Night Life

by muaaimoi

The arctic betrayal happens a few years earlier. Penny breaks up with Kurt right after they move to Pasadena. Penny and Sheldon find themselves as neighbors in L.A. It's a miracle this plot Bunny didn't end up in the Abyss. Why not give it a go? S/P, romantically inclined friendship? Read into it what you will.

The Night Life

by: muaaimoi

1.

Penny storms out of the house with almost everything she had brought into it. Kurt had thought living on Pasadena would be easier than L.A. It was only two hours away, and it had cheaper and had better apartments. So when he had suggested moving in together, he had said it would be best to rent an apartment there.

Penny had agreed with her boyfriend. Going as far as to ask the cheesecake factory to relocate her. Now? Now Penny bitterly regretted that. Not a week into living together and she had already caught him in bed with another.

Penny's only solace was that at least she hadn't gotten around to buying furniture. And that most of her things fit right into her car. Penny cried the two hours back to L.A. She found a parking spot and spent the night there. Mourning what she had thought was her best relationship to date. Two whole years, wasted with a guy who cheated on her. Why did Penny have such shitty taste in men?

She regrouped the next morning. Calling a friend that would let Penny camp out on her couch so long as Penny cleaned the place up. And it wouldn't take her long to find a hole in the wall. She didn't need much if it was just her. A studio would do, all over again.

A week later Penny found one. Just like she wanted. A complete hole in the wall. It's best selling point was that it was in walking distance of quite a few awesome clubs. The pounding music at three o'clock in the morning severely lowered the price of her rent. Penny pounced on it. That meant more shoes for her. She was up at night often anyway, and she would totally be in those clubs.

She needed a pool of possible meaningless hookups if she wanted to get over Kurt anytime soon. He heart still clenched at the thought of him. It was pathetic. She couldn't believe she still loved him. It was crazy...Wasn't it? Penny tried to push it out of her mind. She did have plenty to hold her attention at the moment anyway.

Sadly she needed to find another job, and soon. On a brighter note, the cheesecake factory would probably never hire her again. Yum, that was some good silver lining. Maybe it was all a twist of fate. A way to get her back in LA , where a blossoming actress like her belonged.

At least she wouldn't have to waste a boat load of gas in her quest for parts.

2.

Sheldon can't say anything. It's a strange state for him. Sheldon is used to having to bite back words. The knowledge that swirls around his mind is often eager to come out, and he's usually perfectly content to educate others. Despite their lack of appreciation for it. That is no longer the case.

So for once, he's just quiet.

The heartache and betrayal in his chest freeze the words long before they start. He can't even look at them. He frankly would have preferred to have had them kill him in the arctic. Then he would have died with his scientific integrity intact.

But this? It was unforgivable.

He had thought it was his due. The opportunity had come rather early, but he had honestly thought he had earned it. As a scientist first and foremost with no failings. He had thought he was finally on his way to his Nobel. His lifelong dream, achieved. He had wanted to share that triumph with his friends. A silent thank you, for being there for him through it all.

He hadn't expected the knife in his back.

It makes him question everything. The last eighteen years of his life, and for what? A spotless career that had crashed and burned? Friends who would betray everything he had ever believed in. Attack everything he was? He wanted to curse, to scream, to cry, to let out the torrent of emotions before they ate him alive.

But he didn't know how. He had never been good with his emotions. It was why he had preferred his mind. But both had let him down. His heart for trusting, and his mind for it's inability to perceive what was happening. So he cast them away. He cast everything away.

Sheldon leaves.

He finds an apartment in L.A, the first cheap one he finds, he's just quit his job, and he's not quite sure what he's going to do for a living now. The idea of applying to another university makes his stomach churn. He can't stomach the academic world any longer.

He hires people to retrieve his belongings in their entirety. Only the important ones. His comic collection and memorabilia. It all goes into storage. He's leaving that part of his life behind. He leaves everything he had ever brought with Leonard. He doesn't want any reminders. It's bad enough that he will never forget. He wants a new start. New people in his life, himself included. He's not who he used to be, he can't be, and there is no going back.

3.

Penny finds work at a small Boutique. And she's surprised by how much she likes it.

It's not like the fast food industry at all. Penny still has to have a smile glued to her face, but the lack pressure for tips is a blessing. Plus, some people simply don't have a fashion sense, and watching old cows put on animal print is as hilarious as it is nauseating.

Yes, some customers are awful, but Penny doesn't see many on a regular basis, and she doesn't let herself get pushed around. Penny strikes up a great relationship with the manager, the woman understands the importance of shoes, and is therefore a woman after Penny's own heart. They get along great.

Penny even makes friends with the other salesgirl. And it isn't long until she's invited along to a birthday party. It's fun. She's had a few flings now, and the thought of Kurt doesn't ache the way it used to.

But it doesn't keep Penny from hitting the tequila and partying just a little too hard. It's what she's always done when she doesn't know just what to do with herself. She still wants to be an actress, but she's just lost. It's been three months and Penny's never been alone so long before.

She thinks it should feel liberating. She thinks she should be spending the time working on herself. Her acting ability, her career, the reasons behind her shitty taste in what she actually ends up doing is drinking a lot and attempting to forget how lonely she feels most of the time.

4.

Being a bartender is something Sheldon sometimes has trouble believing he's doing. He's a scientist, a physicist, he should not be mixing alcoholic libations for all manner of party goers.

And yet he does.

By choice, at that.

It's rather novel, but it's the perfect compromise. By now, he can't even fathom going back to his old life after... Not when the Arctic expedition had failed.

He had briefly considered going back to Texas, but Sheldon had always hated it there. And he he didn't see the sense in trading a new found hell for an old one. And as much as he loves his mother, she has a tendency to smother him. And he has always let her. It's not good for either of them.

So he had moved on. Quit his job, his so called friends, and the order he'd striven so hard to establish in the chaotic soup people called life. All he really needed was a way to support himself. It's not like he needs the university in order to think about physics. He has plenty of white boards himself, after all. And he can still publish his findings.

In the end, Sheldon had sat down with a career finder and done his own calculations. Bartending had been the ideal vocation. Working nights meant plenty of free time during the day. And while he's completely useless at theoretical physics past nine o'clock, his ability to mix drinks with different specific gravities in a cylindrical container remain unimpaired. Besides, the club he works at is very trendy and popular. None of his former colleagues would ever be allowed inside.

He knows he could go back to CalTech, or some other university with a great physics department. He's too brilliant not to be accepted in the scientific community, regardless of his blunder. But he thinks about Winkle, Howard and Raj, Leonard, and doesn't.

5.

The first time it happens, Penny is way too drunk to notice.

When she finds herself home the next morning, with no one in bed beside her, after a wild night of drinking, she's mostly impressed with herself. That she still has a matching pair of shoes and her purse with her is a bonus. Penny has lost track of the amount of times she's lost one, or both.

Then she get's a good look at the clock and curses. She's going to be late for work. At least everything she needs to get ready is in the same corner of her apartment.

She's almost grateful that the entirety of her apartment is basically one big room. It's a really shitty studio. So Penny has to live without certain luxuries, like a bedroom. She makes due with a pull out couch.

She almost can't believe she's slept through the afternoon. At least that means she's slept through most of her hangover. She considers it a small mercy that the clubs are within walking distance, otherwise Penny highly doubts she would have remembered where she parked her car.

She speeds more than she should, but she does make it to work on time. When she gets a text halfway through her shift inviting her out to another 'girls night' for drinking and dancing, her recent success at making it home ensures Penny doesn't hesitate for a second to text back that she'll definitely go.

6.

The biggest downside Sheldon finds to his job are the women. Correction, the drunk women, and even the occasional man. The regular drunks he'd at least been warned about. There is not one night that goes by where a few alcoholics don't pass out. It's standard procedure to go into their wallets and call them a cab. At least if you were kind enough to do so. Usually Sheldon isn't, but he's not the only bartender around, and Mark usually does.

No, what his teachers had failed to warn him about was the persistent drunks who were rather desperate to engage in coitus. Or at least he assumed they were desperate, with the way they were hounding him of all people. He got cooed at about how big and blue his eyes were, how tall he was, and how large they found both his hands and feet. And that was all when they weren't doing obscene things to the rim of their bottles, or straws with their tongues, all the while attempting to engage him in prolonged eye contact.

Sheldon actually preferred the later. It involved no physical contact, and was very good for his tips. He'd learned that the occasional compliment and flirting smile was the difference between an empty tip cup, and an overflowing one.

Bartending had actually done what countless teachers and his mother had tried and failed to achieve for years; teach Sheldon passable social skills. He'd felt very accomplished by finally overcoming one of his few failings. But it was hard to be happy about it with a drunk girl clinging to his arm, or shamelessly attempting to follow him home.

7.

Penny is so very wasted. Her mouth tastes blue.

She hadn't meant to get that bad, but she'd met this guy that had reminded her of Kurt, and he'd been there with some brunet that he'd apparently tried to cheat on with Penny. As if his girlfriend really wouldn't notice. Of course the guy was kind of drunk too, so it wasn't like he was using the head on his shoulders.

But It had sent her way back...

Not even to Kurt. It had sent her back to Kindergarten. That guy she was suppose to marry at recess. Of course he'd found another girl by then, and Penny had spent the rest of that day hanging upside down on the jungle gym. Letting all the little boys see her cookie monster undies. She was too drunk to remember the kids name. But it didn't keep Penny from feeling like shit anyway.

Her crappy taste in guys had started so early in life.

Penny wants to go back in time and slap her younger self. She feels likes she's approached wisdom, the way that happens when you drink enough that your misery starts to make some strange alcoholic sense. It's like gin makes her brilliant.

If only someone had passed her a gin and tonic instead of a beer the first night Penny had gotten drunk. Then she wouldn't feel like she should beat her younger self like a red headed step child. Tell her all her future failings and try to scream some sense into the girl.

She wants someone to have done it. To have told her not to settle on a guy because she was lonely. To wait for someone to prove themselves trustworthy before giving her heart. To find a nice guy, someone to take care of her, not someone she needs to take care of. Or at least someone okay with them taking care of each other.

Penny smiles with nothing like happiness, and orders a shot of tequila. Who needs to be brilliant, anyway?

8.

There was just no polite way to tell a woman you had no interest in sleeping with her. Or at least no way she wouldn't take offence. Sheldon had learned this the hard way. He wasn't used to his brilliant mind failing him so often.

"Miss I would appreciate it if you would let go of my arm" Sheldon says, as politely as he knew how. It didn't keep the irritation from bleeding into his voice and his accent from surfacing briefly.

" Aw, ain't chu a southern ge-gent-man" She slurred at him, not letting go. He'd had to physically pry her claws off him. And then rushed quickly towards Mark. Hopefully the more experienced bartender would know what to do.

Mark looked at him like he was crazy once he'd explained his conundrum " Dude, I would love to be that pretty girls drunken mistake" He said with a smile. And Sheldon had gathered that from the way Mark hadn't looked at the woman so much as tried to drink her in with his eyes. Only the last two months of being the recipient of that look had enabled Sheldon to recognize it.

" Tell you what" Mark said, coming back to himself and looking down at the wallet in his hands, then pressing it into Sheldon's." This belongs to a Penelope, that's the other babe passed out over there. Call her a cab, drive her yourself, whatever just make sure she gets home. I'll take that looker off your hands."

And with that Mark booked it. Leaving Sheldon at quite a loss about what to do. Then he looks down at the ID in his hands. What are the chances? Apparently this Penelope is a neighbor of his. He supposes it's a fair enough trade. Though he finds it rather amusing that he's also taking a woman home.

Only the last two months of flirting and innuendo have clued Sheldon in to dirty humor. It certainly makes him laugh at all those dirty jokes his previous barber had told him. Truly, to think they had been so simple...

9.

The third time around, all she has is blurred memories.

Penny can recall the surprising strength behind lanky arms, keeping her upright and steady as she attempts to make it into her apartment. She can also remember panicked blue eyes staring into her own as Penny had leaned forward to kiss him. And then falling over and into her bed as very kissable lips parted under her own. They had been very soft.

Of course her last memory of the night is passing out on top of the guy. Which might explain why he isn't in bed with her. But then it wouldn't explain the new found clean state of her apartment. Seriously, what kind of drunken hook up cleaned? Especially when Penny hadn't managed any actual hooking up.

All Penny can do is look around in confusion. And she has trouble believing she's remembering right. She barely manages to stand on her shaky legs, she's not too badly hung over, but the persistent ache in her head makes her unsteady for a while. She decides to sleep it off.

The second time she wakes she's just as baffled by her clean apartment.

But this time, she spots the note her visitor had apparently left behind.

The handwriting is pretty scritch-scratchy, but it's perfectly legible.

It read:

Please desist from your alcoholic binges if you cannot find someone to ensure you make it to your domicile before hand. I don't find it particularly pleasant to drag an intoxicated female to her abode. Nor to be accosted due to her inebriated state. This is the second time I have had to take you back to your apartment. I do not wish to do so a third.

Sincerely,

Dr. Sheldon Cooper

P.S. Your housekeeping skills could use some work. I did the best I could under the circumstances. But your apartment would truly benefit from a thorough disinfection.

P.P.S. You have an astounding number of shoes.

Penny stares at it incredulously, more confused by the note than the clean apartment. She's not awake enough for this. Had this guy really used like three different words for home? And a doctor, really? Penny's suppose to believe some guy was really nice enough to drag her drunk ass home and clean her apartment? Get real. He'd probably cleaned her out.

Penny was very surprised to find all her valuables intact.

10.

Penelope was a very aggravating neighbor. Sheldon found this especially remarkable as she had yet to exchange a single word with him.

Of course, they had exchanged saliva on two separate occasions when Penelope had been very forceful with her tongue and caught him by surprise. There have also been five closed mouth kisses she has bestowed upon him without his consent.

He's unsure whether she's simply a very affectionate drunk or someone who is very promiscuous. Neither option is terribly promising and he doesn't even attempt to find out. Even if he has become rather curious. He can't quite fathom why.

Maybe it's because they are very different people. Or because Sheldon has so much information on her, he simply feels a need to start drawing conclusions. To complete the observation.

He may not be a theoretical physicist by profession anymore, but the scientist within him is still very present. And that part of him, the one that still has him filling whiteboard after whiteboard with countless equations, has him wondering about the opened, half full bottles of alcohol on her dresser, the sheer amount of shoes that litter her home, and the way she snuggles into him, trusting that he won't hurt her without the slightest idea of who he is.

The woman makes poor decisions and has an alcohol dependency at best, and alcoholism at worst. It's no doubt a small miracle that no one has used her vulnerable state against her.

Yet.

11.

Penny still can't quite believe she keeps making it home alone. Everything she left her house with still on her, and a really clean apartment first thing in the morning. It's freaking unbelievable. Penny can't believe she's been this lucky.

It's not like she has some sort of fairy godmother or something...

Except, well, maybe she does.

None of the girls Penny had gone out with last night had cared about where she ended up. And Lord knows none of them would have come within two feet of her if they thought she needed help cleaning her apartment, let alone just clean it themselves. And yet this guy had claimed he'd brought her home not once, but twice.

Sure the cleaning is a little weird, a little intrusive actually, and Penny's a little insulted by the dig at her cleaning skills. But her apartment looks even cleaner than the day before she moved in. And he'd complimented her shoes, always a plus in her book. She's not even insulted he'd considered her kissing him as an accosting.

He might of been gay. The note certainly sounds sassy. That would explain the cleanliness, and why'd he'd apparently not taken advantage of a drunk hot blonde. Penny nods to herself, that makes sense. She wondered if he would be willing to be her friend. Penny would love to have a friend that cared enough to take her drunk ass home.

If she was really lucky, she could have even been wrong about the gay part. She owes the guy one hell of a thank you. And from what little she can remember, he has really soft lips...

12.

Three times become twelve, and Sheldon honestly considers taking Penelope home as a part of his routine. She doesn't have any sort of schedule for when she walks in, ambles to the bar and summarily passes out. But it honestly seems a part of his to lift her to her feet, rouse her enough to walk, fend off her sexual advances, and drop her home.

He actually begins to prefer it.

When he sees Penelope sleeping on his bar it means he knows where she is. He doesn't have to wonder if she'll make it in that night. If she's passed out in some dark alley, or if something bad has happened to her.

It's completely illogical. And so out of character for him that Sheldon can't understand it. Why does he worry so much for someone who is just short of a perfect stranger?

He doesn't know.

Maybe it's because Penelope seems so helpless. So very vulnerable to the outside world. Someone has to take care of her. It might as well be Sheldon. If the way she handles herself at night is any indication of how she is in her day to day life, it's frankly a miracle that she's alive. And Sheldon doesn't believe in miracles.

He also doesn't believe in nonsensical nicknames.

So it's yet another mystery when, for the thirteenth time since Sheldon first took her home, Penelope wonders in and sleeps until closing. Sheldon wraps an arm around her waist, reaching his other hand to gently shake her shoulders. Penelope's emerald eyes blink sleepily at him. And Sheldon gives her something that's remarkably like a half smile and says, " Let's get you home, Kitten."

13.

She knows she shouldn't push it.

Penny's been very lucky so far. It's just a matter of time before her luck runs out. She's already come close a few times. She passed out on some guys couch just the other day, and only the memory of him being too drunk to get it up explained the fact that she still had her clothes on. She had been missing a heel however. Fortunately she'd found it in the stairwell on her way out.

Penny doesn't know what she's doing to herself.

That guy, Sheldon, can't find her every time. He can't take her home, practically tucking her in, clean up a bit and vanish. Leaving Penny with nothing but vague memories of big warm hands and blue eyes.

It doesn't work that way. She can't be disappointed every time he doesn't take care of her. He has no reason to. She's honestly, genuinely lucky he even bothers still. That he hasn't gotten annoyed and stopped. And that he hasn't decided to take payment...of any kind.

Penny knows he could, she's lucky when she's drunk enough to remember parts of him, let alone the times she's completely blacked out. He could have done whatever he wanted. And he hadn't.

So Penny has to stop pushing her luck. She needs to stop getting so wasted in the hopes some nice guy takes her home. She should have already tracked the guy down. Thanked him anyway she could and offered her friendship. It's the least she could do. There's very little he could ask of her that she would refuse. She owes him too much. And from what she remembers he's pretty hot.

She's not exactly balking at the idea of getting naked and sweaty with him. If he wants. She's still really hoping he wants, even if chances are the guys gay.

It would be extra nice if Penny could remember it too. And she could, if she would just put on her big girl pants and find the guy while sober.

But she's Penny. All she knows how to do is push her luck. So she pushes and pushes, until one night when she goes to get herself a pick me up in heels and a too tight tube top that night. She doesn't realize she forgets her keys.

14.

Penelope is sleeping at the bar.

Mark shoots him an amused look at closing, " You ever think she'll make it in here awake enough to order something?"

" I doubt it." Sheldon answers honestly. There is only a twelve percent chance, Sheldon has done the math. Instead he goes to rouse Penelope as is his habit.

She grabs his butt this time, which is new, and Sheldon sags with relief when they make it to her door, which isn't. He leans her against the wall while he goes through her purse. He can't seem to find her keys. Sheldon looks at her outfit. Penelope is wearing jeans, but they seem to have no pockets.

He shoots her a panicked look, and Penelope is awake enough to give him a reassuring smile. Sheldon is not one for taking strays home. Even Jasper, the beloved leopard from his childhood was barely allowed in the back yard. And even when he was, Meemaw had always stood nearby with a loaded rifle.

Penelope falls into him, having lost her footing while he was lost in thought, and she's barely aware while she clings to him. Utterly helpless, utterly trusting.

It makes Sheldon want to bang his head against something. It's a rather alarming impulse, he's never wanted to harm his brain before. He gives the blonde hair tucked against his chin a frustrated glare. Then he scowls and takes the stray kitten home.

15.

When Penny opens her eyes she thinks she's home. The place is the same uniform cream of her apartment. But the bed she's in is too comfortable and the weight at her back tells a story. Penny's not alone in bed. She twists, realizing she's fully clothed as she does so. Her confusion only grows when she looks at the guy in bed with her.

She thinks back to her night, the usual dancing and drinking aside, all she really remembers is getting to the bar. The safe one, with the guy who will get her home. That, coupled with the lack of raunchy memories and her fully clothed state tell her who's cuddling her in his bed.

It's her probably-a-fairy- godfather. It has to be.

She really, really hopes he's not gay. The guy's really hot.

He's got these cheekbones she kind of want's to lick, and this full pouty mouth Penny really wants to kiss. He has his arms wrapped firmly around her , and Penny just feels safe. Happiness bubbles under her skin and it feels right. Being here, in this guy's arms.

Sheldon, Penny thinks.

She doesn't let herself think his name often. It's dangerous, how much she likes it. It leads to day dreams about meeting him when she isn't drunk off her ass and thanking him, not even with her body. But just, honestly, heartfelt. She treats him to dinner a few times and they fall madly in love. In her day dreams, it's only then they fall into bed.

Penny shift's, tilting her head to get another good long look at his face. Her shifting rouses him enough that Sheldon blinks gorgeous baby blues sleepily up at her.

She reworks some fantasies.

16.

When Sheldon wakes, Penelope seems perfectly content to lay on his bed. She also insists he call her 'Penny.'

Sheldon rises to take his shower and prepare breakfast without directing much her way. He doesn't know what to say. he feels almost...Shy. But that's ridiculous, if anyone should be embarrassed, it's Penny. For making him take care of her so often, for being a mess, for being messy even, given the constant chaotic state of her apartment.

But she seems perfectly happy to watch him putter about.

He only make's her a plate in order to give himself time to think.

" I couldn't find your keys." He ventures, presenting her with a plate of waffles. It was the first thing he thought to make. He tries not to pick days for things anymore. Tries not to set routines. Taking Penny home is the closest thing he's had to a routine in months. Perhaps that's why he's become so invested in her well being. It's the first viable explanation he's thought of.

" I guess I lost them." Penny says, cheerfully tucking into her waffles. " I'll have to call my landlord."

" I could do it for you." Sheldon offers, the quicker the Penny can get back to her apartment, the quicker she vacate his.

" You know my landlord?" Penny demands, apprehension coloring her features.

" We're neighbors." Sheldon explains, gesturing to the uniform space. He'd thought it was pretty obvious, it's nearly identical to Penny's own.

" Oh." Penny says, cheerful again." These waffles are awesome, Sheldon. How about I take you out to lunch later? I know this Chinese place, they make awesome orange chicken. My treat."

" I do like orange chicken." Sheldon muses aloud. It's common sense to take a free meal. He doesn't even mind that it's with his troublesome neighbor.

Penny has a new set of key's by lunch time. The Chinese place does have divine orange chicken. They don't really talk. Not a fluid conversation. There's just a lot of awkward silence punctuated by random, in Penny's case, or informative, in Sheldon's, comments. Still, it's strangely enjoyable.

He's strangely...disappointed, when they say their goodbyes.

That night when Penny shows up at his bar she's actually sober.

" I thought I'd see what the place looked like without beer goggles." Penny offers, when Sheldon shoots her a questioning look.

" Commendable." He says, strangely proud of her. She's stays in her section the entire night, and drinks nothing but diet coke. By some unspoken agreement, they walk home together.

" I have something for you." Penny says, when they reach her door." Just so you don't have to share your bed again. A just in case kind of thing."

She produces a key. Sheldon has seen it enough times to be familiar with her apartment key. It's almost thoughtful of her.

Tucking it into his own ring key. He stares at it for a moment, befuddled. He's just had the strangest feeling of holding something precious. A possibility manifested in the physical realm. It's a ridiculous thought, absolutely whimsical. Penny has been the cause of many.

" Thank you." He says. For some reason, he's not quite sure what he's thanking her for.

17.

It's kind of weird to think of Sheldon as a bartender and a geek, but lunch had shown her that was exactly what he was. She didn't know much about geeky stuff, but Sheldon totally had that know it all geek thing going on. She's pretty sure she's going to pick a lot of stuff up just from listening when he talks. She like's the idea that he's going to teach her things.

Giving Sheldon her key feels right. Like waking up with him, taking him to lunch, and walking home with him sober had felt right. She smiles to herself when she's back in her messy apartment.

He just feels right. Like they fit together. Complementary flavors. Gin and tonic.

She's still pretty sure she wants more than friendship from him, but for once in her life she doesn't feel the need to make the interest known. She wants to do this right. She want's to be his friend first. Know exactly what she's getting into before she happily dives right in.

Sheldon's good like that. And he makes a mean waffle.

Penny nods to herself, accomplished.

First things first, she thinks, gotta get to know the guy. Meanwhile, well, now that she knows exactly what he looks like, she has plenty of fantasies to choose from.

Something tells her she's going to be a long hard while before she wakes up in Sheldon's bed again.

xXx

Usually I'd try to end this at twenty but I like cutting it off here, where it could clearly just stay friendship. This is the kind of oneshot that has a sequel and I hope to god I find the time. I was going through my shenny folder and this was begging to be finished. At this point I'm just happy to have something from the fandom ready to post today.