Stiles sat in his Chemistry class, trying not to hyperventilate. He had forgotten how it was to sit in between this many people and he was slowly getting overwhelmed by the noise. The only reason he was at school today instead of trying to get used to his hearing was because his dad hadn't stopped to listen to him. He looked up, still trying to slow his breathing when Danny leaned over to him "You good?"
"F – Fine," he mumbled, his eyes darting to Danny's face before returning to his shaking hands. He had finished the quiz easily but now he couldn't stop thinking and thinking always made things worse.
Danny frowned in concern. He hadn't seen Stiles at school all week and all of a sudden he comes back but seems to be on edge. He didn't care whether he got into trouble or not… Stiles' ragged breathing was distracting him from his work and he was surprised that none of the others had noticed yet "You don't look fine. Maybe you should go home?"
Stiles shook his head "I'm fine, Danny," he denied, clenching his hands into fists to try and lessen the tremors. He wished he could talk to Tony right now but if he left, he knew Harris would give him detention again and since he scheduled a talk with Tony about the arc, he really wanted to avoid it this time around.
"Yeah. Turning," Scott exclaimed slightly to the right of Stiles, making him flinch a little.
Stiles glanced at Jackson who started at Scott in annoyance "Into…?" When Scott just looked at him, he sighed "Well, I think that if Lydia's turning, she's not the one that's gonna need help."
"What do you mean?" Scott frowned in confusion.
Jackson rolled his eyes just glad that Stilinski wasn't joining in this time "Oh God. You've got it all backwards, McCall. When I was with Lydia, you should have seen the scratch marks she left on me." He sent the other boy a smirk "What do you think she's gonna do with a set of real claws? Heh."
Mr Harris cleared his throat "This is a pop quiz," he spoke up, glaring at his students in exasperation "If I hear anyone talk again, I may be tempted to give you detention for the rest of your high school career."
Stiles choked on a breath and dropped his head to his hands, trying to tune out the world around him. Everything was just so much louder. Was this how it had been when he first had the serum? He couldn't remember anything from that time, most of it having been wiped by HYDRA again and again until there was nothing left. They had done a better job with him and even the few memories he got back, he had had to work for.
"Mr Stilinski," Harris narrowed his eyes on the boy. He had been watching him mess around since he had handed out the quizzes and had only waited for the boy to put a toe out of line "I'll see you at 3:00 for your detention."
Danny was about to speak up, bringing Stiles' current condition to the teacher's attention when he caught sight of Jackson "Dude – your nose. You okay?"
Jackson raised his hand to his nose when he felt the trickle and shot up immediately, stumbling past Harris and out of the classroom.
"Mr Harris?" Danny raised his hand.
"Focus on your paper, Mr Mahealani," Mr Harris sighed without looking up.
"But sir…"
Harris let out a loud breath "One more word out of you and you will join Mr Stilinski in detention. Go. Back. To. Your. Quiz."
Danny shot Stiles another worried look, seeing the boy clutch at his ears "Stiles is having a panic attack," he said, finally making their teacher look up.
Harris stood up not moving from his desk "If this is an attempt to get out of taking the quiz or your detention, Mr Stilinski, it isn't working. Everyone, get back to the quiz. You have ten minutes left."
Stiles coughed, trying to breathe the way Tony had showed him but he was failing miserably. He shoved away from his desk, crumpling the paper in his hand as he blindly stumbled to the door. When Harris tried to stop him, he just shoved the paper into the man's chest. He ran against the doorframe before he managed to fall out of the door, ignoring Harris calling after him.
"Hey, buddy," Scott grinned at Stiles "Where were you last week?"
Stiles just looked at Scott for a moment before he went back to pushing his food around the plate "Sick. I told you that."
"You couldn't have texted?" Scott complained "I mean, I thought you wanted to find Lydia. What if I found some more leads?"
"You didn't," Stiles pointed out dryly "I heard you talking with Jackson earlier. Just let it go, Scott. I don't want to talk about it."
Scott narrowed his eyes "What is your problem?"
"Nothing, Scott," Stiles sighed, giving up on trying to talk to his former best friend. He had forgotten how wilfully blind Scott was to his moods after Allison had come to town. Then again, he wasn't sure whether Scott had changed or whether that had always been a problem. Sometimes he wondered how it would be to remember everything about his past – things that didn't have to do with betrayal or Derek or his pack… "Nothing is my problem."
"Fine," Scott rolled his eyes before he looked over his shoulder, seeing Allison run out of the cafeteria "I gotta go."
"Yeah, sure," Stiles muttered and pulled out his phone. He was uncomfortably but thankfully not as anxious as he had been in Chemistry. Here, he managed to pick a place with his back to the wall that overlooked most of the room.
"Stiles."
"Danny?" Stiles frowned when the other boy sat down across from him.
Danny smiled, concern still shining in his eyes "I just wanted to make sure you were alright. After earlier."
Stiles grimaced "I'm okay."
"Do you have panic attacks often?"
Stiles shrugged "I'm okay."
"Obviously you're not," Danny pointed out "Does anyone know? Scott? Your dad?"
"No," Stiles mumbled "I can deal with it. I don't want pity."
Danny tilted his head "Stiles…"
"I don't want to talk about this anymore," he dismissed, pushing away the full tray of food "I need to go and grab my books."
Danny grabbed Stiles' wrist before he could walk past him, eyes narrowing at the flinch and the tenseness to Stiles' body "Listen, I know that we're not friends but… If you ever need to talk to someone – You know where to find me."
Stiles licked his lips, swallowing past the lump in his throat. He had never been close to Danny before… Not even when he was brought into the pack during the Nogitsune incident "Thank you, Danny."
"You're not alone in this, Stiles," Danny pointed out quietly "There's always people who're going to listen to you."
"Yeah – I… Yeah," Stiles nodded, hastily leaving the cafeteria.
Harris looked up when Stiles slunk into the room, trying to make it seem like he wasn't close to bolting the moment someone looked at him the wrong way "Ah, Mr Stilinski. Sit."
Stiles sank down on a chair towards the back of the room, putting down his notebook that he was holding "I – Sorry for this morning. I wasn't… feeling very well."
"A likely story," Harris scoffed, crossing his arms. He moved closer to the boy, leaning onto a desk the row in front of Stiles "You see, Stiles. Since your father was so judicious in his dealings with me, I've decided to make you my personal project for the rest of the semester." He ignored how Stiles paled at those words "You're going to benefit from all the best that strict discipline has to offer."
"But I didn't mean to…"
Harris raised his hand "You never mean to do anything," he pointed out "At the beginning, it might have been alright but your constant talking, moving and disturbing the class has gone too far. Now, give me your phone."
Stiles wasn't about to argue, realising that the argument wasn't worth the pain it would bring and handed the phone over without a word. He fiddled with his pen, waiting for Harris to move back to his desk before burying himself in his research.
"I'll be right back," Harris sighed, getting up from his chair after close to an hour of supervising the detention. He shot a stern look at his student who had been suspiciously quiet for the time he had been here. Had he been anyone else, he might have actually been worried for the boy but this was most likely just another ploy to get out of trouble faster "If you're not here when I get back, you'll have detention until the end of your high school career, do you understand?"
"Yes, sir," Stiles nodded, not looking up from what he was doing.
Five minutes later, Stiles looked over at his phone when it started buzzing on Harris' desk. He had been doodling, trying to work out some of the problems he and Tony had been having with the inclusion of Vibranium into the arc. For some reason using Starkanium was easier than Vibranium… It seemed like Vibranium was a lot more unstable. How Howard managed to make a shield was beyond him. He probably didn't even realise all the potential Vibranium had and had gotten lucky that it behaved as normal metal would.
He bit his lip, debating on whether to risk answering the call before shrugging to himself "Stiles," Tony exclaimed through the speakers of the phone.
Stiles did nothing to hide the small, relieved smile "I told you that I was in detention, Tony."
"But science," Tony pouted "Science is so much more important."
"Can we do this later?" Stiles asked "I have a couple of ideas but…"
Tony shook his head mournfully "Pep is forcing me to be responsible. Apparently, there is some sort of gala that I'm expected to show up at."
"Let me guess… You forgot?" Stiles smiled wryly.
"I did not forget… I might have temporarily – misplaced the information but I didn't forget," Tony argued before changing the subject "Enough about that. What's your idea, foxy?"
Stiles grabbed the phone from the table and moved over to the board, making sure that Mr Harris wasn't anywhere to be seen. He didn't want to get into even more trouble for being on the phone but he also didn't want to blow Tony off. After the day he had, he really needed to get lost in science for a bit and hear Tony's voice. Spending so many years together made it hard to be apart.
"So, if I'm right you should be able to…" Stiles switched the call to video and perched it on his teacher's desk while he started scribbling on the board. He was trying to put his thoughts and ideas into equations, trying to make Tony understand what he had found out. When he was done, he stepped back, letting his eyes wander across his handwriting, mouthing the formulas to check whether he made a mistake.
Tony whistled, having JARVIS run simulations with Stiles' calculations in the background "I'm impressed, kid. How long did it take you to come up with that? We only talked about it yesterday."
"About seven hours," Stiles shrugged, the meaning behind his words not lost on the older man.
"Nightmares?" Tony asked, sympathy swinging in his voice.
Stiles hummed dismissively "Nothing I'm not used to." He looked up and froze when he realised that Mr Harris was standing in the doorway, staring at the board with a sense of disbelief that would have been funny if Stiles wasn't freaking out internally. He had the tendency to get lost in science and his thoughts when he was working on a project. It had been a habit that he had been trying to break unsuccessfully. This was the reason he felt the need to be alert. Anyone could sneak up on him and he would only realise too late "I – I have to go."
"Take care, Stiles. Text me or JARVIS when anything happens, alright?"
"Yeah," Stiles breathed before he hung up, holding out his phone to Mr Harris sheepishly.
Mr Harris looked at the phone before his gaze travelled to the writing on the board "When did you learn that? I – What even is this?"
"I shouldn't have written it on the board," Stiles avoided the question "I'm sorry. Sometimes I tend to… Well, get carried away."
Harris narrowed his eyes "You changed."
Stiles froze "Excuse me?"
"The panic attack this morning… the missing school? You have been ignoring Mr McCall since you came back," Harris ticked off the arguments on his fingers.
"It's nothing," Stiles shook his head "This…"
Harris crossed his arms "I might not be your biggest fan." He grimaced at that "But you're still my student and it's my duty as a teacher to try and help no matter how much I dislike you – or your father. I wasn't going to say anything but just know that there are people to talk to. Even if it isn't me."
"Why does everyone care all of a sudden?" Stiles muttered in confusion. He never had many people care about him. Especially not since the whole shit with the werewolves started. His dad was constantly working and Scott was with Allison. They had been the only people who really cared about him. He hadn't really seen Mrs McCall either.
Harris raised his eyebrows "Get out of here."
"What?"
"Detention is over," Harris waved him off, his eyes trailing back to the board "Get out before I change my mind."
Hey guys. This is going to be part of my Christmas present to you guys. I did my best to write for as many Fics as possible for Christmas but the rest didn't work yet. For the Fics that haven't been updated in this wave, I'll try to get an update out till March (I have exams in February, so I should be able to get stuff done until March).
For those interested, feel free to join my Facebook Group (NicholasFlamel's Corner) where I post snippets of chapters I write, ideas I have and finished/abandoned Fics. Link: groups/687956758591756
