A/N Starts out like most fix/its, right around the time of the dreaded break up of team Scorpion as well as Walter and Paige. Ends with a happily ever after. Thirty Chapters, over 100,000 words! All finished, edited and uploaded. Some attempts at humor. Be kind, I am not a writer, I only pretend to be one on fan fiction. Song lyric snippets were copied from the internet, I do not own any of them. Same with the characters. Hope you enjoy.

Part 1 April 18,2018

All four of the original Scorpion members just walked out on Walter O'Brien. Following the lead of Paige Dineen and Sylvester Dodd; Happy Quinn and Toby Curtis left without saying a word. What happened? As soon as they walked out of the door from the garage there was so much uncertainty. Were they really all going to quit over a small lie, a misunderstanding, and some harsh words. They had been through so much worse together. Toby quickly suggested they all meet up tomorrow morning at a diner and talk about what they should do next. Happy and Toby took Sly with them, and Paige headed towards her car; alone. She got in the front seat and started her engine, and then she just sat there and started to cry. She desperately wanted to see Walter come running out the garage door after her. Pleading with her to stay. To let him explain. But he never came. Why would he, she just dumped him in front of everyone. And harshly, too. Picked him apart with her words. Left no doubt how she felt. But for some reason she couldn't take the car out of park and leave.

Paige got out of the car and walked back up to the garage door, and after grabbing hold of the handle to open it back up, decided against it. Maybe she should give it some time, cool off, and figure things out tomorrow. So, she got back in her car and drove off.

In a fit of rage after they left, Walter took his phone and smashed it on the ground. Shattered into pieces. he picked it up threw it in his desk drawer and sighed. Who was going to call him anyway. They all left. Every single one of them. Other than Cabe. Cabe wasn't going anywhere. Cabe was the closest thing Walter had to a father, and after what happened between them in Baghdad, he never would leave him again. Florence stayed too, but honestly, she had nowhere else to go. She went back to her lab and kept to herself.

The next morning Walter found himself sitting in the same seat he was in last night. Staring off into nothingness. The garage was quiet, the garage was never quiet. Around 9:30, Florence timidly entered the garage with a forced smile on her face. Walter didn't even notice she came in. She tried to make eye contact with him, but he just continued looking straight ahead. Another five minutes past and Cabe walked in. The sudden bang from the garage door closing barely got any reaction at all from Walter. After glancing towards them he let out a deep sigh.

"What are you guys doing here?" Walter asked.

"Hey, Walt, son, I'm here for you. How are you holding up?" Cabe pleaded with him.

"I'm fine. What are you doing here?" He asked again.

"I told you son, I'm here to make sure you are okay."

"I'm fine Cabe." He answered perturbed.

"Walter, let's talk about what happened last night." Cabe asked again.

"I told you last night and I told you again this morning, I'm fine. Now I suggest you both leave and let me work." Walter told them both, coldly.

"Sorry kid, but I can't do that." Cabe told him.

"There's nothing for you to do here, so there's no use for you being here today." Walter told them.

"Walter, have you eaten anything since last night?" Florence asked.

Walter just turned and glared at her.

"O…kay, I'm going to hang out in my lab." Florence said as she left.

"Walt, let me take you to get something to eat." Cabe offered him.

"Cabe I'm fine. I have work to do on the Gettleman pitch."

"I'll be back with some lunch, give you a little space. I'm gonna call Homeland and tell them to put a halt on cases for a little while. Give you a chance to kind of get a grasp on things. I'm sure they will be back sometime today or tomorrow, and we can get this mess straightened up." Cabe told him after hanging around for a few minutes trying to get him to talk; but to no avail.

Walter opened his laptop and started typing away on the keys looking like he was working on the pitch. After a few more minutes of silence Cabe turned and left reminding him he would be back with lunch.

This went on all week. Cabe brought lunch by every day and sat with Walter and talked to him about anything he could think of. Some days he ate, some days he didn't say a word at all. After a few days Florence stopped coming by and just stayed in her lab the whole day.

Paige tried to call Walter first thing the next morning after the fight. It went straight to voice mail, so she left him a message asking to talk to him. Later that morning she met up with Sly, Happy and Toby at a small diner not too far from her condo. Toby laid out a plan to start a company basically doing what they did with Scorpion. Paige was completely against it and told them so. But the three of them told her it was the best solution for them. They begged and pleaded with her to join them. She told them she needed some time to think it over.

That afternoon, after Ralph got home from school, she told him everything that happened last night. Ralph was visibly shaken. He trusted his mom to tell him the truth and luckily, she waited till today to talk with him. She had some time to cool down and she did tell him everything. He was plenty mad at Walter for what he did. Even more so at Sly, Happy and Toby for walking out. But when he turned on her, she lost it.

"Walter would never leave you, and you know it. He was the closest thing I ever had to a dad. Why did you leave him?" Ralph told her.

"He lied to me sweetie." Paige defended herself.

"About what? The lecture? You said you didn't even want to go."

"No, he cheated on me with Florence."

"Do you really think that? He loves you mom. He loves both of us. He would never cheat on you."

"Well, he did. He took her to the lecture, and she admitted she had feelings for him."

"So what. That's her problem, not dad's. He doesn't have feelings for her."

"He is not your father, do not call him your dad." Paige told him, trying to keep her mind on the fact that she was still mad at him.

"He is my dad! Your ex, Drew, may be my father because you had sex with him, but Walter is my dad." Ralph said with fight in his eyes.

"Go to your room." Paige admonished him.

"You ruined everything." Ralph yelled back at her.

"You were not taught to be disrespectful like that, you take it back, now." Paige demanded, with tears forming in her eyes.

"What're you gonna do, keep me home from school? Ban me from the internet? Do it, you already took away my best friend. What do I care." Ralph said before slamming his door shut.

Paige fell to the ground in tears. She stayed there for over an hour just crying and pleading for her son to understand. Ralph finally opened his door a while later with his face bright red from all the tears he had shed as well. And he laid down next to her and held on to her and hugged her tight.

"I'm sorry Ralph. I'm so sorry this happened." Paige told him.

Paige had trouble sleeping that night. Her mind kept replaying what she said over and over again. She cut him to the core, and they were all lies and half-truths. She really didn't believe any of it. He was hard to deal with sometimes, but her life was leaps and bounds better with Walter and all he had done for them. He had his quirks, but she knew that going in. She had to work hard with him sometimes, but any relationship was like that. She knew that.

Ralph had just as much trouble sleeping last night. And it wasn't until he had gotten an email from Walter while he was in his room after his blow up with his mom that he decided to make peace with her. Walter told him how sorry he was for what happened. He told Ralph to be nice to his mother and not to blame her. He said it was all his fault, she just reacted to his lies. Walter told him he would always be there for him in any way he could. That's when Ralph laid into him and called him out for hurting his mom again. Only then did he feel sorry for the words he said to her. Ralph didn't know what to do.

The next morning, Paige was woken up by an endless string of text messages from Toby. Happy knew better than to send early morning texts. But Toby was adamant about starting this new company and Sylvester was just as eager to teach his former best friend a lesson. Before Paige responded to any of the texts, she tried to call Walter again. She had made some progress last night and wanted to tell Walter she still loved him, and she needed to talk to him. But it went straight to voice mail again. She told him again she was sorry for what she had said. She cried herself back to sleep hoping he would return her call. Ralph had come in and told her he was leaving for school, and he would see her later that afternoon. She fell back to sleep after Ralph left and didn't wake up until she heard a pounding noise at her front door about two hours later.

"Walter!" She jumped out of bed hoping it was him.

"Toby, Sly what are, why are you here?" Paige said answering the door, disappointed.

"Can we come in; we need to talk business." Toby said as he let himself in before being invited. To be followed by an eager Sylvester and a few moments later a dejected Happy.

"Look guys, I don't know about this. Don't you think this is wrong?" Paige told them.

"Yes, no, no." Happy, Toby and Sly quickly said.

"Look, Walt had it coming, he kept us under his thumb for too long. It was always his way. He never gave us a say in anything." Toby told her.

"Yeah, but that's how most jobs are. My old bosses never listened to my advice, that didn't mean I was going to open something to compete with their business." Paige told them again.

"See the waitress gets it." Happy said looking at her husband.

"This can be our chance to show 197 how much he needs us. He will come crawling back to us in I would guess under three weeks." Toby said back to his wife

"I don't know. Sly what do you think?" Paige asked, not having heard anything from him yet.

"Walter hurt me with his words. And he stole Florence from me, so I want to do it to hurt him back." Sly said firmly.

"He didn't steal Flo from you Sly, he didn't make her do anything other than taking her to a lecture." Paige told him, having worked through that last night.

"Glad we turned him down on that one huh, my sweet. That lecture must have been bor-ring." Toby said.

"I'm glad I said no to him too, especially now after he made Florence fall in love with him." Sly said.

Oh Crap, Paige thought to herself, he didn't do anything. How did I get this so wrong. He took her to that freaking lecture that I bailed on and looks like no one else wanted to go to.

"He asked you guys to go? When? He told me it was cancelled at first before he finally fessed up."

"Yeah, he said he heard you telling Ralph you didn't want to go, something about being at the swamp with gators all day wore you out." Toby told her.

No, I said I would rather be at the swamp than that lecture she thought to herself again.

"Why didn't he tell me about any of you guys turning him down?" Paige wondered before realizing she left thinking it had been cancelled that night before he asked them to go.

"Probably because he wanted to take her." Sly said unconvinced.

"Look Paige, he cheated on you with her, let's just all move on together. At least give this a trial run." Toby pled with her.

"Let me talk to Ralph when he gets back today. I'll let you guys know tomorrow." Paige answered him with her mind still trying to figure out about the lecture and how they all kept it from her. She didn't even hear Toby say he cheated on her.

"OK. But we're gonna have to hustle to get our pitch together for Gettleman though. I submitted our name for a bid this morning. Told him we were a new and improved version of Scorpion. Ready for this, Centipede Partners." Toby proclaimed.

"Happy what do you have to say about all this. You've been pretty quiet." Paige asked not caring about whatever name Toby and Sly used for the business.

"If we weren't trying to adopt, I would be against it 100 percent. But we need to keep a steady income, and this is the best alternative we could come up with. I think it's wrong to do this to Walt, but we don't really have any other options right now. And as far as anything personal between the two of you, I would rather stay out of it."

Paige got ready for the day after they left and contemplated driving over to the garage to talk face to face with Walter. But what if Florence was there? What if she was wrong about what happened or didn't happen? Maybe she would try to call him again. But would she seem too needy if she did. He hadn't called her, but he also didn't leave. Maybe I'll text him she thought. She started typing out her text and before she could finish, Ralph walked in the front door.

"Hey Ralph sweetie, how was school."

"It sucked." He said as he plopped down on the couch.

"Hey, don't say that. What happened?"

"I got in trouble with my teachers for talking back to them. I'm just really upset about you and Walter that's all. Can we just go and see him. Emails aren't enough mom, I want to see him, please."

"Wait, he e-emailed you. When did he um do that?" Paige asked; shocked.

"Yesterday and again this morning."

"What did he say?" Paige hopefully asked.

"He said it was his fault and I shouldn't blame you for any of it. Then I told him how immature he was being."

"Oh no, Ralph, you can't say that to him." Paige told him knowing she used the same terminology with him.

"Why, you did. He told me I was right anyway. I want to see him mom. I tried to call him, but he didn't pick up, it went to his voice mail, and before you ask, I didn't bitch him out like you did after you left when I left the message." Ralph shot back.

"Ralph Dineen, you watch your mouth."

"Sorry, I'm just pis… ticked off." Ralph said with his mother ready to pounce on him again.

They cooled down a little and Paige got Ralph an after-school snack. Now she had to talk to him about Centipede Partners. This should be fun, she thought.

"Hey Ralph, I need to talk to you about something else. I met with the guys this morning and they are thinking of trying to start up a business together. And they want me to be a part of it."

Ralph knew where this was going, and he was not happy at all.

"You told them no didn't you. They want to start a company like Scorpion, don't they?"

"Yes, I mean I didn't tell them no, or yes. But they are thinking of starting a comp…" Paige started to tell him.

"Thinking or already did?"

"Well yes they already started it, but I haven't told them what I was going to do."

"Tell them no! Why would you do that to da…, Walter?" Ralph said, his voice cracking.

"It's not that simple Ralph. I have tried to call him twice and he didn't respond to either call. I don't know what else to do. I don't want to wait tables again. This is a quick and solid solution for both of us." She told him emphasizing us, not believing it herself.

"Both of us? Hell n…."

"Go to your room and watch your language." Paige yelled at him.

As mad as she was at Ralph for using that language with her, she felt horrible for him. Especially because she felt like she had to say yes to them. At least on a trial run. She got up the courage to confront her suddenly brazen 13-year-old and inform him she was going to accept the job offer with them, but only on a temporary trial run. Three weeks. After that they would decide together whether or not to continue on.

"See you in three weeks then." He told her slamming the door behind him.

Ralph got on the computer and let Walter have it, never mentioning anything about them forming a new company. His hormones were raging, and he felt like no one would listen to a word he said. Yesterday, it may have been his mom's fault but today it was all Walter's fault. He had only been kept away from Walter for two days, and he felt like his world was already spinning out of control. And now his mom was going back to work with everyone else. Walter again accepted all the blame and told him how sorry he was.

Paige cried again for a solid thirty minutes before texting the group she was on board. But she made it very clear that it was a trial basis only. Three weeks. She reiterated it several times to them.

The next week went by about how the first three days away from Scorpion had gone. Ralph was on her side one minute and against her the next. She tried to call Walter several more times, but never got a single response back. Work had been the only constant the past seven days. As long as constant meant constantly having to put up with Toby. Equal partners, everything split four ways. Seemed pretty simple. They all knew what they were there for. Paige took the largest share on, but she knew she would before she accepted the job.

Happy kept to herself for the most part. Paige tried to talk to her some; but Toby always seemed to be there within seconds to remind them this was their best alternative.

Sly was still mad at Walter and he wouldn't accept any responsibility with the whole Florence dilemma. Paige made some small talk with him, but he would just get overly emotional most of the time and they wouldn't really get anywhere.

Walter spent the same time alone for the most part. He spent a total of 17 minutes and 12 seconds in the same room with Florence and he ate lunch with Cabe on four of those days. They were now only two days away from the pitch with Mr. Gettleman. Walter finally called for a team meeting the morning before the meeting.

He basically told them he would do all the talking in the meeting, they would just be there for show; strength in numbers. Cabe had never attended one of their pitches before, so he didn't seem to be too bothered by it. Florence tried to protest and was quickly told she could stay at her lab if she wanted to. Walter then told her after the presentation was finished, she would no longer be needed at Scorpion 2.0, the new moniker he had decided to go with. He had contemplated letting her go the morning after everyone left, but he wanted to be able to process through some other stuff before he finally decided to end her association with his company.

All the time he spent alone during the past couple of weeks he spent thinking about how he messed everything up with Paige. How the life he never thought he wanted or needed only to realize it was exactly what he secretly craved, was gone. Scorpion was a family. Plain and simple. He built himself a family. His first family, his mom, dad, and Megan, never were a family for him. He had Megan, but that was it. His parents were never there for him. Cabe taught him more the few times he visited him and spent time with him than all the years he was around his parents. And now with his sister gone, he needed his new family. And as much as he loved them all, there were two that stood out from the rest. The two people he wanted to spend the rest of his days with. The two most important people he had ever met in his life. And he was so close. He could see the whole thing. It was right there in front of him, until it wasn't. In the blink of an eye, the person who taught him about love and emotions and so many other things he found at once useless, but now they felt like they were like his life support. He couldn't live without them. Either one of them. He was still in contact with Ralph, an email here or there. One day Ralph defending him and then telling him how dumb and immature he was being the next. But it had been 14,196 minutes since he had heard her voice. The voice he now realized he needed to survive.

He wanted to email her, to call her, to go to her condo and see her. But every time he wanted to follow through, his fear of losing her all over again took over his body and he just froze. He finally overcame some of his fears and made the drive over to her condo. But he couldn't get himself out of the car. Was it too late already? It was like when he first met her. When it took him years to man up and tell her how he really felt. Maybe he was a 15-year-old emotionally, and that was as far as he could get. Her words scarred him. He had lied to her. He had told her he would only ever state facts. He thought it was innocent, but she let him know that it wasn't. And she would know, she was the expert. He kept track of his thought during the two weeks. He wanted to revisit them at some point in the future. But what kind of future would it be without her? Or Ralph? His damn IQ, he couldn't get out of his own head. Every time he would feel like he would make a breakthrough and decide to run back to her and plead with her, beg for her, his mind told him no. There's only more pain. Heartbreak. Hurt.

But Megan told him it would be different. Trust his heart. It would lead him where he was supposed to be. Trust in love. It was real. And Powerful. But his damn IQ kept telling him his sister didn't know. Didn't know what was going to happen to him when he screwed up or opened himself up. How could his heart take it again. But how could his sister be wrong. She was the first one that was always there for him. She would know what he needed to hear. So, he pulled up all the videos she had recorded for him while she was in the hospital. Walter sat there and watched them all several times. He closed his laptop and knew what he needed to do.

The morning of the pitch, he got himself prepared for work. He couldn't think about everyone that left him. Not until it was over. Then he was going to find Paige and tell her how he felt about her. No more waiting years. It had to be done now, he didn't want to be without her. He couldn't be without her. He was going to do everything he could to convince her to give him another chance.