Max and Alec + locked room = ?

By Sinful Starlet

Disclaimer: situation's mine - the characters aren't, except for Ernie - bless him!

Rating: probably somewhere between PG-13 and R - I'm not really sure where the divide is!

Summary: see title! Logan asks for Max and Alec's help with an eyes-only job - not his greatest idea. Oh yeah, and a locked room, rising temperatures and funny breathing noises all feature somewhere! Admit it - ya wanna know what happens now right?! And don't panic - I'm going for funny not smutty! LOL!

Author's note: Chapter 4 now - or as I like to call it, the 'what is Max doing?' chapter. Trust me, you'll see why fairly soon on! *All together!* "It's gettin' hot in herre, so take off all your clothes..." - ya know how it goes! *SS*

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PART #5

The hours wore on, and Max was starting to get seriously bored. Logan had been fairly quiet because he was concentrating on getting the door open, though he would interrupt every now and again to update them or answer their questions. So basically, Max was stuck with only Alec to talk to, in a room that was getting more than uncomfortably hot (for an X5 at least, their basic body temperature being several degrees higher than normal humans' anyway).

They had played about a hundred games of 'rock, paper, scissors', played that memory game about what you would pack on holiday (their memories being somewhat enhanced, the list got up to thirty eight items before Alec eventually gave up), they had started to play 'anywhere but here' but Max objected after Alec's second turn! They'd also told about every joke and story they knew, and Alec had just proposed playing 'truth or dare' ('not a good idea!' Max thought) when Logan interrupted them again.

Max breathed a sigh of relief, then tried not to laugh as she saw Alec's disappointed face. "What's up Logan?", she asked.

"Well I'm back into the main system - it should only take about another half hour or so". Max groaned inwardly - right now, even half an hour was seemingly like a dangerously long time to be left in that room with Alec. She finally gave up trying to preserve whatever idea of modesty she had, and pulled her t-shirt off over her head, leaving only her tank-top and underwear underneath.

Alec seemed to take this as his cue and he reached for the bottom of his now fairly soaked t-shirt, ready to take that off too, but Max stopped him at the first flash of the golden skin of his lower torso.

"Nuh huh!", she said, shaking her head, "No one's taking off any more clothes - you'll just have to wait it out!" At the sound of 'taking off clothes', Logan suddenly focussed his attention back on their conversation for the moment - he took a look at the video monitor, but they were still just sitting on the floor on opposite sides of the room.

"Aw come on Max!", Alec groaned, "I'm dying here!", he protested, holding out his shirt to her as evidence, "You're wearing less than me anyway!"

"What?", Max said, looking down at her tank-top - as was Logan.

"I meant by way of surface area!", Alec said with a rather comical sigh. Max mulled this over in her head for a moment and then got to her feet, succumbing to temptation for a minute.

"Fine!", she said as she came to a stop standing in front of him before dropping down to her knees.

This certainly got Logan's attention, and Alec was more than a little interested himself. "Uh...M-Max", he managed to say eventually, as she paused for a second, then reached forward and ripped his shirt at the collar. Logan was starting to go into a panic here, and from the look of it, Alec wasn't far behind him, but Max was starting to enjoy her little plan! She stopped the tear a couple of inches down, pulling each side of the tear sideways, effectively widening the neck of the t-shirt by about two inches in every direction.

She dumped the discarded material next to her and then turned her attention to the sleeves. She took one in each hand and ripped them both off in one go.

"There!", she said, sitting back on her ankles for a second as she surveyed her handiwork with pride. "I'd say we're about even now", she went on, in response to Alec's somewhat incredulous expression. "In terms of 'surface area' of course!" Alec got what she had done then, looking down at the somewhat tattered remains of his shirt, and realising that he had probably been asking for it anyway.

"Besides", she said, leaning in much closer to Alec again, and speaking quietly enough so that only he would hear her (basically so that Logan wouldn't even be able to pick it up over their microphones), "if Logan's still watching the video feed then seeing me draped over you like this could provide a little incentive to get us out of here faster!" Alec had to restrain his laugh but he smiled anyway, knowing she wouldn't see it - that was fairly sneaky of her - maybe he was starting to influence her after all.

She eventually stood up again, walking back over to the other side of the room and sitting back down, wiping her face with the back of her hand. Alec, in the meantime, was still surveying the remnants of his shirt.

"Oh get over it!", Max said, sighing exasperatedly, "I'll buy you a new one when we get out of here".

"You better!", Alec replied, deciding to stretch a few boundaries for a second, "'Cause I look fairly ridiculous now!", he said, gesturing at the improv tank-top.

"Oh for God's sake!", Max said, throwing her head back to look up at the ceiling, attempting to hide the smile that was starting to form on her lips. "If it bothers you that much, just take the damn thing off already!" Alec didn't reply immediately, so she tilted her head back down to see what he was doing, only to be caught by the full force of his tattered t-shirt as it hit her in the face. She pulled the thing off her and dumped it on the floor, looking up only to see a very characteristic cocky grin on Alec's face.

"What?!", she said, after a few seconds, half way between annoyed and amused. Well actually, the grin wasn't all she had seen, but she was trying not to focus on that right now!

"Nothing really!", Alec replied, still grinning like anything, "Just I keep telling you Max, if you wanna get me naked, all you need to do is ask - you don't have to beg!" That probably was pushing things a little too far, and he got his shirt thrown back in his face as Max's only response!

AN. Evil place to stop it again right?! I know, but I had to leave something for the next chapter! *hugely unsubtle hint* Reviews = more story! *SS*