AN: Well, I was bored, unable to sleep, and feeling a little generous, so I decided to release part twoa little early. Okay a lot early. So sue me.
Hero - Part Two
She was asleep. She had to be, because there was no way that whatever it was that was in control of this universe, whatever deity or fate there may be, could be this cruel. To let her finally find the boy who she had thought would be The One, her soulmate, let her finally realize her feelings after five years, and then snatch him away. Take him out of her reach.
And now the paramedics were trying to take his body.
She fought, she screamed, she made a scene, she didn't care. She remembered something he had said, about taking bodies to the hospital to be declared dead. She didn't want him declared dead. She was going to wake up, any moment now. But if they confirmed this nightmare, it would all become real.
She had a vague sensation of arms reaching around her, holding her own limbs tight by her sides. She glanced down for a moment, and saw Raj's hands clasped together, holding her in a tight bear hug. She screamed and struggled, but he had bought the paramedics enough time to put Sheldon, no, Sheldon's body, onto a gurney, and begin wheeling him towards the ambulance.
As the shop door began to swing closed behind them, a fresh burst of crazed adrenaline came over her, and Penny broke free of Raj. Flinging the door open, she raced out into the street. The ambulance driver had just climbed into the cab, the sirens started, as it began to move away down the street, Penny started to run.
The ambulance drove faster and faster, and still she ran. But then she stumbled over a crack in the street, and as she instinctively slowed down to steady herself, the ambulance started to round the corner at the end of the street, and when she looked up, it was gone. She stood there, in the middle of the street, until the weakness creeping up from her legs became too much, and she slid to her knees on the pavement.
Penny stared at the space where the ambulance had disappeared, willing it to come back. The footsteps running up behind her seemed distant, the arm that wrapped around her like an illusion.
Amy held her hand in hers, and when the animalistic wail that escaped from Penny's throat echoed through the clear Pasadena sunset, she didn't try to quiet her, or offer reassurances.
Because Amy was sobbing too.
Penny was done crying. She felt like it, at least. She couldn't possibly have any more tears left. She had cried on the street with Amy, she had cried on the way to the hospital, and at the hospital morgue when she saw his body. She had cried when she gave her statement to the police, and again when she got to the apartment and saw his spot.
Now she was curled up there, wearing his Flash shirt, the one from when she first met the boys. And she wasn't crying. She just stared at the TV, which was playing something; she didn't know or care what, and willed her mind to stay blank. Thinking of things brought him to mind, and thinking of him made her cry. Penny was so sick of crying.
She inhaled deeply, breathing his scent on the couch, on his shirt. A tear rolled silently down her cheek. Amy snored quietly in the armchair, having stayed over to make sure Penny would be okay.
She really didn't think she'd ever be okay again.
Her arms wrapped protectively around her knees, drawing them up to her chest. To think that just last night she had been lying in her bed, staring at the ceiling, after breaking up with Leonard, again, wondering why all men were dicks. Realizing that she knew one guy who wasn't. And that he WAS the guy, or at least he was now.
And she was going to tell him how she felt, for better or worse, when they got back from the comic book store.
And now... and now he was gone... and he never knew... and she should be the one who was gone. They wouldn't miss her all that much, losing her wouldn't leave a hole in the world where a genius was ripped out. He had just accomplished his great goal, and proven string theory. She didn't even know what string theory was! He sacrificed his life for her, and she couldn't even see what he found worth saving.
And he surely wouldn't be lying on the couch, crying over the failed actress from Nebraska.
Because the tears had started pouring out anew, with less sobbing now. Just a deep, physically painful sadness.
Maybe she wasn't done crying after all.
AN: Well, you know what to do, either you Review, or you return to the previous pages from whenst you came.
