Or tried to punch him, at any rate. Y'know how I said that I couldn't feel my limbs? Scratch that, 'cause I definitely felt it when Fang dodged my punch and blocked my fist with his own arm.

'Max,' he grunted, then doubled over as my knee came up and made contact with his stomach. He followed through on the movement, dropping into a crouch and sweeping a leg under my feet. I vaguely registered Iggy whispering 'are they fighting? Like, actually fighting?' to Gazzy as I lost my balance and all the air was forced out of me when I fell back against the wall. Fang leapt to his feet and darted forwards, slamming his hand down next to my head.

'Max!' By this point I could barely take in anything around me; nothing was getting past the haze of red that had come down over my eyes. I turned against the wall, my elbow moving up to catch him across the face as I came out of the twist. The force sent Fang spinning away from me, and as he went I planted a foot in his back, sending him through the door into the living room and almost throwing him into the coffee table. He managed to right himself just in time, and then he was facing me again, moving automatically into his low fighting stance that I recognised so well from all our time sparring when we were younger. The unexpected memory hit me hard and I faltered for a second, hesitating just long enough for Fang to hook me behind the knee with his foot. I stumbled, giving him the opportunity to wrap his arms around me, pinning my back against him and trapping my own arms at my sides.

'Max, stop,' he growled, and I felt the words vibrating through his chest as he bent his head so that his mouth was level with my ear. I took the opening to snap my head back, hitting him in the jaw and making him stagger backwards, his grip on me falling slack. Whipping around, I lifted my fists once more, then the next thing I knew I was straightening up in surprise as Fang's shout cut through my anger.

'Stop!' For a moment the only thing I could hear was our breathing, hard and quickened, as we stared across the room at each other. Then Fang's hands moved slowly, rising to either side of his head in the universal 'hands up' gesture of surrender. 'I'm not gonna fight you, Max. I don't want to hurt you.'

My arms fell to my sides, and I almost laughed in disbelief at his words. As if he hadn't hurt me already? As if he hadn't hit me and bruised me and broken me down to this pitiful, laughable shell of a thing? 'I don't want to hurt you.'Too late, pal. So I did what any reasonable part-human would do: I kicked him in the head.

Fang came around a few minutes later. We hadn't bothered to move him from where he'd fallen, and the flock was spread out on the couch, looking fidgety and apprehensive. Dylan's foot jerked repeatedly – something I'd come to recognise as a sign of agitation – as his gaze moved between Fang out cold on the floor and me sat on the corner of the coffee table by his head. I leaned forwards when Fang started to stir, resting my elbows on my knees; I could feel a muscle twitching my jaw, but I kept my teeth gritted and my face blank as his eyes opened, squinting against the light coming through the glass doors. His eyelids flickered and I knew that he was cataloguing his new injuries; he shifted around and pushed himself into a sitting position when he saw me watching him.

'What are you doing here?' I asked, my voice low and humourless. Fang drew in a breath, and I noticed how exhausted he seemed, like he hadn't slept in a while. By the looks of things, he hadn't changed his clothes in a good few days, either, and the ones he had on had taken a good beating by someone else before me.

'I don't-' he started, but I cut across him, louder this time.

'I'm not interested in hearing anything unless it's an answer to my question, now what are you doing here?' He blinked – his version of uncertainty – and I sighed. I turned to glance at the flock and gave a slight nod; they understood my meaning and picked themselves up off the couch, heading reluctantly for the hallway. Dylan was the last to leave, pausing as he passed and shooting me a questioning look. Once more, I couldn't figure out whether I was irritated that he was trying to protect me, or pleased that he cared enough to try in the first place.

'I'm fine,' I said quietly, and he let out a sharp, bothered breath before making his own way out of the room. I watched him as he left and shut the door behind him, steeling myself before turning back to Fang on the floor in front of me. God, just looking at him hurt. Everything about him was just so familiar, but at the same time somehow so alien that it almost made me feel dizzy. I wasn't angry anymore; all the anger I'd felt for him since he'd left, all the rage I'd experienced, had been poured into the hits I'd landed on him less than ten minutes ago. Now I just felt lost, and kind of gutted, and totally drained.

'Right, let's have it, then,' I said. 'What do you want?'

Fang gritted his teeth and looked down at the floor for a second, and when he raised his head again, there was pain in his face.

'She's gone.' He spoke tightly, not quite meeting my eyes, and I couldn't help the wince that crossed my face as what he said hit home. My jaw slid from one side to the other, clicking as it went, and I gradually let the breath I hadn't realised I'd been holding out as my head sank down into my hands.

'And you're just figuring this out? You've just come to that realisation?' I muttered to the floor. There was silence and I looked up to see Fang shaking his head slowly, his eyes sad and unsure.

'No, Max; Maya. She's gone. She fell.' His jaw tensed. 'She's dead.'

For a few moments all I could do was stare at him. Then before I knew it I had let out a short, harsh laugh of incredulity, and my head fell backwards to fix my gaze on the ceiling, my eyes moving back and forth across the white plane of paint and plaster.

'Unbelievable,' I breathed, the word somehow coming out soft and bitter at the same time. 'You're not being serious.' I shifted my stare back down to Fang, whose eyebrows were furrowed just slightly in uncertainty.

'Angel,' I said, and my heart sputtered as I said her name for the first time since I'd made myself hoarse shouting it across the remains of a wrecked building in Paris almost a week ago. 'Angel died, Fang. There was an explosion, and a building fell on her, and she died. And we looked for her, we searched for hours, but after that, what happened? What did you do? You gathered up your little Fang gang and you ran away. That little girl who loved you, and grew up with you, and learned from you was worth about twelve hours of your time. And now your friend, who less than a year ago was trying to kill me and lead the flock back to the whitecoats, has fallen out of the sky and you're so torn up over it that you just had to come here and let me know?'

As I spoke, my voice got louder but stayed measured; I was frustrated and confused, and there was still a part of me that couldn't get around what was happening, but I sure as hell wasn't going to let it show. More than that, I was pretty certain that if I didn't keep a tight lock on my emotions then talking about Angel would trigger another breakdown, and I absolutely refused to let that happen in front of Fang. He made a strangled sound in the back of his throat, running both hands back through his hair before he spoke again:

'She looked like you.'

'She was me,' I retorted through gritted teeth. 'And I know, I know, she was her own person and she was unique and special and she wasn't me at all-'

'But she was.' Fang's voice was loud over mine, rough and grating. 'I mean…' His eyes closed briefly. 'When she was falling… When she was falling and I was standing there watching and I couldn't move, couldn't save her… She wasn't her then. She was you. It was you falling, and you hitting the ground, and you-' He broke off wearily, his hand raking through his hair again, making it stand up.

I felt like something inside of me collapsed at that moment. Pulling myself up onto my feet, I paced across the living room floor, the heel of my hand pressed against my forehead as if that might prevent my head from exploding. Neither of us spoke until I finally slumped against the wall opposite Fang, my legs shaking, arms crossed in front of me, shoulders hunched.

'You don't get to do this,' I whispered. 'You don't get to do this to me. Not again. Every time you leave, I have to pick up the pieces, and try to pull things back together and move on. But then every time I think that I'm anywhere close to having the slightest chance of even beginning to get over you, you find a way back into my life. I can't keep doing this. I am so unbelievably tired of trying to figure you out, Fang. I mean… I hate you. I hate you for what you've done to me and what you've turned me into and the fact that you can't just let me get on with my life, but the insane, sick thing is that at the same time I still love you. I love you so much that it hurts. All the time. And there's this part of me, this stupid, messed-up part of me that, whenever you come back, thinks that maybe, just maybe, we'll be able to find a way to become ourselves again, but it never happens. You just… leave.' My voice dropped so low that Fang probably wouldn't have been able to hear me if it weren't for those whacky genetic modifications. 'You leave. Even after you told me you never would again.'

With horror, I felt tears starting for the third time in less than two hours. I was really on a roll. I brought my hand up to my mouth in the hopes that I might be able to hold everything in, but then Fang started getting to his feet. Slowly, without saying a word, he walked forwards until he was standing right in front of me. His hand came up to lean against the wall by my shoulder, and he bent his head down until our faces were level; his eyes met mine, and I almost stopped breathing at the emotion in them. For once, he wasn't guarded, wasn't hiding, and when he spoke, his voice was raw:

'I never wanted to leave you.' I tried to snort derisively and turn away, but his other hand grabbed my chin and pulled my face back. 'Maximum, I never wanted to leave you. Before I actually did it I didn't believe that anything could ever make me. I have loved you for so long.' His voice wavered a little and there was a pang in my chest so strong I nearly flinched. 'Longer than you know. And the idea that I could be putting you in danger? That I could be hurting you without us even realising it? That killed me. More than leaving you did. Only just, but it was enough. I am so, so sorry, Max. I really thought I was doing the right thing. But watching Maya falling, all I could think was 'in what twisted universe would we ever be better off apart?'.' He drew in a ragged breath and his voice grew stronger, fierce with conviction. 'So now I'm done leaving. And I am not trying to mess you around, I promise you. But if you'll have me, then I swear to God, the next time I leave you will be the day I die.'

My head was pounding. Suddenly, I was massively aware of all the blood moving around my body, and my airway felt like it was about half its normal size. This was too much. If I'd thought I was experiencing inner conflict with Dylan, that was nothing compared to the full-on war that was going on inside me now. The two halves of me crashed against each other with enough force to make me shiver; one side was yelling to punch his lights out and throw him onto the street outside, to not let him get close enough to hurt me again, but the other was shouting to trust him, to trust Fang, this guy I'd known almost my whole life, who by the sounds of it had loved me before Dylan even existed.

I looked into his face, trying to work out how the hell I could even attempt to answer him, and then, without warning, I was thrust into a memory; all of a sudden I could see him standing in front of me in a narrow corridor with his head dipped so that his eyes met mine, just as he was now. In the memory, I wrenched my arms out of his grip and made to push past him, then faltered as he spoke, his tone low, dark:

'There's a you and me, alright. There will always be a you and me.'

Oh, no. Too much, too much. Too much history and too much emotion and too much water under the bridge. I had to get away from him. I needed some time without him standing over me and looking at me with that face – God, that face – because right now I could barely think straight, let alone make this kind of decision. So, without breaking eye contact, I stepped slowly around him. Then I turned away, crossed the room, and left.