A/N: Wooo, happy Axel/Xion Day, everybody! After this one-shot, I'm going to focus on my other stories, since I've been a little slow in updating them. Anyway, I hope you all like this 8/14 one-shot that I wrote just for this occasion. XD

Disclaimer: I don't own anything at all.

Bad Boy + Bad Girl=One Perfect Couple

Xion strode down the school corridors after the final bell rang to pick out her next victim to miff. Even though she had held freshman status for only five months, she made it clear that she was a rebel girl. No one was allowed to mess with her and get away with it. Her downright ugly attitude had driven people away in the past, much to her satisfaction. She just loved her bad reputation, to flaunt it in public whenever she so pleased. Maybe she barely possessed any friends, her parents ignored her, and her Saturdays were spent watching the most violent movies on TV. So what? Did anyone truly care concerning any aspect of her? Obviously, the answer was no, so that she could mess with as many of her peers as she wanted. As she defiantly thought this, Xion noticed Seifer taking out a pack of cigarettes outside.

Considering she craved a smoke this time of day, she marched right up to him with her widest smirk on her face. Seifer's IQ definitely wasn't off the charts. To steal his cheap cigarettes would feel so rewarding right now. The resident sophomore bully glared at her just then.

"What do you want, freshman?" he asked testily, gripping his pack protectively with his fingers.

Xion could barely resist laughing as she grabbed hold of his collar. "Fork over the smokes, tough guy."

Seifer returned the laughter, though it sounded ten times as mocking as hers. He merely pushed her out of his way, replying amusedly, "No can do, freshman! What are you gonna do to me now?"

"This!" she shouted and used her infamously powerful fist to punch him in the face.

The ensuing fight quickly escalated into something quite a few members of the student body witnessed. And it seemed that Seifer suffered most of the blows. His lips started bleeding before Xion blackened one of his blue eyes. She herself scarcely received a scratch from the fight—her combative experience proved too extensive for her to get injuries. If resumes could only ask how many kids she embarrassed by her skills, she could actually have a job to stop her mom from complaining. Cheering from the kids combined with the many punches thrown brought the principal to investigate. He abruptly tore Xion away from Seifer and ordered the other students to go home like they were supposed to do. However, he dragged the two delinquents to his office for them to hear their sentences. But first, he lectured.

"What were you thinking, Xion?" he asked sternly, glaring at her through his glasses.

Aware of what always happened on her many trips to the principal's office, Xion smirked calmly, leaning back against her chair. It was easy to say she felt no remorse. Answering the big cheese's question hardly intimidated her.

"I wanted some cigarettes, but Seifer wouldn't give them to me. I asked nicely, though."

"Yeah right," the sophomore muttered, "since when have you been nice?"

She would grant him that fact. On the other hand, couldn't anyone relate to her and how trying to be nice crushed her in the end? This caused her to resolve to become the bad girl from that day forward. Besides, being bad could be so much fun...right?

"You know you're not allowed to smoke on school grounds," the principal told both of them.

Nodding to acknowledge that particular rule, Xion glanced over at Seifer to smirk at him. He would serve the upcoming detention with her, and there was nothing he could do about it. She flipped back strands of her short black hair, anticipating this bit of news that would lead to being stuck in the library. Fifty detentions she served before and fifty more she planned to serve. Why not more? It would add to her bad girl street cred and overall impressive reputation. To her inevitable surprise, though, the principal dropped a metaphorical bombshell on her. And she extremely disliked what came out of his mouth.

"Since you caused the fight, Xion, you will serve a forty-five minute detention after school tomorrow."

Outraged from hearing these rather unfair words, Xion slammed her hand on the desk. How come she had to be the one to receive punishment? Seifer proved himself to be just as guilty as she was. He punched back! Why should the principal ignore that brat's violence? Her nostrils flared angrily, which made her nose ring look more intimidating than usual.

"Why should Seifer get off easy?!?" she shouted, jerking her thumb Seifer's way. "He had the smokes and fought back."

"For self-defense purposes," the principal replied evenly. "Besides, he took more injuries than you did. You barely received a scratch. I think our discussion is finished."

"But, what you placed is not justice, damn it!" Xion yelled one last time before abruptly rising from her chair and slammed the door as she left for home.

After school the next day, the principal escorted her to the library, where she would serve her detention. Of course, Seifer was noticeably absent. The head of the school pulled out a chair for her to take a seat and said a few words that came out coldly.

"Now, I need to do some paperwork today, fortunately for you. However, I don't expect any talking from you or any of your delinquent stunts. Is that understood?"

"Yes, sir," Xion muttered grudgingly, firmly crossing her arms against her chest.

"Good. Remember, not a word."

Finally, the principal abandoned her to a long lonely fate in the most boring, quiet place in the school. Due to a lack of things to do, she decided to observe her surroundings, to look for others just like her.

Shockingly, no one else was in here either—that is, until she noticed a head of scarlet spikes that stood out from behind a bookshelf. Odd, she hadn't seen it when she first arrived here. That only proved she failed at being insightful, not like she cared. She still seethed at the fact that injustice existed when it came to Seifer getting off scot-free. He must possess either the right surname or right amount of cash for him to escape detention. Despite Seifer's lowlife ways, his dad was a lawyer who was known to play golf with the principal. Whatever. Meanwhile, as Xion sulked over her bad luck, the mysterious redhead appeared from where he hid. Once she heard his footsteps, she peered over at him, only to meet beautiful teal eyes.

A lump caught in her throat as she recognized this teenager, a notorious bad boy named Axel. He was a junior, but had ensured to earn his fame in the school, mostly in the form of rumors. As a freshman, he supposedly spent the night in jail once after parking the popular yet cruel Marluxia's convertible in the school. Yes, Xion had definitely heard of him. In fact, he was practically her idol, what with his carelessness regarding the things he had done. It was hot.

Upon seeing her sit numbly in her chair, he strode over to her to strike up casual conversation. "So, freshie, what are you in for?"

Oh God, her crime seemed so inferior compared to this guy's resume! Should she lie? No, even if she thought of a fantastic rule she falsely broke, it would mean suspension, not a lowly detention.

"I beat up a guy for not giving me his smokes, when I was out of mine," she sighed moodily.

Axel pulled out a chair to sit next to Xion, proceeding to comfortably plop down on it. Treating this move as casually as possible, he even propped his boots on top of the table. Against her will, she blushed slightly from the close proximity of his presence. Usually, she never blushed in front of other guys; she just beat them up for fun. Then again, Axel had given her no reason at all to pick a fight with him...yet.

"You wanna know what I'm in here for?" he whispered secretively in her ear, to which she nodded. She always wondered what he did to get detentions.

"I was a smart aleck in math class, when the teacher asked me a question. I couldn't resist letting her know that I'm not the resident genius."

Xion couldn't help but snort with laughter at this comment. After all, she also knew that Axel had a knack for telling jokes. Ever since her first day of high school, she longed to emulate that aspect. She decided to reply to this in a manner as clever as his. Leaning closer to him, she knew that she wanted to whisper this, in case the principal's ears were too sharp in their hearing. Her blue eyes locked onto his teal ones—the chemistry between them was practically instant.

"So, the famous bad boy gets in trouble for that? I'm sure you've done worse things."

The proud smirk that had implanted itself on his face disappeared as he suddenly sobered, much to her confusion. Axel wasn't supposed to be serious. He joked all the time about everything in the world.

But, he did remain grave, and this side of him wasn't going to vanish any time soon. Xion immediately regretted her remark due to the thought that she may have struck a nerve. With this realization, she moved her chair away from him and fumed. Not ten minutes had passed, and he already hated her, just because she had to go and say absolutely stupid things. She grudgingly hoped he was aware of how much torture he put her through by maintaining his silence. When she directed her narrowed blue eyes at the wooden table, she felt his orbs stare heatedly at her. And along with the gaze, Axel resolved to break his seemingly eternal silence.

"I've done heck of a lot of bad things in my time. I regret them now, believe me," he murmured, speaking as though every word was a sharp knife that cut little pieces away from him. He sounded extremely remorseful, something that Xion wanted to scoff. He would never act like this.

His fingers abruptly coiled gently around hers, his way of imploring her to listen to what he implied with his words. "Sure, it was fun being bad while it lasted. The truth was I was a wreck. While I was off breaking school rules, I admit that I was miserable. My life sucked and so did my grades. At the end of sophomore year, I barely passed. It made me realize that I didn't wanna end up being a failure. So, kid, look at it this way. Being bad might be tempting, but it doesn't pay off in the end."

The second disappointment within two days nearly crushed Xion, who could hardly believe what came out of Axel's mouth. This was her idol talking here, the one who toilet papered the school without acting apologetic about it. On the other hand, did she truly embrace the title "bad girl?" Did she enjoy her immense lack of friends that often nagged at her each day?

No matter what second-guessing thoughts swirled through her mind, she moved her chair even further away from him until it was impossible to move it any more. Axel hardly seemed like the rebellious nonconformist hero she adored from afar. She felt like screaming at him, which she did after a heavy sigh.

"You are such a hypocrite! I thought you were cool, man! I thought maybe, just maybe, there was one person who could relate to me and be bad right along with me! I hate you!" she shouted furiously, though certainly didn't mean what she said. Nonetheless, she resorted to her pouting self and positioned herself turned away from him. She inwardly refused to converse with him again. However, even with her hateful talk, warm fingers brushed her shoulder.

Axel had scooted his chair closer to hers, so that proximity they shared before returned with a vengeance. Xion tried not to punch him in the face, though felt tempted. She resolved to hear him out anyway. Maybe, with his charm and charisma, he could convince her to forgive him.

"Look, Xion," he whispered caringly, rubbing her shoulder with as much comfort, "I've been there. Besides, I don't want you to be lonely just because you admired the old me. That's not the right way to go, freshie. Not if you want to be sulky for the rest of your pathetic life."

The hostile side of her tamed, she looked over her shoulder at him and smiled. "OK, I'll take your advice. Though I have one thing I want to ask you."

"What?" His aquamarine eyes sparkled intriguingly.

"Did you seriously park Marluxia's Corvette in the school that one time?"

Holding back his head, Axel let out a hearty laugh that admittedly warmed her heart. She couldn't deny the inevitable that he was an awesome guy once someone got to know him. His hot appearance was a great bonus, too.

"Yeah, I did. I almost got suspended for that. But, I got an in-school instead."

Xion laughed along with him until she stared crying, the tears of mirth rolling down her face. Her charming detention companion wiped them away, now staring at her with passionate eyes that practically pierced her soul.

"You're cute when you're not trying to be though," he told her with a flashy grin.

"How do you know my name?" she inquired, leaning toward him again.

Pretending that this question served as difficult to respond to, Axel scratched his chin. As he did so, he lazily draped an arm around her shoulders. She reacted to this was a scarlet blush spreading on her face.

"You've managed to make a name for yourself in your short time as freshman, Xion," he said half-sarcastically, leaning in to promptly kiss her on the lips. Excited that this actually happened to her, she kissed back enthusiastically. Despite her mysterious smirk, she never dated anyone before, never had a boyfriend. This year, perhaps she would have Axel, the one guy she had doubted she would ever converse with in the first place. Unluckily for the two lovebirds, the principal walked inside to investigate some noise.

Staring at them disapprovingly, he clicked his tongue, for he extremely frowned upon witnessing this kiss. It should have occurred outside of school.

"Public display of affection—both of you can't go through a detention without breaking a single rule. You have ten minutes left, Xion. And Axel...you were supposed to leave a while ago. Never mind. I will let this 'slide' as the kids say. But, I thought I heard a ruckus," the principal informed them, glaring warily as he did so.

Xion and Axel glanced at each other, simultaneously winking.

"Meet me five o'clock at the park?" the redhead suggested.

The freshman rebel grinned. "We're both 'bad' kids. Why not?"

A/N: I decided to turn Xion into a tough girl with a nose ring for this fic. I thought it'd be cool, make her a little bit more edgy. Actually, I'm not sure if she'll be like that in the next KH game, but I really don't care. XD

Also, I kind of wanted to pay homage to certain teen flicks that have slightly inspired my AU fanfic writing when it comes to the cynical, realistic humor. So, with that, RIP John Hughes.