aworldonfire | rp | all the hurt that brought me here

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rp | all the hurt that brought me here

It's a miracle, he thinks, that he got away from Nobu, from Fisk. It's a miracle that he made it back to his apartment, as beaten as he is. It's a miracle, but singing the praises of God doesn't follow him much past the door, not because he doesn't want to but because, while he's still alive, still fighting, he's rapidly devolving into hysterical thought thanks to the blood loss, and what he's stricken by, standing in the doorway of the rooftop access, is that he remembers what red looks like, would swear he could see it.

It's in the taste of his own blood in his mouth, after all, the wash of pain in his stomach and chest that rushes over him whenever he draws breath, the smell of metal (not his own, not copper, so much blood, oh, God), clinging to his wounds, where he was stabbed again and again and again. It all permeates as much as Clint's cover's body spray did, the red, making it hard to think, hard to see beyond his absent sight, and he takes a drunken step forward, presses his fingers to the wall that runs alongside the steps that come down into his apartment, hoping it will help, praying for a touchstone. He makes it down a handful of stairs, something like wild optimism rising in his chest, alongside the pain (he can make it, if he can just make it to the phone, make it to Claire), before it all goes to hell.

His foot catches on something, something likely broken by him, by Stick, less than a handful of days ago, and he trips. He hits the remaining steps face-first, so fast it takes him a moment to register what just happened, to grunt, no more winded that he already was (is his lung punctured? he can't tell. it hurts. father forgive him -- both of them), and try to sit up. All he manages is to slide the rest of the way down the steps to the ground and for black to join the red, a memory of tunnel vision closing in on the edges of his mind's eye, as what little he can get from his other senses slips, stutters, unconsciousness creeping up on him. He doesn't try to get up again, after that, just lays there, panting. He doesn't even hear the door opening again above him, practically miles away.

He doesn't know how many minutes pass, him laying there, but eventually and what seems to him suddenly, something occurs to him. He shifts again, not trying to get up this time but to press his shaking fingers to the comm at his ear, always worn, just in case, but rarely used outside of his team ups with Clint and Natasha. It takes him three tries to actually get there, actually find his ear, and when he manages, it takes a moment more of false starts to fight past the black and find the breath for his words. It never occurs to him to think that the Avengers, if they're listening, already know what's going on, if only to a certain degree, that the comms are always transmitting, always receiving, that help may already be on the way.

"Little -- little help here?" he chokes out. "I need help. Please."

The red and black catch up to him, after that, as relentless as he's ever been in the same colors, and he slips into something like twilight.

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"Yeah," Foggy returns, because that does make so much sense, and he's kind of miserable about it, still hung up on the fact that, for all he thought he knew everything about Matt, he's realizing how much he doesn't know. "So how did that happen? The Stick guy, too?"

Edited 2015-12-27 05:57 (UTC)

His expression clouds over again at the mention of Stick, though he doesn't raise his eyes. Instead, he forces himself to take a deep breath, in spite of his protesting sides and chest, holds it for a moment and then blows out a breath. With it, goes some of the tension that's crept into his shoulders, the lurking anger on his face. With it, he finds he can actually answer the question.

"Sort of?" A pause. "You know how Buddhist monks meditate all the time? They learn to control their bodies, through that -- heart rate, blood flow, all of it."

Somehow, it was easier explaining this to Clint. Not that he thinks Foggy won't understand, isn't smart enough to get it (guy wouldn't have graduated cum laude if he wasn't, wouldn't have graduated summa cum laude, like him, if he'd toned down the partying a little), it's just -- this is different, somehow. If Clint hadn't followed, he wouldn't have minded, contenting himself to just shrugging it off, letting it go. Foggy, though? He wants him to understand.

"I learned to do that, too. The extra blood flow means wounds heal faster -- or that I can stop myself from bleeding out, if I need to." He pauses again, mostly so he can offer Foggy a wry smile. "In theory, anyway. Last night ... "

Last night, he's not sure he wouldn't have bled to death, if Foggy hadn't found him, if Steve and Bruce hadn't shown up.

"So this is definitely the Karate Kid," Foggy returns after a moment in which he digests all that - but at least his tone is a little lighter again?

It doesn't last, though, as he picks up on what Matt didn't say. "Was bad. Yeah, I got that. What was I supposed to do if the damn Avengers hadn't shown up? I'm a lawyer, Matt, not any kind of doctor." And he's just going to flashback to the state Matt was in last night, because he's fairly likely to have nightmares about that.

"Pretty sure you've got that backwards," Matt tries, hoping to carry some of that levity. (Damn it, Jim, I'm a doctor, not a lawyer!) He doesn't get far with it, however, feeling too bad on any number of levels to manage, and so he doesn't try again, lapsing into silence for a moment, instead, as he takes another mouthful of coffee.

"That burner phone I've been carrying around?" You know, the one he completely forgot about, when he came in, last night? The one Foggy thought was for some girl he's been bedding? "There's only one number in it -- it's for a nurse. Her name's Claire. If you could have gotten me up for a few minutes ... "

Maybe he would have thought to call her. Probably not, but maybe. He shakes his head, either way.

"I'd already gotten in touch with them, though. With the, uh ... " He reaches up to touch his ear, rather than finish that statement -- and finally does raise his eyes, his expression puzzled, when he realizes he's not wearing his comm anymore. Turning his head to one side, brow furrowed, he feels for it, mentally, and when he catches the scent of plastic, sweat and blood, somewhere back in the kitchen, he gestures in that direction. Someone must have taken it off him, while he slept, so it wouldn't end up permanently lodged in his ear or -- whatever.

"Stark gave me a direct line to them, when I started working with Barton and Romanoff, and if I ever needed anything. I never bothered to use it, when we weren't working together, until last night."

Foggy does huff out an amused laugh, because yeah, that did actually occur to him, but he doesn't address it, either.

"No one was getting you up without medical attention last night," Foggy returns. "But you have a nurse in speed dial. This isn't the first time it's been this bad, is it?"

He doesn't want to know that answer. He really doesn't. Except he needs to.

"And I'm still working on the fact that you have ties to the Avengers and no one actually knows that but you and them." Because seriously. That's one of the most epic parts of this whole thing - and, he's pretty sure, would affect heavily the media portrayal of one or the other. Probably not in the Avengers' favor, admittedly, considering how against the Devil of Hell's Kitchen they are right now.

"No, it's not," Matt admits after a long moment. He could have just focused on Foggy's continued shock over the fact that he's connected to the Avengers, but well. Again with wanting to be honest with him. He has at least half a decade worth of lies to make up for.

"A couple of nights after we got Karen out of lock-up, I went after the Russians. They'd kidnapped this kid -- he couldn't have been more than eight." Not old enough for puberty, not by the way his heart sounded. Just like the Black Sky. Shaking his head, he pushes the thought away. "He wasn't where I thought they'd taken him. It was a set up.

"Claire found me in the dumpster outside of her apartment with the punctured lung I mentioned." Among other things.

"Jesus," Foggy breathes because, like Matt's explanation of why he got started doing this, he really can't fault him for going after the kid. He also doesn't know what else to say to that, though he does come up with something after a moment, considering the scars he saw. "And she's been the one to patch you up since then?"

"When it's been serious enough that I needed help." He pauses. When he starts again, it's slowly at first, but with building fervor as he moves past the initial stab of guilt. "Probably not as often as I should -- and that's less stubbornness and more ... I don't want her caught up in this anymore than she has to be. It's already cost her. She got picked up by the Russians, after she helped me that first time. They thought, maybe, she could give them information on me. They tortured her, Foggy -- or they would have, if I hadn't gotten to her in time -- and I don't ... "

He closes his eyes briefly, tightly. When he opens them again, he fixes his gaze on Foggy as best he can. "It was never about not trusting you with this. It was me trying to protect you from me, from this double life I'm leading. I've seen what happens to people who get to close to it."

Foggy stays quiet for a long moment before he drops his head, sighing. "You're my best friend, Matt," he begins after another pause, as he raises his head again, and Matt might be relieved to notice he's still using the present tense in there. "And I thought I knew everything about you, and now there's this whole other side I know nothing about. These people I didn't even know existed." He obviously knew the Avengers existed, but he had no idea about Matt's connections to the various members.

"And I understand you didn't tell me to keep me out of the bad side of it, but." He shakes his head again, slowly. His previous statements stand.

There is a measure of relief to be taken from that, but it's minute, secondary to the guilt that assaults him again, as Foggy continues. He bows his head again, silent, searching for words beyond it. What he comes up with is lame, but it's the best he has, right now.

"Well, now you know." A beat. "And you'll have as much time as you need, to -- to process."

Whether that means he stays away from Foggy until he's got his equilibrium back or answering more questions. Whether it means showing off, now or later, or being more upfront about what he's about to do before he does it, even if, yes, he'd rather Foggy not know everything if only for the sake of plausible deniability. At this point, Foggy has him by the balls and he's willing to go along with it. Whatever he wants, whatever either of them think he's owed, as long as he doesn't lose him in any sense of the word.

Foggy nods, again. "Yeah." Foggy would rather not know every minute detail for the sake of plausible deniability - but he does want to know more, to not feel so out of the loop. "Just. Let me know if I need to be worrying about you, okay?"

He's trying to joke about it, to get back to some levity - but he's also not entirely joking.

"Not right this second," Matt starts, trying and failing at carrying that levity again. "Seriously, though -- I'll let you know if I'm planning on doing something stupid."

Even if Matt thinks it fell flat, Foggy chuckles faintly. "You did enough stupid last night." And he's sort of teasing, again. He knows Matt didn't mean to get his ass kicked that badly, but, well. Engaging a ninja is still not the best life choice.

"But okay. Good."

"Yeah, not gonna argue that." It takes an act of will not to touch his fingers to the bandages on his side again. It doesn't help that he's kind of keenly aware of them, but to his credit, he manages, taking another sip of his coffee, instead.

When he lowers the cup again, he's silent for a handful of beats, before, slowly, seriously, and with a gesture between them, he starts, "We're gonna be okay, right?"

Foggy continuing to call him his best friend, present tense, helps, sure, but he wants direct assurances if he can get them.

Foggy hesitates - and it's not because he's not sure, but because he honestly hadn't thought of the possibility of them not being okay. Yeah, this might have thrown him for a loop, and he might still be reeling from it all, but. They've had fights before and got past them.

"Yeah," he answers, finally, when he actually realizes he hasn't. "Of course we will."

He's just on the edge of saying something, of trying to placate Foggy and his silence, somehow, when he answers. He blows out a breath he wasn't aware he'd been holding all at once, following it, and closes his eyes briefly, head bowing.

"Okay, good," he says when he raises his head again. "Just -- good."

Yeah, that's all he's got.

"I'm not gonna bail on you because of this, Jesus, Murdock." He's pretty sure he's said Matt's his best friend a time or two already in this conversation or he'd be saying it again. "I might kick your ass if you scare the shit out of me again like this, but you're stuck with me."

He pauses a beat. "Though if you've got any other skeletons you wanna let out of the closet, now might be a good time." He's teasing, again, and it's more audible this time.

"It was an honest worry," Matt tells him, apologetically. It's not that he doesn't think Foggy's the sticking around type, mind you, it's more the fact that on the rare occasion he's actually imagined coming out of the vigilante closet, his imagination has been far less kind. Probably because, "I'm not sure I would have handled all this half as gracefully."

Foggy's temper, when he's truly angry, can be bad; his is a thousand times worse. He might hide it better, maybe, but it's still a fact and he knows it. He knew it before he started beating the shit out of assholes for a living.

"But no," he continues, part serious, part teasing himself, now, too, "I'm pretty sure this is the only skeleton I had rattling around." Foggy knows everything else about him.

"If this all hadn't led to Captain frickin' America offering me breakfast this morning, I might not be handling it this well.

"But okay," he continues on an exhale. "I'm holding you to that, but. Good to know."

"That's a definitely plus," he agrees on the heel of a breath of a laugh. If he didn't, you know, already know Steve, and if he actually felt like eating right now, he might actually be a little jealous. Maybe. It's hard to say, considering.

Either way, he, too, sobers again after a moment and with a breath out. A moment of pause follows, and then, "If there's anything specific you want to know ... "

He can't remember how much he told Foggy last night, everything a little fragmented, between his bouts of unconsciousness and the blood loss. (Hell, he can't remember if he's made this offer already, once, over the course of this conversation, either, though now it's because of the drugs and the emotional ups and downs of this conversation and the one before it, with Clint.) He also doesn't know how much Foggy was told, by someone else, while he was out, and so -- well. Again, if it makes Foggy feel better, if it keeps him from calling him out on something related to all of this, later, claiming he didn't know, he'll talk. And he'll keep making that offer, until Foggy is honestly comfortable with all of this, until he is, with him knowing.

"Offer's open," he finishes, that in mind.

Foggy nods. "I don't know how with it you were last night, but you answered a lot of it then. As for the rest... give me a second." He's had plenty of things come to mind to ask, but now that Matt's reopened the offer, most of them have fled.

"I can remember bits and pieces," Matt admits, making a face, "but not much else."

He's really not thrilled by those gaps in his memory. Still, he lets it go there and nods in response to Foggy, shifting to lean back into the couch. He can wait on him to decide what he wants to ask -- or to decide he'll come back to it later. Either way.

"I found you at the bottom of the stairs," Foggy begins, because he figures that face means he's bothered by it. "About the time I was ready to call the cops, Rogers showed up and then called Banner in, and he patched you up. They told me about your deal with the Avengers and how Fisk is actually a complete asshole. You told me how the whole... your other senses making up for your eyes thing works, and about your life being a kung-fu movie."

He pauses a beat, trying to think if there was anything else, before he adds, "Oh, right. And, uh. Karen thinks you got hit by a car, by the way, so she'll probably freak out at you at some point."

"Is that verbatim, counselor?" The part about his life being a kung-fu movie, he means. Not that that's not accurate (or not amusing, which along with Foggy going through it for him, takes some of the edge off of his inability to remember it all), it's just -- well, he can't help but ask.

Whatever light he actually managed there evaporates at the mention of Karen, however, and he winces. Not that it's not a good lie. "Well, I definitely felt like I got hit by one, last night, so ... "

Foggy grins. "I asked if the Stick guy made you paint a fence." So, close enough.

"You definitely looked like it last night, and you're only losing a little of it, now." He definitely sees already what Matt means about healing quickly - most people would still have needed to go to the hospital, even with Bruce's work.

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