by pebble/scifipony
Fandom: Teen Wolf
Characters: Scott McCall, Alan Deaton
Words: 3,867
Tags: Episode Tag, Missing Scene, Father-Son Relationships, Panic Attacks, Hurt/Comfort
Warnings: Panic Attacks, Canon Dehumanizing Language
Author's Notes: Written for the 2025 Scottuary Bingo event on Tumblr. Originally posted to AO3 and SquidgeWorld on 2025/02/28.
Takes place during the ending of 1x10 "Co-Captain" and the beginning of 1x11 "Formality".
When he wakes, it takes several seconds too long to put the scrambled pieces of his consciousness back together.
A bright light greets him when he blinks his eyes open. It stings straight through to his brain. A fire is burning in his side, and he instinctively wants to move away from it.
There’s a voice offering reassurances, and it’s so familiar that a rush of relief floods through Scott before he fully processes it.
“Where am I?”
He’s lying on his back on a metal examination table. The examination table at the vet clinic, he realizes. And the familiar voice belongs to Deaton. His boss that was recently kidnapped because of the insanity that has become Scott’s life — who has somehow miraculously not fired him yet despite everything.
“I’ve given you something that should speed up the healing process.”
There’s something wrong in that. A secret hiding in the specific words chosen that isn’t supposed to be there. But his thoughts are still kind of hazy and he doesn’t focus on it.
His eyes sweep over the bandage on his side, the bloody bullet sitting in a basin nearby, and the various pieces of medical equipment on the tray. He knows what it all adds up to, but the math doesn’t fully compute.
“But… you’re a vet?”
Maybe it’s not the most pertinent thing to get hung up on. But everything else is too volatile and overwhelming to even begin to touch. The last thing he wants to do right now is have to explain to Deaton why he’s been shot with a bullet, or why his body is already beginning to heal the wound. Worse, he doesn’t want to ask why Deaton isn’t at all surprised by either of those facts.
“That’s very true,” Deaton says calmly. There’s always a solid undercurrent to his words and Scott clings to it now as a lifeline — one steady thing in the ever shifting currents he’s been caught in. “And ninety-percent of the time, I’m mostly treating cats and dogs.”
“Mostly?”
There’s a warm smile as he nods. “Mostly.”
Scott kind of gets it, and it definitely warrants a full explanation, but not in this moment. For now, he seizes that reassurance and ignores the rest.
The familiarity of the vet clinic offers a much needed reprieve. He’s been hunted by the Argents, shot by them. Attacked by Derek. His home isn’t safe anymore, not when Peter can appear on his doorstep without warning. Not when Peter can call him out with a single roar.
For right now, though, all of it is hovering at the edges of the fog that is still hanging over his mind. For now, there is only the smell of antiseptic and the steady flow of Deaton’s voice.
He closes his eyes and drifts again.
The lightbulb is just as bright when he blinks his eyes open the next time. He winces. A newfound sympathy for their animal patients settles in as he fully processes the bright light and the hard metal table under him.
Everything feels strangely muted. A bit hazy around the edges. There’s a distant ache there, too, hovering just out of reach beyond the fog. Part of him wants to grab for it as something solid to latch onto; part of him is glad it’s content to stay away. He’s been in pain so much these last two months already.
“Welcome back to the land of the conscious.”
The memories rush back a moment later. The hunters, Peter, Derek. Being shot by the Argents.
The wound in his side ignites as he tries to sit up, the pain burning away the comfortable fog from a moment ago.
He needs to move, though. The light streaming in through the windows indicates that it’s already morning. He can’t stay here. There are too many people in danger. Too many problems to solve, and he hasn’t the faintest idea where to even start on any of them.
A few months ago, his biggest problem in an average day would be fixing his bike chain or worrying about his history grades. Not that his life had been idyllic before all of the werewolf stuff, but at least it had felt manageable for the most part. His problems had been normal problems before. All of this… how is anyone supposed to know how to react to any of this?
Deaton catches him as he stumbles. The man smiles, but there’s a deep concern etched into his eyes that Scott wishes he doesn’t notice. “You doing okay?”
He tries to brush it off, but the vet isn’t fooled.
“Maybe you should sit down.”
‘How are you so okay with all of this?’ he wants to ask. He doesn’t. Asking that means asking a lot of other questions that he isn’t ready for yet. This is safe and comfortable right now. He needs it more desperately than he would have thought possible.
There’s so much else that he needs to worry over already. Peter threatened to hurt his mom last night. The Argents are after Jackson. Derek threatened to kill Jackson and, even if Scott doesn’t believe he was going to go through with it, that still means that Peter wants him dead — and Peter probably would do it. Even if he does succeed in saving Jackson, that creates a whole new problem since he knows Scott’s secret.
The bell over the door chimes and Scott freezes in place. The air is suddenly a lot harder to breathe. His eyes lock on the doorway that leads into the reception room.
He knows.
Without having to look, he somehow just knows.
Derek had told him that he would have a special connection to the alpha who bit him. Scott feels like that was a massive understatement.
He remembers feeling it last night when Peter first showed up at his front door. He remembers how paralyzing it had been then, too.
It’s a not-so-gentle tugging in the back of his mind, insisting that he needs to be with his alpha. It makes him want to walk straight through that door and to the spot where he belongs. It makes him want to hide in a corner and never be found. There’s a twisted sense of belonging when Peter is near, one that is neither soothing nor comfortable — like trying to fit into a shirt that is the wrong size.
Deaton takes a step forward and Scott grabs his arm. He wants to say something, anything. He needs to warn him not to go out there. No words come out.
Deaton offers him a reassuring smile, like he’s trying to tell Scott that everything is okay. Scott wishes he could believe it. Normally, he would. When he was a kid, it had felt as if there wasn’t a problem in the world that couldn’t be made better simply by telling Deaton about it.
He steps through the door and Scott watches him leave.
“I’m sorry, but we’re closed.”
When Peter’s voice hits his ears, Scott moves away instinctively. His back hits a wall and he curls in on himself. Part of him wants to cover his ears like a child hiding from a thunderstorm, but he needs to hear this. He needs to remain aware of the danger. It’s a lesson he learned long before werewolves entered his life.
“You have something of mine. I’m here to collect it.”
Something. Mine. It.
The possessive words crawl into his brain and make him feel sick. Even taking into account everything he’s dealt with since being bitten, Scott is sure he hasn’t felt this small or helpless since he was six years old and his parents were fighting in the hallway outside his bedroom.
Somehow, Deaton manages to make Peter leave. It should be a relief, but it isn’t. The pull in Scott’s brain is still insisting that he should be walking out the door after him.
Peter doesn’t leave without a last parting shot. “There are others who can help me get what I want, Scott. More innocent — and far more vulnerable.”
Allison.
The thought flashes through his mind in an instant. Peter has already tried to hurt his mom and Jackson, of course he wouldn’t have any scruples about going after another innocent person.
Allison’s family are werewolf hunters, but she isn’t with them all the time. She doesn’t know about any of this. She won’t even know she’s in danger. Peter is going to kill her, and it will be his fault.
His fingers scrabble at the ground on either side as he crumples fully into the corner.
He needs to protect her. How can he protect her? He only just barely managed to protect his mom. Half the time, he hasn’t even been able to keep himself safe, let alone protecting anyone else.
There was nothing he could do when Peter called him out to the woods during those early nights. There was nothing he could do when the roar of his alpha had forced him to change on that gym floor. Or when Peter had held him down in the locker room and forced all of his pain and trauma into Scott’s head.
What is he supposed to do now that he couldn’t do then?
What about Stiles? Would Peter go after him, too? Probably. He seems to know everything that would hurt Scott most. If Peter thought taking Scott’s mom would persuade him, surely he knows that taking his brother would do the same.
Then again, Peter ordered Derek to go after Jackson, what if he tries again? What if Lydia is next, or Danny?
“Scott?”
Warm hands cover his own, uncurling his fingers in firm but gentle movements. Scott doesn’t even realize that his claws are out until they’re being carefully pulled out of the beds of his palms. Rivulets of blood drip down his hands but he barely registers them.
“Scott, you’re okay. He’s gone.”
He wants to breathe but he can’t. Wants to move, but his entire body is paralyzed.
Everyone is in danger. Because of him.
The hands shift so that they are pressed gently around Scott’s, the larger ones wrapping protectively over his own. They are solid, warm.
“Scott, I need you to look at me for a moment. Can you do that for me?”
The voice is a center of calm in the raging sea. Scott finds himself obeying instinctively.
Deaton’s eyes are filled with gentle concern. The air around him is different, too. Less bitter and charged then what Scott breathes in from himself. He shifts forward almost without thinking, needing more of that calm.
“Good,” Deaton encourages softly. “Now I want you to count with me, okay?” One hand releases Scott as it raises up into his field of vision. A single finger raises. “Count the fingers with me. One.”
Scott keeps his eyes locked on that solitary finger as thoughts of his mom in Peter’s car swirl through his head. His mom, Allison, Stiles, Jackson, Lydia… the list of people to keep safe feels endless. And he’s only one person — one kid who could barely manage to not trip on the lacrosse field a few months ago.
A second finger raises. “Two.”
Everything else feels muted again and this time he knows it’s not pain killers.
It’s all going too fast. He needs everything to stop for five minutes so he can think. So he can breathe.
The other hand squeezes his gently. Scott latches onto it, gripping it back tightly. He remembers that hand guiding his the first time Deaton showed him how to give Roxie her allergy medication.
Another finger raises. “Three.”
A dog barks from the next room and Scott jumps at the suddenness of the noise. The smells of the vet clinic come flooding back into his senses. Dogs, cats, medication, sterile equipment. Familiar smells. Safe ones.
Deaton is blocking most of his field of vision. He’s glad for it. This little bubble of space he can handle, he’s fairly sure. Everything else is safely blocked away.
“Four.”
Scott breathes. His lungs ache as the air rushes in. He lets it out in a huff.
The supply cabinet digging into his shoulder is the same one he’s restocked every evening for the past year. Restocking used to be his least favorite job; he preferred working with the animals. But Deaton usually filled out his charts while Scott worked and the vet would let him talk about anything and everything — from the latest prank he and Stiles pulled at school to his worries over his mom having to increase her job hours. Restocking wasn’t his least favorite job anymore. It was nice to have someone listen when he talked.
He shifts his shoulder so that it’s resting more comfortably against the metal cabinet and meets Deaton’s eyes as the last finger is raised.
“Five.”
This time, Scott says the number with him. He breathes again, and keeps breathing.
Peter was here, in the only place Scott has always felt safe — invading this last refuge.
And yet…
The supply cabinet still rests solid under his shoulder. The dogs are barking for breakfast. Deaton’s hands are still warm and steady — alive — as he releases Scott and sits back.
“I want to check your wound to make sure that movement didn’t pull at it,” Deaton says, his voice as casual as if he was commenting on the weather outside. “Are you okay with that?”
It’s a choice. He can say no. It’s one of the first things in a long while he can say no to.
“Yeah.”
Deaton smiles and stands. He reaches down to help pull Scott to his feet.
They move back over to the exam table. Scott feels a little funny being on the table that is normally used for treating pets. Argent’s dog comparisons flash through his mind unbidden.
“Something that out of control is better off dead.”
“You have something of mine. I’m here to collect it.”
He shudders and his hands grip the edge of the table a bit tighter.
Deaton’s hands hover near the bandage without touching. “Do you mind?” he asks, tone neutral.
He nods. Technically, he’s already agreed to this, but it eases the knot in his stomach to be asked anyway. They wouldn’t have asked Prada.
The calendar on the wall catches his attention as the bandage is gently pulled away from his skin. His eyes skim over the various patients, medications, and other miscellaneous notes jotted down in red ink on the different days.
It suddenly occurs to him how few of those days he was actually here. The last couple weeks have been a blur of stress and terror; his job admittedly was one of the things that slipped through the cracks. He’s pretty sure he only showed up for three days last week.
There hadn’t been any calls from Deaton, though. A few texts to check in that he was okay and confirm that he needed the day off, but no angry calls about shirking his responsibilities. Considering how many lectures he’s been getting from everyone else lately, it’s a welcome change. He does wonder why his boss is so understanding of his absences — why he hasn’t once demanded an explanation — but decides that this is another of those questions that will open too big of a door to push shut again.
“It looks okay,” Deaton says, drawing the room back into focus. “It should be finished healing by the time you get home.”
He bites his lip to keep from asking how Deaton knows that he can heal that fast. Instead, he nods his thanks and slips off the exam table. Deaton passes him a sweatshirt that he must have left here at some point. He pulls it on gratefully.
The doorway looms in front of him, but he doesn’t move from beside the table. He knows he needs to leave. There’s so much that he needs to take care of. He needs to fill Stiles in on everything, needs to check in to make sure his mom is okay. Then he really needs to find Derek. Whatever is going on between him and his creepy uncle, Derek is probably his best chance at stopping all of this.
There is so much to do, but he can’t make his feet move. He knows Peter isn’t out there anymore — he’d be able to feel it if he was. How far does that ability extend, he wonders. Would he be able to sense it if Peter was waiting right outside the building?
His hand absently brushes over the surface of the exam table. His gaze tracks over the supply cabinet and calendar and the door to the dog kennels.
He needs to leave. There are so many people in danger that he needs to worry about. There is an endless list of problems to be dealt with, and it keeps growing by the minute. And he doesn’t yet have any ideas on how to deal with any of them.
Deaton steps into his line of sight again. He rests a hand on Scott’s shoulder. It’s solid, real. An anchor for Scott, who feels as if he’s been drifting ever since that night in the woods — probably longer even than that.
He can’t believe he ever let Derek and Stiles put it into his head that Deaton could be the alpha. Deaton isn’t anything like Peter. Where Peter is violence and taking and need; Deaton is steady and gentle and guiding. Right now, he’s the one person that Scott doesn’t feel the need to tiptoe around or hide from. Maybe that’s why he can’t seem to make his feet move towards the door.
“Actually,” Deaton says, “I just remembered, I have a lot of paperwork to catch up on before my first appointment today. If you have time before school, do you think you could help me with feeding our boarders? It would let me get to my paperwork sooner.”
There’s a look in the vet’s eyes that makes Scott wonder if there really is any paperwork waiting for him, but he doesn’t ask. Another question best left unanswered.
He nods. “Sure. I have time.”
He doesn’t know if it’s true or not — he has no idea what time it is. It doesn’t matter. There’s an alpha werewolf trying to murder everyone and he has a bullet wound from being shot by hunters. The idea of sitting in a classroom while his teacher lectures them on Shakespeare is so laughable he can’t wrap his brain around it. Which version of his reality is even real anymore?
“The feeding chart was updated last night,” Deaton says as he leads the way into the dog kennels. “If you start with the Pitbull that came in yesterday, I’ll take care of the Hewitt family’s new pup.”
This is familiar work to Scott and he easily falls back into the rhythm of it. By the time he’s cleaned the water dish and refilled it, his hands have stopped trembling. He takes an extra minute to shake out the dog’s bedding before moving on to the next one.
They work mostly in silence, moving in sync with each other as easily as they always have. Deaton makes a few comments to explain some of the dietary notes on the feeding chart. He talks soothingly to one of the younger dogs who is still nervous about being away from home. He doesn’t say anything about the night before, and Scott is content to stay quiet as he listens to the vet’s voice.
They move to the cat room next. Scott has always loved working with the cats. He hasn’t spent as much time with them since becoming a werewolf, worried about stressing them out the way he did right after being bitten.
They don’t freak out this time as he walks into the room. A few of them watch him with a cautious eye, but they seem mostly okay. He’s been working on that — trying his best to teach them that he won’t hurt them despite what their instincts probably tell them about him. If only it was as easy to persuade the Argents.
Deaton moves down the row, measuring out food and administering medications as needed. Scott follows to clean and refill the water dishes. He’ll be back after school to clean the litter boxes, if he doesn’t miss his shift again.
One of the older cats, a frequent boarder of theirs, headbutts his hand as he reaches in. Scott freezes for a brief moment before rubbing her gently on the forehead. The rattling purr that greets him in return brings a genuine smile to his face. He pauses at her cage long enough to give her a few ear scratches and she bumps his nose gratefully.
“Seems as if you two have managed to work through your differences,” Deaton comments.
“Guess she forgives me,” Scott agrees. His chest doesn’t feel as tight when he moves on to the next cage.
“Cats can be unpredictable creatures, but I’ve found that they often only need time and a little patience.”
Scott takes his time with the next few cats. He feels absurdly proud when one of the kittens rolls over for a belly rub. By the time he reaches the end of the row, Deaton has long since finished. The vet is waiting for him by the door, apparently in no rush to actually get to that paperwork he’d mentioned.
They walk out to the front room together. Scott stops in his tracks as he approaches the low barrier between the office space and the reception area. There’s a strange sensation in his limbs as he gets closer, almost as if something is trying to gently push him away. Deaton steps around him and swings open the gate for him. The sensation vanishes immediately. Shaking off the weirdness as nerves, Scott steps through.
“Thank you for your help this morning,” Deaton says. “Now, you should probably get to school.”
Scott glances through the glass door. The early morning light is casting the parking lot in a soft glow. He can see the stirrings of activity as some of the neighboring businesses prepare to open.
Everything is less looming than it had been a short while ago. He still has a lot to deal with when he leaves, but he isn’t paralyzed anymore.
“Thank you,” he says, realizing how woefully inadequate those words are.
Deaton smiles and offers a nod of acknowledgement. “Any time, Scott.” The words are spoken so casually, but Scott knows that he really means it, and that sort of blows his mind.
The bell rings as he pushes through the door. It shuts behind him, sealing away the animal noises and the smell of antiseptic.
Plans for how to deal with Peter and the Argents begin to swirl through his mind on the walk home. As his brain shifts gears to refocus on his werewolf problems, there’s a part of them that does feel lighter. If they manage to survive this whole situation, he promises himself he’s going to work harder at making his shifts at the clinic.
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