"Donald! Donald, what's going on down here? I thought I heard a dog barking!" Tasha called as she walked out of the elevator towards where the others were. She was wearing a bathrobe and had her hair in a towel. She froze when she saw the scene before her eyes. "Donald, why is there a dog in here? And I thought you were the one who didn't want pets."

"Oh, he's not really a dog," Adam said giddily.

"Well it sure looks like one," Tasha said, clearly not amused by Adam's supposed antics. She was fed up with his pranks; earlier that day she had gotten a face full of ketchup and mustard – the second time that that had happened. "What's going on?"

"For once, Adam's right (and I don't get to say that very often)," Mr. Davenport said.

Tasha shot him a look, saying "Oh I suppose it's a horse in disguise then. That makes perfect sense!"

"No, actually, 'the dog' is Chase," Leo said matter-of-factly.

Tasha rolled her eyes. "Well of course it is!" she said sarcastically.

Throughout this exchange, Chase had simply been lying on the floor, sulking about his predicament; but now he groaned, covering his muzzle with his paws in frustration. He didn't appreciate being referred to as an 'it'.

At that moment Bree came zooming in, saying quickly "Owen went home, so now you'd better tell me what's going on!" She looked around, and her eyes fell on the smallest member of the group. "Oh my gosh, cute dog!" she squealed. "Where'd you get it? What's its name?"

"Yes Donald, where did you get it?" Tasha demanded.

Mr. Davenport opened and closed his mouth several times, gesturing emptily at the youngest bionic, finally exclaiming "That's Chase!"

"He's telling the truth!" Leo vouched, and Adam nodded seriously.

Tasha and Bree looked at them skeptically, so Mr. Davenport shouted "Eddy! Pull up the video you showed me earlier."

Grudgingly, the smart home system retrieved the wanted video footage, and Tasha and Bree witnessed what the others had earlier. Chase watched in queasy fascination as he saw himself morph into his current state, remembering much of the terrible event himself as he did.

"You turned Chase into a dog?!" Bree asked incredulously, choking with laughter.

Chase growled. It's not funny!

"How do you plan to turn him back?" Tasha asked worriedly, raising an eyebrow.

"I- uh – I-I…" Mr. Davenport began stuttering, but he closed his mouth, at a loss for words.

"Chase was blasted by that machine, wasn't he? Why can't you just blast him back to normal?" Bree asked.

"Because there isn't a person setting," Mr. Davenport answered obstinately.

"Well then make one!" Bree argued.

"It's not that simple," Mr. Davenport sighed. "The machine turns an object – or a person, in Chase's case – into something else, but it is only a simple, generic change. If we attempted to turn him back, there's no telling how he would come out; his appearance would for sure be simplified, but I'm not worried about that so much. People are complex, and you, Adam, and Chase are even more complex because of your bionic chips. Turning Chase back with another blast could have disastrous results. We can't re-organize him to be human again from scratch, we need to fully reverse the effects of the machine."

"So what are you going to do?" Leo asked, briefly glancing at a sorely depressed Chase.

"I'll have to invent a new machine made specifically for Chase," Mr. Davenport groaned, giving Adam and Leo the evil eye. "I've never done anything like this before, so who knows how long it will take me to figure it out?"

"What if you can't change him back?" Adam asked.

"Well, I guess we have a pet, then," Leo said. Chase growled at that.

AN: Ah, and the story gets good from here. It was really fun to write, and I'm glad I worked up the courage to share this crazy story :)

Thank you to all of you who have followed, favorited, and reviewed this story; y'all have tickled me silly with all the kind comments! And some of you consistently hit the dot on the nose when it comes to figuring out what happens next - bravo!

Oh, and it's Mother's day today as I write this, so you should all go give your mothers a big hug! And if it's not Mother's day as you read this, go give her a big hug anyways 'cause mom's are great. I'm going to go give my mom a humongous hug now!

That's all I have to say for now, so stay tuned for Chapter 5!