Chapter Text
It’s been two years now. Two years since the Maze, the Scorch and taking down WICKED. Two years of attempting at a normal life. Only so far for Thomas, it didn’t turn out as normal as he would have originally thought.
After they blew up WICKED’s headquarters and the government found them, the Gladers were all taken away from each other. It turned out that the world hadn’t, in fact, suffered an apocalypse and there were never any Solar Flames or the Flare, neither Cranks nor any of what they were led to believe. Only, everything that happened, that they went through and did, that all stayed. In spite of the facts that the world they though they lived in never existed, there was no taking back everything that happened. WICKED was only using them all to do their own illegal research and if Thomas and others hadn’t fought them back, it is likely that the government would never find out about it. What pained Thomas though, was that he didn’t even have much time to say anything to his friends, much less a goodbye, for they have all been taken back to their families instantly. He really hated not having to talk to Minho before the new strangers flooded them once again.
Now thinking back on it, Thomas partially hated himself for not ever attempting to get back in touch with the Asian boy and others. But as time passed, it became harder and harder for him to get back to that old life. He wasn’t even Thomas anymore.
Upon returning “home” and to his original friends and family, he learnt that his real name is Stiles Stilinski (well his nickname actually), his dad is a Sheriff and that he always used to be funny, sarcastic and kind of a lovable goofball. So Thomas ( that is, Stiles) did his best to be that kind of person his friends knew so well, before WICKED took him away.
Although the first couple of months were immensely hard and confusing, and rightly so for after doing nothing but surviving and fighting for so long, it took some time to adjust to simply going to school, doing homework and hanging out with friends. Also, there were the nightmares. The constant and seemingly never ending scream-yourself-awake nightmares that exhausted Stiles. His best friend, Scott, helped him out a lot though. If it weren’t for his and Sheriff Stilinski’s support, he didn’t think he would have managed it.
However, as if getting used to the life of the ordinary doesn’t have its own difficulties; Stiles got caught into the world of the supernatural as well. He didn’t mind much though, because worrying about werewolves, Kanimas and Dread Doctors took his mind off of the huge elephant in the room for him. Finding ways to get out of the sticky situations brought with themselves some familarity as well and so Stiles didn’t have time to bother much about the fact that made him anxious more than anything else that he experienced. And that is that he isn’t Stiles at all. He simply couldn’t be after all he’s been through. No matter how hard he tried, he saw himself only as Thomas. Boring, liver-faced, would-do-anything-for-my-friends, leader Thomas. So he resulted in acting the way Stiles would, for his friends’ sakes, at least for the time being.