Madeline wasn't holding up very well. Her shoulder was healing very slowly, she hadn't been allowed to go back to Earth yet, and she was about to crack and confront J'onn.

She finally gave up against her attempts to secret her emotions and was going to talk to J'onn, but he was sent on a mission. So she waited by the teleporter pads for his return. About an hour after the team had left, Ten'tia came into the room. She didn't see Madeline, so she went about why she had come into the room. She walked over to the teleporter control station, and plugged some type of device into it, and began to type on the keypad.

That's when Madeline decided to intercede. "Ten'tia," she called. "What are you doing?" She jogged over to the Martian.

Ten'tia looked down (having chosen a form still much taller than Madeline) at Madeline looked as innocent as she could. "Batman told me to run the diagnostics on the teleporters."

"No, he didn't." Madeline corrected. "He told me to run the diagnostics. Care to try that explanation again?"

Ten'tia smiled down at her with a bit of a menacing edge, but it did not faze Madeline. "You seem to be a bit, oh what is the word…touchy. Afraid that you are being replaced in more than one way?"

Madeline stood as tall as she could, which was still more than five inches shorter than Ten'tia. "I have not been replaced in anything." She warned.

"Oh," Ten'tia still smiled, her voice becoming sickly sweet. "Then what about our beloved J'onn? Have I not replaced you in his heart?"

Madeline bit back the tears. "I was never there to begin with." She told Ten'tia what she thought was the truth. Then it suddenly donned on her what Ten'tia was doing. "You're hacking the system, downloading the teleportation location code." She gasped.

Ten'tia laughed; a short, crisp, and deadly sound. "Now however did you come up with such a ridiculous idea?"

"I should never have had J'onn rescue you." Madeline growled. "I bet you weren't even a prisoner." Her hands balled into fists at her sides, slight clouds of purple surrounding them.

"And now you harbor ill-will against me, the innocent victim. I would hate to find out what Batman, or Superman would do to you when they found out. Or better yet, J'onn; I am the only one left of his kind, and here you are wishing that he had never saved me." She purred, pulling out the card.

Madeline growled low in her throat. "They're going to find out about this first." She hissed and turned on her comm piece. "Trix to Batman, Trix to Batman, over." No answer. "Trix to Batman, Batman come…. Ah!" she cried slightly when high-pitched, feedback like static filled her ears. Her knees gave way as she fell to the ground, clutching her head. But the sound wasn't coming from her ears; it was coming from inside her mind.

Madeline could hear past the sound in her head that the teleporters were charging; the others were coming back from their mission. That's when Ten'tia played another card in her hand. She changed her attitude to be one of the worried caretaker and friend. "Madeline, are you alright?" Ten'tia asked her, letting up on the mental feedback, but still not enough for her to talk.

Madeline shook he head in the negative. As she struggled to get away from Ten'tia, she covertly grabbed the disk that Ten'tia had copied the teleportation location codes onto and tucked it into her jeans pocket. "What happened to her?" Madeline heard Superman ask Ten'tia.

"She fell and hit her head on something." Ten'tia answered, her voice sounded completely innocent.

"J'onn, take Madeline to the medical bay and check her head out." Superman called across the room.

Madeline tried to shake her head, but Ten'tia increased the pain in her head. She felt the one cool hand of Ten'tia on her back replaced by two cooler ones accompanied with sparks on her lower back and taking her right hand in his. "Madeline, can you walk?" his smooth, low voice asked her.

Through the haze of the pain in her head, Madeline classified her love for J'onn like a drug; the more she stayed away from it, the worse the craving was, and the better felt when she got it again. But she pushed that aside and nodded her head yes. J'onn helped her to her feet and Madeline concentrated very hard on keeping her feat moving and keeping her eyes open so she could see where she was going. After a few steps, she gave another cry and her knees gave way again; she would have hit the floor again, but J'onn tightened her grip on her and held her to his side.

He knew that this was more than falling and hitting her head. She had been more coherent with a shattered shoulder and a bullet in her side. "Madeline, what happened?" he asked while he helped her get back to her feet and walk to the elevator.

She shook her head, not able to speak. She instead grabbed the disk out of her pocket and put it into J'onn's hand. He looked down at Madeline, not understanding any of what was going on. He walked a bit swifter to get her into the elevator sooner. As soon as the steel doors shut, Madeline was released from the pain in her mind. Her knees buckled and she slipped out of J'onn's grasp as she tumbled to the floor. But she caught herself with some mist before she actually did hit her head on something.

"Ten'tia." She gasped when she was able to speak again. "I was on the teleporter deck, she didn't see me there. She went over to the control board and put that in," she pointed to the disk in J'onn's hand. "And started to hack it. I confronted her, we exchanged words, and when I tried to call Batman over the comm links, she did something and it felt like there was feedback in my head." J'onn kneeled down on the floor and tentatively wrapped his arm around Madeline's thin and shaking shoulders, trying to comfort her. "I don't think she was prisoner at STAR Labs." She added before she curled into J'onn's side.

J'onn rested his cheek on top of Madeline's head and held her closer. "Madeline," he spoke softly. "What happened, after the rescue?"

Madeline's heart did a freefall as she came back to her senses ad remembered the promise she had made to herself; not to bother J'onn with her feelings. She snaked out of his hold and shakily stood up. "Nothing happened, J'onn."

"Something did happen." He corrected. "We kissed in the medical bay, you went back to Norfolk, you were kidnapped, we saved you, you woke up, and now you will not even look at me or talk to me." He stood and tried to walk up to Madeline, but she moved to the other side of the elevator.

"I don't talk to you because you never told me something that was only fair for me to know!" Madeline nearly shouted. As soon as she finished her outburst, the doors opened and she took off sprinting down the hallway to take the other elevator to escape; tears flowing freely from her eyes.

J'onn stepped off the elevator, but he didn't follow Madeline. Instead he went to the observation deck to think. What had he not said to Madeline that she needed to hear? He had not actually told her that he loved her, but he thought that she have heard it in his thoughts by now. She had let him kiss her after all. And there was nothing else that he could think of. "What have I done?" He groaned to himself as he sank down onto the bench in the corridor, clutching his head between his hands.

"What's wrong, J'onn?" Shiera asked as she walked onto the observation deck and saw J'onn the most pitiful and deplorable she ever had.

J'onn just shook his head again, asking himself the same question. "I do not know." He finally answered. "But apparently I have destroyed something before I had it."

Shiera chuckled and sat down on the bench next to J'onn. "Things go down the drain with Ten'tia this fast?" she guessed.

"Ten'tia?!" he ejaculated. "What are you talking about?"

Shiera was very confused right about then. "Maddie told me that you hooked up with Ten'tia."

"I did no such…" J'onn suddenly realized what had happened. "Madeline said this?" he asked to clarify.

Shiera nodded. But before she could ask why he had repeated what she said, he dropped his density and floated to the floor to where he sensed Madeline's mind was. She had gone to the gym to take out her frustrations on an unsuspecting bag. J'onn just stood in the doorway and watched. When she refused to acknowledge his presence, he walked into the room.

"Madeline," he called softly. He couldn't see it, but Madeline scrunched her eyes shut against the tears and kept punching the bag. "Madeline, I know what is wrong." He explained as he came up behind her and gently grabbed her arms to try and stop her from hitting the bag.

"Do you really?" he asked sarcastically. She wrenched her arms way from him and moved to a different bag.

J'onn nodded and followed her to stand beside her. He made no move to try and stop her from punching, for he knew that he had her attention. "You believe that I am in love with Ten'tia." He stated simply.

Madeline turned from the bag to face him, a small river of tears flowing down her face. "I know you are. But don't' worry about apologizing, it makes perfect sense to me. You're both Martians, and I'm just a human. What happened in the medical bay must have just been a fling or something. And don't go asking if I love you, because I don't." it hurt her to lie to J'onn about her feelings, and it hurt even worse to say the lies; wishing so badly to tell him the truth.

But he knew the truth anyways. "Madeline, I am telepathic, lying to me does not work well." He took a step closer to Madeline. "And I am not involved with Ten'tia; I am too much in love with another woman." He whispered.

"But what about Ten'tia's thoughts when she walked into the medical bay? She called you her love." Madeline asked, looking up at J'onn, pleading for an explanation, wishing with all of her heart that what J'onn was saying now was true.

"I have no idea what you are talking about." J'onn solemnly promised. "So you believed her thoughts, but not mine?" he asked, trying to understand Madeline's thought process that had led her to her faulty conclusion.

Madeline raised a delicate eyebrow slightly at his question. "J'onn, I can't hear your thoughts."

"You cannot? Not even when we are in contact?" he was confused now. If Madeline could hear Ten'tia's thoughts, how come she could not hear his?

Madeline nodded in the negative. Then she looked up into J'onn's scarlet eyes, snaring them with the intensity of the gaze. "Promise me this is the truth, J'onn." She pleaded in a whisper.

"I promise." He whispered. He closed the distance between them and did what he had wanted to for over a month. He put one hand on her waist and drew her flush with him and rested his other hand on her cheek. "Madeline, I love you." He told Madeline, his eyes still locker with hers.

"I love you too, J'onn." She smiled back before standing on her tiptoes and pressed her lips softly to J'onn's.

He kissed her back with as much fervor as he did back in the medical bay. Without either one being aware of what was going on, J'onn had Madeline off the ground like the last time and her back was pressed against the heavy bag she had been punching.

That's when they both heard an unearthly screech come from the doorway. They broke the kiss and turned quickly to the sound. Ten'tia was standing there, and her skin was slowly morphing in her rage. But instead of going to the green form that Madeline had first seen her in, her skin began to turn white. J'onn quickly set Madeline on the ground and pushed her behind him. He knew what was going on while Madeline had no clue.

Ten'tia was a White Martian.

She began talking in a strange language that Madeline didn't understand, but apparently J'onn did. Madeline, put up a shield around yourself when I tell you. He told her through a mental link.

In doing so, he accidentally showed her what he was going to do. No, I'm not going to let you fight her. She shouted back in his head. Before J'onn could launch himself at the other Martian, Madeline put up a shield around the both of them. And Madeline knew from experience that he couldn't get out if she didn't want him to. "Trix to Superman, Trix to Superman, over." She spoke through the comm piece.

"Superman here." Came his response.

"J'onn and I are stuck in the gym with a very angry Martian named Ten'tia, who isn't what we thought she was. Bring everybody you can find." She closed the link so that she could concentrate on Ten'tia.

If she aimed right, she could trap her in a net of mist. But Ten'tia could also just use that feedback thing on her again; then she wouldn't be able to concentrate on anything with her mist.

But neither got the chance of either. Because apparently Ten'tia heard the others coming and she took off running down the hallway. Madeline dropped the shield and she and J'onn ran after her. Once they were in the hallway, J'onn took flight, leaving Madeline behind him. When she and the others finally caught up to him, he was standing on the teleporter deck where the teleporters were just shutting down.

"Where did she go?" Superman asked no one in particular.

Batman walked over to the control panel and pulled up the last location that had been keyed in. "STAR Labs headquarters." He growled.

We're back!

Dun, dun, dun… so, Ten'tia was a White Martian who actually worked for STAR Labs. That won't go over to well.

But at least Maddie and J'onn are back together.

Questions, Comments, Concerns? Shoot us a review.

Sincerely,

C M + L W = idkaname