May 2nd Tompkins House (Maddie's POV)-

"The longer you wait the harder it's gonna be to tell him."

"Really Alex? I thought it would be way easier." I lashed out, he sent me a dry look in return. "Sorry."

"Maddie, if Chase doesn't see how awesome it is that you got into MIT then I'll beat his ass." He added for his spot on the couch.

"That's very comforting." I added not completely sure on what I meant.

"Look, you leave at the end of the month. You might as well just tell him now. It's better to get it out of the way. Like ripping off a band aid." He explained as I grabbed my bag.

"You're right it's better to tell him now, than later." I rushed out the door without another word

Davenport Lab (Maddie's POV)-

I was pumping myself up to tell Chase as I rode the elevator down to the lab.

"Leo, look at this. It's bad enough that magazines are twisting the facts, but now gossip sites are now writing all sorts of lies about us." I heard my boyfriend complain. I walked into the lab with a smile.

"Yeah. Like I can't keep a boyfriend. Hey Maddie." Bree waved as she noticed me.

"And that I'm a nerd." Chase sighed. I came over and kissed his temple wrapping my arms around his shoulders.

"Awe you're my nerd baby." I added before he pulled me closer, smiling and giving me a quick kiss to which the rest groaned and gagged.

"Guys, look. This is the price of fame. Now you see why I've chosen to live my bionic life out of the spotlight...and take my modest 25 percent as your manager." Leo said, mumbling the second part.

"Leo, this is wrong. The world is not seeing us for who we really are." Chase added. I couldn't cut in anywhere to talk to him. I'd just have to wait.

"Yeah. People need to know that I'm a humble, down to Earth, bionic super model." Bree whined, I rolled my eyes at the three, unable to believe how superficial they were being.

"Look, I have a fix. When you guys first went public, a production company wanted to do a live reality show about you, but Big D turned them down." Leo explained.

I huffed knowing this could only end in disaster. Chase asked, "Why?"

"One hint: Guess who wasn't going to be the star? Davenport is going away on a business trip, so I'll call the company and let them know we've reconsidered. They'll send in camera crews to follow you around." Leo said waving us off.

"Yes. Then the whole world will see how things really are." Chase smiled.

"This can't be a good idea. Those shows twist words and warp the truth. There's a reason superheroes are hidden." Leo scoffed but I continued. "Putting yourself in front of a camera will just shine a light on any mistakes you make for the whole world to see."

"Yeah but it's better than the world thinking we're something that we're not." With Bree's words the three siblings left.

Davenport House (Leo's POV)-

"Great, we'll see the camera crew here tomorrow... Yes, I am a great negotiator for an eight year old." Maddie laughed as she walked by hearing my conversation. jerk.

'The genius got comfortable on the couch and didn't bother to move when the doorbell rang. "You gonna get the door?"

"It's your house." She mumbled.

"You work here." I reasoned.

"Not for you." I rolled my eyes at the girl as I got up to answer the door.

Finding Principal Perry at the door is something I never wanted. "What's up, Clooney?!"

"Why are you wearing that coat? You look more suspicious than usual." I asked as she pushed me aside to barge in.

"I just thought I would drop by and see how my good friends, the Davenports, are doing—Whoa! Look! There's a mountain lion in your yard!" She exclaimed, Maddie and I turned to see as it was rare to see one so close to the houses out here.

"Really? Where? I don't see anything!" Maddie turned around then turned me around to find Perry rifling through our couch.

"Keep looking, something will show up." She groaned as Maddie made her way down to the couch pulling her tablet from and phone from Perry's hands.

"Why are you taking my things? What else do you have?" She asked.

"Nothing." I shook out her coat watching as my wallet fell on the floor, along with a few other items. "Like I said, nothing."

"Really? You're stealing from us?" I asked dryly.

"Not anymore! You caught me! Once Adam, Bree, and Chase became famous, I made a fortune auctioning off their bionic belongings online. But then I ran out. Now I have to restock." She explained as she grabbed the salt and pepper shakers.

"Put those back!" I groaned. We did not have time for this.

"Oh! You're gonna have to catch me first!" She ran towards the door, Maddie stepped in front of her to block the exit. "Oh! Cramp! Cramp! Cramp! Ah, my hammy!"

May 3rd Davenport Lab (Maddie' POV)-

I wandered into the lab the next morning to find a full crew preparing to film for the reality show.

A woman in a headset blocked me from getting to my desk. "Mam you can't be down here."

"What the-" Before I could continue to yell I felt a hand wrap over my mouth and an arm pulling me away. Chase.

"She's my girlfriend and she also works for Mr. Davenport so she stays." He explained as he placed me down, but he still kept his arms around me.

"Okay, people, we go live in two minutes!" Leo called before turning back to the makeup artist. "Oh no, that was for them - you keep puffing that powder sweetheart."

"If you're gonna stay down here and be on camera we need you to sign this." The woman said, handing me a packet of forms.

By quickly skimming through the packet I could tell I wouldn't be signing it. The whole contract basically gave the camera crew permission to use any shots of me that they wanted to. "No thanks."

"Well then you can't be here while we film."

"Fine with me." I turned around still in Chase's arms to face him. "This is all a bad idea so I'm just gonna work from home today."

"You sure? We haven't spent much time together lately." He asked.

"Yeah. This is your thing I'll be watching from my house. We can go out when you finish shooting." I couldn't resist the smile that came with his pout. He was so cute. I gave him a soft kiss. He smiled in the kiss before we pulled apart.

"She needs to leave. We're about to go live." A man said to Chase.

Rolling my eyes I leaned in to give a quick kiss. "Love you." Chase smiled as we pulled away, I grabbed my tablet and a few prototypes from my desk.

"Love you too, break a leg." I teased as I stepped out, hearing his laugh behind me.

. . .

"What are you doing here?" Alex asked as he walked in to find me buried in my work on the living room couch. I was only partially paying attention due to the fact that the tv was currently playing a live reality show. The subjects being my best friends.

"I had to work from home today because I wouldn't consent to being filmed." I explained. Without looking up I could sense my brother's confusion and pointed towards the tv.

"What the heck?" He said being dumbfounded by the show he was seeing.

"They thought it would be a good idea to make a reality show to let the world know how they really live. I was completely against it but couldn't stop it. The alternative was working from home." I said without looking up from my laptop.

Before he could respond the conversation was cut off as we focused on the tv, "It's the President with a mission alert!" Chase said to the camera.

"That means there's an emergency somewhere." Bree added.

"I'm guessing it's that way." Adam added while flexing his muscles and for whatever reason lacked a shirt.

Chase accepted the president's transmission and answered for the team. "Mr. President, we got the alert."

"Listen, there's a power surge at a major electrical tower, and it's too dangerous for anyone else to handle. I need you to fix the broken transformer before it blows and starts a nationwide chain reaction." The president explained.

"Shouldn't you be there to help them?"

"I can't with the camera's there." I jumped up and started packing up my stuff. "I'll just have to help them from upstairs."

"Bring 'em with us! That way, people can see what really happens when we save the world!" Chase said invite the camera crew to join him.

"Idiot." I groaned. "What is he thinking?"

"At least the lab will be empty for you to go help them." Alex said as he helped me gather my things.

"Yeah hopefully this doesn't end up as bad as I think it will." I said before running out towards the Davenport house.

By the time I had reached the house the three siblings had begun fighting on camera and were making a mess of things. I tried reaching out to their comms only to find that they had left them behind.

"Great." I collapsed onto the chair to watch the mission unfold.

"Ow! You see, fixing an electrical transformer is a walk in the park. I'll just use my molecular kinesis to stabilize it. That's right, folks, mission leader!" Chase exclaimed as he pushed his siblings behind. I could not believe how immature he was being about this.

"Now, get ready, everybody, this is where he touches his temple!" Adam teased, and Bree joined in.

"I'm not gonna touch my temple! I'm gonna hold my hand out like this." Chase groaned.

"Okay, uh, while you do that, I'm gonna go super speed up the tower and take care of the transformer. See ya!" Bree sped off but Chase held her back. The fighting escalated and the three continued to make fools of themselves on national tv.

While they were occupied, sparking wires fell down from the transformer before the whole thing blew. The feed cut out and the power went out. I grabbed my phone only to find that the signal was gone. Great.

With my flashlight on I went down to the lab storage to get the back up power up and running. Suddenly thankful that Davenport listened to my concerns of the vulnerabilities we would have if we ever managed to lose power.

After an hour or so I had the power up and running. I took the storage lift back to the lab right as the bionic siblings strolled in. "I can't believe we blew the mission!"

"Chase, relax. All we have to do is cause a bigger disaster somewhere else, and people will forget all about this." Adam added as the three sulked right past me. Before anything else could be added Leo came in.

"What were you thinking? That explosion took out power grids all over the country! You grounded flights, caused traffic accidents. People are freaking out!" The boy explained.

"You know what, this is all your fault. If you would've just let me go up the tower, none of this would've ever happened!" Bree added, blaming her younger brother.

"Don't blame me! You guys are the ones who didn't follow orders." He fought back. I didn't know how to help.

"Yeah, 'cause they were stupid orders, and don't drag me into this, it was Bree's fault." Adam pouted.

The three continued to argue, I had no idea what to do to help. I knew that the reality show was a bad idea but I didn't know that it would ruin their relationships. Davenport finally joined us and pulled the three apart.

"Knock it off! You're all to blame. And everybody knows it, because it's on every news channel in the entire world." He turned the screen to the news channel showing them the coverage. "People are furious. They're saying you're irresponsible, that you can't be trusted. You have managed to turn the whole world against you."

"I know how we can fix this. A commercial-free sit-down with Oprah. Which one of you cries best?" Leo jumped in, somehow making the tension in the room worse. I smacked him over the head for that.

"This cannot be fixed with PR. Do you realize the gravity of what you've done? It's the White House. The President wants to video conference with us in 20 minutes. This is bad, this is really bad." The man started to sob in front of us.

"Okay, I'm calling Oprah. I think we found our crier." Leo left with a smile.

"I'm just gonna go. This seems like a family thing..." I walked out of the room, the bionic siblings were too absorbed with their own problems to even notice me leave.

. . .

I had a feeling that the bionic heroes would need some backup soon so instead of heading home I made my way towards the forest. Soon I found a certain marked tree and started the journey towards my old hideout. Without my powers the task proved to be more strenuous and my heart rate would spike at some of my near misses.

Once the tree came into view I pushed myself into overdrive to reach it. I had pulled down on the lever but my grip slipped a bit and fell towards the opening. I couldn't stick the landing so I rolled off, as I rose to my feet I winced in pain as I gripped my now bruised shoulder. "Occupant identified. Maddison Tompkins, authorized." Stronghold hummed.

"Now that we're back I think you should move back in."

"Already on it boss." If I didn't know any better I'd say Tessa had a smile as she took over the base's operating system once again. The doors opened for me and I walked back in to find the empty lab but my eyes lingered and stuck onto my old costume. "Uh, boss you might want to take a look at this."

I turned to the screen to find a newscast in front of the Davenport house. The title gave me a heart attack. Four bionics send protesters to the hospital.

At first my mind was stuck on hospital but then I realized what it said. Four. Oh my gosh. Leo. I was about to run out when my phone buzzed. I stopped to find a message from Chase.

Hey, you were right. That show was a bad idea. The team split up, for real this time, and right now I just want to sleep. I'll see you tomorrow.

I could tell Chase was hurt but I didn't know how bad the damage would be.

May 24th Davenport House (Maddie's POV)-

Each day the fighting had gotten worse and worse. I began trying to work from home but they would even follow me there.

It really started bothering me when the three began talking through Leo and fought over me. Bree would want to hangout and Chase would fight back saying that I was his girlfriend (which was a whole nother situation that I would have to talk to him about.) then Adam would get jealous and say that he would need a workout buddy.

"Hey you wanna go shopping?" Bree asked, interrupting Chase and I's movie night, completely ignoring her brother.

"Uh, Bree I..." I didn't want to turn her down but Chase and I hadn't had any time to relax together in a while.

"We're kind of busy." Chase grumbled.

"I wasn't talking to you. So?" She asked again, completely shifting her attitude when she talked to me.

"Well I- It's just-" I huffed trying to find the right words. "We haven't been able to have a movie night in a while and I kinda just wanted to spend the night with Chase, but maybe we can go shopping tomorrow?" Chase had begun leaving soft kisses down the side of my neck. Leaving little bites along the way.

"Really?" She asked, trying to ignore her brother.

My breathing began to hitch as I held back a moan, Chase smirked knowing full well what he was doing as he continued to work. "Yeah, we- we can make a day ouuut of it."

The speedster left with a clearly disgusted face from the sounds her brother was pulling from me.

"Chase, the movie." I tried. My boyfriend pulled away from my neck and smirked.

"We've both seen it, and like said earlier we need to relax." He smirked.

Chase had been more loving lately, we would work together in the lab and often fall asleep together. I guess he needed a release for all his emotions and it happened to be me. Not that I didn't love it.

I pulled on his collar, pulling his lips to mine with a smile. He laid me back on the couch as we continued to kiss.

"Ugh, get a room." Adam gagged.

"We were here first. You ruined it." Chase grumbled as he pulled away.

"Said the little brother to his big brother." Adam laughed dryly. I could help but snort at the comeback before Chase turned back to me and I covered my smile sheepishly.

"What are you even doing up here?"

"A) I live here, 2) I wanted to see if Maddie was free to work out, and D) I wanted a snack." Adam explained and I questioned his listing in my head.

"Well, we're busy." Chase added.

"I could see that, even though I want to unsee it." Adam said as he grabbed an apple and water bottle before heading back to the lab.

"Finally." He sighed.

"You want to go out for dinner tonight?" I asked, trying to lighten the situation.

"Sounds great." He smiled as we cuddled up to finish the movie.

A/N: This book will be over soon but there will be a sequel. It might take a but longer to get it out.