The Tropical Island Conundrum

[has_no_peers]

The test of a true leader is whether his followers will adhere to his cause of their own volition, enduring the most arduous hardships without being forced to do so. His friends couldn't even endure their own petty squabbling about their fornication habits, which of course was their own shortcoming, but Sheldon could not help but find some truth

Comments

[captainjack]

Jack looked at the man who was yelling and barely even blinked.

"Oh, I don't know. All the earth sciences are pretty useful," Jack said. "And geology is the study of pressure and time...So there's that."

It had happened so many times that Jack was absolutely calm about it. New people just appeared, that had long since quit shocking him. He found it was just easiest to roll with it and try his best to not be shocking or overwhelming. Of course, it wasn't every day he met someone decrying geology. That was new. And the outfit was something he'd never seen.

"Are you a soldier?" he asked, looking the man over. Then he smiled and a flirty glimmer sparkled in his eye. "I like soldiers."

[has_no_peers]

There were so many things so utterly wrong with this scenario that Sheldon's mind immediately went to the most logical place: He was dreaming. Likely because he'd been struck on the head with a rogue paintball. Oh god, he could have a concussion. That battlefield promotion to Major was well, well earned.

He outranked Captain Harkness now, which was of course appropriate.

"Of course you do," he said tersely. "Why wouldn't my hallucination of a sub-par Doctor Who companion not like soldiars and be a dirt people apologist? Now I would appreciate being allowed to wake, as it is important to be able to watch for a life-threatening brain injury and I don't trust my friends to have the proper first aid training for a concussion."

[captainjack]

Sub-par? Sub-par? Jack didn't even know how to answer that for a minute. He simply stared, then took a deep breath.

Okay, so someone who had seen the show and wasn't impressed. That was kinda tragic. He had looked so good in those pants on that show.

"You're not dreaming and you don't have a concussion," he said after a long pause. "You've traveled trans-dimensionally. Do you know what that means? You're not where you were a minute ago. You've slipped through time and space."

It seemed to him this guy might know what he was talking about, but he still spoke slowly and clearly, just so he wasn't misunderstood.

[has_no_peers]

Sheldon stared at him for a moment in disbelief. Not because of the implication, but...

"Did you just suggest that I don't know what transdimensional means? Do you know realize who you're speaking to? Honestly, what do you think I am, an experimental physicist? Even my hallucinations are getting dumber these days, what is the world coming to. And besides, I... I outrank you. I just gave myself a battlefiend promotion." He said this last bit with a slight lift of his chin.

[polly_okeefe]

I found the man sitting perfectly still in the kitchen -- drawing in, in fact, from the armrests of the chair. Er... Yikes. The time I'd come here had been bad, but compared to him, I'd handled it as if I'd stepped off the subway at Penn Station.

"Um... excuse me," I said, cautiously. "But can I help?"

[has_no_peers]

"Oh I very much doubt that," said Sheldon. His hands were resting on his thighs, knees tucked together with his messenger bag on the table in front of him. It seemed marginally cleaner than the floor. Marginally.

[polly_okeefe]

Okay. Let's try another tack.

"So... what are you doing in fortress chair?"

[has_no_peers]

Sheldon looked blankly at her. "I can't even parse that sentence."

[capable_of]

When Lex came into the kitchen to get dinner for Anatoly and himself, he made a note of the man sitting at the kitchen table with a passing thought. As he gathered together food to take with him, he kept glancing back at the man, frowning when he hadn't moved or even reacted.

Once he had food packed up and waiting to go, he walked over and just watched the man for a moment, like he was an artifact his father had insisted be placed in the Smallville castle. He didn't much care about the man's well being...it was just unnerving. Finally, it was cliche, but it was about the only thing Lex could think of to do: He waved his hand in front of the man's face.

[has_no_peers]

Sheldon immediately flinched away like he'd been struck. "Personal space!" he blurted, and slid the chair back a few inches.

Which meant touching the table.

He immediately started fumbling in his bag for his hand sanitizer.

[capable_of]

It took every bit of his training as a Luthor to bite back a snort of laughter at the man's reaction and even then, he was sure his smirk gave him away.

"My apologies. I wanted to be sure you weren't dead the way you were staring."

[has_no_peers]

"Oh of course I wasn't dead," said Sheldon, as if the idea were utterly moronic. He dabbed sanitizer on his hands and rubbed them together. "If I were a freshly dead body, rigor mortis would not have set in yet and there would be no muscle tension keeping me upright so I'd be slumped down onto the table. Not to mention that I'd likely have only just vacated my bowels, so there would be the smell. And If I'd been dead for several hours I suppose someone could have posed me here, but in that case my pallor would have been a giveaway unless you think someone would have gone to the trouble of embalming simply for the sake of a prank."

[lt_blade]

Food food food.

Christ, there were times when Sonya wasn't sure if she was giving birth to a pair of babies or a pair of piranhas. It was just a good thing that the school was so close to the compound, or she wouldn't have been able to focus on the class over her stomach.

She set her books on the table before heading over to the fridge, wondering if there was any pineapple already cut up.

[has_no_peers]

Sheldon appeared to pay absolutely no attention to her. Which he wasn't. He would have been hard pressed to notice that anyone actually walked into the room.

[lt_blade]

It may've been just as well, the only thing Sonya seemed to notice at the moment was that her babies went from being referred to 'gummy bears' to 'parahnas'.

She did feel a little better after a quick sandwhich made from pork, pinapple and soy sauce. It was only after she'd inhaled half of it did she notice the poor guy looking a little comatose.

"Hey," She normally didn't do this, but the guy did look like he needed something to shock him awake. "Buddy, you need something?" She gave a quick wave infront of his face."

[has_no_peers]

"Nothing that you could provide me," Sheldon said. To his credit, he did at least acknowledge her presence with a glance.

[starchilde_lost]

It wasn't often that Rachel found people who looked so... new. Yes, she supposed she'd seen her own share of new arrivals, who hadn't, but the man sitting at the compound kitchen looked so uncomfortable that she almost wanted to give him a hug if she didn't think it would scare him.

"Hi, I'm guessing you're new here." She eased herself into the kitchen with what she hoped was a reassuring smile on her face. Either he'd take it at face value or the hound-marks would freak him out and frankly, he didn't look all that even-keeled to begin with.

"Has someone given you the run-down yet?" You never could tell.

[has_no_peers]

Sheldon met her gaze, though his hands didn't move from where they were safely resting on his thighs. He recognized the pattern of the markings on her face, of course. This place was starting to feel like he was stuck in some hellish Comic Con candid camera.

"If by run-down you mean the unsatisfying explanation that makes Occam weep, then yes."

[starchilde_lost]

"Oh yeah, what does Occam say about you waking up on a mysterious island, then?"

Respecting his space, she sat down across from him. God, he looked like he was about to break. As jaded as she was about cross-dimensional travel it was easy to forget how the rookies must feel. Poor guy.

"Or are you still in the, 'it's just a hallucination,' phase?"

[has_no_peers]

"Occam says that it is much more probable that I've been hit in the head with a paintball," said Sheldon. "And considering that Marvel Girl just sat down across from me, yes, I'm feeling confident about putting my eggs into the hallucination basket."