"You didn't sleep again." A statement, not a question.

"Mhm." A grunt.

"I thought I told you to come get me if you couldn't sleep."

Max shrugged. "Sleep is for the weak. Fire cannot kill a dragon."

"Sadly you are neither a dragon or Daenerys." Max was a different beast altogether. Fang tried not to worry too much about Max's lack of sleep but when she was collapsing on the couch, her head on his lap? That wasn't very Max.

Also, the temptation to run his hand through her hair was just far too great and if she kept looking up at him with those half-lidded eyes, Fang would not be responsible for what he did. Seriously, it should be illegal to look that good.

"Hush." Was her sharp, witty response to him. Oh, how he was wounded.

"You know if you fall asleep now, you just wont sleep again tonight?"

"Then you'll just have to keep me awake then, won't you?"

Oh, Fang could think of a number of ways to keep Max awake. Sadly, tickling would lead to his untimely end and kissing was...well...

Huh. Maybe he could have some fun with this. Winding Max up was always entertaining.

Before he could overthink what he was about to do, Fang leaned down and made his voice as low as he could. Bless puberty for not making his voice crack.

"You know Max..." Closed eyes opened in curiosity, and Fang heard her breath hitch a bit as she realised how close he was. Secretly, Fang was struggling to keep his own breathing steady. "You really shouldn't say stuff like that to me..."

"What?"

Fang grinned wickedly, gave her a lingering kiss on the cheek, straightened up and promptly shoved her onto the floor. He wasn't stupid. Amidst the (admittedly impressive) rather creative swearing, he was up and on the move, making a somewhat swift exit before what he'd done caught up to them. He caught a small glimpse of Max sat up straight, bright red and Fang couldn't help but bow theatrically before he left the room, grinning.

God, she was going to kill him.

...So worth it.

Before he could realise what happened, he was trapped against a wall (god, the stairs were right there. So close) with a very angry (flustered?) Max pushing him against it. Now it was Fang's breath that hitched in his throat, Max the one leaning in close to him.

"And what..." Oh, hell, she was practically purring in his ear. He wasn't the only one that could do husky voices and damn, that was sending shivers down his spine. "...was that?"

"Er...keeping you awake?" Christ, he was in trouble. Big, big trouble.

"I didn't quite have that in mind when I said that, you know." She murmured and was it Fang or was she looking at his lips with a wicked gleam in her eyes?

Don't ask it, don't ask it, don't ask it. "What did you have in mind?" Godfuckingdamnit Fang you-

All thoughts stopped when Max placed a thumb lightly at his lips and dragged it down slowly with a grin just as wicked as the gleam in her eye. Common sense told Fang that she was just winding him up, and sleep was making her bolder than usual. Every other sense in Fang screamed at him to just kiss her senseless and be done with it. Common sense was in short supply and it was only stubborn pride that stopped him from listening to the roaring blood in his ears.

"Something a bit more...tame, honestly."

This is tame?

Before Fang could reply, Max had removed her hand, replacing it with a lightning fast kiss at the corner of his mouth. And then, she was gone, walking quickly up the stairs after flashing him a bright grin, her cheeks flaming furiously.

It took Fang a couple of seconds to pull himself together after that. His heart was pounding and he had that heady, rollercoaster feeling in his stomach that made him giddy, sick and pleasantly dizzy all at once. It wasn't too dissimilar to that rushing sensation you experienced as you hurtled towards the ground, hitting terminal velocity seconds before your wings snapped out.

Only thing was, Fang didn't think he wanted to stop falling.

Max didn't swear much. Saying that, fuck fuck fuck fuck, what the fuck did she think she was doing? Teasing had not been in the plan, doing that thing with his lip had not been in the plan and Christ, kissing Fang on the corner of the mouth certainly hadn't been in the plan. She didn't even have a damn plan to begin with, what the hell was-

It must be the lack of sleep. That had to be it. It wasn't the way Fang's hair had fallen when she had pushed him against the wall, or the way his breath sucked in when she had placed her thumb on his lip and it definitely wasn't the way she had visibly flustered him. Fang. Flustered. By her.

Yeah. No. Had to be the lack of sleep.

She didn't even know what the hell she had been doing the past few days. Sparring and having that little brush of the lips at the end? That weird (see:awesome) night flying session they'd had? These were not things that Max did. Sensible Max stayed far, far away from those things.

Sensible Max just wasn't around much anymore it seemed.

Was it fun? Yes. Definitely. Oh god, it was the best fun she'd had in a while.

Did she enjoy those fleeting moments when she lost her mind and gave him a peck on the cheek? Admittedly, that last one had been enjoyably closer to his very nice looking lips. And hell yes was the answer to that one. Max didn't want to stop doing that, whether she had her sensible head on or not.

And she definitely liked watching Fang unwind and relax more than he had in years. She'd be lying if she said she didn't a small amount of pride in the fact she was the only one Fang seemed to properly unwind around but watching him laugh more freely, talk a lot more was something special in itself.

So why the hell didn't she have Fang up against that wall still, kissing him until they were both breathless?

Max made to move out the bedroom door, froze, groaned and retreated, letting it close shut.

So she could take on a metric fuckton of Erasers with no hesitation but she couldn't even go out and kiss someone she knew for a near certainty would kiss her back?

You feel too vulnerable.

Oh no.

Oh yes. Sorry Max. Couldn't help it.

"Angel," Max hissed. "Out of my head."

Aye Aye Captain. Your language is appalling in your head by the way.

"Angel. Out. Of. My. Head."

"Sorry." She chirped from her place on the bed, magazine in hand, not sounding sorry at all. "Fang does the exact same thing all the time though , if it helps."

"Angel, sweetie, I love you, I really do but-"

-You could kill me some-No, No MAX STOP!"

Loud, raucous laughter exploded from Angel as Max pounced, fingers tickling mercilessly at Angel's ribs. Her magazine fluttered to the ground forgotten and Max could almost forget about the fact she'd genuinely almost kissed her best friend because he'd just decided to annoy her.

Almost being the key word.

"What on earth...?" came Ella's voice, lighter than usual. There was a small break in Max's unrelenting assault and Angel started speaking before Max could stop her.

"Max just realised she likes likes Fang and wants to kiss him but can't because she's scared and Fang wants to kiss Max but-" Her gasped words were broken by Max's hand muffling her. Ella grinned widely, wiggling her eyebrows.

"Well that would explain why he looked so dazed when I crossed him on the stairs."

Max couldn't help herself and her hand slid off Angel's mouth.

"He was still on the stairs?" Ella and Angel roared in laughter while Max just flushed red. She seemed to be doing a lot of that lately.

She definitely preferred when it Fang was setting her cheeks on fire. It was with a great resolve that she decided, screw it, she was going to be kiss him hard and senseless the next time the oppurtunity arose. She'd taken on Itex and won, she'd beat the living snot out of a buttload of Erasers and lived to see the end. She could damn well kiss Fang and not freak out about how eerily vulnerable it made her.

Angel stopped laughing for a moment and turned to Ella, smile horrifyingly innocent.

"Ella?"

"Uh oh."

"You never told us that-"

"Angel, I swear, I will never give you another sweet again if you finish that sentence"

"-that you liked Iggy's company that much."

Now it was Max's turn to laugh as Ella picked a cushion up, Angel slipping out the door quickly with a wink at Max.

A/N-Thank you so much for the reviews! If I wasn't motivated beforehand to provide some quality oneshots, I certainly am now.