Hello! Here we are once again, another chapter! This one starts from the last Leonard's POV part in the last chapter, though this one is with a different POV. I tried to make a mixture of emotions down there, I really hope it works. Also there is a scene that… well, you will understand when you get there. Thank you, thank you all for your comments, favorites and kudos, it really means a lot to me.

As you know I don't own the series (sadly), no, really, not even in DVD, so I rely on Warner Bros channel to constantly air it to watch the episodes, which is why I'm not sure if the scenes from the past that I mention down there are in order or if they belong to the same or different chapters (I promise to investigate), so once again I hope you enjoy this new one, and thanks again for reading!

5. – Experimentation.

Once Penny saw Sheldon arrive with Leonard, things got complicated, maybe it was because they had just experienced a 'long distance' communication, their minds were in a very sensible state and they could actually feel their shared anxiety and confusion.

Penny could also feel Sheldon's curiosity, he was afraid and confused, of course, but at the same time he was really excited, his natural instincts made him want to know more about what was going on, experiment, learn… this man was really in love with science, he was also worried, questioning himself.

Sheldon on the other side was already cataloging the overload of emotions running through his and Penny's connection, the blonde was nervous, starting to panic even, she was unsure of the situation, afraid of the consequences; there was also some very different emotions that he hadn't expected to feel, like relief, and slight happiness, that was contributing to calm her, but there was also admiration and trust…

"Aren't you coming in?" asked Leonard, suddenly pulling them out of the weird atmosphere they had just fallen into. Without paying attention to their synchronized moves they turned to look at him.

"I almost forget about him" said Penny.

"Although it should be impossible, I almost forgot about him too" was Sheldon's reply. Again, without noticing the way they were moving, they turned towards the door and walking into 4A, going straight to the couch and sitting down, waiting for Leonard to enter.

"He looks wary, almost frightened…"asked Penny, watching Leonard go to the kitchen.

"Would you like something to drink?" asked Leonard from the refrigerator, from where he grabbed a bottle of water.

"I assume it's because we've been unable to act normal… all this hyper-sensibility it's making it difficult for us to regain control over ourselves" said Sheldon.

Penny then became aware of that fact, the connection between them had at some point started to feel natural, not bothering her at all, and once in the same frequency of Sheldon's mind from the distance she hadn't noticed that they had been acting strange in front of Leonard. Fortunately Sheldon managed somehow to pull out of that and speak normally.

"Leonard" he said, and Penny could feel Sheldon's resolution behind a very strange idea "I need to talk with you."

Suddenly, without Penny being prepared to receive such amount of information, in her mind appeared information of different graphics, one of those was a chart with data about her, things that Sheldon knew about her - unconsciously her mind made some changes to it – and another one with Leonard's data, a series of questions and prepared experiments also ran through her thoughts making her feel dizzy for a moment. All the while Leonard walked towards them and sat down on his chair.

"You want to experiment on us!" she almost shouted in her mind, Leonard's reply however made her look back to him.

"What is it Sheldon?" he asked.

"I have a request to make" Yes, can I use you two to get the results of a very weird experiment I have in mind was Penny's thought, and she could almost see Sheldon rolling his eyes.

"What is it?" Poor Leonard, he didn't know what he was getting himself into.

"I can assure you: is nothing dangerous. I've been pondering the girl's experiment, the other day you told me about what you had noticed while interacting with the others and since Penny and I weren't able to 'learn' anything about that experience I was wondering if you would mind a little experimentation" the realization of his roommate intentions were obvious in Leonard's change of expression.

"What kind of experiments? Let me tell you Sheldon that if your experiments put us in danger somehow I…" By that moment Penny had been already presented with a fresh mental image from Sheldon stating what was going to be the main activity during his experiment.

"Relax, Sheldon only wants us to spend some time together" she said probably resting too much importance to the situation, if Sheldon's scowl was anything to go by. He nodded and then stared into space for a moment.

"Sheldon!" she said, pulling him out of wherever he had gone.

"Sorry… As I was saying, I've been noticing the subtle changes that you mentioned in my interactions with Penny, but I need to compare it with someone else, and since you and I spend a considerable amount of time together I think I could be able to notice more if we spend time doing ordinary things" this made her curious, what kind of changes had he noticed? Was it really that important to compare them to Leonard's?

"Why are you really doing this?" she asked looking at him, while Leonard once again looked at them as if they were strangers.

"Because, the connection between him and you should be strong, not comparable to ours, especially because you were his girlfriend. I want to know how much the original experiment affected you, it could be useful"

"Hang on. What you're saying is that if I had been connected with Leonard when the lighting stroked, we – Leonard and me – would be having a stronger psychic connection?"

"Telepathic. But yes, that's what I was thinking…"

"But…" in that moment Leonard cleared his throat, making them turn to look at him again a bit ashamed.

"Should I leave you two alone? I kind of feel like I'm interrupting something…" said the experimental physicist rubbing the back of his head but with and obvious tinge of anger in his voice.

"Don't be silly!" said Penny composing a smile for him. "Let me tell you something Sheldon, I don't like people playing with my feelings, so keep that in mind while you do this"

A wave with a mixture of fear and seriousness coming from Sheldon's mind was everything she got in response.

"And… what are we suppose to do? Sheldon?" said Leonard joining his hands and leaning his elbows over his knees.

"It's actually something quite simple. I want us to hang out as we usually do, we can watch a movie, play games – including videogames, I want to observe and make some comparative notes to know if it actually made any difference between you and me, or you and Penny."

"H-hold on. Basically what you want is to see how much the experiment improved our friendship… have you… what kind of differences have you noticed between you two?"

"Well, I cannot tell you for sure, I need data to compare it. After all you're my best friend; in theory our friendship should have improved a higher percentage than my friendship with Penny. And between you two, seeing as you were once in a romantic relationship, things should have changed as well." Leonard thought about it for a moment. Penny on the other hand was trying to understand the real purpose behind this experiment; Sheldon had felt something akin to shame while saying all that, what he had said was not completely a lie, they had noticed huge difference, something that couldn't be so easily compared, but technically the experiment should have enhanced their other relationships as well, so Sheldon's behavior was probably more linked to what he was going to feel through his connection with her when she interacted with Leonard.

This was going to be an interesting evening…

At first the trio stood there on the couch for a moment, Penny was starting to get used to the quiet whispers that usually came from Sheldon's mind when there was no active communication, she silently wondered if he could hear something like that as well…

Leonard seemed nervous in his chair, looking from her to Sheldon as if expecting something to happen…

Finally Sheldon cleared his throat and straightened on the couch.

"As part of this experiment I would like you to tell me something you did together, preferably something you both enjoyed and that it's within a safe rating, I don't want to hear anything about your 'night activities'…"

Leonard turned his head to one side, closing his eyes, probably not believing that Sheldon had just referred to their… ehm, sexy moments in bed. Penny immediately felt blood rush to her cheeks, partial images and a lot of warm feelings that she had experienced with Leonard coming back to life.

"I said 'safe rating' Penny!" said Sheldon's voice in her head, she looked at him, noticing - slightly amused - the faint blush on his cheeks.

"Uhm… How about that time when we… no we ended up in bed that time… or maybe when we… no gosh, was it sex the only thing we had in common a part from Sheldon?"

"How about our first date? Not the very first date, the 2.0 version?"

"Oh, yeah, that one will do, we had a very interesting and different evening that day" said Penny immediately picturing images of their date, where Leonard had introduced himself and they had then started talking in a way that was far more casual than her ex-boyfriend's funny attempts when they first met.

"Yeah, or maybe that time when we went out as friends, and we ended up at that bar…" again images flood her mind with Leonard's words; they do shared a few things after all.

"Sure, if I'm not mistaken, that day… I had a nice chat with a writer… you allowed me to keep talking to him, but you were so jealous and when he left, you were making a lousy effort to talk with that woman… what was her name? Paula?" That day both had been on the rope, trying to pretend that they had already moved on…

"I don't really remember... but yeah, that were really good times, remember the movie we saw earlier that same day?" asked Leonard, and an echo of his comments about her likes of romantic movies resonated in her head.

"Leonard, that wasn't a movie, that was a documentary… and no, I frankly don't remember it, I think I actually fell asleep at some point" a little town and water were really the only things she could remember about that torture.

"But you did used it to try to impress that 'writer'" said Leonard making the quotation marks with his hands and frowning.

That was it, suddenly the spell was broken once again, she had tried, she had even managed to give him another chance as a friend, but the truth was that Leonard was incapable of moving over the insecurity line, he was always thinking that she would cheat on him, or leave him, or lie to him, seriously, when she was his girlfriend she had at some point decided to try it for him, to make a serious commitment to keep their relationship standing, but he couldn't do it for her. No matter how much she proved that she had grown and was ready to move forward, Leonard had to stay in his bubble and think that every mistake, every friend she talked about, every time she had something else to do, she was somehow not being faithful to him.

She couldn't remember when her friends had stopped visiting her, when her social circle had narrowed so much that she now only had Amy and Bernadette as women in her social group, and when all those funny guys had stopped inviting her to their parties… Leonard was a great guy, really, but she had already let go of many things for him that there was no much left, it angered her that he used to act the victim every time something like that happened, it wasn't all her fault, and when she had tried to make him see that, he had feigned offense and broke up with her. It still hurt a little to see the man, but they had become part of her life and she refused the idea of letting go of them too.

Sheldon's hand landed hesitantly on her shoulder, patting her slowly but silently supporting her. A warm feeling flooded her when she looked at him, it was odd how much his very simple gestures meant for her, maybe it was because she knew how difficult it was for him to express his emotions and touch people at the same time.

"I think that was enough, I have enough data from that little conversation of yours…"

"Are you sure? With so little?" asked Leonard.

"Yes. I still need to talk with you, we don't have all day. Oh, and I will probably ask you to do it again in the next few days so, try to make a list of different scenarios shared with Penny that had caused you different emotions, it could be a good idea for you to do that as well Penny" said Sheldon standing up and walking towards his computer, taking a note book and making some notes in it.

After speaking with Leonard for a while, Sheldon made a pause and explained the next part of the experiment; he proposed they watch a movie; the three of them went for one movie they really wanted to see and then they tried to choose one, surprisingly Sheldon allowed the debate to start and made no complaints when a movie was finally chosen – which was Leonard's by the way.

It was maybe because it presented a good story with enough action and romance that none of them could really complain. There was one problem though, they hadn't mentioned it yet, but it was inevitable.

Every now and then Sheldon would look at them, as if taking in their expressions after one or two scenes; he then made a self check – fairly inaccurate in Penny's opinion – of his own emotions about the movie before writing them down on his notebook.

And then it happened…

Leonard risked a glance towards his friend, watching his eyebrows rose at the sudden heated scene playing on the screen.

Penny suppressed a smirk by pressing her lips together and tried to keep watching the movie, though she could feel Sheldon's struggles to ignore the moans of the couple 'busy' on the screen.

Sheldon shifted uncomfortably on his spot, he usually avoided movies with any sort of sexual content; the three of them stayed quiet during the scene which for some unexplained reason was longer than expected.

When the movie ended Leonard stood up, mumbling something about the bathroom. Penny on her place on the couch was leaning against the back looking at the ceiling. She sighed, distractingly ignoring Sheldon's thoughts and mental comparisons with surprisingly good graphics of "Day one" in his experiment.

It hadn't been that much time, since the last time she had… taken someone to bed. She could usually handle the problem by herself, but suddenly she was feeling the urge to look for someone… It wasn't a good idea at all, that meant she had to know somebody, start a relationship and wait for it to get her there… Ugh, maybe it hadn't been such a good idea to grow up and start thinking that it was better to have a serious relationship with someone, but really a one night stand just wasn't for her anymore.

The next part of the experiment to end up the night was playing some videogames. To say that it had been the most interesting part of the night was not enough. Leonard and Sheldon had a very good match in pairs, and then a really tough battle against each other in Halo.

Of course being a natural and really good player of that game, beating Leonard wasn't hard. They had had good communication during the pair match, and though they had been nearly beaten there they had managed to win in the last minute.

Playing with Sheldon was a complete different thing. Leonard had really watched them amazed in the pair match, they had tried to keep in mind that communication during those matches was crucial and Leonard needed to hear them speak, but as the game moved on their phrases became simple or very few words, making for a very instinctual game.

"Penny"

"Done!"

"Sheldon!"

"There already!"

The most exciting part had been the match face to face, at first… the match begun with them moving their characters on the screen to specific locations, but their thoughts kept being 'intercepted' by the enemy, they really tried to beat the other, trying different tactics, but failing at some of them, it was becoming the longest game they had ever played.

With the monotony of the fight, their thoughts focused on the strategy and the avoidance of movements that they thought the rival would use, at some point they started to mirror each other even on the screen. The end of the match was so simple that it was disappointing, a bomb thrown at certain bush at the same time, hitting its intended target and killing them both was not the way to finish a good game. It did however make them notice that they had fallen into that trance without noticing, and if Leonard hadn't fall asleep during the last part – probably because of the boring simultaneous moves – things would have been hard to explain.

So by the time Penny returned home, frustrated and tired she found no trouble to fall asleep.

The place around her looked different than how it had been the last time she had saw it, the walls around her were now of the same height and there was a roof, the place was still a mess, but at least she could see the floor. There was something new. A window, right in front of the puff couch she was currently sitting on.

Through the window however there was not a sight of the outside, but a sight of the inside of another place, a room with walls filled with books, a chair, a TV screen… it was probably Sheldon's place.

Curious she stood up and walked towards the window, the crystal on it was very thick; it will probably take something really heavy to break it. Sheldon wasn't there, or at least he was no where to be seen, she whistled impressed, the man really had a good taste, the place was neat, ordered and clean, everything he could want it to be, and it also looked hi-tech.

She looked back to her place, wondering why she hadn't thought of putting a TV in here.

Pop!

Well, speaking of the power of the mind, she now had a TV – and it looked a lot like the one Sheldon had in his place (she looked through the window to check, his was still there). Great, if she could add things that easily to this place, maybe it will be easier to clean it up as well… Nope, the mess on the floor was the same.

"It's a mental representation Penny, you have to put things in order first…" she thought to herself.

Eyeing the mess and feeling lazy at the moment she walked outside. There was still no floor in that zone, and it was still difficult to convince herself that she was not going to fall by stepping outside.

"Sheldon?" she asked out loud expecting him to come out of his place "Sheldon, are you there?" she asked once again approaching the bubble like wall in the middle of the place that kept their minds from blending together.

And then she noticed, letters, numbers and graphics were appearing over the white walls of the house, from the distance it seemed like some kind of light game, producing moving shadows over the surface, well, he was the brilliant mind, this probably meant that he was still working on the experiment and that he was not going to be available to speak with her tonight in this place. Well that allowed her to dream with what she wanted…

Now if only she knew how to get out of this place and have a nice dream instead…

She entered the house again and started picking up things from the floor, placing them in different zones of the place, making some furniture appear to accommodate things in them and letting a song play around her – it was amazing she didn't need a radio or a CD, just thinking on the song was enough for her to hear it – while she worked.

When she felt she had done enough for the place that night she returned to the puff and dropped herself over it. Well this was a good moment to review those scenes from the movie!

It was some kind of dream after all, a fantasy… And she was on her side, so it won't affect him… probably.

The TV turned on and started playing the movie once again, from the point where the sex scenes had started; she relaxed on the puff and allowed her hands to roam over her body, her imagination and experience providing her with some very real sensations and pictures of the handsome man in the movie touching her as the leading actress, allowing herself to be pulled in the fantasy and let go…

Sooo… I did mentioned somewhere that the rating could change in future chapters, its just implied and I don't really write the whole explicit experience when it comes to mature content, so in any case if the rating actually changes it will be mild and gradual (if you've read 'Not a secret…' you know how gradual it can be – just in this one it will be a little bit faster). Please let me know what you think about it, I can always keep the story on the same track… Possibilities, possibilities… I'll start working on the next chapter soon, until next one.