"The X-Advisors..."

"The X-Advisors..." Part LVI...

The elevator dinged and opened on the lobby floor...

"All right...Take me out for a minute." Penny, breathing hard. "Sheldon? Go on down and check on her. See that she's staying here and what room she's in and whatever you can find out about her diagnosis, if it's real or whatever. Sheldon?"

"George..." he hissed.

"Yeah, sure...Promise me..." she looked up at him.

"I swear...She won't hurt Amy. Or anyone else."

"No... Well, yeah, that too. Promise me you'll leave her to me. I don't want you to throw your life and Amy's away. Promise me that, most of all." She eyed him. "I don't have anything left but you...And Amy..."

"I'll promise." He nodded. "If you never say that again. Think what Leonard would say, he'd be so angry at you. And I won't see you hurt my friend. I tole you that, remember?" Hard stare. "He lives on in you, Penny. Don't kill him again."

"I remember. God bless you, George. Ok..." she eyed Margaret. "You win, Gran Mag. Take me out for a minute and we'll go back up. George? I want a full report in thirty minutes, by phone if you have to."

"Right cha are, lil' lady." Nod. Hastily stepping back on elevator down as the others got off.

"Amy?" Penny turned to her in the foyer. "I'm sorry if I scared you...I'd never do anything that would get you and Sheldon in trouble..."

"I never thought anyone would be so good a friend to me, Penny. Thank you." Amy smiled, leaning to kiss her.

"'Leonard lives in me'...Your idea?" Penny smiled wanly at Margaret as the older woman began pushing her to the front exit. "I know Sheldon's become much more empathetic but that sounds like therapy."

"Very good." Margaret smiled. "I know you'll want to honor Leonard in Physics but I think you should consider Psychology, you're a natural."

...

"How was Susan, the younger?" young Sheldon asked Dr. Stein as he and Stein made their way to the lecture hall for Stein's class in "Applied Quantum Mechanics", leaving Kripke to his fwrustwrated efforts to use the current Internet to track Susan's and/or Xavier's actions.

"Curious about both you and your brother. I think 'George' made a hit with her." Sigh. "Cooper, I know you all must hate my daughter, but..."

"I don't hate her, sir. Especially her current self. I feel sorry for her." Sheldon noted. "But I didn't lose all my friends, family, and my world to her actions. I don't think we can expect the others to share my sympathy."

"No. And I understand it. I just hope somehow..." Stein, bleak look.

"If we can, her life can be saved too..." Sheldon nodded. "It doesn't have to be the same outcome for her either. We're committed to that, too."

"Her mother was a wonderful person once...I still care for her. It breaks my heart to know Susan...My greatest fear..."

"I know. I'm sorry, Doctor." Sheldon patted him.

"We are remarkably alike, Mr. Cooper." Stein smiled. "I felt that the day I first saw you in my office. I'm glad that at least all this has given us a chance to know each other better."

"It's been a privilege. I'm sorry if my feelings for Dr. Brown interfered before. I did love him very much."

"A fine man, from all I knew of him." Sigh. "My friend Xavier was a fine man too, once...Now, I hope. I still can't grasp what changed him so..."

"He lost everything and saw no hope..." Sheldon shrugged. "I think I can understand it, if not approve his actions. I wonder..." careful look at Stein. "If you or I hadn't be so lucky as to find such good friends as we did...If I'd not met Leonard Hofstadter or you, Xavier Francis...If we'd been alone...Seeing our lives coming to an end, alone."

"Yes...And that breaks my heart most of all, Sheldon. I feel I must have failed my old friend in the future. Was I so concerned with Susan and my own life that I forgot he needed me?"

"I can't believe you would do that, Doctor. But life can tie us up...Perhaps you just had too many demands at once."

"Perhaps." Sigh. "But perhaps, in this existence I can make amends and stand ready to help his other self."

"I shall do the same for Leonard...Particularly in the later future, beyond my counterpart's era when I have no guide." Sheldon nodded solemnly. "Though right now, I'm trying to do it for Barry."

"Yes...I see that. It's kind of you." Stein smiled. "I gather he wasn't quite so close to older Sheldon."

"No. And yet he cares, in his odd way. There's a goodness to him in spite of his bizarre attempts to compensate for his inadequacies with women and life. Though I imagine much of his current searching on the 1996 net involves attractive poorly dressed women." Smile.

"I won't deny there's something to be said for the ability to appreciate such..." Stein noted, returning smile. "Though perhaps that's a conversation best put off for a few years yet in your case."

"Perhaps. Certainly best not to mention such to my Amys or her grandmother."

"Certainly...Though, frankly...Margaret was a bit of a wildcat in her day, till she settled down with Leonard Horowitz, much to the regret of the Princeton student body, male."

Sigh at Sheldon's look. "Again, a conversation best left to the future."

"I shall look forward to it..." nod.

"Dr. Stein!" several calls...Anxious grad students approaching where they stood by the lecture hall door.

"Duty calls, Cooper. See you inside." Stein beamed. "Keep a close eye out...And your usual sharp edge. This will be a rigorous one. I expect seventy percent of them to be lost within fifteen minutes, so I'll need your participation."

"Looking forward to that, too, Doctor." Smile.

...