THE METAHUMAN TRANSFIGURATION

Description: The gang gets superpowers. It's not as cool as some of them always thought. Alternate Season 9 premiere.

Notes: Okay, despite my certainty that I could wrap this thing up in a chapter, it turns out this is actually the first of two final chapters; I was planning to do it all as one big finish, but I decided not to push the limits of readers' patience or FanFiction's file upload protocol. Part of the dialogue in this story will be recognized as an adaptation from the episode "The Matrimonial Momentum" (story by Chuck Lorre, Jim Reynolds and Maria Ferrari, teleplay by Steven Molaro, Steve Holland and Eric Kaplan), but as I have never—brace yourself for a shocker, folks—actually seen any of the Toy Story movies after the first, I changed Penny's improvised vows to come from something that I think means just as much to Leonard and far more to me.

Disclaimer: The author does not own THE BIG BANG THEORY or any of the characters.

- 21 -

HUNTINGTON MEMORIAL HOSPITAL, PASADENA, CA

SATURDAY, AUGUST 29, 2015, 2:00 P.M.

Penny had taken one glance at the legalese of the contract Bernadette and Locke had drawn up and had abandoned even trying to read it half a paragraph in; she was essentially riding on faith in Bernadette and Leonard that she wasn't giving away the rights to her and Leonard's firstborn (and God how freaky a thought was that?!). As a result, she'd been pleasantly surprised to find out that one of the elements Locke had incorporated into the contract was a general assistant. The assistant in question was a young woman who'd been an intern at Locke's law firm, a dark-eyed Chinese girl named Nicola, whose evident intellect had intimidated Penny a little until they'd discovered a mutual love for shoes. After chattering happily away over their most fondly-remembered scores on Amazon, Penny had felt a lot more comfortable about asking Nicola to go retrieve an appropriate dress from her closet.

"I can get a suit for Dr. Hofstadter as well," Nicola had added. "Do you have any recommendations for what he might prefer? Or should I ask him? I think he's out front waiting for his mother to get back."

Penny rolled her eyes. "After you strip out the burgundy corduroy, the fan costumes and the paisley, you'll be down to, like, three. Any of them should do. Get the grey, he looks good in that."

"Okay." Nicola nodded in satisfaction and held out her hand. "Can I get the keys to your units? Or does Dr. Hofstadter have those?"

Penny carefully restrained a smile. "I heard you say earlier Dr. Cooper had volunteered to take you around the places you're getting stuff from?"

"Well, more like his girlfriend kinda browbeat him into it, but yeah, he agreed." Nicola glanced down at a list of addresses in her notebook and frowned. "He must be a really good driver if he thinks he can hit all these places in less than two hours."

Penny smirked. "Yeah, you're not gonna need any keys. Trust me." As Nicola thought about that with a bemused look, Penny put her hand on the other woman's arm. "Listen, Nicola, I really hope this job isn't a come-down for you. If you were in line to make partner or something, I don't want you to think all we're gonna ask you to do is, like, get drycleaning or stuff like that . . . ."

Nicola snorted. "You think they didn't ask me to get drycleaning at the firm? And they took their interns a lot more for granted. My thinking was, if I'm gonna be running menial errands anyway, I might as well do it for a much better pay rate. And this way Ms. Locke knows my name. I mean, I'm not gonna be making what you make, but—"

"What I make?" It hadn't occurred to Penny that there would be a paycheque for her in this. She'd thought of it solely in terms of staying out of jail or off a laboratory table. "How much do I make?"

Nicola lowered her voice and told her. Penny's jaw had dropped. Holy crap! That was half again what she made in a good year as a sales rep from Zangen! "Man, I should've gotten into government work sooner," she'd managed after a moment.

"Yeah, well, don't go broadcasting it," Nicola warned her. "Nobody likes hearing how much federal contractors make or what kind of benefits they get. Even if they are superheroes."

A little over an hour later, Nicola had returned to the doctors' lounge on the government-commandeered eighth floor, staggering under the weight of both a boatload of clothes and several bags (Sheldon, typically for him, clearly hadn't offered to carry any of it) and a flabbergasted expression which Penny guessed to be the result of going through half a dozen Cooper Special whooshy-gateway things in a row. Penny grabbed the clothes and the bags, handed Nicola one of the bottles of wine from those bags, and told everybody but herself and the bridesmaids to clear out of the lounge. Amy had virtually broken down in tears when Penny had given her her tiara. "You remembered!" she gushed, and hugged Penny tightly, an embrace only broken up by the static-shock zing that went through them both when her power triggered.

Now she, Amy, Bernadette and Lucy were downstairs outside the hospital's tiny chapel on the first floor, shifting uncomfortably as they glanced back and forth from the chapel's closed door to the suited agents standing guard at either end of the corridor. Penny's hands felt sweaty on the bridal bouquet. "What the heck is taking them so long in there?" she hissed.

From the iPad Amy held came a tinny contralto voice, at a surprising volume. "You know," said Susan Carmichaels, her face distorted from leaning into the computer webcam pickup at her end, "somebody who's so impatient to get married she can't even wait for her parents to be there maybe doesn't have room to complain about somebody else making her wait."

"Oh, give it a rest, Susie," said Wyatt Carmichaels, squeezed in beside her. He grinned at his daughter. "Don't let her fool ya, sweetheart. Ever since she heard you and Leonard were engaged she's been all, 'I thought it'd never happen!', and 'Why haven't they set a date yet?' and 'Please God, don't let her do something stupid and dump him!'" He laughed as his wife glowered at him; then his own expression suddenly turned to an intensely serious stare, and he pointed at her. "But you guys are gonna have a proper do-over ceremony that we can actually attend, you hear me? Ideally when your brother's out of jail so he can be there too."

Amy looked thoughtful. "You have government influence now, you know," she said to Penny. "Maybe you can have a word with somebody behind the scenes."

"Yeah, I'm . . . not really sure I want to get into that, Amy." Penny shook her head and brushed down her dress, a pinkish-champagne frock that was the nicest thing she owned which didn't cross over into slutty territory. It wasn't anywhere near as nice as the dress they'd bought in Vegas, but she was fed up with waiting. "Come on, come on, what is the—oh. Okay, we're starting!" The door had opened, and Raj and Sheldon emerged, both wearing the best suits Nicola had been able to find in their closets. After them came Stuart in a blazer and tie.

Bernadette frowned. "Where's Howie? I thought he was gonna walk me down the aisle."

"He was," explained Stuart. "That was before he realized he couldn't do that and play his keyboard, too, so he asked me to fill in." Through the chapel's open door drifted the notes of Pachelbel's "Canon and Gigue in D Major". "That was part of the holdup, it took forever to find a plug." He offered his arm. "Well? Shall we?"

Bernadette sighed. "Fine." She took Stuart's arm. An odd expression flickered briefly across Stuart's face, as if he'd been about to grimace and then repressed it by force of will. Penny vaguely noticed Raj look at Stuart with a frown, but couldn't pay much attention. A horde of butterflies had just exploded into being in her stomach. Stuart and Bernadette went into the chapel, then Raj and Lucy, and finally Sheldon and Amy joined her at either side, Sheldon holding up the iPad so it appeared Wyatt's and Susan's heads were floating just above Penny's left shoulder. Penny was having trouble breathing. Oh God, oh God, oh God. This was it.

"Baby? You okay?" said Susan.

"Yeah! Yeah, I am, I'm just . . . whoo." Penny fanned her face vigorously with the bouquet, though she felt far more chilled than overheated. "This is just a bit scary, that's all."

Sheldon frowned. "Penny, forgive me, but I don't understand the logic by which simply going through a perfectly mundane social ritual which you were already planning to do yesterday is somehow more intimidating than taking on an entire Texas riot squad, catching a falling helicopter, or fighting Russian gangsters and a metahuman monster. Would it help if you beat Leonard up a little first?"

"Sheldon!" Amy snapped.

"Well, I'm sorry, but it doesn't make any sense!" Sheldon protested.

"No, no, Amy, it's okay," said Penny. She made herself take a deep breath, then another, and deliberately recalled the last couple of days. Sheldon was right—how could this be scarier than any of that? But the weird thing was that almost all of it had happened too fast to be really frightening, and even the genuinely terrifying bits had been leavened by anger, desperation, shock or adrenaline. Nothing like this blank, sheer, wholly unflinching terror. Nothing except . . . .

. . . except those horrible hours in Leonard's hospital room last night, before she'd finally dozed off, wondering if he was ever going to wake up. Sick to her stomach with the thought of the emptiness that waited for her, for the entire rest of her life, if he didn't.

Yeah. Yeah, that had been what real fear was like. This? This was just nerves. Penny's stomach settled with astonishing speed, like her whole body had abruptly seen the hidden second face in one of the optical illusions Leonard liked. She let out her breath slowly and smiled. "Actually, Sheldon, you know what? That helped. Thank you."

"You're welcome," said Sheldon, his sudden smile so warm that for a moment he looked like a different person entirely, and Penny wanted to hug him. Then he added, "I hope that one day you'll stop being surprised at how helpful I am."

Penny's smile twisted. "Yeah, that's not gonna be today, Sheldon. Sorry."

The chapel was small and nondenominational; the minister, though dressed in black and wearing a white collar, also sported an obvious wedding ring of his own on his left hand. Penny hoped her parents wouldn't be too upset with the vagueness—they were pretty much nothing but Christmas-and-Easter Methodists, but you never knew. The rest of the groomsmen and bridesmaids had spread out up front; Leslie, Kripke, Alfred, and a rather chastened-looking Beverly had taken seats. To one side, Page sat in her wheelchair, watching with a small smile on her face. Perhaps she did like weddings after all.

Then Penny's mood soured. Next to Alfred, wearing a wide, relaxed smile that seemed as much possessive as it did celebratory, was Mrs. Latham. Oh, God, she thought uncharitably. She'd hoped Leonard's offer of a wedding invitation was just polite noise, but evidently Laura Latham had learned long ago to seize whatever opportunity was given her. At least, Penny consoled herself, she'd been able to get Raj to not bring Priya along, when he'd hesitantly asked if he could. She didn't know what Priya was doing back in the States, but had every intention of making sure that today spelled the final doom of any thoughts in that direction. Her smile came back. Spelled the final doom—God, she even thought like these guys did now.

She reached the space before the altar where Leonard waited, and grinned at him. He hadn't gotten around to replacing the lensless frames he'd lost in Vegas; there was no denying he did look more handsome this way, but she found herself missing the glasses all the same. He just wasn't her Leonard without them. Still, it made it easier to see that his eyes were already looking watery. "Betcha ten bucks you cry first," she whispered under her breath to him.

"Yeah, no bet," he whispered back.

The minister coughed and nodded to Howard, who wound up the "Canon" with a slightly hurried jangle of notes and a disgruntled look. "Dearly beloved," he began, "we are gathered today in the presence of God to unite this man, Leonard Hofstadter, and this woman, Penny Carmichaels, in holy matrimony. This is truly an occasion for joy and celebration, but let us remember that marriage is not to be entered into lightly or in jest, and only after much consideration."

"Hmph," Beverly snorted.

"Mother," said Leonard quietly. To Penny's astonishment and delight, Beverly subsided immediately, and Penny had to repress an urge to grab Leonard and kiss him senseless.

The minister cleared his throat. "To honour that consideration, we ask the celebrants to state before the assembly the vows they here today make unto one another." He smiled. "Now, before I go any farther, have the two of you prepared your own vows?"

"Yes," said Leonard, even as Penny sheepishly admitted, "No." Then she frowned at Leonard, who was blinking at her. "Wait a minute, you wrote vows?"

"Well, yeah. I mean, we were going to do this yesterday, remember?"

"Yeah, but yesterday was just as much an impulse as this was!" Penny caught herself, cleared her throat and added to the minister, whose eyebrows had shot up, "But still a very seriously considered impulse." She turned back to Leonard. "Seriously, when did you have time?"

Leonard blushed. "Actually, I've, uh, kinda been working on them since we got engaged. I know them now better than I know the Next Generation episode 'The Best of Both Worlds'."

Raj whistled. "Now that's serious," he said helpfully to Penny. "He can recite that entire two-hour script from memory, you know."

"Yeah," said Penny, her smile pained, "I know."

"If there's a problem, I can take you through the formal vows," the minister offered.

"No, no, no, no." Penny waved him back. "It's okay, Leonard, go ahead. I'll wing it, say something mushy, you'll cry, we got this."

Leonard looked a little put out, but recovered himself. "All right. Um—Penny. We are made of particles that have existed since the moment the universe began. I like to think those atoms travelled fourteen billion years through time and space to create us, so that we could be together and make each other whole." He took her hands. "As a physicist, I try to discover and explain the mysteries of the universe, but I don't think I'll ever be able to explain how I could possibly have been lucky enough to discover you. I promise to love you, honour you, and cherish you always, for the rest of my life."

Penny gulped. "Wow," she whispered, guiltily aware she'd half expected something from Star Trek. Her vision blurred. And she'd been giving him a hard time about him crying? "Okay, um, wow. All right. Um . . . ." What would be that meaningful to him? Wait. That was it. She smiled.

"Leonard. If I had to sum up all the years you've been my friend, then my boyfriend, then my friend again, and then my fiancée, and then almost my not fiancée . . . well, anyway," she hastily caught herself at the confused looks from the audience. "If I had to sum all those years up in one word, it'd be: Learning. Every day I was with you, I always learned something new. I didn't always understand it—"

"More like 'rarely if ever'," said Sheldon.

"Sheldon, shush!" Leonard and Penny burst out together, startling Sheldon into a visible twitch backwards. He opened his mouth, then saw Amy's fierce glare and closed it.

Penny took a deep breath, then turned back to Leonard. "But one of the most important things I learned was that . . . for good or bad, we don't get as much input as we'd like into what happens to us. And as the last few days've made pretty clear, we don't get to decide the times we live in." She paused and held Leonard's gaze. "But as a wise old wizard once said, all we have to decide is what to do with the time that's given to us." Inside, she grinned at the look of delight on Leonard's face, but kept going. "And if that wise old wizard were here, I think he'd probably say to me, 'Don't you leave him, Penny!'" Suddenly her own throat was thick. Her cheeks felt wet. "And I don't mean to," she finished with some effort. "I don't mean to."

The minister frowned. "Isn't that from Lord of the Rings?"

"He loves those movies," said Penny triumphantly.

"I do, I really do," Leonard got out through the tears spilling down his cheeks.

The minister shrugged, clearly deciding not to bother. "Very well. Have you the rings?" Sheldon and Amy stepped forward and, after a brief juggling act involving the iPad, both ring boxes and a few annoyed comments from Wyatt and Susan, finally got the right rings into the right hands. The minister took them both through the final pledges, and suddenly the wedding band was on Penny's finger, and her breath stopped.

"You may kiss the bride," the minister finished, and only barely got the last syllable out before Penny threw herself at her husband—her husband! she thought giddily—and kissed him as enthusiastically and ecstatically as he was kissing her. Cheers and applause went up around the room; a little bit of her revelled in the noise, but most of her attention was consumed in the kiss. She felt as if she was floating, as if there was nothing under her feet at all. The noise seemed to be dying away in silence, as if she and Leonard were alone in the universe. Heat and light grew against her face, as if a beam of sunlight had broken over the two of them—

Something bumped the top of her head. Penny blinked, slowly disengaged from Leonard, and looked down. The two of them were hovering in mid-air just below the ceiling of the chapel, and Leonard . . . was glowing; an aura of golden light surrounded him, like a softer version of the blazing radiance he'd given off when he caught the sword last night in Vegas, or the light that had briefly seared from his eyes when he'd teleported Beverly away. Everybody in the room was staring up at them in awestruck silence; even Wyatt and Susan were gaping on Sheldon's iPad screen. Penny couldn't help but notice that Raj's cheeks looked even more tearstained than either hers or Leonard's. At least he hadn't swamped the whole room with his emotions this time; she supposed that was something.

She cleared her throat. "Um, honey," she whispered, "you're glowing."

"Oh, Penny, can you blame me? I've never been so happy in my life," Leonard murmured back, and moved in to kiss her again.

"No, no, honey, I mean—literally. Look at yourself. Look at us." Penny let go of him and drifted backwards, just enough to make it clear she wasn't holding him up. When his grin didn't falter, only looking slightly perplexed, she sighed. "Okay; look down."

He did, then blinked. For a moment he only stared. Then, abruptly, the golden light around him winked out and Leonard plunged to the floor, landing with a yell of pain. Raj, Howard, Stuart and Sheldon immediately hurried to his side and helped him up. Alarmed, Penny dropped down and landed much more deftly. "Honey! Are you okay?"

"Ow, ow, ow ow ow," Leonard muttered. He tried to put his weight on his ankle, then yelled again and shifted to leaning on Sheldon. "No, I don't think I am; I think that's an honest to God sprain."

Sheldon huffed. "Well, that's just remarkably inconsiderate of you, Leonard! How do you think you're going to be able to do your husbandly duties by your wife tonight if you're in pain? Or doped up on painkillers? You know, your predilection for showing off really does get the best of you sometimes."

"My predilection for showing off?!" began Leonard through clenched teeth, but any eruption was forestalled when Bernadette burst through the ring of groomsmen with a muttered, "Oh for God's sake!", dropped to her knees by Leonard's feet and grabbed his ankle. Sparkles of white light surrounded her hands; Leonard's mouth fell open. A few seconds later, Bernadette let go and glared up at him. "And that's the last freebie healing I'm doling out today, so you better not get yourself hurt again!"

"I told you they did weddings differently out in California, Wyatt," said Susan on the iPad.

Wyatt snorted. "Ah, they had rings, they had a kiss, some people got high, there was almost a fight—sounds like every wedding I ever went to. I'm going to break out a beer." He disappeared out of the side of the screen. Susan glared after him.

"Wait wait wait wait wait!" said Amy loudly. "Penny, the bouquet! You've got to throw the bouquet! Single girls, all the single ladies, line up over here!" With quite startling enthusiasm, Amy shepherded herself, Lucy, and Leslie to one side of the chapel and imperiously pointed Penny to the other side. Giggling, Penny complied. "Beverly!" Amy called. "You're a single girl now, get on up here!"

Beverly sighed. "I've already been married, Dr. Fowler," she said, "and I'm in no hurry to return to that so-called blessed state."

"For which the single men of the world remain devoutly grateful," said Alfred. Beverly scowled at him.

Mrs. Latham looked at Alfred, intrigued. "Oh, you're single, Alfred? Maybe I should get in on this too." She shot Alfred a charming smile. "One should never neglect pursuing opportunities of interest." She got up and joined the girls, who looked askance at her but made room. Beverly stared at her, then at Alfred, and with a sigh that sounded a lot like a snarl got up and took her place in the group, her arms folded and her feet tapping impatiently.

"Okay, we're ready, Penny!" Amy shouted, and Penny turned to face the wall, grinning. "On three! One!" Penny swung the bouquet with each count. "Two! Three!" She lofted the bouquet back over her shoulder. There came a volley of yells—and then a crunch, and a horrid thump. Penny whirled back around in alarm, then gaped.

A large dent had been smashed into the ceiling; Amy's tiara was embedded in the plaster. Leslie, Mrs. Latham and Lucy had all staggered apart in separate directions, as if shoved. Amy lay on the floor between them, the bouquet half-crushed in her hands, her glasses askew as she blinked dazedly. Fragments of ceiling plaster were strewn through her disordered hair. Beverly regarded her with a lifted eyebrow. "Well," she said. "That was a remarkably . . . enthusiastic reaction for a neurobiologist of your renown, Dr. Fowler."

"But I got it, didn't I?" Amy mumbled. Beverly rolled her eyes and reached down to help her up.

Navigating through the chairs, Page rolled up to the group as they congregated about Leonard and Penny, shaking hands. "Congratulations, Dr. Hofstadter," she said, with a faint but sincere-looking smile. "Congratulations, Mrs. Hofstadter." Penny grinned happily at the sound of her new last name. "I wish you both the best and I look forward to seeing you when you get back from whatever you're doing for your honeymoon. But," she added without missing a beat, "I'm afraid there's one small thing we've got to take care of before you go."

Leonard rolled his eyes. "Oh, God. Just one thing? You promise?"

Penny glowered. "This isn't going to involve saving the world, is it?"

"In a manner of speaking, perhaps," said Page calmly.

2:30 P.M.

Leonard had never seen so many cameras and microphones in his life. Even the original Power Pulse experiment hadn't brought this many press to the scene. Just outside the main door to the hospital, Senator Thorpe was standing in the sunlight at a mike-festooned podium with Director Belasco, and beyond them a crowd of reporters, photographers and journalists seethed. Lucy was clinging to Raj in what looked very like sheer terror, and Leonard wasn't at all sure he blamed her. Even Penny, who normally loved playing to crowds, was looking a little uncomfortable. Sheldon had gone nearly as white as liquid paper. Leonard couldn't help noting the convenient alacrity with which Mrs. Latham had found someplace else to be and neatly avoided the spotlight.

"One small thing? Helping save the world?" he gritted at Page.

"A quick introductory speech to reassure people that the genius intellects who created the Power Pulse are now taking the lead in sorting out its consequences," said Page serenely. "People just want to know somebody trustworthy is in charge, Dr. Hofstadter. That's not so much to ask, is it?"

"I'm not going to say anything that's a flat out lie, Agent Page," said Leonard.

"And we wouldn't ask you to. That's how they catch you, later," said Page. If she was aware her words were superbly unhelpful, she showed no sign of it. "Just introduce yourself and your team, tell the public as much about your new abilities as you feel comfortable saying, reassure them that the vast majority of metahumans are—" Her voice went flat. "—just people, and no more dangerous than anybody else . . . and that your team is working directly with the United States government on ensuring public safety and stability in these turbulent times."

Sheldon frowned. "Wait. If the majority of metahumans aren't dangerous, then why do we need to say we're ensuring public safety and stability? Isn't that a contradiction in terms?"

"It is indeed, Dr. Cooper, so it's one I would appreciate you not drawing attention to. As a matter of fact," Page added with a second look at him, "perhaps you'd better not speak at all." She put one hand to her earpiece. "Yes? —All right, we'll send them out." She rolled her chair back and out of Leonard's way, then gestured to the doors with a raised eyebrow.

Leonard glanced at Penny, who gripped his hand comfortingly. He took a deep breath, then strode forward, hoping the others were following. The noise of the crowd of reporters hit him in the face like a pillow as he emerged through the glass doors onto the front sidewalk, but with an effort of will he kept going until he stood just behind Senator Thorpe. ". . . like to introduce you now to the leaders of this new team of government partners, representing both the state of the art in metahuman science and themselves among the most powerful metahumans yet discovered," the Senator was saying. "They'll be working directly with the Commission for Metahuman Integration. Ladies and gentlemen, may I present Dr. Leonard Hofstadter and his colleagues." He stepped back and gestured Leonard to the podium.

To his vast relief, Penny stayed with him, coming straight up to the podium at his side, her head held high. Leonard cleared his throat. "Um, good afternoon," he said into the mikes. "My name is Dr. Leonard Hofstadter; I'd like to introduce my wife, Penelope Hofstadter." A great glee filled his stomach as he said the words my wife for the first time, but he kept it down. "Some of you may know her as the Angel, the metahuman who saved a crashing FBI helicopter on Thursday evening here in Pasadena, and who helped take a criminal metahuman into custody in Las Vegas last night—"

"They're calling that meta the Cave Troll!" yelled one reporter from the audience. "Is that his official name? Do you have an official name?"

The Cave Troll? Leonard groaned inwardly. "We haven't designated official aliases for anybody yet," he temporized. "In fact, that's probably the first thing we'd better get clear right now. Whatever you've read in comic books for eighty years, both good and bad, or seen on TV or in movies, you'd better forget most of it. Real life is not necessarily going to work the same way. For one thing, real life isn't under any obligation to be exciting or interesting."

"Coulda fooled me," said Penny, not quite far enough under her breath for the mikes to miss it. A rumble of laughter went through the crowd.

"What about the other metas sighted in Vegas?" called another voice, a woman this time. "Like the man that witnesses on the downtown monorail saw flying with anti-gravity boots?"

Howard looked indignant. "They're counter-gravity ska—oh, you know what, forget it," he finished morosely. At Leonard's gesture he came up to the mikes. "That, ah, that would be me," he said, recovering his confidence. "Howard Joel Wolowitz, at the public's service."

"Oh, Howie," Bernadette muttered, half exasperated and half fondly.

"The talents the Pulse awakened in me seem to be a greatly enhanced aptitude for engineering and technological breakthroughs," said Howard. "I believe that the devices seen in Las Vegas last night are only the beginning of what will be possible. I invite you, ladies and gentlemen, to consider the future, a future far more glorious and spectacular than any we have ever imagined! I invite you—"

"Yes, thank you, Howard," Leonard cut him off hurriedly, noting Thorpe's glare. "Perhaps to save time, we should just finish the introductions quickly . . . ." One by one he ran through the group, naming Lucy and Stuart as quickly as possible—he didn't want the press demanding credentials that didn't exist, beyond having the sheer bad luck to be at ground zero of the biggest accident in history. "And my partner, Dr. Sheldon Cooper, who devised the equation that made creating the Power Pulse possible." Looking rather sick, Sheldon waved feebly at the crowd of reporters. As if sensing weakness, the crowd suddenly exploded with shouted questions:

"Dr. Cooper! Did you know that the equation had the potential to create this kind of chaos?"

"Dr. Cooper! Is it true you can teleport anywhere in the world?"

"Dr. Cooper! Are you going to release the specs on the Power Pulse experiment to other world governments?"

"Dr. Cooper! What's your response to the claims that you and your colleagues should be held legally liable for the damages and injuries caused by abuse of meta-abilities?"

"Dr. Cooper! Are you single?"

"No!" yelled Amy, shoving her way up to take the podium by Sheldon's side and glaring at the young female reporter who'd asked that last question. She waved the crushed bouquet angrily. "No, Dr. Cooper is very much off the market at the present time, and—oh, no." She'd clearly caught Sheldon's teetering sway out of the corner of her eye, and turned to catch him just as he passed out. Thankfully, she still retained the superstrength she'd copied from Penny, and held his limp, unconscious body easily, flushed with both embarrassment and annoyance.

Leonard seized the opportunity and got back in front of the microphones. "Um, ladies and gentlemen, we'll be putting together a formal press release compiling the information we're free to disclose to the public at this time," he said. "In the meantime, we'd like to refer all media inquiries to the office of the, uh," oh God, what had Thorpe called it? "—the Commission for Metahuman Integration, and—"

"Dr. Hofstadter, if you don't mind!" The loud voice cut through the babble of the rest of the crowd. Leonard blinked. Where'd he heard that voice before? Then he saw the blond young man in a dark blue suit pushing his way through the crowd, and stopping in the front rank with his FBI badge held up. "Your group is going to ensure full compliance with all U.S. and California law, correct?"

"Agent Anderson?" said Penny, blinking. "Oh my God, you're all right! The last I saw you they were loading you into an ambulance! What are you doing here? How'd you recover so quick?"

Anderson nodded to Bernadette, who looked equally taken aback. "Dr. Rostenkowski-Wolowitz was kind enough to treat my injuries last night when it became clear my life was in danger. I never did get the chance to thank you, Doctor." He bowed his head, then turned back to Leonard with a grim look, as if even he didn't want to be doing this. "But you never answered my question, Dr. Hofstadter. You plan to obey fully all the laws of the land, correct? Including the law about not harbouring fugitives?"

"Nick," said Page, in a low voice of warning. "What are you doing?"

"My job, Angela," Anderson shot back. "You know, the one you used to do?"

In growing alarm, Leonard glanced to either side and then beyond the crowd, realizing that more dark-suited agents were gathering around them with casual but careful movements. His stomach sank. "Agent Anderson, if you've got a point here, please get to it?"

"A point? All right." Anderson sighed, closed his eyes, and then turned to point at Barry Kripke, who stood blinking with the rest of the group. He raised his voice, clearly making sure all the mikes around him could catch his words: "Dr. Barry Julius Kripke, you're under arrest for the ownership and distribution of child pornography across state lines."

The crowd erupted in an uproar. Leonard spun to gape at Kripke; Kripke threw up his hands, looking appalled. "Whoa, whoa, whoa!" he yelled. "No, no, no fwickin' way, okay? Wook, I downwoad a wot of pohn, I neveh pwetended not to, but if theah's anything on my computah involving anybody undewage, it's a total accident, awh wight? I'd never get involved with that kinda cwap! I mean, come on—" He turned to the reporters, spread his hands and tried for a jocular leer. "—I wike my wadies all gwown up and meaty, you know?!"

A torrent of boos and outraged shrieks went up. Kripke's smile collapsed into a look of sick dismay. Horrified, Leonard tried to think what to do—could there possibly be any truth to this? He'd never thought even Kripke capable of that level of sickness . . . but then, that was how people got away with it, wasn't it? Because nobody could believe it of them? But what if he handed Kripke over and he turned out to be innocent? Or hid him behind Mrs. Latham's lawyers and he turned out to be guilty? What if—

A fierce grip on his arm broke his spiraling panic. "Leonard," Raj hissed under cover of the noise, hauling Leonard around to face him. "It's a trap!"

Reflexively, Leonard fought back memories of Admiral Ackbar in Return of the Jedi. "What? What do you mean?"

"I mean even Anderson doesn't believe it!" Raj jerked his head at the blond FBI agent. Amid the crowd of yelling reporters, Anderson had folded his arms with an unhappy but resolute expression as the other FBI agents closed in on the podium. "This whole thing's just an act; it's all a big performance. He isn't feeling any of the outrage he'd feel if he really believed this! I don't think he even really wants to be here!"

"Well then why the hell is he here?!" Penny demanded. "Why're they doing this?!"

"I don't know!" Raj snapped back. "What do I look like to you, a mind reader? What should we do?!"

"Um—" Leonard cast an imploring look at Thorpe and Belasco, but neither man was moving; they must have decided that there was no public upside whatsoever to openly defying the FBI. Even Page, outraged as she looked, didn't seem to have any idea what to do. Maybe they should cooperate, Leonard thought. Even if this was a mistake, or a gambit, or worst of all an outright frame-up, it would probably be easier to go along for the moment and fix things up afterward—

One of the FBI men pushed past the flabbergasted-looking Leslie and gripped Kripke's arm, yanking the physicist off-balance. Kripke yelled in fear and rage and grabbed at the agent's hand—and with a low booming roar, a searing white ball of energy flared around Kripke's hand where it covered the agent's. The agent screamed, a hideous, agonized wail that cut through the roar of the crowd and silenced it instantly; he let go of Kripke and reeled back, holding up the smoking blackened ruin of his hand, still screaming. For a moment there was nothing except those horrid shrieks, and the low roaring of the blazing ball of power on Kripke's hand, the other agents too frozen even to finish drawing their sidearms.

Then the aghast look on Kripke's face suddenly twisted into fury. He flourished his other hand, producing a second burning sphere of plasma with another dull boom, almost too bright to look at. "Yeah, that's what you get when you scwew with someone who can twigguh nucwear fusion in his hands!" he yelled. "Scwew aww of you, I'm outa heah!" He held out both his hands to either side, palms flat down. Energy burst from them in twin plumes of blinding white fire, and Kripke jetted upwards like a rocket taking off, leaving the sidewalk a pool of steaming melted concrete in his wake. His first arc carried him nearly a hundred metres into the sky; then the jets flared out, and for a moment they saw him start to fall before he let go with another blast and leapt upwards in another great pulse of movement. Burst by burst, the plasma jets carried him into the distance, until he was nothing but a dimly flaring speck in the sky and then vanished at last.

The wounded FBI agent had passed out. Bernadette shook herself and ran to his side, grimacing at the damage. Before she could take the agent's burned hand, Penny suddenly came to life. "Bernadette, wait, just a minute!" she shouted. She picked up the podium and hauled it to one side, clearing the way so that every camera could see Bernadette and the injured man on the sidewalk. "I want you all to see this!" she shouted at the crowd, and at the millions Leonard knew must be watching. "Yeah, some of us aren't so nice. But some of us are heroes." She turned to Bernadette. "Hit it, Bernie. Do your stuff."

Bernadette swallowed, but didn't hesitate. She took the agent's wrist with one hand, touched two fingers delicately to the shrunken black smoking claw, and closed her eyes. Soft white light welled about the ruined hand. Gasps came from the crowd as, very slowly, the pinkness of healthy flesh came back into the hand, and it began to plump out and resume its former shape.

Trying to be as inconspicuous as he could, Leonard hurried around them, circled past the cooling pool of melted concrete, moved to Penny's side and slipped an arm around her waist. "That," he whispered in her ear, "was absolutely brilliant. Far as I'm concerned the smartest person in this entire group now isn't me or Sheldon; it's you."

Penny's smile held as much rue as pleasure. "Yeah, Mrs. Latham'd probably say the same thing," she murmured. The worry hadn't left her eyes. "God, Leonard, what just happened? Is Kripke actually a—a—oh, God, I can't even say it!" She grimaced.

"I don't know. I don't think so. But if it's a trick or a frame-up, then there must still be people in the government who want us all locked up," said Leonard, thinking aloud. "Fake up some charges against the most legally vulnerable one of us, get Kripke to give the rest of us up in return for clemency, ruin Senator Thorpe's credibility en route . . . ." He trailed off, and realized Penny had buried her head against his shoulder. Awkwardly, he hugged her.

"Leonard?" came Penny's muffled voice. "Can we just go home?"

Slowly, Leonard nodded. "Yeah," he said, voice firming. "Yeah." He turned to Thorpe and Belasco. "Senator? Director? We're leaving. You wrap this up."

Thorpe merely nodded. Belasco made a scoffing sound in his throat. "You guys think you're getting a car through this crush, you're—oh. Right." Leonard had barely heard the last words because the minute Thorpe nodded, Penny had tightened her arms round Leonard's waist and hoisted the two of them into the air. Leonard couldn't quite keep from seizing her in panic—whatever force had levitated him during their wedding, it was nowhere to be found now—but Penny only laughed. She picked up speed, and the air whipped coldly through Leonard's hair. The crowd of reporters, FBI agents, their friends, and the hospital all fell away. Looking up, Leonard thought he caught Amy—still holding the unconscious Sheldon—give them a salute and a smile before vanishing with distance.