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Look, dude, we can fight about the farmers' market later. You need get over here right now. And, uh, bring some of your mom's Valium. Do you have any silver-
"You're going to have to talk to me again at some point, you know."
"I have to do no such thing!" Sheldon snapped his mouth closed and glared at Penny, who sat back with a smug "Ha!"
He tried again. "It-"
"-totally counts, even if I tricked you," she finished for him.
"It does not!"
"Sheldon, face it: I win." She punctuated her statement with a snap of her teeth, sharp and white.
"Do you-" Howard cleared his throat and started over in a register closer to his normal voice. "Do you guys have any idea what they're saying?"
Raj peeked over the top of the kitchen island. "Who cares what they're saying? Should we really be this close to them?"
"I don't know, they seem pretty docile. Let's just try to sort of herd them down the hallway, okay? I managed to get some food and water in his room before they- Well, before we knew for sure."
Raj and Howard stared at Leonard, then looked at each other, then ran for the apartment's front door.
Leonard rolled his eyes and headed for the couch. "Like I didn't see that coming."
Hey Raj, it's Leonard. Sheldon and Penny were in some kind of- They both got bitten by something, I guess. I don't know. Could you meet-
"Look, not that it isn't, you know, tons of fun being locked up with you and all your ... whatever this stuff is, but how much longer do you think we'll be in here?"
Sheldon peered out the window, craning his neck to see the swollen moon just peeking out from behind the thin cloud cover. "Provided that there's any truth whatsoever to the apocryphal stories with which we're familiar-"
"What the hell are you talking about?"
"We'll be in here for at least a day."
Penny made a noise like a teakettle about to boil over.
"Give or take several hours, of course. I can't be precise without an accurate lunar calen-"
He turned back to her as she bit off another chunk of her steak. Her tongue swept out to catch the juices before they ran down her chin.
Sheldon whimpered.
Mr, uh, Leonard Hoofstander? This is Jackie at Memorial Hospital. You're listed as the emergency contact for-
"None of this would be happening right now if Raj had driven me home like I'd asked," he complained for the umpteenth time. Penny thought his drawl was becoming more pronounced by the minute as he paced back and forth, shooting wary glances out the window.
"Just shut up already," Penny moaned. "I can't take your stupid yapping anymore." She curled up tighter on the floor, nuzzling her face against the carpet and covering her face.
Sheldon cast a glance at her over his shoulder. "You're never going to stay warm that way. The more surface area you have in contact with the air and floor, the faster your body heat is going to flow away from you. It's simple thermodynamics."
He tumbled down in a heap next to her when she snagged him behind one leg and pulled. By the time she'd adjusted her position to complement his, he was already starting to yawn.
"I think they laced the steak with some kind of soporific agent," he said, sounding altogether too agreeable to the idea.
His chest was warm under her cheek, the scrawny muscle giving just enough padding between his ribs and the bones of her face.
"If you mean they drugged us, um, duh?" Penny dug her nails into the soft skin of his belly when he started to sit up. "No, come on, I don't want to argue. I just want to sleep for, like, ever."
"That's hardly a practical response," he said around a yawn, curling back into his previous position. "But maybe after some rest..."
Whatever he meant to happen after they rested, she never found out. Instead, she stopped fighting against her own yawns. "I really need to work on that whole vegetarian thing."
Sheldon made a faint whuffling noise in response.
"Yeah, good luck with that now," Penny mumbled as she covered her face again.
The nature of my emergency is that this jackass got us chased by I don't even know what and now we're both bleeding all over the damn-
The sun had long since set when Penny awoke. She stretched muscles that felt as alien as her reflection looked in the window. Her neck twinged when she moved her head too far and a groan slipped out. Before she could draw another breath, Sheldon sprang at her from a few feet away. They landed in a tangle of limbs and rolled across the floor, each of them fighting to get the upper hand. Sheldon yelped as they banged into the wall; Penny took advantage of his momentary surprise to pin him to the floor. She was panting so hard she was almost whining.
He bared his teeth.
Penny, it does no one any good to leave incomprehensible voicemails. I may be- Oh, you just pulled up. Well, if you were already on your way, why didn't you answer your-
"Let me guess: we're not going to talk about this," Penny mumbled. She stretched, slow and lazy in the pool of sunlight.
Next to her Sheldon kept his face turned toward the open window, his eyes closed as the breeze blew over them. "What is there to talk about?"
"Gosh, you know, I bet if you think about it really hard you could probably come up with something."
She had almost drifted off again when he finally did. His chest vibrated under her head, making the hairs on the back of her neck stand up.
"I wonder if your birth control is effective under these circumstances."
Penny's eyes flew open.
Sheldonmybattery'sabouttodiebutI'monmywaykeepwalk-
"I guess now we have to move to London." At Sheldon's blank look, Penny kept going. "You know, drinks at Trader Vic's? Get a big bowl of beef chow mein?"
"I prefer tangerine chicken."
"No, it's a-"
"But only if it's authentic tangerine chicken. You know I can tell the difference when they try to pass off orange chicken as tangerine chicken."
She sighed. "Yes, I know."
"In any case, I think it would make more sense to move to Geneva, not London. Professor Hawking would probably petition the Crown to deny me a visa, anyway."
"Okay, I was just trying to make a joke."
"Oh." He paused for a minute, apparently trying to work out the original reference. "Oh. No, I don't know what you're talking about. Now, if you'd said something like 'I hope we don't wake up in the zoo' I might have gotten the reference. Although I don't see how it would even be possible for us to wake up in a zoo. Surely Leonard wouldn't be so callous as to have us transported while we're incapacitated."
"Oh my God, just forget I said anything."
"Well, that's hardly likely."
Penny, this is Sheldon. Again. I tried calling the restaurant but they said you weren't working. I distinctly remember that you said you were- Oh, good Lord, now you're calling me-
When Penny woke again the raw, heavy smell of the leftover meat made her stomach turn. The breeze blowing through the screened window was cooler and nowhere near as sweet as she remembered, but she couldn't tell if the difference was in the wind itself or in her nose. She poked Sheldon in the ribs before clambering over the side of the bed and pulling on the shirt and shorts she found folded on top of his dresser.
Sheldon sat up, dragging a hand across his jaw. He looked startled by the rasp of his stubble. Penny tried not to smile as he gaped down at his hands and chest, but she couldn't hold back a snort when he pulled the sheet away to examine the rest of his newly restored body.
He yanked the sheet up to his chin. "How long- What- When did-"
"I dunno. I woke up like this and you were like that." Penny checked her reflection and pulled back her hair in one hand. A new elongated ring of teethmarks was just visible at the base of her neck, the skin unbroken but reddened and likely to bruise. The bite mark on her calf - she'd lost the bandaging sometime during the night - didn't look half as good, but at least it was healing faster than she'd expected.
In the mirror, she saw Sheldon lift the sheet again. "Don't worry; you're all there."
"I'm more concerned with whether there are any lasting effects."
He let the sheet pool in his lap when Penny sat at the foot of the bed, facing him, and stretched out her legs so they bracketed his.
"So is now when you start freaking out about this?"
"You're going to have to be more specific."
She waved her hand in the air, trying to convey what she couldn't put into words with a sweeping gesture that encompassed the room and everything in it.
Sheldon raised an eyebrow. "In the last thirty-six hours, I discovered that Raj is superior to me at two things, was attacked by a wild animal, transformed into what I'd always thought was an imaginary creature, and mated with the last person on Earth I would have chosen were I in complete control of my faculties."
It was Penny's turn to raise a brow.
"Oh come on," he protested, "you can't blame me for not choosing to act on what was, until last night, completely beyond the realm of possibility."
She crossed her arms. "You're not exactly helping yourself there, buster."
So he regretted it already; that wasn't much of a surprise. She'd certainly been there before. It might take a little while for the urge to punch him right in the face to subside, but it would go away. Eventually. The faster he got back to acting like his normal jerky self, the easier it would be.
What was a surprise, though, was the queasy, anxious feeling welling up in her belly at the prospect.
"Now you're just being willfully obtuse," he shot back. "Obviously, our circumstances have changed."
Penny forced a smile, almost believing it herself. She curled her hands in her lap and looked away. It took a minute to squeeze her next words out past the lump in her throat; it felt like her entire body was rebelling against them. Sweat popped out on her brow and under her arms, and her stomach lurched like she'd just stepped out on stage. "Look, whatever. Let's just pretend it never happened and we'll-"
Sheldon's hands closed around her ankles, the grip tight but not painful as he stared her down. Penny curled her hands around the hem of her shorts to keep from reaching for him, her pulse already quickening and pounding in her ears.
"I don't think we can do that," he rasped, his voice growing thicker and rougher with each word. "I don't think that's an option."
She could see his narrow chest starting to heave as his breathing sped up. When his gaze slipped from her face and his tongue darted out to sweep across his bottom lip, Penny kicked out of his grip and lunged forward.
Sheldon went down easy this time, letting her pin him against the bed with minimal effort. She could feel the excess adrenaline and whatever the hell else bubbling in her bloodstream, sparking through her brain. Her lips scraped over teeth that seemed too big for her mouth again as she grinned down at him. "You got that right."
His nostrils flared as she gentled her hold.
"I think you'll find," he breathed as his hands came up to land on her hips, "that I'm rarely wrong."
Penny, it's Sheldon. ...Cooper. Raj refuses to drive me home, even though I told him about the dog- Well there's no need to be rude, Raj! My word, and after I came all this way to tell him he was right about-