The internet, X5-452 concluded, was an amazing thing.

The soft clicks of a mouse echoed through the otherwise silent apartment, as Max sat, entranced, in front of the small laptop. The bright glow of the screen shone heavily on her face, illuminating her exotic features and turning them a shocking, pasty white. Occasionally the computer came to life, whirring loudly as a page loaded, and Max would flinch inwardly; the noise too loud for her liking. She knew it wouldn't take much to wake Alec. X5-494's cat-like senses was bound to pick up on any slight sound that travelled through their TC residence and Max knew she couldn't afford to wake him. If he caught her in her current predicament, she'd never live it down. Alec would make sure of that.

As the computer whined down after minutes of buzzing wildly, Max let out a sigh of relief. Wiping a sweaty hand on her jeans, she placed it back on the mouse, manoeuvring it across the tattered mouse pad to click on the desired page.

Since discovering the joys of the internet, Max had been an avid addict. She spent almost all her free time on it, although free time was rare for the leader of Terminal City. But whenever 452 got the chance, she would log on to her favourite sites and indulge in her favourite pastime.

Fanfiction.

She'd discovered it a few months back, when the residents of TC had finally settled and no imminent danger had been threatening their lives. A computer with an internet connection had been a vital source for the transgenics and as the leader of the city, it had been decided that Max should have her own source in the apartment she shared with Alec. Not one to argue, Max had taken the pre-offered technology from Logan and had watched admiringly as he set it up. Once Eyes Only had taught her all she needed to know, she'd sat down, logged on and had been hooked ever since.

She'd come across fanfiction when she'd done a Google search for transgenics. Expecting to find vital data on the genetic make-up of her kind, she'd been surprised to find sites - hundreds and hundreds of sites - filled with stories. Not just any stories. Stories about her.

And some of the stories were rather... interesting, for lack of a better word. They revolved mostly around her, referring to her world as the "Dark Angel universe". In each one, she faced a new adventure, a new threat, a new romance...

After accidentally falling upon a fic based on her and Logan during one of her more... heated... moments, she'd left them well alone. They were too private, and too detailed for her liking. The fact that people were writing about the relationship she didn't have with Logan freaked her out to no end. Didn't these people have anything better to do?

After days of sieving through them all, she'd concluded that yes, they did have something better to do. Writing about her and Alec was one of them.

She'd nearly choked on her pizza when she'd stumbled across a somewhat steamy story about her and Alec. She'd been repulsed at first, then intrigued, and now... she was addicted.

Yes, it was official. Max - aka X5-452 - was a smut addict. Who'd have thought it? She certainly hadn't.

Munching her potato chips quietly, she scrolled down the page. A large image greeted her, the words GUMBOOT MAFIA splashed generously across the front; a familiar and somewhat appreciated welcome. Gumboot Mafia was one of the more popular "Dark Angel" sites, as they liked to call it. Jam-packed with fics based on her, her friends and her enemies, Max had never felt more at home.

It had been strange at first, reading about herself, but after a while she'd found the funny side of it. They were, after all, entertaining. In the stories they wrote she could be anything she wanted to be, do anything she wanted to do and have hot, passionate sex with anyone of her choosing.

Fantasy, she decided, was the greatest drug of them all.

Scrolling further down the page, she clicked on "chat" and signed in without hesitation. This was one of the many enjoyable aspects of the site. Not only could she talk to the authors that had written her into so many of these wonderful fics, she could even drop hints on new challenges she'd like to face, new friends (or enemies) she'd like to make, and even the new scenarios she'd like to try in the erotic smut that littered the boards.

Yes, befriending the authors of this site had its advantages.

As soon as she was logged in, a flood of greetings welcomed her.

With flying fingers, Trans-Sexual (she found the nickname ironic, in a twisted sort of way) returned their greeting with an alien sense of enthusiasm.

Max nodded subconsciously with each name she ticked off, oblivious to the rapid tapping of her fingers.

With a final tap of the keyboard, she pursed her lips contently. There, that was everyone. She waited a breath for someone to reply, and to her delight, someone did.

Max frowned. Smut competition? Where?

She smirked at the irony of the comment. Filled with constrained anticipation, Max went in search of the topic in question. A competition meant more fics, and not just any fics - smut fics. The best kind. She could hardly wait.

Finding the thread, she scrolled through, briefly scanning the basic rules of the competition. She wasn't interested in that. She wasn't even entering. She just wanted to see if there were any entries yet.

Noting the date of the thread, she huffed in annoyance. The competition had only been announced yesterday. There'd be no entries for days, weeks maybe. Silently disappointed, she clicked back on the chat.

Max laughed, despite herself. With a faint smile, she replied.

452's brow furrowed and with slight hesitation, she typed out what seemed a logical explanation. Well, to her, anyway.

Strangely, Max was beginning to consider the proposal. She contemplated the task silently, rapping her fingers against the desk as she thought, ignoring the scrolling encouragement on the screen.

Could she do it? Could she write fanfiction? More importantly, could she write smut?

Max didn't know, and with an agitated sigh, she typed a hurried response.

A flood of goodbyes followed but Max ignored them, clicking the page closed and shutting the computer down. She was tense with indecision, the opportunity nagging at her. If she wrote it, she could make anything happen. On the other hand, it could spell disaster.

With a tired sigh, Max turned away from the computer and resigned to bed. She'd leave the decision until the morning.

---

Fate, however, had other plans. As Max lay tossing and turning, wide awake with the flow of ideas buzzing in her head, she couldn't help but worry.

Since when had she become such an addict? Last month, her only priority had been to keep the residents of Terminal City safe and well, but now the only thing she seemed to care about was whether she was capable of writing a fanfiction or not.

Life sure had its twists.

With an agitated sigh, 452 tried to stem the flow of thoughts seeping through the haze of sleep. Ideas bombarded her; perfect scenarios for potential fight scenes; charismatic characters that she knew everybody would love or hate, admire or despise, and ideally planned endings that would leave readers awe-struck and gob-smacked. But most of all, she couldn't stop thinking of the different ways she could cook up the sexual chemistry between herself and Alec.

On that thought, Max decided that it wasn't her life that had its twists, it was her mind. And what a twisted mind it was.

Flinging herself bodily out of bed, the X5 trudged tiredly back into the lounge. Switching the computer back on, she slumped into the comfy, leather chair, rotating it around impatiently as she waited for it to load.

There was no way she was going to get any sleep tonight. Not until she wrote the beginning, or even better - a chapter - of the fanfiction she wasn't sure she could even pull off.

With a sigh, Max opened up a blank word document, settled herself down and let the twists and turns of her mind flow through her fingertips.