Scared To Be Lonely

Chapter 4: The Mandarin

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The next day, school had been completely fine and normal, for the most part. Lexie was her usual preppy and seemingly always happy self - as well as freaking out over the fact that Jack had given Nick his letterman jacket, while Kayla seemed to be getting more excited for the football game that was getting closer, since she was also on the team - but she didn't want to dress up for it during the Prep Rally. 

And Nick seemed to be seeing Jack more often - like in the hallways where he'd always make sure to say something to her, or in classes that they shared and he'd sit next to her, or even at lunch when he usually sat with his football buddies, but instead, sat next to her and her group. 

Which, weirdly enough, meant that Nick also hadn't seen her brother that entire day. 

It was kind of getting weird with the Williams, because of the entire New York thing, where they then said that "danger follows Tony" but then Nick obviously defended him. After that, it was almost like they were beginning to regret letting Tony get custody of her - even though it wasn't their choice at all. 

Then the whole issue with Christmas coming up... and Nick saying that she wanted to spend it this year with Pepper and Tony, since last year she had spent it at the Williams house.

And that seemed to cause a whole load of other issues that meant that Nick hadn't gone over to their house in a while.

Then, it wasn't until History class, which is the last class of the day, did things start to get bad.

Nick was sat in the desk between Lexie and Kayla, while Jack was sat behind her. The three girls were passing notes to each other while the teacher had been speaking, before they joined in Jack, since he seemed to be becoming part of their friend group. They were just talking about the silliest things, up until Lexie then brought up the dance that was coming up after the game. 

But Nick really didn't mind. It was great to finally have normalcy - or, as close as she could get to it, with being Tony Stark's daughter and some freak with powers. 

Except, that's also when the teacher had them work on their projects that were due next week, which meant that she turned on the News as basically background.

But then they all watched as the News cut out with something else playing, as though whatever station it was, had gotten hacked. 

And what showed on the screen, made each kid in the room actually get scared. Nick felt her heart drop while her stomach felt a little queasy.

"Some people call me a terrorist." The older man with a beard and bun, voiced over the video of himself walking away after gesturing for his men to shoot all the people who were kneeled down in a line, somewhere in the dessert. "I consider myself a teacher." 

Then the video showed a bunch of people yelling, almost like they were rallying, before it then showed clips of old film - including one where there were kids playing with guns. "America, ready for another lesson?" His voice was deep, as it showed him in a dark place speaking, before the scene changed again.