"And I'm driving." Sora was actually quite relieved at this, as we was a very reckless driver himself, and had destroyed multiple cars already. But he was one to take advantage of the situation.

"Fine, but you're buying lunch!"


X

Xion awoke to the high-pitched squealing of her once-best-friend-now-adopted-sister.

"Come on, come on, come on! Get up! It's your first day, and you've got to make a good impression on everyone!"

Xion groaned. She was NOT as excited as Kairi about her first day at her new school.

"COME ON; get up so we can pick out your outfit!" This earned another, even louder groan. Xion HATED picking clothes for herself. All she liked to wear was black, black, and more black. Maybe some occasional blue too.

Xion reluctantly drug herself out of bed.

"I'm taking a shower."

"Not until we pick what you're wearing!"

Xion sighed exasperatedly. "Just pick it out for me; you're better at that kind of thing anyway." She turned and walked out of the room before Kairi could get in another word of protest. Kairi might be a Junior, but she still had the maturity level of a little kid.

Xion came out of the shower feeling much better. A nice hot shower always woke her up. Upon entering her room, she had a bundle of clothes shoved at her by Kairi.

"Here, this is the best I could do with so little time."

Xion put on the clothes and admitted, to herself anyway, that Kairi did have excellent fashion sense. She had picked out a nice black Tee with a blue graphic that matched her eyes perfectly. She'd also pulled out some of Xion's black skinny jeans. She had on black tennis shoes with some white laces, to counteract just a little of the overall "look, you can't see me" vibe she was exuding.

Xion fixed her hair into her signature raven-style look and applied some light makeup. Satisfied with her appearance, she went downstairs to get some breakfast.

She grabbed the Cheerios from the cabinet and poured herself a bowl. As she ate, she heard a lot of noise coming from the general direction of Kairi's room. After she finished, she rinsed out her bowl and went to check on Kairi. She found her standing, satisfied, in the middle of a completely wrecked room. She was FINALLY fully clothed, and had chosen a lavender theme for her clothes, to bring out her eyes.

"Come on, Kai. We'll be late at this rate."

"I know…"

Kairi grabbed a couple of pop-tarts on the way out to the car.

"Today's gonna be great!"


R

If it were up to Roxas, he would have gone straight to class without bothering with Kairi. But Sora was right, there would be hell to pay if he tried that. So he reluctantly drug himself to their usual meeting spot, the lone willow tree in the little forest that was their school courtyard. Kairi was already there, damn it. Her constant hyperactive bounciness drove him nuts.

Once she saw Roxas and Sora, she held out her hands to the both of them.

"Schedules."

They gave her their schedules, knowing it was worthless to protest or complain. Kairi stacked them neatly, then called out, "Xion, I need your schedule!"

Roxas was momentarily confused, before he saw a black-haired girl hovering near the willow yell out a defiant, "No!"

Sora chuckled. Even Roxas raised an eyebrow. Kairi marched over to the girl, snatched her schedule away, and drug her over to the brothers.

"Xion, these are my friends, Roxas and Sora. They'll be nice to you, WON'T THEY?" She said the last bit quite menacingly.

Sora chuckled and gave a mock salute. "Yes, ma'am, whatever you say."

Kairi turned to glare at Roxas. He rolled his eyes.

"Sure, whatever…"

Kairi started to examine their schedules. After she'd looked over them all, she passed them back out.

"Roxas, I—" Roxas knew what was coming, and tried to hastily extricate himself from the situation. Unfortunately, Kairi caught on, and snagged him by his shirt sleeve. "—want you to help Xion get around school for a week or so, K?"

He tried to shake her off of his sleeve, but her grip was like iron.

"Ok, fine. Just next time, let Sora show the new kid around."

As Sora and Kairi departed for their classes, Roxas turned to Xion. "Let me see your schedule."

She clutched it close to herself. "Why?"

Roxas sighed. He didn't want to have to deal with this for ten minutes, let alone an entire week or more. "So I can know where I'm taking you ahead of time."

She gingerly handed him her schedule. As they walked, he compared hers to his, and saw why Kairi had stuck him with her. Their schedules were identical. Chemistry, Advanced World Geography, Computer II, Physics, Algebra III, and Art. Same classes, same order. Roxas was actually relieved. He wasn't going to have to be late for… er… Xion, wasn't it?

Roxas handed Xion her schedule back.

She looked at him questioningly. "Well?"

He shrugged. "Our schedules are identical. You'll just have to deal with me through all of our classes."

By this time they had gotten to the Chemistry lab.

"I'd suggest you work with me today, seeing as no one knows you."

The chemistry teacher was an older man with lemon-yellow hair, and a chopstick (or was it a very long toothpick? Roxas had never figured it out) in his mouth.

"Before we start our first lab today, I need y'all to split into groups of three."

Roxas face palmed. He knew who the third member of the group would be.

To his deepest regret, he was right. "Roxy!" Roxas barely managed to avoid a full speed tackle-hug.

"Now that wasn't very nice."

Roxas rolled his eyes. "Get over it, Dem."

Demyx pulled himself to his feet. In doing so, he noticed Xion. "Hey, I don't recognize you! You must be the new girl Kairi was talking about. My name's Demyx!"

"Um… my name's Xion…"

Demyx hugged her. "Good to meet you, Xion!"

Xion attempted to fight her way out of the hug, but Roxas knew it was useless. Demyx's had a lot of practice giving unwilling people hugs.

He finally let go. "I'm sure we'll be the best of friends."

Xion looked around the room frantically, before Roxas stopped her by putting his hand on her shoulder.

"Nobody noticed. It's not unusual for Demyx to make a scene in every class. It's just in his nature to be overly buoyant."

She looked horrified. "We don't have every class with him, do we?"

"God, no. This is the only accelerated class that he takes."

This was the only class where Roxas didn't have to do any work, because Demyx was more than happy to do everything in that day's lab.

Figuring that he should at least TRY to make some small talk, Roxas glanced at Xion.

"So where're you from?"

"Los Angeles…"

Roxas nodded. It wasn't that unusual. He himself was born in LA, but he had moved to Vegas about a year before he started kindergarten.

"Why move now?"

Xion looked a little hesitant to discuss it.

"Kairi's family adopted me…"

This was news to Roxas. He had known that Kairi had lots of friends in LA, but he hadn't heard about an adoption.

"I'd console you about the loss of your family, but I bet you're sick of hearing it."

She looked him in the eyes. "How would you know that?"

Roxas held her gaze. "Personal experience."

"What do you mean?"

It was a touchy subject for Roxas. "Mom left us a year or so before we moved here. I don't know if she died or just left, because Dad refuses to talk about it."

She nodded and looked back down. "Then you would know the feeling…"

They spent the rest of the class in an awkward silence, broken only by Demyx's random outbursts.


X

Though Roxas was dead depressing, Xion had to admit that he was a genius. All through Computer, Physics, and Geography he was the teachers' popular student to call on. His heart didn't really seem in the lessons, though. Why is he so depressed? She didn't recall Kairi telling her that one of the Hikari brothers was so far down in the dumps.

Upon entering the Algebra classroom, she could only make one assumption: "Oh, great. We've got a hyperactive teacher." The algebra classroom was very brightly painted, with lots of posters and drawings all over the walls. She also noticed that the classroom was virtually empty. Her, Roxas, a blonde haired boy, and a brown haired girl, and that was it.

She decided to sit next to Roxas, who, for once, plopped himself at the front of the row. Moments later, she found out why. A black haired girl that couldn't be much older than 22 came bouncing into the room.

"Hey guys! I hope you had a good summer and I hope that we'll work very well together and I don't know you what's your name?" All this was said in one breath, with the last bit directed at Xion.

Xion, rather than glower at the bouncing teacher as she would Kairi, decided to grin hugely. "I'm Xion, good to meet you!"

Yuffie beamed. "I think we'll get along just fine." She shot a glance at Roxas. "Friend of yours?" Roxas gave a small smile and nodded. Xion nearly did a double take. A SMILE? That was the first emotion she'd seen from him all day.

Yuffie's methods of teaching reflected her personality; they were very simple (as Algebra goes, anyway). She was also very bouncy and cheerful, regardless of whether you caught on immediately or not.

Upon dismissal, Yuffie held Xion back.

"Xion, I need to talk to you."

Yuffie all but shoved Roxas out the door, and closed it behind him, then shot around to look at Xion.

"I know that, regardless of how hard he tries to hide it during my class, that Roxas is really depressed. He's been toting you around all day, so I'm sure you've figured that out."

She didn't know what Yuffie was getting at. "Yeah…"

"Well, Roxas is one of those guys that likes to feel needed… which, as you should know, is uncommon."

"And…?"

Yuffie sighed exasperatedly. "He'd never admit it, not even to himself, but I'm sure he's enjoying toting you around. So, if you wouldn't mind, would you mind letting him show you around for a while longer?"

Xion sighed. Yuffie rolled her eyes at her. "I know he can be a pain, but he's not that bad. Besides, you'll really like Roxas once he's cheered up…"

"How would you know that?"

Yuffie blushed. "Call me a cougar if you want, but I had a bit of a crush on him until he got all… depressed."

"Why is he depressed anyway?"

"It's not my place to say." She got up. "Now, I'm sure you're very eager to get out of here, and I won't deny Roxas the chance to walk you around."

She opened the door. "See you tomorrow!"

Xion and Roxas walked down the hallway, but Yuffie got in one last comment. "And remember what I said."

Xion sighed. This is gonna be an ordeal…

Her last class, art, thankfully passed without major incident.

Until the part where she had to leave. Where Kai had parked the car that morning was now just an empty space. Xion pulled out her phone and called her.

"Kai…"

"Yes?"

"Why did you go and leave me here all by myself?"

"Er… I forgot about you?"

"Well, how am I supposed to get home?"

"Why don't you have Roxas bring you home?"

Xion sighed. "Sure, send me home with the depressed kid…"

"He's not THAT bad…"

"Fine, whatever."

"He should be at basketball practice right now. You'll have to wait till he's finished."

"Ok." Xion ended the call and walked to the gym. Sure enough, Roxas was in practice. Xion realized that, while he did very little friend-wise, off of the court, everyone on the floor seemed to be cool with him. Except for this one silver-haired dude, who seemed to very cold to Roxas. Roxas also reciprocated this coldness, and they ignored each other on the whole if they could.

Another thing that she noticed was that Roxas was very, VERY athletic. He was by far the fastest on the floor, and probably jumped highest too.

Xion didn't have time to form more advanced conclusions before the practice ended. Roxas trotted over to her.

"Why're you still here?" He wasn't unfriendly. He just seemed puzzled as to why she had remained at school.

Xion almost giggled. "Kairi stranded me here."

Roxas rolled his eyes. "Somehow, that doesn't surprise me." He grabbed his stuff from next to the door and pulled out his keys. "Need a ride?"

Xion was in awe. He seemed like a normal person right now… what was up? She smiled at him anyway. "Yeah, thanks."

Roxas raised an eyebrow. "Thanks?" He chuckled. "Regardless of how much you look like Kairi, your temperament couldn't be much more different."

Roxas threw his bags into the bed of an old El Camino, unlocked her door, opened it for her, closed it behind her, and THEN got behind the wheel. Xion was amazed. What a 180 from just hours ago!

Xion was still curious about Roxas's attitude towards that silver-haired kid.

"Hey, Roxas…"

"Yeah?" He seemed completely normal.

"What was with that silver-haired kid?"

Xion could tell that this was a touchy subject for him, as he badly stifled a glare that had probably been meant for her. "Why?"

"Well, it looked like you two avoided each other during your practice…"

Roxas had degenerated rapidly. "You'll find out soon enough… just don't let him get to you… because if you're my friend, he'll try his hardest to."

Regardless of Xion's attempts at starting a fresh conversation, Roxas was silent the rest of the short drive home.

As she got out, Roxas gave a casual, two fingered salute. "See you later."

She waved back. "Later!"

He drove off…


R

Roxas was glad that he hadn't had to explain to Xion his situation with Riku. It would be better, in the long run, for her to see and understand how deep the enmity between them ran first.

Roxas pulled into his house's massive garage.

He heard his father's incredibly deep, but not overly loud, voice. "So how was your day?"

He raised an eyebrow. It was unusual for his dad to be home so early.

"The Uchida's adopted a kid."

His father nodded. "I seem to recall hearing of that. Xion, I believe…?"

Roxas nodded. "That's right."

His dad went to the door. "I've got business to attend to tonight, so you're in charge. Make sure Sora doesn't eat all of the food, or wreck the house."

"Gotcha."

Roxas knew that it was unlikely that he would be watching out for just Sora.

Even knowing that it was a probably a bad idea, Roxas called Sora. Thankfully, he picked up.

"Yo, sup?"

"Sora, dad's gonna be gone, and—"

"Party?"

Roxas face palmed. He was NOT going to take responsibility for a bunch of drunk teens. "No party. At most, one or two people over."

Roxas knew who Sora was guaranteed to bring. "Ok, how about Kai and… um… Xion!"

Roxas knew that Sora was going to try to bargain to get more people over.

"Ok, but that's it. No one else.

"What! No way!"

Roxas sighed. "I'm not bargaining, Sora." He hung up. Keeping an eye on Kairi was gonna be a pain…


S

Sora couldn't believe it. Dad was away, and they were only having two people over. Two! That's it! Still, he remembered, two was better than none.

The two sisters took the invitation differently. Kairi just grabbed her bag that she kept for this kind of situation, and she was ready to go. Xion, meanwhile, grumbled and went to grab a few clothes and other essential items.

Sora drove them to his house and (somehow) managed not to wreck the car. Upon entering his house, he found Roxas, as per the norm, attached to his video games. Today, it was GTA: San Andreas. He was tempted to turn off the games, but knew Roxas would probably flip his shit and trash Sora's room later.

Xion was much braver. She plopped her stuff down next to the couch, snatched the controller out of Roxas's hands, and started to play herself. Sora wished he had a camera at this point, as Roxas looked utterly dumbfounded. Then, he seemed to be debating whether to snatch the controller back, or leave Xion to it. In a moment of decisiveness, he got up and snatched the controller back. Xion was the one who had the "DAFUQ?" look on her face now. Sora decided to leave. He did NOT want to be in the room when they started to fight over video game privileges.

Sora came back into the room with a big bowl of popcorn. Kairi had settled into one of the recliners in the room, and was watching Xion and Roxas play Call of Duty. Unlike normal (where Roxas destroyed everybody single-handedly) they were reasonably close in terms of skill. Match after match, Sora noticed that, while Xion would usually get an early lead, Roxas would later catch up and beat her. After a couple of hours of this pattern, with very little non-video game small talk between the four, Kairi got up and turned off the system and the TV.

"That's enough video games for one night.

Roxas had yet to move. He WAS, however, shooting death glares in Kairi's direction.

Sora stood up, too. "Then what're we gonna do?"

Kairi didn't seem to have thought this far ahead. "Uh… movies?"

Sora had another idea. "Skate Park."

"No way, how about…"

And so it went for a few minutes. Xion didn't participate, because she was new in town, and Roxas didn't give many ideas, because he was… well… Roxas. But finally, he did come up with a good idea.

"Uh… how about the clock tower?"

Sora and Kairi both stopped talking midsentence. Roxas had refused to go to the clock tower for the past year, because that was where he poured out his heart to… her. Back when he was still normal.

The clock tower used to be routine for them. Go get some ice cream, go watch the sunset. But they weren't going to deny Roxas a chance at normality.

"Sounds good to me."

Kairi agreed. "I think so, too.

Xion raised her hand. "Just one question."

Sora nodded. "Yeah?"

"Where're we going?"

THREE HOURS! Three hours of typing! And I already had it written! Ugh. Now my hands hurt.

Sorry about the horrible updating, I'm a lazy typist. I have quite a bit of material for each story, but I'm too lazy to transfer it from the page to the computer.

I'll try to update this one AT LEAST bimonthly. As for When Worlds Collide, I'm gonna get to work on posting what I already have written for it.

Review, please!