Upstairs, in a room as sterile as a CDC isolation ward, nine-year-old Sheldon Cooper was not playing with toys. He was building a scale model of the Large Hadron Collider out of LEGOs, a K'Nex loop, and a stolen dental mirror. On his corkboard, a hand-drawn flowchart titled “EXPERIMENTAL PROTOCOL: DETERMINING IF MY TWIN SISTER IS A SECRET ALIEN” was pinned next to a signed photo of Carl Sagan.
“Coach Cooper,” Tompkins said, using George’s football-coach title like a peace offering. “We have a situation. This is Dale. He’s our senior chess champion. Regional runner-up.”
Underneath, he drew two columns: and SOCIAL DEFENSE MECHANISMS . young sheldon s01e01 720p web-dl
Checkmate in fourteen moves. Total time: six minutes, forty-two seconds.
Three moves later, Dale’s queen was pinned. Two moves after that, Sheldon forked his rook and king with a bishop he had seemingly forgotten on the edge of the board. Dale’s hand hovered over his pieces. His face went pink, then red. Upstairs, in a room as sterile as a
George stabbed a potato. “High school. He’s nine years old. He’ll get eaten alive.”
“Your boy called the high school this morning. Not the middle school. The high school . Said their chess team’s opening theory was ‘statistically indistinguishable from random chance.’ Then he offered to demonstrate at 4:30 p.m. Dale here took it as a challenge.” He’s our senior chess champion
Sheldon appeared at the top of the stairs. He was holding a stopwatch and a miniature whiteboard.