"The X-Advisors..."

"The X-Advisors..." Part LXVIII...

...

"Are you really calling Stein?" Bernadette eyed Leonard as they walked over to the payphone area...

How quaint...Leonard, peering... "Isn't it weird?" Bernadette grinned at him. "If only I had my Howie's engineering skills, I'd have had young Steve Jobs workin' for me by now."

"I have to try." Leonard noted. "He's our best contact besides little Sheldon, after all. And if Penny or anyone else made it...They'd've had to have tried to reach him. If he doesn't have any idea who I am, I'll just claim a wrong number or maybe just say I'm a colleague interested in his work..."

"Ok...But be careful, Leonard." Bernadette sighed. "For all we know, our Dr. Stein was in on this. And Susan is his daughter. Who knows what or how this one feels."

"Only alternative is Sheldon..." Leonard shrugged. "And much as I'd love to see lil' Shelly..." grin...

"Yeah...Best to keep him the last resort." Bernadette nodded, eyeing him as he stared at the pay phone...

"Let me do it..." she took phone. "It took me a day of waiting for the thing to ask me who I wanted, Siri style, before I learned how to do it." Punching numbers... "Hi, ya...Directory Assistance? Could you get me the number in Austin for Dr. Francis Stein, 513 Bakewell St? Thanks, honey." She handed phone to Leonard.

"But it is nice to know you always have something to club to death or strangle Susan or Dr. Francis with..." she noted, indicating phone. Leonard staring...

"And yeah, I call dibs, particularly for bashing or strangling Susan Stein..." she nodded, beatific look.

"Hi, yeah?" Leonard, to phone as he stared at Bernadette's calm face... "Sure...What? Ok...Bernie? You got a piece of paper?" She already having pulled same and offering it to him, with a pen.

We really have gone back in time, he thought.

"God, it's nice to be called 'Bernie' again." she smiled, tearing a bit as he wrote.

...

"Well, gentlemen..." Barry smiled at his luncheon companions. "This has been a plweasuwre." He rose. "But as Doctowr Stein's gwraciously allowed me the use of his office computewr to check some data..."

"Yes, of course, Barry." Stein nodded pleasantly.

"Something new?" Francis asked.

"Oh, just a few plasma equations that I wanted to check againwst the good doctowr's theowry on plasma distwribution in stable states."

"Really...? Is that related to your wormhole stability paper, Francis?" Dr. Frances eyed Stein who smiled, nodding. "I hope you'll let me know how it goes." Beam.

"Glwad too." Barry smiled.

"And don't forget Princeton is willing to go the limit to try and offer you a decent deal. Before you sign on the line with Frankenstein and co, here." Xavier grinned.

"I'm always open..." Barry nodded. "Gentlemen." He headed to the entrance.

"Interesting fellow..." Xavier noted. "Terrible about his friend."

"Yes..." Stein sighed.

"Francis?" Xavier eyed him. "What's wrong? You seem quite out of sorts today. Susan's all right, isn't she?"

"Oh, quite well, yes, thanks, Xavier." Stein nodded.

"And...?" sympathetic look. "No bad news regards Agnes?"

"No, she's been fairly calm..."

"Good...Well?" stern look. "There is something...What's up, ole friend? I'm sensing this little game to summon me to Austin was more than you and Maggie pulling my leg?"

...

"Oh, well..." Raj considered Summer's eager question as to the most likely places to find life off Earth... "I'd say the exoplanets, Kepler 682 and 445b, but in our solar system, Europa, Titan, Encephalus, and since that discovery of underground water, Mars, sub-surface."

"Water?" Summer blinked. "I know they think there's lots at the poles but I hadn't heard..."

"Yeah, this is very new..." Raj nodded.

Hmmn...Drs. Rajesh Koothrapali and Summer Glau-Koothrapali predict the discovery of water at the Mars equatorial canyon twenty-four years before it was actually discovered... Nice. He thought.

Well, perhaps best not to indulge that fantasy too much, given both Uncle Max and Aunt "Zana".

And you, my dearest Lucy...

...

"Hi...This is Leonard Hofstadter? Is Dr...? Oh, hi." He grimaced at the sound of young Susan's voice. Bernadette, in mid-conversation with Summer's mother, looking over.

"Well, not exactly...I'm a colleague of your dad's. Oh, experimental physics...Yes, like his friend Dr. Francis... Well, I'll try to reach him at his office. Could you tell him I called? Yes, Leonard Hofstadter...H-o-f-s-t-a-d-t-e-r, thanks." He hung up, eyeing Bernadette.

"I know." She nodded. "I've called twice, though I couldn't go through with trying to reach him since I had no proof." Sigh. "I got her both times."

"It's an awful thing to find you so want to kill a little kid like that..." she said, simply.

...

"Dr. Kripke?" Bernie Kim addressed Barry in the hallway outside the faculty dining room.

"Bernie Kim...And this is Harvey Lichtensten. We're Physics grad students..."

"Wreally?" he eyed the two. "Yes, you look it."

"Thanks..." Kim beamed. Barry repressing smile. "We'd heard you were here on campus and doing some interesting work with a computer algorithm..."

"Big fans, sir." Harvey cut in, offering smile.

"Oh?" noncommittal look. "Well, boys...I'm just using the facilities of youwr fine institutwion couwrtesy youwr Doctowr Stein while I see if the place fits me."

"So, we heard, sir." Kim smiled. "But we were wondering, about your algorithm...?"

"Uh-huh. It's just a seawrch test, not wreally centewred in Physics."

"Unless one considers the broader applications of Physics, sir." Harvey, beaming. "The Physics of...Love and attraction, for example." Attempt at lewd stare.

Oh, pwlease...Barry eyed him.

Still...

"Ah..." Nod. "I see. You two awre men aftewr my own heawrt and the lowvely heawrts of the beautiful women of this faiwr campus. Well, sadly, gentlemen...The pwrogwram in question had a few minowr flaws which led to some concewrns on the pawrt of the Computewr facility...And youwr secuwrity office. I've been asked, tempowarily to suspend fuwrthewr wowrk on it." Eyeing the two disappointed faces.

Hmmn...Accolytes, eh? Of the horny persuasion.

Might come in very handy...Though no need for them to know they're searching for the original Dr. Francis as well as Susan...And...

The solution...

"Of couwrse, gentlemen...If in the intewrests of Science, you might be willing to assist me, employing an impwroved, less intwrusive as pewr the Univewrsity system, vewrsion of the pwrogwram..." smile.

Bernie and Harvey eyeing each other...

...