Disclaimer: This is getting a bit repetitive, isn't it? sighs Oh, well… still not ours!

- Part 6 -

DG had decided to start small. Well, proportionally speaking. She crawled up on a stick that came up to her thighs and stood, balancing on it as she waited for Cain to join her. He just stared at her while their traveling companions started to make themselves comfortable back around the campsite. Raw, it seemed, decided he would rather be sleeping and curled up against the trunk of a tree. Glitch was watching them with wide-eyed excitement and Toto sneezed in annoyance.

"Well? What are you waiting for? You're the one who wanted to learn to fly. Get up here!" His staring was making her nervous.

Cain muttered under his breath before jumping up next to her. She looked at his wings, considering them. They looked the same as hers, so she hoped they worked the same, as well. Speaking of which... She turned her head to regard the pink monstrosities. How exactly did they work? She hadn't thought about that before… they just had.

"Kid, you have no idea how you fly, do you?" Cain sounded unsurprised and her temper flared. Her wings began to flutter angrily, then, she had an idea.

Turning her nose up at him, she snipped. "Of course, I know how I fly; I just don't think you can handle it. Some things may just be out of your reach."

Cain's eyes narrowed, his wings beginning to vibrate softly. That just wasn't going to do it. She was going to have to get him way more pissed off than that. Good thing Cain-baiting was her new favorite hobby.

"I think I'm perfectly capable of learning anything you can, Princess," Cain stated, arms crossed confidently.

"Oh, I'm sure you are," DG teased some more, arching an eyebrow at him.

"And just what is that supposed to mean?" His wings had started to buzz again, but still she didn't think it was enough.

"Geez, Cain, it's nothing personal. Some of us just have what Glitch likes to call..." She raised her hands, making quotation marks in the air with her fingers. "Rhythm."

"Are you saying I don't have rhythm?!" He was indignant, his wings sounding like an angry wasp. She suppressed a grin and took a step back. He was hovering half an inch off the stick.

"I'm saying you don't even know what it is, Tin Man!"

He spluttered angrily, reaching out to grab her wrist. She floated up as imperceptibly as possible and he followed without realizing it. He opened his mouth to yell at her, but she cut him off with a cheeky grin. "Then again, I could be wrong. Looks like you got this flying thing down."

Glitch started clapping enthusiastically behind them. "Well done, Doll! That was marvelous. You had him flying in under five minutes!"

Cain's face went from angry to confused in five seconds flat. He looked at her, then down at the ground they were now a good foot above.

Then he dropped like a rock.

The real pity of it was, he still had a hold of her wrist.

Shrieking, she grabbed his arm with her remaining free hand and beat her wings like a wild woman. She managed to keep them both aloft for all of two seconds before her strength gave out. It wasn't like she was freaking Supergirl or anything. They both impacted the dirt hard, Cain flat of his back with DG landing on top of him.

From his position by the campfire, Glitch winced. "Oooh. That had to hurt."

DG used her arms to push herself up into a sitting position. "Good job," she wheezed, as she peered down at Cain. "You flew! If I had a gold star, I would so give it to you."

Cain grunted beneath her, but otherwise remained motionless. She hoped she hadn't crushed him to death. That would be fun to explain to Jeb. 'Sorry, hate to tell you this, but, when I was a pixie, I sorta fell on your dad and, gosh darn it, I just squished him.'

A few seconds later she realized this was not the problem Cain was currently facing.

DG gasped sharply, her face turning bright red. 'Oh, my God! That had better not be what I think it is!'

Just to test her theory, she shifted slightly, her hips rocking against his imperceptibly in the process.

His eyes snapped open and locked with hers, his tan skin flushed. Clenching his jaw, he grabbed her hips and sat up, pulling her ear to his mouth. His hat blocked their faces from Glitch's concerned gaze. "DG, do not move." His voice brooked no argument.

DG's face flushed deeper and her hands clutched onto Cain's shoulders when she felt his fingers dig into her hips in an almost desperate manner.

She sat, frozen, in his lap as she felt him take several deep, calming breaths below her. His hands slowly loosened their hold on her hips and, after several extremely long moments, he relaxed and moved her off of him. Standing, he left her sitting on the ground and walked off into the nearby trees.

DG sat on the ground, confused as hell and - she had to admit, if only to herself - a little turned on. "What the hell just happened?" she asked, turning to Glitch, who had come to kneel beside her. He offered her a finger and she grabbed onto it, allowing him to help her up. She noticed Toto had come to sit beside Glitch, his doggie eyes looking at her knowingly and she cursed beneath her breath. Damn the shape-shifter and his heightened sense of smell all to hell!

She heard Raw rumble from his place next to the tree. "DG need go talk to Cain." She jumped when he spoke, bouncing off Glitch's hand in surprise. He was supposed to be sleeping!

"Raw, don't do that! You could scare a girl to death!"

Raw had the decency to give her a sheepish look, but he nodded all the same. DG sighed. She supposed he was right. Dammit. Oh, no, this wasn't going to be an uncomfortable conversation at all.

Squaring her shoulders, DG felt as if she were walking to her own execution as she followed the Tin Man's trail, leaving the others behind.

It took her a little while to find him, and when she finally did, DG almost did an about-face and ran the other way. Cain was sitting against a rock, one knee up, with his fedora pulled so far down she couldn't see his face. He had one hand resting on the hilt of his gun and the other gripping the fabric of his duster so hard his knuckles were turning white. She approached him slowly, thinking that sneaking up on him right now would not be the best idea at the moment.

Taking a deep breath to calm her nerves, DG moved to stand in front of him. "Cain?" She wasn't sure he was even aware she was there, so she called softly, not wanting to startle him.

He didn't move, but she still heard his response. "Go back to camp, DG."

"Oh, come on, Cain. Don't be like this," she sighed wearily. Deciding that it would be best if she just came out and stated the obvious, she continued: "So, you, uh... got a little excited. Big deal, right? You're a guy! That's normal! Frankly, I'd be worried if you didn't. So, no worries, okay?"

He finally moved; his head came up and he searched her face. "No big deal," he deadpanned, causing the hair on the back of her neck to stand up. Somehow, she felt she had blundered badly.

She bit her lip nervously. "Uh..."

His eyes went icy. "Tell me, DG, when does it become a big deal?"

The tone of his voice was so cold; she took an imperceptible step back. "I- I-I-I..." She stuttered; licked her lips before she could continue. "I-I don't know."

Moving faster than she could register, he leaned forward and grabbed her around the waist, pulling her back down into his lap. He leaned in, dangerously close to her face, and stopped a hair's breath away from touching his lips to hers. Her eyes fluttered closed and she quivered in his arms. She felt the air around her face move when he started to talk to her. "Maybe you should think about that and get back to me, Princess."

Her eyes snapped open in shocked embarrassment as he leaned away from her, eyeing her coolly. Her jaw dropped.

How dare he tease her! What kind of twisted game was he trying to play with her mind! She couldn't handle this kind of stress. Here he was, a gorgeous hunk o' man, dangling himself in front of her like a carrot on a string. 'Bastard!'

"Grrr!" She shot up from his lap, his arms falling away from her easily. He hadn't been holding her there at all, she noticed. Damn him! "Go to hell!" she spat before spinning on her heel and stalking back toward camp.

Just before she left the small clearing that Cain had claimed to brood in, she turned back to add: "Tell you what, Wyatt. How about you tell me when you're ready to admit that I just might mean more to you than a pesky kid that constantly gets underfoot." She grinned smugly at his slightly shocked expression. "Let's see which one of us is really making a big deal out of this."

With that, she stalked away. 'Let the games begin, Tin Man.' She thought deviously.