Of Psychics and Physicists
by: muaaimoi
When the Visions start, Sheldon doesn't tell anyone. Genii are known to tread the line between genius and insanity. He knows that there are already times where he seems to cross it. And he hasn't, he knows better.
It's absurd, impossibly improbable. Clairvoyance does not exist, neither do psychics, it's all hokum. Absolute hokum.
He lays in bed and starts reciting the decimals of Pi in a vain attempt not to think about it. Its fruitless of course. Sheldon has never been worse at anything in his life than not thinking.
But he's a man of logic.
So what if, at fourteen, he's not considered a man at all. He stays in a dormitory by himself and he's graduated college, even got his first masters. Surely he's smarter than most . And that's what matters. So he gets up. There's no more sleeping to be done regardless. Not after that.
Sheldon pads silently into the living room and turns on his computer. There is a very simple way to assure himself its all a dream. Katherine Meson may exist. She may even be an eight year old, little girl, in Texas. But she's home. With her parents. Not dead in a ditch. Dumped there by some pedophile who'd done unspeakable things to her.
Two minutes later he's staring at a Missing Persons Poster. And Sheldon feels sick down to his toes. Bile rises in his throat and its all he can do to sprint to the bathroom and deposit his vomit there.
Hugh Anderson was a working man. He had a pregnant wife at home who knew nothing about the drives he liked to take around elementary schools and playgrounds. He's throw up all he can but it doesn't stop Sheldon's stomach from attempting to relieve itself of all content regardless.
Some part of his brain is trying to figure out how he knows. Theory's of solving problems in his subconscious are reviewed and discarded. Sheldon remembers everything he sees, so long as he's consciously aware of it, and he doesn't miss much. Katherine had been missing for two day's. Nothing he's seen or heard in the last two day's has even hinted at her existence. Let alone what has been done to her.
And he knows what's been done to her. Intimately, every abuse she'd just suffered through. Knows and hates himself for not knowing soon enough to have stopped it. All he could do was watch her suffer, utterly impotent. Further evolved than his fellow man indeed. He wonders if this is what happens once you put yourself above the norm.
He can hear his mother's voice in his head. She keeps calling it a punishment from God, for running his mouth and acting like he knows better than everybody else. He hasn't believed in her God since he was eight years old and he'd read about Darwin. It doesn't stop him from wondering if it is a divine punishment of some kind. He wondered what he did that's so wrong. He's only ever tried to help. That can't be that awful of him, surely. He may not have gone about it in the best of ways, but he had to protect himself somehow. People were prone to using each other the same ease of long practice that he used had with his computer. Who didn't want a genius at their beck and call?
Sheldon wipes his mouth after washing it out on the sink. He takes a moment to be thankful for mouthwash when it occurs to him there could still be something he could do for her.
Or at least to save another little girl like her.
Sheldon heads towards his computer again. It takes a few days, and it's hardly sacrificing sleep when he's so scared to sleep again, scared to dream, but in the end Hugh Anderson ends up behind bars. It doesn't truly feel like an accomplishment. Not when he'd been too late to save Katherine Meson. But he can't do that to another little girl, and that...that matters.
It's the first time he does it. It's not the last.
-Six years later-
Leonard Hofstadter was definitely going to be his new roommate.
The man owed him his life, and if Sheldon played his cards right, that could easily translate into a complete doormat for a roommate. His utter disbelief in the supernatural only seals the deal. Sheldon could stand before the man and recite his entire life's story from his point of view and only convince the man of being a stalker.
It also helps that Leonard is a small man. Not in stature, though he is that too. But Leonard has an incredibly small universe he considers himself the center of. Not as small as Sheldon's, granted. But Leonard Hofstadter hadn't spent most of his life pushing people away. Far, far away.
It's almost impressive, when Sheldon thinks about it like that. Leonard Hofstadter is accompanied by two equally small people Sheldon must now include in his life. Their concerns are petty, material, and biological "needs" they clearly often do without.
In the end its tolerable, mostly because they easily cave into his rules and takes almost no effort for them to ''knuckle under" so to speak. He's almost disappointed, but enough things are hard for him as it is. So even whilst gaining a social circle, he's mostly all right. It helps that he can disguise his fear of touching things with excuses about bacteria. Mysophobia, indeed. He demands all of the furniture be new ,and when they shop it's all the same brands Sheldon has always used. They also make sure to take the objects furthest back in the row.
Yet, no matter how large his personal bubble, he still knows much more about his new acquaintances than he has ever wanted to.
Leonard Hofstadter is the product of a perfectly loveless home. He is searching, desperate for an acceptance that will never come. Not when he can't accept himself. He is forever attempting to mold himself into some ideal he doesn't truly believe he can achieve. And having never learned what love is he can't recognize it. Or find it in himself. How could he ever love anyone else?
Howard Wolowitz is a coward. He's so afraid to become a man he'd rather pretend to be nothing but. He talks about women, and leaving his mother, when he doesn't want anything less. He can barely remember his father, but what he does remember he doesn't even like to think about. He's terrified of being that man. Any man. He has reason to be. All the potentials there, just under the surface.
Rajesh Koothropali is a latent homosexual. All the clues are there ,but he will never admit it to himself. Not when it means two generations worth of taunting will be proven right. His selective mutism is a result of the instinctual knowledge that any girl would love to keep him. What girl doesn't want a gay best friend? And Raj knows, somewhere deep in his subconscious ,that it wouldn't take a girl long to figure it out.
Sheldon thinks it's all rather pathetic. All of it, but it's hardly their fault. When your problems consist of making sure the police get people they don't even know they should be after, it's a little hard to care about personal concerns. Add that to waking visions, making sure everything he touches doesn't have a strong psychic imprint, the living hell he calls his dreams , and it's no wonder he can barely understand other people.
He has more meaningful interactions with the dead.
The only solace he finds is his work. No matter what kind of monster he's currently chasing after, the age of the ghost he's seeking justice for, his work is still able to make living worthwhile.
Some days, that's all that keeps him going.
- Two years later-
Penny was going to be a problem. Sheldon wonders at the usefulness of a an ability that had only informed him of the troublesome creature after the fact.
Sheldon would have known even if his gift hadn't informed him the second he laid eyes on her regardless. The hug hadn't helped at all.
She's just so...bright. Penny is vivid in a way that makes everything else around her fade away. She cuts through the shades left behind like a supernova through the darkness of space. Its blissful. Touching her gives Sheldon a peace he hadn't known existed. Touching Penny makes Sheldon glad he's alive.
And he can't stand it.
He can't stand the thought of needing someone.
Not when he's so aware of the frailness of ones existence. Not when he knows that none of the people that leave actually want to leave those that love them behind. Not when he doubts he can have her in the first place (You can't hold onto light...).
Helping Leonard deliver a package into her apartment is the straw that breaks the camels back. He really can't stand the mess, but getting to touch so many things that don't give him anything makes cleaning fun again. He doesn't even dream when he falls asleep that night. Its the first time in nine years that that's the case.
Of course Penny doesn't appreciate it. It's impossible for the woman to make anything nice and simple.
And he's almost glad.
If she stays away he can justify ignoring her. Pushing thoughts of her, and better yet, her ability to clear things of those lingering flickers that torment him daily, far, far away (As if it could ever be far enough...).
But Penny doesn't stay mad for long. Next thing he knows, she's a part of his life. Constantly occupying the seat beside him. Bright in a world that has been nothing but dark for years and years.
He can't take it.
He tries to make her mad with backhanded insults and biting remarks. In short, he acts like a child. But Penny accepts this as his temperament and forgives him. He makes excuses for himself when she needs him. Surely no one deserves to be homeless, or hurt and alone. And there's just no sense staying away when he's sick ( The dead are so much more vivid then, pulling at him and it's so much worse than usual, especially now that he knew that need not be the case. He could barely keep the tears at bay. How was he expected to keep away?)
But he's too smart to fall for that trap. He knows what he's doing, for all he wishes he wouldn't have to acknowledge it. Sheldon is doing everything he can to keep her close, even while most of him knows he should push her away.
He's completely disgusted with himself. He hadn't believed himself to be that weak.
xXx
So this story won by a land slide, it's officially the one I'll be continuing. Merry Christmas, or whatever it is you guy's celebrate!
