BIOGRAPHY Madelyn Franklin was a vision. A free spirited teenager whose ability to express herself was smothered by a pair of overly strict and zealously religious parents. The young girl kept her grades up until the year before she was set to graduate high school, when she started dating the stereotypical bad boy. Of course, her parents refused to give any type of blessing to the young (and in love) teenagers, which only fueled Madelyn's desire to see the boy more. Rebelling every curfew and rule that her parents set forth eventually led to some unforseen circumstances, and much to Madelyn's dismay, she found herself staring down at two very pink lines on a pregnancy test in the back corner stall of a McDonald's bathroom. Madelyn was sixteen. Her parents wanted absolutely nothing to do with their daughter or her pregnancy. Their religion chastised pregnancy before marriage, and Madelyn was pulled from high school for the duration of the pregnancy. On March 17th, she gave birth to a brown eyed baby boy -- a rosy and happy baby who she refused to look at before handing him over to the prearranged adoptive family.

The Reilly family originated in Manhattan, New York, and consisted of May Dominic and Jameson Reilly. The Dominics were the owners of a well known luxury hotel chain and May was their only child, leaving her as the sole inheritor of the estate. Jameson, though his wife's fortune meant that he didn't need to work a day in his life, found satisfaction in his career as a general surgeon at Mount Sinai. The pair were considered the Upper East Side's elite; they owned a spread overlooking Central Park in Manhattan, traveled endlessly, were well-respected in the community, and had everything that they had hoped for. Everything except a child. After years of failed in vitro procedures and fertility specialist after fertility specialist, the couple had decided it was time to pursue other avenues. They had put their name in at an adoption agency, and within a few months had gotten into contact with Madelyn Reilly in Brooklyn. On March 17th, they piled into the back of a town car to New York Presbyterian, where they met their son for the first time. The Reillys named him Maxwell, after May's father, and he was very, very loved.

May was the sole inheritor of her family's fortune, which had relegated a majority of the businss aspect onto her shoulders. She worked late hours and traveled frequently, leaving Max with his father more often than not. Once Max reached the age of two (and his father finished his residency at Mount Sinai), the decision was made to move back to London to focus her attentions on running the company that her family had built. May had given Jameson the opportunity to foster his career -- now it was her turn. Max grew up a quiet but extremely bright child. He was tenacious from the very beginning, devouring every piece of knowledge that anyone would give him and opting to stay inside to read during recess instead of forming bonds with his classmates. Eventually, he managed to ostracize himself from most of his peers. He had started his education at an upper-crust British private school, finishing his coursework with grades ahead of where he was projected to be.

When he was 12 years old, the family decided that moving stateside was in their best interest. Max was uprooted from his friends, his school, his life, and forced to start over in Manhattan. Max had trouble associating to life in the states. Though he was a social butterfly back home in London, in New York, he was often bullied for his accent, for his somewhat lanky build, or for his passion for academia. There were hastily covered black eyes, bruised ribs, and an hour long stint stuffed into a gym locker. Sixth grade wasn't easy... until he met Zuri.

Though things had begun to look up once he met his preteen savior, his life veered sharply off course once again on his 13th birthday, when his father never came home from a quick trip to get birthday candles for his cake. Max and his mother had been setting the table for their annual birthday dinner when the police came to tell them about the accident. Jameson had been on his way back to the house when a drunk driver hit his car head on. Max, having been raised almost solely by his father, did not handle the loss well. While he had never been popular to begin with, instead chosing books over friends, the paltry social life that he had languished following the accident. His classmates continued to tease and bully him relentlessly until May had no other choice but to pull him from the upper crust Manhattan school he was attending to move him back to her birthplace on the West Coast. When Max was 14, the family of two packed up their belongings and headed to San Francisco.

They arrived in the late spring, giving Max the entire summer to explore their new home in San Francisco. There was plenty of time, his mother hoped, for Max's social skills to flourish. Starting eighth grade in a brand new school with a brand new group of kids had seemed to be the new beginning he was hoping for. Max had found solace within a small group of friends that allowed him to blossom socially. He became more involved in extracurricular activities; he was active in Science Olympiad, joined robotics club, and helped the school's math club place at the state level. Max still avoided sports (and the people that played them) like the plague, settling for the fact that he was far smarter than he would ever be athletic.

His mother allowed work to swallow her whole, and following the accident, Max was basically raised by a continually rotating cast of nannies and babysitters. The relationship that he had with his mom grew strained and distant, and while she still loved him, she wasn't around enough to show it. The accident fueled Max's ambitions, serving as a driving force for him to do better. To be better. Max graduated a year early in the spring of 2011 with a full scholarship to Stanford on the table. By that time, he was head over heels in love with his high school sweetheart, and more than ready to take on the next stage of his life with her. However, she had different plans -- plans that didn't include him. Max dealt with her departure in the best way that he knew how -- by burying himself in schoolwork and taking on a way bigger courseload than his advisor recommended.

After graduating magna cum laude with his Bachelor's degree in Mechanical Engineering, he decided take a two year break to travel and to refocus himself. In 2017 he reenrolled at Stanford to complete his Masters (mostly to put an end to the constant badgering from his mother), finishing in May of 2019. Max loves to learn, but isn't ready to resign himself to a laboratory just yet. Though he can live more than comfortably off of his trust fund, he works as a tragically unpaid intern to Samuel Aust at Austomic Systems to keep himself out of trouble. He also uses his ample free time to co-coach a robotics team as a means of giving back to his community.