Keep in mind that Sheldon has suffered a traumatic brain injury as a result of being whacked hard by Penny's steel firedoor. His thoughts are hardly linear and his imagination is running rampant lacking the filters normally present - even in Sheldon's mind.

Reparata

The Incident 4

"Dr. Cooper, quit fighting us! Nurse, grab his hands while I pull out the 'tube. You'll be able to breathe easier after it's out."

Sheldon fought the suffocating thing in his throat. Something was trying to pull his lungs out! He flailed his arms around hoping to knock whatever had attacked him off his face but something grabbed his wrists and stopped him.

Far off, like whispers, he heard 'you'll be able to breathe easier…' and suddenly he could and taking one then a second deep breath, he slipped back into unconsciousness.

"Oh, Sheldon, I've been wanting to do this since our 'I do's'. Let me get this tie off you and you'll be able to breathe easier…" She laughed and then ripped the tie from around Sheldon's neck and tore open his tuxedo dress shirt, causing buttons to fly. She ran the palms of her hands over his chest and up over his shoulders and then the shirt was hanging from his pants where it was still tucked in.

"Mrs. Cooper, a little decorum, if you please. Penny, I rented the tux and now I'll have to pay for the shirt!"

He didn't really care since he was busy carefully unbuttoning her wedding gown. He should have insisted on a zipper but she was wearing her grandmother's dress and it was from another age and all buttons - little tiny buttons that defied his large fingers.

"I'm glad we waited to have sex, Shel. This is our first time and we're married now and it's just so right! You were right, husband. I'm glad we waited although I was getting so damned frustrated…and when you whispered those naughty thoughts of yours in my ear during the Bride's dance, I thought I'd die right there…make love to me, Sheldon…"

"These damned buttons, Penny…"

Sheldon hated airports. People were either leaving others behind or waiting impatiently to greet returning loved ones. He was the exception. With Penny gone and his trio of male friends either estranged (Leonard) or feeling guilty about the last expedition (Wolowitz and Koothrappalli), there was no one to bid him farewell and adieu. It bothered him but he wouldn't let on.

He wasn't thrilled with his expedition's other members: Leslie Winkle and Klaus Daniken, both skeptics in his quest for the elusive monopole but he'd agree to skeptics to give his discovery more credence.

"Well, Cooper, where's Barbie? She too busy getting her nails done or playing with her yummy co-star?" Leslie had dropped the 'Dr. Dumbass' after Penny had threatened to rearrange her smile and 'correct that disgusting overbite you have, Dr. Tinkle' with a few fists in her face.

"She's on her way to Indonesia for some location shooting and I saw her off earlier this week. You're just jealous, Leslie. Admit it. She's one of the most popular actresses on TV and you're just a technocrat who repeats the successful efforts of others. Let's agree to bury our differences since the Arctic will try and kill us more effortlessly than either of us can manage."

That had ended it, at least for the moment.

Their charter flight was leaving LAX for Ottawa where they'd check in with the Canadian authorities and pick up their equipment. The next and final leg of the journey was by bush plane and Sheldon had arranged for a winterized kayak to be attached to one of the floats in the event that the wandering MNP was in open water. It should make a stable-enough platform for his readings.

Latitude 078' 47.497N
Longitude 103' 28.984 W
Ellesmere Island

"Cooper, you're nuts. Take the readings from the closest land-based point. You'll never make it out and back again in the time we have before the storm hits. The barometer has fallen through the bottom. We'll document your efforts via video camera and I'm certain that damned mythic monopole of yours is out there and will be found but damn it, Sheldon, do it on land!"

"Leslie, it's not enough to be 'close' to MNP, I have to be on it for the results to be unquestionable. I'll leave at first light and it's not but 20 miles and I'll check GPS, videotape my location and findings, run and transmit the experiment and results back to you. I trust you, Leslie, to do the right thing and not screw with my data like the others did. Right or wrong, it's the last chance for me."

"It'll be your last anything if the storm hits while you're out there in your damned kayak! Cooper, we have been swayed from the Dark Side and now support your beliefs. Don't throw away your life for something so…so unimportant. Think about your wife and the people who love you…" Klaus was desperate to keep Sheldon from dragging the kayak out over the ice flows and into clear water. He liked the nutball scientist and had reviewed his equations and gradually embraced string theory. What he proposed doing was simply suicide.

"As leader of this expedition, it is within my purview to decide and decide I have. I'm going. Get things ready here at the ice station for the storm. I'll be back within 8 hours but I'll start transmitting when I've got the experiment set up and ready to run."

He was tired and cold and the waves that periodically crashed over his little kayak had soaked him even through his survival suit. His equipment was set, he was at the MNP according to his GPS equipment and he initialized his equipment and flipped on the hand-held video camera.

"This is Dr. Sheldon Cooper at the MNP," he aimed the camera at the GPS readout and then continued, " and I'm initiating the final experiment to prove the existence of monopoles." He flipped a switch and said a prayer to the gods of science and discovery and then continued his narrative.

"I've run the experiment and the results are being transmitted back to my colleagues on the island. The storm is picking up and I'm heading back. This is Sheldon Coop – "

The wave broke over his little kayak, capsizing it and sending everything not secured into the icy black waters of the sea. Including Sheldon Cooper.

"Sheldon! I got the part! I'm gonna be on TV!" Penny ran into their apartment, the same one Sheldon had shared with Leonard until their marriage and then he moved across the hall into Penny's. Sheldon basically ignored Leonard except for their morning and evening drives to and from the University. Leonard was still smarting from Penny's blunt rejection of his efforts to rekindle their failed 'relationship'…and of course her marriage to Sheldon.

"See? I told you that you'd get it. All you had to do was relax and just be 'Serena Hatchett, evil and sexy wench and ne'er do well femme fatale'. I'm so proud of you, Penny!"

After numerous kisses that melted her and set her blood boiling, she dragged him to their bedroom. "Penny, I was right in the middle of…oh, Jesus, Penny…"

They were still wrapped up in one another when Penny mentioned 'travel'. Sheldon was running his fingertip over her tight buttock inscribing string theory equations when she said "I'll have to be on location for a lot of the shooting schedule but we'll have all the time together we need, honey. Besides, you're going back to the Magnetic Pole this summer, right? So we'll both be gone at about the same time."

"I was thinking about that. We've only been married a short time, Penny, and I don't think it's healthy for us to be apart – "

"Sheldon Cooper! You old softy. Shelly's gonna miss me…" she sing-songed and then whispered that she loved him and that they could do 'phone sex' every night and it would help the time pass. "I love you more than anything, Moon Pie, but it's my job, just like going up there and freezing your sexy butt off is yours. Just don't freeze off this," she muttered, squeezing his cock and giggling. "I need this and the guy attached to it. So you be careful up there. I'd die if anything were to happen to you, Sheldon. Even after 18 months it seems like we've been married only a few weeks. Is the honeymoon over?"

"Penny, I think you should see Dr. Stephanie about this constant nausea. Maybe you picked up something out there in the Indonesian jungle. You could have a parasite or something worse that's making you vomit so prodigiously."

"No, sweetie, it's not a parasite…well, it is, sort of. I'm pregnant, Sheldon. You, my love, are going to be a daddy in 8 months or so!"

"Uh…me? A father? ME? Oh, Penny, I'm not ready to be a father. I can hardly handle my own life. How can I be someone to look up to and emulate when people think I'm half-crazy? And what if she's…what if she's ugly like me and doesn't inherit your beauty and grace? Maybe it's the flu…yeah, the flu!"

"Nope, sweetie. I think that trip to the Arctic with Winkle and Klaus really did something to you. You knocked me up and we're going to be wonderful parents, Shel. We have money and brains and looks and our baby will grow up to rule the world!"

"Sheldon, he was in the house! We need to move right now, today. That damned psycho stalker was in our house, in our bedroom! Thank God I was out with Newt. God knows what that psycho bastard might have done!"

"Penny, the police have laid on extra patrols and I've taken steps to ensure our family's safety. Penny, meet Erasmus…he's Newt's bodyguard. And yours, of course, but he'll stay by Newt 24/7 and when the police catch the psycho he'll be Newt's best friend."

"Shelly, he's cute and all but he only weighs about 3 pounds…"

"He'll weigh 130 within a year and I've already arranged for him to go through guard dog training and also 'baby sitting' school for dogs. A boy needs a dog and this one just happens to be highly ranked in family protection."

"No, I mean, okay, Newt can have the dog but I want a bodyguard on Newt when I'm home. He's only interested in me and the studio says – "

"Penny, you and Newt are going to your folks until they catch this nut. I've already talked with the producer and they can film at a studio in Omaha, just not the exterior shots."

"You can't run my life like this, Sheldon. I have a career and – "

"You're my son's mother and my wife. I will damned well do what's necessary to protect my family. The matter is closed. Besides, once you drop out of sight the publicity about 'Where is Penny Cooper?' will be good for ratings. You leave for location shots in a few weeks anyway so what's the big deal? Your won't mind having the both of you for a few weeks."

Penny wrapped her arms around his neck and buried her face in his shoulder and mumbled, "The big deal is that you'll be here and I'll be there. Taking Newt to Greenland isn't that big a deal but leaving you behind, alone and vulnerable, that's a huge deal, Shel."

Sheldon started to say something when he heard a man's voice, a threatening voice, beside him. The stalker! He felt a 'pop' in his head and knew that he'd been shot and was probably dying.

ICU

"Dr. Cooper, can you hear me? Dr. Cooper?" The neurologist was stumped. He kept drifting in and out of consciousness and the EEG showed astounding brain activity. He should be awake and up and about but instead he just seemed to be in a coma although the Glasgow scales were all over the place and his posturing was normal.

He left the ICU enclosure intent on calling in some favors and getting second opinions.

Sheldon's eyes snapped open.

"Penny?" 'Where is she? We were just talking and…where am I? Hospital? Oh, crap, the stalker must have got us…' He panicked. The stalker was after his wife and would stop at nothing to have her. He needed to get up and help her.

"PENNY! I'M COMING…" he shouted. He tore out his IV and the electrodes that dotted his body and leaped from the bed and the floor rose up and smacked him hard.

Penny's Apartment

Penny was asleep and dreaming about her wedding day. She was walking down the aisle with her arm on her father's and smiling so broadly that it hurt her face. Her future husband stood before the altar flanked by his best man and various groomsmen.

The shrill trilling of her cell phone tore at her dream and she snapped "What!" when she answered the phone.

"Mrs. Cooper, this is Dorene at the ICU. You need to come down here as quickly as you can. Your husband is awake and frantic because you're not there. He thinks a stalker has you and your son. It's irregular, but can you bring your son along? We need to get him calmed down before he has a stroke!"

A/N: Leaving Wisconsin with my skin intact. What a effing zoo!