Doofenshmirtz recognized that look all too well. As well as the pale-faced, terrified wheezing that followed it.
Carelessly he let the power tools fall from his hands, and stumbled over the rest of his -inator-making supplies in his hurry to rush to Stan's side; as soon as he reached him he lifted the blueprints from the boy's clenching hands, and guided him to the wall, having him sit down with his back against it and lean his head into his knees.
"Easy, easy, take a few deep breaths, in through your nose, out through your mouth. That's it, good job, just keep doing that, just focus on doing nothing but breathing."
Way to not sound like a babbling idiot, Heinz.
Doofenshmirtz felt a small rush of helplessness as he knelt in front of Stan, trying to help him breathe. He'd never known what it was like to have to help someone who was having a panic attack; the closest he came to it was when Vanessa was having a tantrum and needed to be held until she calmed down, but he didn't know this boy well enough to be comfortable with holding him, and besides, at least in his experience it felt better to be held after a panic attack had passed and oh good grief he was doing a terrible job of this-
After about ten minutes, Stan's breathing started to even out, and his shoulders drooped. His head stayed lowered, though, and his breathing had become all sad and shuddery again.
"...Yeah, I probably should've told you about the time travel thing sooner," Doofenshmirtz said at last.
Stan gave a very bitter-sounding snort. "Ya think?"
Even though he couldn't see his face, Doofenshmirtz smiled sheepishly, and rubbed his arm with an awkward hand. "To be fair, I haven't had much experience with handling time-traveling teenagers. The closest was this one teleport-inator I made that was supposed to help me get the key to the city of Danville, and accidentally locked onto the mayor's thirteen-year-old who was in the room at the same time-"
He was saved from further awkwardness by Perry the Platypus sailing through the window.
"Perry the Platypus?! You're at least fourteen hours ahead of schedule, I haven't even had time to set up the trap yet! Heck, I haven't even finished my -inator yet!" Doofenshmirtz pushed himself to his feet, confused and, frankly, somewhat indignant. "This is honestly a little discourteous, I expect better of you-what, no?"
Perry was shaking his head at him, and holding up his little paws in a kind of placating gesture. After a moment he beckoned for Doofenshmirtz to join him over in a far corner of the room.
Doofenshmirtz glanced uncertainly at Stan, who had finally sat up a little bit and was leaning against the wall with tired eyes (this was probably going to be a recurring thing for him for quite a while), and then went over to his nemesis.
"...What is it, Perry the Platypus, I've got a lot to do to prepare for tomorrow." Not to mention figuring out what I'm gonna do with this kid.
Perry reached up into his hat (one of these days Doofenshmirtz really wanted to get a good look at that thing and try to figure out how it could hold so much stuff) and pulled out an old, yellowed newspaper clipping, holding it up.
Doofenshmirtz slowly unfolded it, and squinted at the article. "'Glass Shard Beach's saltwater taffy shop creates new flavor'?"
Perry made a somewhat exasperated-sounding noise through his bill and turned the clipping around to the side he'd wanted Doofenshmirtz to see. He got a good look-and his heart dropped into his stomach.
"...Oh."
As he read and reread the article, his heart showed no sign of moving back into its proper spot.
When his eyes finally met Perry's again, the little platypus pointed to the article, and then over in Stan's direction.
"Yeah, I get that it's about him, I'm not that dumb-"
Perry the Platypus shook his head, and pointed more emphatically.
Doofenshmirtz got the gist of what he was saying this time-and now it was his turn to shake his head.
"No. Nuh-uh."
Perry the Platypus folded his arms and gave him a stern look.
"He's had enough traumatizing revelations for one day!" Doofenshmirtz retorted. "Geez, Perry the Platypus, there's a big difference between being evil and being completely heartless, like you seem intent on being-!"
"What's that?" Stan's voice asked from behind them.
Immediately Doofenshmirtz thrust the newspaper behind his back, and turned to face the boy with a grin that he knew was a little too wide. "Nothing!"
Stan gave him a look indicating that he wasn't buying it.
A second later the newspaper was snatched from his hand by a smaller, teal-colored one, and Perry held it out to Stan, who hesitantly accepted it.
"No! Stanley, stop, you don't want to see-!"
Stan held it up and squinted at it.
"...'Glass Shard Beach's saltwater taffy shop creates new flavor'?"
Perry rolled his eyes, and gestured for him to flip it around, holding up his other hand as a warning to Doofenshmirtz.
He was forced to watch helplessly as Stan turned the paper around, allowing him to see the article entitled, 'Stan Pines Dead.'
Apparently, when Stan had been caught by the Time Travel-Inator, he was in his car at the time, traveling down the road away from his house at accelerated speed. Once he was no longer in it, and therefore unable to keep control of the steering wheel or anything else, it had smashed head-on into a lamppost at the end of the street, causing the base to break off and fall onto the car. And then, in true movie fashion that defied some law of physics or other, the whole mess had caught fire and exploded.
There was a picture of the carnage that was all that remained of the beloved Stanley-Mobile, after the firefighters had managed to put it out: a sad pile of broken, twisted, burned metal, glass and rubber.
Even though they hadn't been able to distinguish whether there was a body in the wreckage, the authorities had officially pronounced him dead, on the basis that "nobody could survive that."
All it said about his family was that Filbrick Pines, the father, had been unavailable for comment when questioned.
Doofenshmirtz fully expected Stan to start crying again, or have another panic attack. Either of those would probably have been his reaction to hearing that the world thought he was dead, and that his family hadn't cared enough to comment on it.
Instead, what happened was far, far worse: Stan's shoulders drooped, and he said quietly, "...Oh," before just dropping the clipping to the floor and walking away. He barely stopped to grab his blanket before reaching for the door out into the main part of the penthouse.
The man and the platypus glanced at each other in equal concern; after a moment Perry quietly removed the pack he was wearing, and pulled out a large plastic bag with a hot wings logo on it.
"Oh-look Stan, Perry the Platypus has our hot wings!" Doofenshmirtz accepted it, and glanced at Stan's retreating back with somewhat frantic cheerfulness. "He got here just within the time frame, unfortunately, but they should still be nice and warm! I didn't even know he worked as a hot wing delivery platypus!"
"No thanks. I'm not hungry." Stan shut the door behind him.
Doofenshmirtz considered short-changing Perry for the delivery in revenge, but right now...his heart just wasn't in it.
Oh, don't look at me like that.
In stories like this, things have to get worse before they get better.