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It's almost a relief when he goes to the university to study law. Foggy thinks these might be the best years of his life ahead of him, and he's honestly looking forward to it. He moves into his single in the first-year residences and quickly endears himself to many of his housing-mates. Classes start and they're a bit rough, but no one would accuse Foggy of being dumb. He buckles down and studies and his easy demeanor makes it easy to work with the other students, with the professors.
He's peripherally aware of the hot blind guy, the way people tend to be of that one special needs kid in the class, or the really good-looking guy. Matthew Murdock is both, and so if you share one class with the guy, you're bound to know about him. Foggy's a relatively soft-touch, so he worries about it a bit; picks his head up and takes notice. There's no one here to notice him noticing, so he feels safe doing so.
Murdock seems like the kind of guy that Foggy would have liked to know, if that kind of thing was something he could do. Murdock's bright and attentive in the classes they share, even when Foggy notices that the professors really haven't adjusted for a blind student. He's not the only one looking, but the thing is, he watches the way Murdock's jaw clenches and the fake little twist at the corner of his mouth and the strained politeness of his words when he brushes away the awkwardness of "Oh, right. This guy's blind." He's painfully polite and obliging in familiar flavors of depending-on-the-goodwill-of-others.
Foggy notices because he's not blind and Murdock's more entertaining than the teachers most of the time. He notices because he's looking, and so the day that Murdock comes in with something a bit awkward in his gait, it doesn't go unremarked. He thinks it's bruised shins, which: shouldn't Murdock know where he was going by now? He never sees anyone helping the guy out, but Murdock seems to manage well enough, tapping his way around campus with his long white cane.
He notices the day it's especially hot but Murdock's wearing one of his long, soft sweaters, and the sleeve slides up his arm and there's something dark and purple and green on the meat of it, on the outside of his arm. Like Murdock had knocked it into something, or perhaps something knocked into it? Murdock tugs the sleeve back down, and his jaw flexes a bit and his mouth twists and he ducks his head like somehow he's sensed Foggy looking.
He notices when Murdock flexes his arm or leg or back, the way his lips pinch tight and white. When there's a hitch in the way he gets up from the chairs, or his knuckles are white for a moment over the back of the chair as he pauses. He notices when Murdock's a bit late, hands empty and trailing along the wall.
He notices when Murdock doesn't show up at class at all.
--
It's about halfway through the first semester that Foggy calls home. It's not like he's really homesick, or anything, but he's aware that for all the freedom he has now, he somehow has less control over things than before. It's a strange feeling.
"Bobby Dixon's there," Uncle Philip says. He sounds distracted, and Foggy thinks that he probably would have told anyone else that he was busy, that he'd call back, but he's been talking to Foggy for the last ten minutes or so, even though Foggy is saying a lot of nothing.
"Bobby Dixon," Foggy scoffs, rolling his eyes. He half expects to be smacked in the head for it, but Philip isn't standing there and wouldn't know if he were rolling his eyes. "Bobby Dixon doesn't count, the man's a rat in a uniform. He'd sell us out to the cops if they offered him a bottle of water."
"Nah, he wouldn't," Philip says. "He knows what would happen if he did." A dull crack comes in over the phone, accompanied by a muffled shout, and Philip sighs loudly. "Look, Frankie, I'm a bit busy. I know you're nervous about this whole University thing, but don't worry about it, okay? You're a smart kid. Just keep your head down and do what your mom tells you, yeah?"
He holds his breath for a second, then says, "I always do."
"Yeah, I know. Like I said, you're smart. Do us proud for once, eh?"
"Right," he says. "I will."
--
It isn't just because Murdock lives in the same building as Foggy that Foggy knows who his roommate is, though he does wonder about that. It's seems a bit strange that he himself got a single but Murdock got a double. Did they simply ask Murdock if he needs special accommodations, and did he simply say 'no'? No one is helping him to get around campus, and while he seems to get around fine, it sits badly with Foggy.
The roommate certainly isn't a help. His name is Brian Michaels, and pretty much everyone knows his family or soon hears about them from the guy himself. He comes from money, is the point, doctors and lawyers and psychiatrists, though Foggy thinks he wouldn't want any of them working on his brain or body or rights.
He notices Brian Michaels: the way Michaels looks at his classmates, especially the girls, and how he acts at parties. He's charismatic and he's well-liked and sometimes he shows up dragging Murdock along whose mouth is tight and shoulders are hunched. Murdock's not a small guy - he's the same size as Michaels, Foggy knows, but they don't look like it. Girls don't know how to interact with Murdock, but Foggy sees how they and Michaels laugh and Murdock's mouth peels open and shows his teeth.
Marci, pretty and sharp and mean with her nails biting into his elbow, follows his gaze and says "hmm." It's flat and aware, and there are steel shutters in her eyes, cold and knowing. "Pet project," she wonders thoughtfully.
"Nah," Foggy says, "he's clever and all, but we're not very compliant, you know."
"Uh-huh." Marci keeps staring, her eyes roving over Murdock's bruised fingers and his shoulders drawn up to his ears and Michaels' broad gestures and wide smile. "Would be better if it were," she says at last, "Michaels' family pretty large. Old money, you know." She glances at him sideways.
"Yeah," he agrees, because it costs him nothing and it's true. He has nothing to offer his own family, and it's not like Michaels was there on scholastic achievement or anything else that Foggy could easily ruin all on his own.
Marci curls her sharp nails over his neck, and scratches at the short hair at the back of his head. She pats his chest where his heart beats, and he doesn't think she's going to forget it.
--
Murdock smiles, thin and polite, and says that he's simply clumsy. His lips are white except where they're brown and bruised, and there are too many points to his teeth. He looks small and tired and thin and his glasses are crooked and his clothes are wrinkled and there's a quiver to his fingers and a tightness to him like he might vibrate apart into a million-billion atoms like a nuclear bomb.
"On your five, Murdock," Foggy says after class, after the hall is mostly empty except for a few stragglers and Murdock who doesn't have his cane today, either. Murdock stills and then flinches from the lightest touch that Foggy can manage at his elbow. "You gotta stop being so clumsy, man," he observes mildly.
"Yeah," Murdock agrees amicably as Foggy ducks to grab up the paper that one of the exiting students had knocked to the floor. It's blank but for the braille, and Foggy lets himself ogle it curiously for a moment before he reaches out and taps it against Murdock's forearm. Murdock takes it, his fingers skimming it for a moment and he says, "Thanks," and doesn't mean it, wary. "Just the workload," he adds, "sometimes I don't pay attention to where I'm going."
"Uh-huh," Foggy says, and "You know, if doubling is distracting you, we could go down to Housing and see if they can get you a single? I don't mean to toot my own horn, but I'm pretty good at convincing people."
Murdock is very still for a moment, his fingers still splayed over the paper that Foggy had picked up for him. His head is twisted in that slightly uncanny way Foggy presumes all blind people must have. Then his jaw clenches, and his smile is as polite and fake as it ever is when someone gets awkward about 'see' or 'saw'. "Thanks," he says, "but that's - really not necessary. I mean: everything's fine, it's just stress. I keep forgetting where things are, that's all."
"You sure," Foggy says, though he thinks there's very little chance that Murdock will change his mind.
"Yeah, it's fine," Murdock says. "Excuse me, I should - you know."
"Yeah, sure," Foggy agrees, even though he doesn't want to let it go. He leaves first, and wonders what he can do to fix things and set them right.
--
He thinks about it. Foggy finds himself thinking of little else, even when Christmas break comes around and he's called home and leaves campus far behind him. Uncle Philip finds him in the kitchen and watches him from the doorway for a second. Foggy tries not to give anything away, but he's grilling a ham and cheese, so it's clearly a bit late for that.
"Penny for your thoughts," Uncle Philip says.
"Yeah, that's not going to do me much good," Foggy says. "I'd have to sell them for - oh. Roughly eight-hundred million dollars for it to be worth it."
Philip nods thoughtfully and not at all as if Foggy is being overwrought or melodramatic the way he feels like he is. "That kind of a problem, huh," he says. "Kid, whatever it is can't be that bad. At least wait until you're doing work for us before you start cryin' about multimillion dollar problems. We have them in spades, after all."
"Right," he says, and sighs, and adds: "Don't remind me. I am treasuring the fact that I have so little to worry about. My course workload will probably kill me, and if it doesn't, I'm pretty sure I'll be looking fondly back on it."
"That's the spirit," Philip says with a smile, then steals half his sandwich after it's cut.
--
It's only a few days later that the video comes out. Or at least that he finds out about it.
Marci hasn't forgotten his personal interest any more than he had thought she would, and she finds out first because Foggy can't afford to be distracted while he's at home. She calls him to warn him about it, and her voice is casual, mostly - except where it trembles when she breathes. "This is off the record, of course," she says, "I don't want to be tangled up in any of it, thank you anyway."
"Of course," he agrees, but he's not going to forget it.
The video is difficult to watch. It's poor quality, amateur work taken with a cheap phone and then compressed into a file because it's not short. There's audio, too, but it's particularly terrible, mostly sharp edges of words and laughter.
Foggy sicks up half-way through the first viewing, then washes his mouth out and then gets a bottle of high-proof vodka. He doesn't fair any better on the second attempt, and he doesn't understand why, completely. He's seen worse things done, probably. Has done some pretty terrible things himself when it's required of him - it often is.
It shouldn't twist his gut and tighten his chest and make him vomit bile and liquor, but it does. There are worse things that go on all the time. He's forced to consider that it's because he knows Murdock, and wonders if he's gone and gotten himself attached.
It's impossible to distance and disassociate himself from the events on the video, but Foggy forces himself to watch, to study it to see if he can identify anyone else on it. It's amateur work, but there is either beginners' luck at play or these amateurs are practiced enough to avoid getting caught. The voices aren't recognizable and there are no faces - corners of grins, chins, but nothing higher, and it's almost too blurry to count how many are present.
He already knows the percentages, already knows that Michaels' family is too loaded to fall. The outcome has been predetermined, but -
"Something's come up," he tells his mom vaguely, "I've gotta head back to school and take care of it."
"The hell you do," she says, unamused. "There's nothing as important as this meeting, Franklin, you know that. I've spent months setting this up. You either be there, or you can forget about school and go back to being an embarrassment and getting tears and snot all over everything."
"Right, yeah," he says, because there's no use in arguing. "Sorry, Mom, you're right. I'll be there."
But he can't get the video out of his head, and it intrudes into his dreams until he wakes up wet and shaking, and he makes a few calls just to make sure - and it doesn't help him sleep at night, but nothing ever does anyway. It's a mockery to think of anything being 'safe' at the moment, but he tries, anyway.
--
For some reason, his mother always forgets that he's personable. He never forgets how little gestures can help in the long run. He's already in town but he's not on campus when Bobby Dixon, the man they have in campus security, gives him a call.
It takes too long for him to get on campus, and he immediately goes to Murdock's floor, because -
There are familiar sounds of an altercation, but it's over by the time he gets to the door and gets it open. The room is wrecked, but not as much the occupants. Murdock's covered in blood, Jesus Christ. It's all over his hands, all over his arms. His glasses are missing, his bare face splotched yellow and black and red with soon-to-be-bruises and flecks of blood. He's sitting on his bed with a serene expression, his sightless eyes aimed somewhere across the room.
"Hello, Foggy," he says calmly, despite his heaving breath. It sounds like bellows over the wet crackling popping noise Michaels makes at his feet.
It's a few days too early for the bulk of the student body to be back on campus, but Foggy shuts the door behind him in a hurry, anyway. Murdock's head cocks at the noise, but he seems otherwise unperturbed; it was a little late to try to run with the evidence all over him, perhaps. "Christ, Murdock," Foggy says. "This - well, this is pretty incriminating."
"Yeah," Murdock agrees easily, even as his breaths begin to even out. He reaches up like he's going to mop at the sweat on his face, but hesitates at the last moment. He looks pale and a little shocky, his nose wrinkling and his mouth twisting unhappily. "But hey," he adds, his mouth pulling open into a not-smile, "who's gonna believe a blind guy could beat up anyone, right? I mean, I just - " He huffs, a poor mockery of a laugh, twisted and a bit wet. "I'm just the helpless blind guy, right?"
"Uh-huh," Foggy says, staring down at the tenderized, bloody mess of a man; Foggy only knows it's Michaels because Bobby Dixon had said it was. They should really call an ambulance. "So," he says, "did you just get tired of his bullshit, or was Michaels one of them?"
There isn't an answer, and when Foggy looks up, Murdock's even paler than before and shaking, something wounded and crushed in his face for the first time. Murdock sucks in a breath that shakes and rattles, and his face crumples and he says, "oh."
It occurs to Foggy then that Murdock must not have known that there had been any video. He'd looked pretty out of it, and - Foggy feels like vomiting all over again, his throat burning and stomach heaving. He opens his mouth, but nothing comes out - not bile or words. Murdock hadn't even known why Foggy came up to his dorm, just sitting pretty as you please over the dying body of his roommate.
Murdock's crumpled face goes a bit blotchy, and then he breathes deep and knuckles down, his bloodied hands tightening and his head ducking slightly. His knuckles are torn. There will be his blood on Michaels' body, Foggy thinks. "Of course there was," Murdock says into his chest to himself, then louder: "Yeah. I don't think he expected -" He peels open one fist to gesture down at the dying body at his feet. "I don't think he thought I'd know - that I'd be - I could -"
His breathing is a mess and getting faster and he's starting to shake and Foggy says, "Christ, Murdock," again because he can't think of anything else. "Alright, hey," he says. "Cut that out, okay? Breathe . Breathe with me. In-one-two-three, out-four-five-six." He repeats himself a few more times even though it doesn't seem to help Murdock. It's helping him come to terms with this situation, frankly.
Murdock is clearly more competent than Foggy thought. He beat the shit out of a fully able man, despite the fact that he looks like he's lost even more weight over the break. It begs the question of why he'd put up with Michaels long enough for it to escalate into - this. Michaels' chest looks like it's collapsed, and it sounds like he's going to drown in his own blood. Michaels' family is definitely going to put Murdock away for a very long time.
Unless.
Foggy's feeling slightly more calm now, and he notices that Murdock has managed to barely avoid the panic attack he'd been plunging into. "Okay?" He asks, and Murdock's face spasms slightly but he says, "fine." Foggy says, casually, "Do you think you could positively ID the others?"
Murdock cringes before his face goes slack, and he says, "Yes," confidently, if a bit distant: shock or disassociation. "Not that it matters," he adds, his teeth white and pink like the bitterness of the words was bleeding out between them. "I'm pretty sure I'm going to jail for a long time."
He's already done the math, then, Foggy thinks; the same math that Foggy had done when he'd gotten the video. "Oh," he says, lightly, "I don't know about that." He moves over to where Michaels lays and bends down. It's a fairly simple matter to seal his hand over Michaels' mouth, torn and wet with saliva and blood, and pinch his swollen, blood-clotted nose shut between forefinger and thumb.
Murdock's head cocks again: he's listening. His brow pinches, and he says, "Foggy, what are you doing? You're getting the evidence on you."
"What are you talking about, man," Foggy says. "There's gotta be a crime for there to be evidence. Do you see a crime here? We should probably clean up before your roommate gets back on campus."
"That's," Murdock says, and his breath goes unsteady again but doesn't seem to be threatening another panic attack. "That's illegal, Foggy," he says. "I know - I know what kinds of things your sort of people do. I won't -"
"Well, now you're just being rude," Foggy says, even as he clenches his jaw and shoves the struggling body down. Weaken and beaten and bloody as it is, it's still alive at the moment and thoughtlessly trying to remain that way. "What do you mean by that? My 'sort of people'? Come on, I thought you'd be more open minded."
"Nelson," Murdock says, low and dangerous, his knuckles bleeding sluggishly as they break back open over his knees.
"Yeah, it's not about that," Foggy snaps. "Look, I saw, okay? You and I know this didn't start here with you, and it isn't going to end with you, either. Beginner's luck doesn't keep people's faces out of frame, Murdock." Maybe it's the strength of his anger, but Michaels finally goes still, and he breathes a bit easier even though he doesn't remove his hand. "So: good riddance," he says.
For a moment longer, Murdock looks like he might stand up and attack Foggy, beat him to death as well. If he tries, Foggy's pretty sure he'll succeed. "I guess even mobsters have limits," he says at last, bitter and dark.
He's not sure how Murdock knows; Foggy's legally a Nelson, which hasn't been the brand name in ten and a half years. He supposes it would have come up either way, considering the way things are going at present. There are a lot of questions, suddenly, about Matthew Murdock. The way he'd identified Foggy the moment he'd opened the door, how he'd be able to identify his assailants and how he'd known about Foggy's connections.
"Yeah, don't count on it," he says. "Your martyr idea sucks, by the way, I've got a better one. How about this: you hunt these fuckers down, and I'll clean up the mess."
"Out of the goodness of your heart," Murdock says, low and doubtful and dangerous.
"Well, it's not made of stone," Foggy says, pulling back from Michaels' body. He stands and looks at Murdock, covered in drying blood and looking small and wounded and full of fists and teeth. "Come on," he says, like gentling an animal, "up. Go take a shower. We'll have to dispose of those clothes and those sheets." On a hunch, he holds out his hand, the one that's already bloodied.
Murdock doesn't twitch for a moment, but then his head moves slightly, his sightless eyes wandering aimlessly just to the left of Foggy, and his nose flares. Then he reaches out, misses Foggy's hand by a mere inch, and catches it on the second try, and lets Foggy pull him to his feet.
"I guess you've been an accessory to worse," he half questions, half states, prodding and wary.
No point in lying, so he says, artlessly: "Yep. Though in this case I think we're joint principals, so the consequences are a bit uglier." He releases Murdock's hand, and jerks his head toward the door. "Now seriously: go wash up. Don't get blood everywhere. The more contained we keep this, the better."
"Yeah, fine," he says distantly, stepping around the body and the furniture in the room with eerie precision.
Foggy waits until he hears the shower turn on in the bathroom before he gets to work. The sheets on Murdock's bed are startlingly soft, but it's not until he pulls them off that he realizes he recognizes them. Foggy swallows bile and bends to wrap them around the body.
The best thing about disposing of a body that doesn't have holes in it is the fact that there is very little blood to clean up. In that, Murdock is much more polite than most people Foggy has cleaned up after. He calls Bobby Dixon, who might sell the family to the cops for a bottle of water, but seems about fifty times more attached to Foggy lately, and willing to help to boot.
It's a relatively simple task to set the room right, and Foggy is as meticulous as he can be in cleaning all the blood up. When he has accomplished that and the shower is still running, Foggy knocks on the bathroom door.
"You're going to prune, Murdock," he says. There's no reply, and he frowns and tilts his ear toward the door. On the same hunch that had him holding his hand out to a blind man, he knocks again, but softer. "Come on," he says, speaking coaxingly. "You're going to need new sheets and I have no idea what the thread count on the old set was."
That at least provokes a response, something startling and loud and broken. "Okay," Murdock replies, and the sound of water cuts off.
Foggy steps out of the room to let Murdock settle himself in peace, leaning his head against the hallway wall and wondering just what it was he thought he was doing. It seems like the fairly obvious thing to do - to help Murdock duck the long arm of the law and money.
He knows that they're going to get new sheets for Murdock's bed, and that he'll give Murdock his number, and they'll continue not to pay attention to each other in the daytime hours, and he'll have body after body to dispose of - at least four. And then?
And then hopefully they'll graduate, and he can put it all behind him. The few things that tie them to the crimes, the better.
--
That's not quite what happens.
The day before classes start again, Foggy comes back to his room and finds Murdock waiting for him inside it. "Jesus," he says, startled, and Murdock smiles thin and mean. He's mirroring the same posture he had right after beating Michaels half to death, but it doesn't look small or wounded, now. It might be the glasses he has again, it might not.
"Your room is surprisingly normal for a mobster in training," Murdock observes.
"What, did you think I was going to have pounds of crack-cocaine under the bed," Foggy asks, sharp and annoyed. "Or maybe counterfeit bills pasted on the walls for wallpaper? I'm here to learn law, Murdock, not get kicked out before I can graduate."
Murdock's mouth twists, and then he stands from Foggy's bed. "Well," he says, "since it seems we're reluctant partners in crime, I need you to do something for me."
"Oh, we are not off to a good start," Foggy says, folding his arms. "Look, Murdock, I wanna help you. I am such a huge sucker for the underdog and all semester you've had this wounded duck thing going on - although you're obviously more than capable of killing a man. But breaking into my room and doing this weird - vaguely threatening power-play thing? Doesn't make me wanna help you."
Murdock's jaw flexes, and it's obvious he doesn't like what he's hearing. "Alright," he says stiffly. "Still. You have it - don't you? The Video." His head cocks, and a bit of the menace comes back when he says, lip peeled back, "I'll know if you lie."
"Right, okay," Foggy says, and doesn't bother questioning how Murdock will know or if it's just the whole intimidation scheme all over again. "I do, actually, why? It's useless as evidence. And also a little beside the point at this time."
He stands extremely still for a second, then swallows, and says, "I'm going to need you to describe it for me."
"Oh ," Foggy says, "oh, no. No, that would be - that doesn't even sound in the same ballpark as a good idea - that's not even in the same stadium, the same - the same country as a good idea!"
Murdock has him by the front of his shirt before Foggy can even register him moving. His knuckles are digging into Foggy's sternum, and he's so pale his bitten lips are garishly red and he's all teeth and claw. "They 'll have seen it," he snarls, "and I'll have to listen to them talk about it. They'll see me, and they'll know I'm the blind guy that got -" He's shaking, and he releases Foggy and takes a few sharp steps away and slams his torn fist into the wall. It leaves a deep dent smeared in red.
Thank god the real police are rarely as smart or thorough or lucky as they are on CSI. As it was, Foggy is going to have to put plaster in that.
"I have the right to know," Murdock says, low and raw and furious.
"I think a better idea would be to just stick your whole leg in a meat grinder," Foggy says, but Murdock isn't his friend, and he's frankly a little terrifying at the moment and Foggy can't for the life of him figure out how to explain that he's wrong. Murdock sounds right, it all adds up like 1+1=2, even though Foggy thinks there's something not right with the logic, like there are invisible letters there, an 'a' or 'b' or 'x' or all three. "Alright, fine, whatever," he says, feeling sick and uncomfortable, "but I'm getting a trashcan and a bottle of water, first."
Murdock ends up using both, though he holds off on throwing up until the end of the video. The smell nearly does it for Foggy, but Murdock looks like he's going to vibrate and fly to pieces so he swallows it back. He thinks touch will be the last thing Murdock wants and so he pulls up the first app on his phone that he can, and ends up spending five minutes rambling about the local weather and another ten about classes in general, and their professors.
After a bit, Murdock gets up from the floor and staggers into Foggy's bathroom. Foggy can hear him dry heaving before running the water in the sink. Foggy sets the dirty trash bin out of the way and collects Murdock's cane off the floor, standing it against his desk.
When Murdock emerges, he's pretending at put-together, but he'd raked his wet hands through his hair and his color is still off, wet splotches on his shirt. "Sorry for making a mess," he says. His throat is raw and he sounds faint and distant again.
"Yeah, your welcome, feel free to break in again sometime and make another," Foggy says dryly. "Your cane's by the desk, by the way. Don't let the door hit you on the way out."
"Right." Murdock clears his throat and stands uncertainly for a moment before he aims himself at the desk. It takes a big of fumbling about for him to find the cane itself, but he doesn't bother using it to make it to the door and the implications of that are slightly unsettling.
Foggy can't quite help himself; Murdock reminds him too much of videos of guys strolling along thin wires, wobbling, wobbling, about to tumble off. He doesn't know if there's a net at the bottom to catch him. He says, "You going to be okay going after those guys?"
Murdock stills, his head tilting. "I'm not actually helpless," he says tonelessly.
"Yeah, no, obviously," he says, dry. "I have actually felt real fear for my life at your hands. Also not what I asked, Murdock. Are you going to be okay?"
He has very little doubt in his mind that Murdock can and will kill every last one of them and that Foggy will be stuck footing the bill, but. Mom always told him he didn't have the guts for it - for any of it, that becoming a lawyer was the only way he was going to cut it, but. He's feared for his life from Murdock. But.
Murdock's back is painfully straight and his shoulders are incredibly tight, and so Foggy blows out his breath and says instead, "Look, just don't get caught. People have eyes, you know, and cameras. You have my number if you need help."
"Right," Murdock says flatly, and only barely doesn't slam the door behind him.
--
Murdock is about seven different kinds of not actually helpless, of course. Foggy has good instincts to have been frightened for his life; Murdock's extremely well suited to hunting people down and wrecking their bodies with a relentless kind of fury so they drown in their own blood.
"There are places you're supposed to avoid hitting, in the ring," he says mildly as Foggy pours water over his busted knuckles to wash the worst of the blood away. "Things that rupture. Things that break. People like to pretend that it's a hard thing to do, but it's not. Did you know that the human hand is actually a poor weapon?"
"I'm looking at the evidence of it," Foggy says unimpressed. He can't believe he's actually doctoring this asshole, but the fucker will bleed everywhere and if Murdock gets caught, then Foggy will, and somehow Foggy thinks that Mom's lawyers won't come by to get him a plea.
Murdock doesn't bother to disagree. "Yes, but also because the force necessary to make a hit hurt. There's so many small bones in the hand that will break if you hit something wrong. But we learned how to do it, didn't we? Humans, I mean. God gave us these things that can make art and we learned how to make war."
"Are you punch-drunk?" Murdock doesn't sound particularly dazed, but he's rambling and waxing philosophical so it seems like a logical question to Foggy. He suspects that the thing on Murdock's head is a shirt tied all inside out, but it does a fair job of hiding his features, so he supposes it works. "Look, hands heal, too," he says, "though at this rate we're going to need an actual med student."
"Not really. They don't really put up much of a fight," he says, and his words get all sharp and broken the way they do at times like these: hate and self-hate in equal measures.
"Okay," he says, rolling his eyes - then says so. "But at least invest in some gloves, Murdock. You can't keep leaving your DNA at the scene of the crime."
The smile that crosses Murdock's face is all wrong - too sharp at the corners, too many points of his teeth, too much pleasure. "Sure," he says lowly, like a verbal leer, "if it makes your job easier."
Foggy glances cautiously as he winds gauze over the broken skin, but refrains from answering.
The thing is, Murdock seems to be a genuinely nice guy - so do most psychopaths, up until they peel the skin off your face. Murdock definitely has the kind of face that evil might wear to tempt a person with. He's charismatic and magnetic when he puts his mind to it, and his aggressive good looks do the rest. Without Michaels there to shoehorn him into being the butt of every joke, Murdock manages to pull girls in and charm everyone else with very little fail.
The number of times Murdock turns his charm on Foggy is just short of alarming. Foggy already knows he's a sucker; was from the moment he proposed to be one half of a serial killer vigilante pair. He's not sure why Murdock feels the need to try to charm him when they're already locked together by being literal partners in crime. He's already wrapped so tightly around Murdock's little finger they may as well tie the knot.
Which might not be a bad idea, legally speaking, although it might put a damper on Murdock's conga line of girls he's been leading back to his temporarily-a-single room. Foggy isn't sure how healthy that was, but he isn't an expert on PTSD or Murdock so whatever; he bandages knuckles and disposes of bodies, and when in the aftermath Murdock is high on adrenaline, Foggy ignores whatever strange things he does or says.
He tapes down the free end of the bandage and tosses the roll back into the bag he's brought this time. "It'd be great if you had a better alibi, Murdock," he says. "You can't show up to class with busted knuckles every time someone goes missing."
"As long as you do your part, it won't matter."
"It's like you don't even understand criminal investigations and just how incredibly loaded these people are." Foggy pulls the plastic square out of the bag and unzips it, shaking the bed sheet free. Mom always said there was an art to things, and since they'll be fucked if they find the bodies anyway, Foggy figures this won't go astray.
With moves verging on practiced - this is the fourth time he's done it - he ties the bed sheet around the body's neck like a reverse cape, then pulls it over the head and settles the body over sheet and wraps it tight around to keep the limbs closed in. The sheet isn't so thick or good quality that he needs a thick steel needle, but it seems appropriate, and he seals the sheet closed like a body bag.
When he's satisfied, he stands and turns, and Murdock's still crouched up against the wall, his beaten hands hanging between his knees, fingers twined together. He doesn't look much like Murdock - there's daytime Murdock, who is all good looks and charm and wounded duck, and then there's - this. Something that dresses in dark colors with only a mean slash of red mouth and white teeth and bloodied fingers to show for it, coiled and dangerous and waiting.
"What are you doing here," Foggy asks, means to be rude about it but only sounds resigned. "You hate the smell of death, remember?"
"Yeah," Murdock agrees, but he doesn't get up.
--
They put the last two culprits six feet down - figuratively speaking, since actually the Hudson is politely nearby and Murdock squawks when he realizes but doesn't argue the point. Foggy figures that's the end of their association. It's not like they meet up or hang out in public where they might be seen together. They're not friends . He should be happy he won't be called on to dispose of anymore bodies - he should be, and he is, in a way, but -
Well, his phone won't be ringing and he won't answer it to Murdock's breathless "Got another one for you." His phone doesn't do much ringing anyway. Marci is sharp and intuitive and she had cut her losses and given him space when she'd picked up on the way the wind was blowing. Foggy doesn't blame her, though he misses her. The disappearances have gained national attention the way things do when the people involved are good-looking and rich and white. As long as they don't drag the Hudson, Foggy's not spectacularly worried about that.
He is worried about his mom taking notice. Dreading it, actually, and he still hasn't come up with a contingency plan for when she finally bothers to pick up the phone or - god forbid - shows up herself. He certainly can't give her Murdock. The guy still hasn't let up on his grudge against Foggy's roots, which, whatever, he's had people be gross toward him about worse things. He's not entirely sure, but he thinks it might even be a legitimate reason to be gross toward him.
Except that Murdock's thing about Foggy's family ranks about the same as when straight guys figure out he's liberally bi and they're not homophobic but they still don't know where the boundary is with him. Which basically means that Murdock doesn't seem to hate that part of him, but he doesn't want anything to do with it, either. Foggy's not sure how much he wants his mom being anywhere near Murdock either, so that's fine, really. So long as his mom stays out of it.
All the same, Foggy is pretty sure that everything will calm down now, and maybe Marci will come back around again because whatever she says, they like each other and the sex is good.
That's what he thinks until his phone rings and he answers it to the sound of Murdock unable to catch his breath on the other end. Foggy panics until he manages to wrestle enough words out of Murdock's gasps to realize that there isn't another body and Murdock is in no real trouble except from himself, and then he's trying to talk the guy into breathing like this is a Lamaze class.
It doesn't help and so he defaults to talking about classes, about the weather, until Murdock sounds a little less like he's dying and more like he's just winded. When even that calms to just slightly harsh breathing, Foggy says, "Okay, that was slightly terrifying. Anything I can do for you, buddy?"
"No," Murdock says, then "Jesus, I'm sorry, I didn't - fuck, it was just -"
He's starting to sound upset and panicky again and before he knows it, Foggy's making senseless soothing noises. "No, no, it's fine," he says, though he's not sure it is. "I told you to call me if you needed help, okay, so it's fine. It's perfectly fine, okay?"
His breath is still a bit rough and rushed, but Murdock relents and says, "Sure."
He doesn't sound like he believes it, and Foggy chews on that for a moment before he asks, "Is this the first one?" He doesn't even know if Murdock's going to answer or not, but he has to at least ask.
"No," Murdock says after a bit. "But there were things to do, before."
Foggy wonders just how quickly after the Incident Murdock had decided that murder was the way to go. Then again, Foggy had been the one to actually kill Michaels, so maybe Murdock hadn't thought that until Foggy said it to his face.
"Well, okay," Foggy says, "then there's going to be things to do now. You've been working out again, right? You look a little less skinny than you were for a bit there." Less small and thin and pathetic and more wiry and mean, muscles corded over too-many-bones.
"Yeah," Murdock says, sounding like his breath was going with it, "but it's not enough."
"Okay." Foggy thinks for a second while there's a secondary, lower thought process protesting that he's going to have to fucking Google how to deal with survivors because he can already tell Murdock's not going to take himself to the therapy he desperately needs. "Okay," he says again, thinking of the odd, waiting silence on the other end of the phone. "Goddammit, Murdock, you already know what I'm going to say, don't you?"
"I don't know, do I?"
It isn't like there hadn't been an outbreak of vigilantism when Tony Stark had publicly declared himself Iron Man - stupid kids and neuroatypical adults dressing the part. Then gain, anyone had to be neuroatypical to put on tights and go fight crime, no matter how many billions of dollars they had.
But if that was what it took to stave off Murdock's panic attacks -
"Alright," Foggy says, "listen. You call me anytime, okay? But if you don't think that's going to help, then maybe -" He stops, sighs, and firms his jaw. "Then maybe you should think about. You know. Doing - security work. Stopping shit from happening, right? But I swear, Murdock, you get yourself some gloves or weapons and a vest, because getting yourself killed is not what I signed up for."
Murdock is breathing almost normally again, but he sounds hushed. "What did you sign up for?"
"God only knows," he says dryly. "You gonna be okay or do I need to regale you with the most recent frankly ridiculous movie plots? Wait - what even was the last movie you've seen? Can't imagine they're very entertaining when all the special effects go to waste."
"Yeah, no, movies don't - maybe some other night," Murdock says, and for fuck's sake, he can apparently manage wounded duck over the phone, it's basically completely unfair.
"Alright, I'll brush up on my movie trivia. Get yourself a bottle of water or something, or a sandwich, and go enjoy your frankly ridiculous bed sheets. Call me if you need something."
After he hangs up, Foggy stares at his phone for a moment. It seems that Murdock's needs went beyond just having someone dispose of the bodies, and somehow - well, no. Not 'somehow'. Murdock had been isolated from the get-go by his association with Michaels.
"What the hell have I signed myself up for," Foggy wonders, but it's too late to back out now, so he swallows it down and deals with it.
--
It goes like that for a while. Murdock doesn't make any indication that he's followed up on any vigilante urges he may or may not be having, but he calls Foggy. Sometimes he just sounds tense and sometimes he's let it get as bad as not being able to breathe. At least he calls , and the reading suggests that Foggy keep acting like Murdock's doing him a favor in doing it, and it's really not that hard to make it sound true.
All of that is fine, and Foggy figures that everything else is fine, too, which is why it comes as a complete shock when he wakes up to Murdock climbing into his bed.
He's exhausted from the trifecta of fucked-upness that is class/Murdock/family, and confused, and so all he does is scoot sideways in his too-small bed while belligerently saying, "What the fuck."
"I can't sleep," Murdock tells him, sounding equally belligerent, and "Your sheets are awful."
Foggy lets that soak into his exhausted brain for a moment before he says, "I know we talked about this, Murdock."
He huffs out a breath and finally squeezes into the small space left. Foggy's not a small guy by any means and Murdock can look like it, but he's really not, either. His twisting is threatening to shove Foggy right out of the bed, and finally Murdock manages to pull the covers until he's under them. He's cold and he's shaking, and the mild urge to toss him out because what the fuck, no, seriously, fades.
It's worse than the time that Foggy had found a puppy, small and dirty and hungry with its ribs showing along its sides. He can't imagine that this will turn out any better if anyone finds out, with the added threat of his mom making him do it with his own hands.
"Alright," Foggy says, "whatever." Murdock probably is fairing even worse than he is, with all the additional bullshit going on in his head. He's not cut out for the life he's living. Neither is Foggy, actually, but wonders of wonders, he's had more practice at it, born into it the way he was. "How'd you even get in," he adds, slurring a bit as even the shock fails to keep him awake. "Didn't hear the door."
"Window," Murdock answers, like it's the obvious answer.
"You're a lunatic," Foggy says. It only vaguely occurs to him to ask how, but he's too tired to really care at the moment. Murdock can fly for all he cares, so long as he gets back to sleep.
Murdock snorts. "I wish," he says grumpily. He's cold, but his breath is warm, tickling Foggy's ear.
"Contrary to your obvious opinion," Foggy says, even as he rolls over to present Murdock with his back, "being crazy does not make your life easier."
Murdock seems to mull that over for a moment, quiet as his skin warms and his tremors subside. He says, "Do you think that some people are born bad?"
Foggy could groan here, but his exasperation is stifled by the strange tone Murdock's taken. "No," he says, then "Yes. I don't know. I think being bad is a decision people make, Matt, every minute of every day."
Murdock's close enough that Foggy feels more than hears the small hitch of his breath. He's quiet long enough that Foggy starts to think that maybe he's dropping the strange questions there, but then he says, "If it's a choice they make, then do they deserve the bad things that happen to them?"
"Matt," he says, half pleading for mercy, half annoyed. "You think a guilty man screams any different than an innocent one? Because they really don't. They scream the same, and they bleed the same, and when it's all said and done, they're both the same piles of viscera."
"It isn't the same," Murdock argues, tense against his back.
Foggy's not awake enough for this kind of bullshit, and more important, he can't let himself examine it any more closely than he already has: no one deserves pain and suffering. He knows there's a place where the math doesn't add up now that Murdock is part of the equation, but fuck it: he's always been terrible at math and there's too many unknown variables in the parenthesis that are Matthew Murdock.
He considers telling Murdock that he's math, basically, but that's probably just the lack of sleep talking. It's as he's considering it that one 'x' abruptly becomes an 'a' that he recognizes, and he realizes with a nasty shock that Murdock might be speaking about something closer to home with his 'deserving bad things' talk.
"No one deserves the bad shit that happens to them," he says, and it comes out firm and final.
"Not even the one you killed?" Murdock asks - and the thing is, he doesn't even say it cruelly. He's not being cold, or mean, or even particularly judgmental - probably because his judgment is skewed. Foggy thinks that Murdock knows that and may even accept it.
"No," Foggy says. He doesn't feel regret. Nothing about those days had even tugged on his conscious or disrupted his sleep. He held down a man suffocating on his own blood and killed him faster. Michaels hadn't deserved death - he deserved consequences for his actions. Jail, and a ruined career, and a ruined life, and all of that.
Murdock's quiet, like he's thinking about it, or waiting for him to continue. Just as Foggy is almost asleep again, he asks, "Then why'd you do it?"
God help him, but Murdock actually sounds like he doesn't know. "What do you think would happen if I hadn't," he demands, and groans loudly, and adds: "You are the literal worst at pillow talk, Murdock." He's tired, and now that Murdock's warm, it feels good to have that solid heat next to him.
Murdock pauses, and then says, "I think pillow talk is supposed to occur after sex, Foggy."
"Get your narrow-minded ass out of my bed." He swats at Murdock and huffs, but when Murdock moves, Foggy relents and hooks his leg back over his. "I wasn't being serious," he says, settling back in. He killed a man for Murdock; sharing a bed, while current bad for him actually getting sleep, isn't that big of a deal.
"What do you think they deserved, then," Murdock asks tonelessly. He might be laying next to Foggy but he's clearly a million miles away.
"A lot worse than they got, to be honest," Foggy says muzzily. "Think you deserved better justice than you got, though." He rubs a hand over his face and deliberately turns more into his pillow. "Go to sleep. I'd like to catch some rest before stepping back into the hell that is early classes."
Behind him, there is only silence, and Murdock breathing against him. It isn't precisely a moody silence, so Foggy thinks nothing of it, already tired, and falls asleep. In the morning, Murdock is long gone, no evidence of the visit except where the bed is disturbed.
It isn't the last time it happens. Murdock isn't always driven to make debate with him on morality or whatever his chosen methods of dealing with people. Usually isn't, actually, more prone to complaining about his sheets or his shampoo or his occasional bed mates. At least once a week, Foggy is either woken up by Murdock climbing into his bed minus his glasses and shoes, wakes up to evidence that at some point Murdock had climbed into his bed, or on one or two memorable occasions, actually woke up to Murdock still in his bed. It's worth noting that Murdock isn't a morning person.
Foggy quietly doesn't freak out, although Murdock's low "Stop freaking out" indicates he needs to work on that, manages to confirm that Murdock won't miss any classes if he sleeps in, and leaves him there.
--
First year comes to a close and Foggy's almost thankful to pack up and go back home to the family business. He feels like it might give him some breathing room, because as he's thought previously: the guy's magnetic. He pulls people in like a black hole and they get stuck in his orbit and Foggy's not entirely sure that's a healthy place to be.
He especially can't remember the last time he platonically shared a bed with anyone when recreational drugs weren't in use. Sure, he'd tried to correct that; made a frankly desperate attempt at the whole drugs thing, but his bed invader only pursed his mouth and said "I can't" and "I don't" and then, awkwardly, "It's not good. With my senses." And then refused to elaborate further.
Foggy thinks about how he used to see Murdock with a red solo cup at the parties Before, and hasn't since, and deeply regrets everything.
He thinks he's okay with going back home, almost thankful to return to the family business - until he remembers he's not, because sometimes Mom thinks he's going to forget if he's away for too long. He doesn't forget, though. He never really does.
--
Foggy is frankly too old to be hiding in his room, so of course that's not what he's doing. He just happens to be spending his free time there. It's not like he's needed for anything else. They only think about him with any purpose when they see him, after all. The less they see him, the less they put heavy arms around his shoulders and laugh and wink and say "You ready to learn something, kid?"
Like they're doing him some kind of favor. Maybe they are, considering what he's been up to in the last year. So long as it's anywhere that Mom can see, where she'll roll her eyes with her lips thin and dissatisfied. "Stay out of the way, Franklin," she says when she catches sight of him. It's probably always going to be like that, which is fine. He wants to stay out of the way. It's much better than when they take notice.
So it's not surprising that he's alone there when his phone vibrates. It startles him a bit, but he already suspects he knows what he'll see when he picks it up. There are only so many people who might be calling him and he's already at home, so his family knows where to find him. The image of a red M&M on the screen seems almost shockingly childish, but - makes something ease, a bit, too.
"Hey, buddy," he says when the call connects and it isn't to broken breaths.
"Foggy," Matt says, then almost immediately: "You okay? You sound weird."
"Yeah, fine," Foggy says. "You just don't normally call me while I'm out. What's going on?"
Matt doesn't answer for a second, and Foggy imagines that his head is tilting. He wonders just how good Matt's hearing must be. That's what it looks like: videos of foxes hunting in the snow, head cocked to listen to mice below. "Thinking about going half on a residence," Matt says.
"You know that's not a good idea." Foggy sighs a bit, getting up from his bed to pace to the door. The hallway is empty outside it, but he lingers there for a moment, old paranoia acting up. "The fewer connections we have, the better."
"Come on." He sounds impatient, exasperated. "Have you been paying attention to the news at all? They think it's over. It is over. It's going to be fine."
"That kind of lazy thinking is what gets people caught," he points out.
"Foggy."
His stomach and chest do something weird, either for the tone or the implications. He's flustered enough to shoot "Matty" back, chastising, and it feels weird in his mouth. "Come on, bat your lashes at one of your pretty girls or cuddle up to someone else if you wanna share residences," he says just to wash the strangeness out.
Reluctantly, Matt says "I don't want to have a - an episode - in front of anyone. I'm sick of having to pretend to be normal." He sounds low and unhappy the way he does when climbing into Foggy's bed, and Foggy wonders if he's also concerned about having to trek across town to do that if Foggy doesn't live in the same building as him. That weird, stray thought makes something bright and panicked burst in his chest.
He swallows it down. He's good at that.
"Yeah, okay, I get that," he says, stepping back into his room and closing the door. "Doesn't make it a good idea, though."
"Doesn't have to be a bad one, either," Matt says, and only that, and waits.
Reaching up to rub at his aching head, Foggy finds his lip between his teeth and sighs. Honestly, he has been watching the news, he knows they think its one person, and he knows that a lot of people will be pairing or grouping off to split the cost of living. He thinks of Matt sharing living space with other people and even though he knows Matt is better socialized now, he can only imagine the same thin, polite smiles he'd had at the beginning of school.
"Alright," he says, "fine, if only so I don't have to see you doing that weird wounded-duck thing in class."
Matt makes a noise that's mostly air, and says, "What's with you and ducks?"
"I don't know, I like ducks," Foggy says absently. Its not anything meaningful. Something keeps prodding around the edges of his mind, ducks shot down and gold retrievers with soft mouths. Something he'd watched when he was younger, maybe. "Right. Well, I'll be packing up and on my way back up in the next couple of days."
"Good," Matt says, and "I'll start scouting around, then."
"Oh, good, we're sending the blind guy to figure out where we're going to live," Foggy says blandly.
He snorts. "I'm probably better at picking out residences than you," he says, but he sounds pleased, and Foggy has a moment to realize he likes the way that sounds, and aw, shit. He's in pretty deep.
"Yeah, one of these days you'll have to tell me about it," he says, and Matt says, "Maybe."
--
Philip actually asks, either because he's curious or Foggy just looks distracted, he's not sure which. He asks, so Foggy tells him that he's going to be rooming with a friend. Philip frowns and wonders, "Is that a good idea?"
"I don't know," Foggy says offhand, even though he's pretty sure it's a terrible idea.
"You'll disappoint a few people, takin' yourself out of circulation," Philip points out, and Foggy sighs loudly and rolls his eyes and gets knuckles to his head for his efforts.
"Look, I can't be doing that kind of thing while studying law ," he says, because they're all ridiculous to think otherwise. If he gets kicked out before he even gets started, he doesn't know what he'll do. He doesn't know what Matt will do, even though he's not supposed to be responsible for the guy or anything. As a matter of fact, it would probably be better if they stayed far away from each other.
That plan's gone pretty poorly so far, though, so he doesn't think getting kicked out of school will stick, either.
--
Matt has a list of residences he wants them to look into and Foggy does his best not to think about it too much. He already knows he's in over his head, he doesn't need to look at it closely and freak out about it. In the end, he's not sure why Matt's bothered with a list of places - it's clear that Matt has a particular residence he's favoring over the others.
Foggy doesn't overthink the way he can read the tension at the back of Matt's neck to know this, either.
Later, after the paperwork is handled and Matt Murdock has proven himself to be a sneaky little shit with his fake little ingratiating grin and bullshit words that Foggy is certain actually aren't in any law book, ever - after that, when they're getting boxes of stuff and bringing it in, Matt stops and hovers in the doorway.
"You know," he says mildly, "I thought after I stopped that you wouldn't smell like death."
Foggy just about drops the cardboard box in his hands, manages not to and still swears in a slight panic. It has all his books in it, after all, which means it's heavy enough to break his foot. "What the fuck, Matt," he says, and dumps the box onto the floor. There's pathetic little in the way of furniture, which Foggy figures is fine since he has seen Matt stumble into a misplaced chair once.
"You stopped to," Matt says with a wry twist to his mouth, thumping his cane idly against the floor, straight up and down like a judge's gavel. "For a bit there, at the end. Before you left."
"Holy shit," Foggy says, because this really isn't a conversation he wants to have. He doesn't want to think about the fact that apparently Matt can smell dead bodies on him. It's not like he rolled in them like a dog. "Well, that's exceedingly gross," he says, and means both his thoughts and the fact that - again, not thinking about it.
"Sorry," Matt says, mouth flat and fingers drumming on his cane.
"No, you're not," he says. He's trying not to think about it so hard that it's the only thing he can think of, and he ends up laughing. Well, it's not much of a laugh, tight and high and uncomfortable. "Hey, at least I'm not an actual med student," he points out. "Can you imagine? Autopsies?"
Matt's whole face screws up in the most hilarious way, and suddenly the laugh loosened in his chest. "No thanks," Matt says. "Some chemicals are awful."
"Like my sheets, huh," Foggy says without thinking, because it was the exact same tone.
There's a supremely grumpy look on Matt's face. He doesn't like discussing the fact that he crawls into Foggy's bed, which means that Foggy tends to rag on it when he's feeling defensive. "A bit," he agrees with a scowl. "Mostly it's just that they're scratchy. I know I used to - it just feels like sleeping on sandpaper."
"Uh huh, mister hundred-and-fifty dollar sheets. Unlike you, I make due with the basics."
Matt makes a disgruntled noise with a face like a cat that had gotten sprayed in the face with a water bottle. The number still sits badly with Matt because when Foggy had decided that he was going to cover the cost of the replacement sheets, he hadn't told Matt how much the ones he'd chosen had cost until the cashier had said it. Foggy still can't figure out exactly how he talked Matt around to accepting it, because Matt has pride in a way that Foggy hasn't really seen before, but somehow he managed.
Matt huffs a lot and says a lot of nothing like he doesn't have a comeback for that. It's to the point that Foggy figures the conversation is mostly over and it's safe to turn his back. The box can't just stay in the middle of the room, even though he has no place to store the books yet. It's supposed to be his room, but what if - no, he isn't thinking about that.
"What if we got you different ones?" Matt asks.
"What?" Foggy's not really paying attention, doesn't feel like he has to. Whatever strangeness had provoked Matt to comment on the fact that he's been doing - work. With bodies. That strangeness has left.
"Bed sheets," Matt clarifies.
Or not. It's a different strangeness, and Foggy straightens again and turns and does his damnedest to read Matt, but he really doesn't - he doesn't know. Matt's sometimes an open book with large print and pictures, and sometimes, like now, he's open but the words inside are written in a foreign language: hieroglyphs or braille. Foggy settles for a noncommittal noise, and watches Matt's head duck, mouth flat.
"Look," Foggy says, "you're going to have to put up with whatever weird smells are on my things for at least a little while, I'm not looking to upheave my entire life right now."
"I reserve the right to complain about it," Matt says, but drops it.
--
It's kind of scary, the way Foggy and Matt fit together in their shared residence. Foggy had expected it to be weird, but it's more weird how not weird it is. Then again, maybe it has something to do with the fact that Foggy had finished killing a man for Matt, had developed his own special little MO for the whole practice. Maybe it has something to do with how Matt had climbed into his bed and Foggy hadn't kicked him out, though he should have. Something to do with how they bicker about mattresses and sheets and Matt's water-sprayed-into-his-face expressions.
Three weeks into class, Foggy wakes up to the bed jarring a little violently. "No. Sorry. Go back to sleep, Foggy," Matt says, but he sounds wrong and wrecked and his breath is harsh.
"Matt," he says, muzzy and confused and his alarm is wavering between being startled awake and the fact that maybe Matt's having another panic attack. "What the fuck." He twists over onto his back to shove up, and registers that the empty space next to him is warm.
Matt has made it to the door by that time, but he stops, stepping one direction and then the other. "It's nothing, don't worry about it," he says, and he sounds more angry than panicked now.
"Okay?" Foggy's not sure if he should push or not, confused by the entire situation because what the fuck. He touches at the warm, wrinkled sheets next to him, thinking about how he'd thought there wouldn't be any more of this kind of thing. They were sharing a residence now, and he smells like dead people, and Matt has an endless conga line of girls he bats his lashes at and follows home.
Maybe he should be equally alarmed by the fact that he hadn't even woken up until Matt jarred the bed getting out in such a hurry. He's not, and that's alarming.
Matt doesn't stick around for any more interrogating; he slips out of Foggy's bedroom and snaps the door shut behind him crisply. Foggy lets himself collapse back into bed and decides this is probably another thing he's better off not thinking about. Matt's always cold until he catches Foggy's warmth, and it's actually hot in the little pocket under Foggy's shoulder.
He's far from cold, but he finds himself turning into it before he falls asleep.
It ends up not being the last time, although Foggy never manages to be awake when Matt climbs in and Matt never stays long enough for him to wake up. He can tell, though, because the covers are turned down on the left and the sheets get wrinkled, and sometimes Matt wakes him just like he did that night, surging out of the bed and sounding angry.
The third time it happens, Foggy is so annoyed and tired that he follows Matt into the hall. Matt stops and turns and opens his mouth, probably to repeat his instructions for Foggy to go back to sleep, but Foggy just prods him along. "No, you shut up," he says, a little snappish. "Someone's going to get some sleep around here, somehow. Go. Go on. To your room."
"Foggy, what -"
"Matt. Go."
Matt kind of fights him - only kind of , because he does walk, mostly backwards and sideways like a crab, fending off Foggy's prodding fingers and trying to set his heels like a stubborn five-year-old. It would be easier if he were actually five, Foggy thinks, because then he could pick Matt up and not get his face beaten in during the process. He manages to herd Matt into his own bedroom and tells him, "Bed."
"That's a little forward of you," Matt jeers, and Foggy snaps "For sleeping," and is slightly mollified when Matt actually sits down.
"Is that the side you want?" It's the right-hand side of the bed, but he can also tell that yeah, Matt does sleep on the right when it's his own bed. Whatever, Foggy's flexible, so he climbs into the left and flops down and gets comfortable.
"Foggy?"
"Go to sleep, Matt," he says, nosing into the soft mattress. Matt's sheets truly are ridiculous, and they smell good and clean. Matt had picked them out, of course, but he thinks they were worth every buck that he spent on them. Now that he thinks about it, it's only natural he should get to enjoy them, too.
"This isn't," Matt says, then sighs, cross and defeated, and lays down.
Matt's still there when he wakes up in the morning, but where else would he go?
--
It's late and for once Foggy's at home. It's really not a rare state of affairs anymore, as he really hasn't had the stomach for parties since this whole thing with Matt started, and now that Marci's keeping her distance, it leaves Foggy with time on his hands. He spent most of this night catching a bite to eat with Bobby Dixon, and he's had a beer or two, but that's about it.
He's gotten settled in for the night, since last night Matt had slept in his bed and today he was grinning and trailing his fingers up some pretty first-year's arm and it's unlikely that he'll come home.
That's when he gets the phone call. Matt sounds winded and rough, and he says, "Foggy, I need your help."
It has to be how the words are said, or maybe the quality of that roughness, of that breathlessness. Foggy knows immediately, intuitively, that there is a body. That Matt's calling him because he has killed someone and he will go to jail if Foggy doesn't help.
"Okay," he says, "where?"
He tells Matt that it will be a little longer than usual before he hangs up. He's caught a little flat-footed; after Matt's remarks, he figured that it probably wouldn't be happening again, so he'd - In the back of his head, he starts a shopping list, but until then he packs what he thinks he'll need. He catches a cab and pays in cash to be dropped off several blocks from where the body is supposed to be, because neither of them need any additional attention.
Matt's waiting for him, pressed deep and still into the shadows so that he nearly gives Foggy a heart attack. He's dressed all in dark shades, no black, with what appears to be another t-shirt tied over his head and what appears to be a police baton. At least there's no broken knuckles.
"What happened?" Foggy drops his bag onto the alley and bends over the body on the ground.
"There was a girl," Matt says, and only that. His breathing is mostly even by now, though his words were slightly harsh. He sounds drained and faded and faintly bruised, if 'bruised' had a sound. Fragile, maybe, but not in the way he used to - not in a shattered way. Matt is done shattering, it sounds like.
"Okay." He turns the body over - it's definitely a body. There's the usual lack of blood other than where the skin had split and the nose had been crushed. "I'm guessing that she saw you?"
"Yes."
"Okay," he says again, a little exasperated. If she hadn't, then they could just leave the body here or call it in or whatever, but if she comes forward talking about some kind of masked vigilante then they can't let Matt's reputation start with a body left behind. "Okay," he says a third time, standing. "I've got it from here. You'll probably want to go home for this part."
All he can see is the bottom of Matt's face, but his mouth goes thin and hard. "I can help you get rid of the body," he says. "I made it. I took that man's life."
Foggy doesn't exactly disagree, except for how he really does. He rubs his face with the hand he hadn't touched the body with. "Yeah, I'm not handling this in the same polite way I did the others," he says. "The less there is to connect this one with the others, the better, and you really don't have a skill set that can contribute to it. This is - this is going to be a bit worse than the others."
Whatever Matt hears in that, whatever he smelled on Foggy on that first day, it makes him go terribly still. He says, "Oh," and sounds a little raw, a little numb.
"Go home." Foggy doesn't want his recriminations or his disgust, and he feels like he'll probably be able to hold his stomach as usual just so long as Matt isn't there watching. "You don't want to smell or hear this."
Matt does leave then, or at least he thinks Matt does. He hopes Matt does. If he doesn't then he could have at least stuck around to help Foggy with the heavy lifting. It takes most of the night for Foggy to deal with the problem, but he was expecting as much. Usually he could get it taken care of in a few hours, but he doesn't exactly have his professional tools with him.
He comes home and he showers first in cold water, then hot until there's no hot water left. It will take extra care to repair the damage done to his skin, but he's not excessively concerned about that at the moment. They'll have to get a coffee-maker, he thinks, standing in the kitchen and staring at the closed fridge.
They don't live that far from campus so it's not hard at all for Foggy to find some place that's open and serving coffee. He drinks one cup right there then orders another two and takes them back home.
Matt's waiting for him in the living area, and Foggy doesn't know if he came home before or after him or if Matt got any sleep at all - one of them should. Matt's face is pale and drawn, but he doesn't say anything about what happened hours before, and Foggy hands him one of the coffees and returns the favor.
--
It catches up with him the next day, and when it does, Foggy thinks: oh, that's what I've been trying to outrun. He hadn't realized what the tightness in his chest was, what had him swallowing only a few bites of food here or there because it tasted like chalk.
He feels it crowd up under his ribs like a squirming tangle of worms, or maybe fluid, and his lungs pull less and less air and something is blooming bright and hot and diaphanous where his heart beats. He takes a turn and moves like there's a tailwind and it's rushing him onward.
Stepping into the bathroom, he ignores the person at the sinks and steps into the stall and locks it and whiteness blazes through his mind and consumes everything, almost, except for the thought that says 'thank god' because he doesn't want anything in his brain anymore. He doesn't want the memories of so much meat and blood and bone and viscera, the smell or the sound and the pop of cartilage.
He almost ignores the sound of his phone ringing, except that it pierces over the dull, echoing rushing noise in his ears. His fingers are nerveless and tingling, almost painful, and only when he sees that stupid red M&M does Foggy give serious consideration to answering.
Something is clawing in his throat and he swallows and swallows and manages to accept the call and lift his phone to his face. "Yeah, Matt," he says, and Matt sounds breathless as he says, "Foggy. Foggy: breathe."
Everything's bright and ridiculous and his hands are shaking and his face feels cold and clammy under his fingers. "I think that's my line," he says irrationally, or he tries to, at least. Matt sounds like he's been fighting, so naturally Foggy asks, "Are you okay?" That comes out at least.
Matt sounds pissed as he snaps, "Foggy," and then a moment later he says, "I need you to be quiet, okay? Hold your breath. Or I'll get caught."
Part of him registers that it's crazy, that Matt should just hang up if he's in danger of being caught, and also it's in the middle of the day and Matt should be at class right now, but very few things are making sense at the moment and Foggy finds himself holding his breath. The sudden silence in his ears nearly rings, and he wonders where all the sound has gone.
"That's right," Matt says, his voice and breath juddering strangely over the phone, "just like that, okay, Foggy? Just - keep holding it, okay?"
He can't hold his breath and say 'okay' at the same time, so he settles for holding it instead because his face feels numb like his fingertips and he sags into the door behind him. His vision is blurry and sparkling and his throat aches but his lungs haven't begun heaving yet like he needs a breath, so he can hold it. He can hold it a bit longer -
The bathroom door crashes open, and then the stall door shakes against Foggy's shoulder blades. "Foggy, Foggy, open the door, let me in," Matt says, and it sounds like he's pounding the heel of his hand against it, and what the hell?
His held breath breaks. It sounds loud and strangely fragile in the acoustics of the bathroom. Foggy's not sure how he manages to pull away from the door, but he does, he somehow manages to pull the latch open because Matt sounds like he needs help, tight and worried over the desperate thud of his hand against the door.
The latch releases and the door gives and then Matt's in his personal space, pressing him against the tile wall where the flimsy stall walls bolt in. He abruptly feels like he needs to crawl out of his skin - it's too much. He can't catch his breath and Matt's hands are on him, shoulders, sides, shoulders again, looking pale and his brow wrinkled and his dark hair blown wild with his mouth pinched thin and unhappy.
"Matt," he manages, sounding strangled, and then Matt grabs him around the neck and reels him in, pressing Foggy's face against his neck and shoulder and pressing his body hard against the wall.
"Breathe, Foggy," he demands raggedly.
He can't, really. But he tries. The air in the crook of Matt's neck is hot and quickly grows moist, and thick, but he tries. He holds on and tries and feels the frantic pounding of Matt's heart against his chest, against his knuckles, not as fast at the humming of his own but not calm either.
"I'm here, Foggy," Matt says, and his hands are so tight they hurt, but it also feels like he's holding Foggy into his skin and something loosens below his lungs and they finally fill. They finally fill and his head is full of bright lights and crisp noises and the suddenly obtrusive smell of Matt's skin. Matt doesn't let him go, not until the rattled feeling and the prickliness of his fingers and face stops hurting, not until his heart slows and he can no longer feel the hammering against his chest.
Then it's just an embrace in a bathroom stall, and that should feel awkward, but it's not, and maybe that's because once you dispose of a body for someone, it's impossible. Foggy feels raw and embarrassed, but can't bring himself to say anything about it, because Matt's gone through worse attacks for better reasons.
"Alright," he says, pushing against Matt, but only lightly. "Alright, I think I'm -" Well, no, he isn't okay, still feels shaky and pale around the edges, but he is feeling good enough that this is getting awkward.
Matt withdraws all at once, pulling back his hands and himself until he's almost pressed to the far wall and still too close. Foggy slips out of the stall and heads for the sinks, his face still moist from where his breath had been trapped against it, his skin feeling tight now that the cold sweat has dried.
"You okay?" Matt follows him out, but remains at a distance, lurking along the wall. Foggy watches him warily in the bathroom mirror for a moment before he turns the water on in the sink. Matt's head cocks and twists, his brow wrinkling.
"Yeah, yeah," he says, "Well, no , but I probably will be, for the rest of the day, at least. God, that sucks."
"A little bit, yeah," he agrees.
Foggy splashes water on his face, then wets a paper towel and wipes it over his neck until his fingers are a bit more steady. He glances back at Matt in the mirror, lurking more like he does at night than how he stands during the day. "Hey, where's your cane," he asks, turning off the water, and then, "how'd you even know -"
"I don't always need it," Matt says vaguely, his brow smoothing slightly even as his shoulders tense. "You know that."
"Yeah, but I'm pretty sure you had it this morning, Matt."
Matt ducks his head, mouth twisting awkwardly. "Uh," he says, "I might have - it got in the way."
"In the way." Foggy turns so that he can see Matt full-on. Matt looks slightly exasperated, squaring his shoulders and aiming his face off some other direction like a kid caught with his hands in the cookie jar. "What'd you do with it? You're supposed to be in class right now."
Matt exhales like he'd like to growl or snarl. It's hard to imagine, but on the other hand, Foggy's seen what Matt's done to people with just his bare hands, so its not impossible to imagine either. "I left it with my things," he admits. "All I took with my was my phone. I knew I'd never make it soon enough."
Foggy remembers: breathe. "Your class isn't anywhere near here, Matt," he says. "Do I even want to know how you knew I was -" He is about to say 'in trouble', but even that seems too close to outright saying he'd had a sudden freak-out before class in the campus bathroom.
Matt tenses even further, and it's so entirely too much like he used to be - small and angry and dangerous - that Foggy exhales loudly and discards the wet paper towel. He doesn't feel good or grateful at the moment, still a bit sharp around the edges, still feeling a bit hot and raw where Matt's fingers had bitten into his flesh.
"You don't have to tell me," he says, because Matt doesn't. Matt gives himself away in all kinds of ways without even opening his mouth. "Look, just - Thanks." He doesn't feel thankful, but he knows that standing here with Matt is better than breaking into a million pieces alone in a university bathroom.
Relaxing warily, Matt says, "It's my fault this happened."
It is, and it isn't, so Foggy just rolls his eyes and gives another exasperated sigh. There's a bit of relief in being able to inhale deep enough to do so. "Shut up, Matt," he says. "And don't get any funny ideas, either. I'm a worrier by nature. And I have a delicate stomach. You don't call me when stuff like that happens and I'll develop ulcers wondering about it."
Matt pulls a face like he's trying to figure out which is the more acceptable risk and Foggy realizes that this is it. Matt bolted out of class because he somehow knew that Foggy needed him. Matt's standing there right in front of him pulling a list of pros and cons between different symptoms of anxiety like he's going to plan his actions around them.
Great. His 'pet murderer' likes him back. Well, fuck.
--
The phone call comes late another night, and it's an utter surprise. Foggy's sussed out a kind of abstract pattern to their sleeping locations, and he's pretty sure tonight is a Matt's bed night. Matt's not home yet, probably prowling around in his stupid vigilante gear, but he's pretty sure. Sure enough to take steps, anyway.
Foggy doesn't think a lot about the fact that he has a special routine for nights he suspects they'll end up in Matt's bed. It's just that Matt has special detergents for everything, and Foggy suspects more and more than his senses are beyond enhanced and overcompensating and heading into superhuman territory.
So that's when the phone call comes in. It starts out relatively normal, with "Foggy, I -" and then goes silent and then cuts off.
Foggy thinks it's adorable Matt doesn't realize he can track the GPS on the phone. He thinks Matt must know that he's handled the phone, but he never asks about it and the tracking never got disabled.
It's already long been evident to Foggy that Matt's the exception to all kinds of rules. Not just in general, not just humanity's, but even Foggy's. If he were smart, he would have cut things off at the start of it and cauterized whatever was left. That night, he should have called an ambulance for Michaels and gotten Matt locked away.
But he didn't, and now he's standing in the back of an alley with a body at his feet and a bloodied bat in his hand and he can't catch his breath. It isn't the first time Foggy's killed a man, but it is the first time that he has used Matt's methods to do it.
Well, sort of, anyway. He's given his share of concussions, but never quite beat a man over the head until the body stopped twitching and there was blood and hair and flecks of crackling white on the bat.
Matt's barely on his own feet, collapsed against the brick wall so completely that his jaw is pressed to it, breathing like the bellows. He swallows hard and wet, and it's obviously pure will that pulls him upright to stagger toward Foggy.
"He's dead," Matt says, ignoring the body at Foggy's feet to crowd into his space. They're roughly the same size, but Matt somehow looms in his ridiculous crime-fighting costume. There's blood on his face, and he's panting with his mouth wide open and his split lip coloring his teeth. He takes a deep breath, beginning through his nose but finishing with his mouth, and his tongue curls to run along the sharp edges of his teeth.
Matt sways forward, and for a paralyzed moment, Foggy's not sure if the idiot is going to collapse on him or - or do something else, but at the last second he veers to the side and twists the bat out of Foggy's numb grip. He smells of sweat and blood and there is heat boiling off him. Foggy's hot and sweaty from the exertion of beating two guys and killing the one below them and his teeth ache from wanting to move forward and into that moist heat.
Then Matt's staggering a few feet away, leaving Foggy raw and winded. His head cocks and he reaches up and pulls the cloth from his face, and it's not the first time that Foggy's seen it bare but it looks especially strange now.
"Come on," Matt says, even as he twists his mask over the bat. "Everyone's quite happily ignoring the noise." There's something biting and bitter to the words, but at the same time he calms, becomes more like daytime Matt. "Let's go."
Foggy trusts Matt, so he does. "No witnesses?"
"No." The answer is quick, but he doesn't think it's false, either. The whole situation seemed more like a trap than some kind of crime in progress that Matt had been trying to stop. Foggy isn't sure how much work Matt's been doing on this vigilante thing, but apparently news has been spreading.
Foggy doesn't like it. He doesn't like the shape of things, what it means that he's had to come to Matt's aid like this , the fact that there was a trap and a trap means planning and planning suggests organization. It could just be a gang. It could be. But there was usually a higher organization that made demands upon the smaller ones, and there's something cold and unhappy in pit of his gut.
If Foggy was smart, he would have stopped this thing before it began. By now, it's really too late to stop.
--
Matt's strange in the days following the altercation in the alley and Foggy can't make heads or tails of it. He doesn't think it was the guy he actually killed, and surely it can't be the fact that he showed up and saved Matt's tail. He's done more dramatic saving in the shape of a quieter, less violent but more gross manner. Foggy's mostly happily suppressing, which he mostly does with ease until he hears an eggshell crack. That's rare, though, since Matt complains about lingering food smells in the house if Foggy actually tries to cook anything.
Still, Matt's strange after that, distracted and fussy and moody. As quickly as he snipes at Foggy, he apologizes with a guilty expression, then turns around and does it again. Foggy's had worse things said to his face with no remorse to take any of it very seriously; he's more concerned with the way Matt seems to be trying not to crawl out of his own skin.
It finally comes to a head one night. The first sign of something being up is the fact that it's not a night for sharing beds, but there Matt is: climbing into his bed so clumsily that Foggy is shaken awake. The second sign of it is when Matt puts his hands on Foggy. One settles on his elbow and slides up his arm in a slow, deliberate drag as Matt settles into the space between Foggy's back and the mattress.
Matt doesn't always crowd him, but he does often enough that Foggy's generally forgets to feel weird about it. After all, Matt is down his eyesight; if he needs touch to make up for that, then Foggy isn't going to worry about the contact. It's clearly a comfort thing.
But he never, never actually touches Foggy with his hands.
He is now, though just with the one, and his palm feels hot like a brand and his fingers hook around Foggy's shoulder like they're making themselves a home. Matt isn't cold, and he says, "Foggy," hushed and rough and a little urgent.
It feels important to wake up a bit more than just enough to observe everything. "Yeah," he says. He figures Matt already knows he's awake. Matt has an uncanny ability to sense it, judging by all the times Matt tries to hush him back to sleep. Matt's been strange and he's even stranger tonight, and he asks, "You okay?"
"Yes," Matt says, then, "No. Yes. I don't know. Just." He shifts his whole body, like he's trying to press in further along Foggy's back, a hot line of impatient breath shifting against him, pressing. Some animal instinct rears its head and Foggy thinks, stunned: oh. Oh, Matt wants to -
"Can I," Matt says, his hand tightening but not holding Foggy down. "Can I - I just -" His breath sounds wet and desperate. His throat clicks when he swallows, and he makes a small, sad animal sound low in his chest. "I can't," he says, "it's only -"
"Oh," Foggy says. He's wide awake now, his skin humming. He's not sure he has the shape of the problem, and he's not so sure this is a good idea with how Matt's been acting, but he feels hot and cold, and he's getting hard. Swallowing, he says, "Are you sure?"
"Yes," Matt says, almost in the shape of a snarl. He's burning hot and tense where he's pressing into Foggy's back, the corner of his shoulder, his biceps, the taunt muscle of his thigh only. In one sinuous move, he pushes up and hovers over Foggy, focusing on his cheek with sightless eyes. "Please," he says, flushed and pretty and wrecked, "can I just -"
The only way Foggy knows this isn't a wet dream is the fact that Matt doesn't bother asking in those. "Yeah," he says, already painfully turned on. "Okay. Yes."
Then Matt is touching him with intent, pulling him over and pushing him down flat onto his back and sprawling over him. His thigh slips between Foggy's like it belongs there, and he's rocking, grinding into Foggy's hip. "Oh," escapes Matt's open mouth, an exclamation of relief, and he bows his head to Foggy's shoulder, pulling deep, gasping breaths.
"Jesus," Foggy breaths, and he's ridiculously hard and turned on, he can't not be , but there's an edge to Matt's breathing and the jagged thrust of his hips that makes him afraid to touch him. He would like to, he'd love to, but Matt has an edge to him like panic attacks and nuclear bombs.
Matt's fingers curl like painful brands into his ribs, and he rasps, "Foggy," into his shoulder, into his neck, pressing down into him like Foggy's skin is a better place to be than his own. "Foggy, could you - talk?"
"Okay," he says. "Okay, Matt, it's fine, I've got you." Matt shudders against him, his movements less frantic, and Foggy grasps him just above the elbow and slides his hands up to Matt's shoulders. "It's fine. Alright? I've got you. Come on, Matt. Come on."
Matt moans, low and wrecked, and then his mouth is on Foggy's neck, hot and sharp and wringing a "Fuck ," out of Foggy. Matt licks him, wet and filthy, and then bites the wet skin and that's not even a kink Foggy knew he had or maybe it was just a Matt thing, but it lifts his hips from the bed. "Oh shit," he says, shocked, grasping at Matt's hair. "Matt. Matt."
He goes off embarrassingly quick, like a bottle rocket, but he's just discovered a brand new kink and Matt's stupidly hot and he's been trying not to think about this kind of things for weeks. Matt makes a small desperate noise into his jaw where his mouth is hot and demanding, his fingers digging into Foggy's hip. He tenses, cording, then unspools all at once, spilling all his weight out over Foggy like he's become a liquid himself, loose-limbed and pliant.
It's a bit uncomfortable, stifling and wet until the heavy hang of Matt's body, and there's a sticky mess that'll turn really unpleasant before morning. It's a bit uncomfortable, but Foggy's catching his breath and feels a bit cosseted, like he's been dodging a panic attack for days now and Matt sniffed it out and fucked it out of his skin. Or maybe the other way around, he thinks, and if so, then he has no complaints. He likes the slack feeling of the muscular back under his fingers, the sweaty hair at the back of Matt's neck.
"You know," he says, "I'm not usually this easy. Usually there's a dinner or something involved."
"You really are that easy," Matt argues, and well: here they are, so he might have a point. He stirs a bit, but then settles back down without moving away. "I'll buy you coffee in the morning," he offers, speaking mostly into Foggy's pillow and hair.
"Well, that's a start."
After a while, Matt makes him get up and they both take showers and move to Matt's bed to sleep, but it's not all that bad. As always, Matt's bed is utter bliss, and in the morning Matt does buy him coffee, the really strong kind as is his due.
--
After coffee, nothing changes.
Actually, that might be better than what actually happens, which is Matt starts giving him those fake smiles and suddenly has a whole lot of nothing to say to him. It's almost as bad as every time Foggy's gotten tipsy enough to forget he doesn't fool around with guys still in the closet. The fact that during the normal course of their day, Foggy and Matt didn't touch much was probably the only saving grace.
It's not surprising at all that Matt doesn't climb into his bed anymore after that, when he can't even pretend to be normal even during class. The morning that Matt ends up limping after whatever disastrous nighttime escapade he got up to before he crawled home, Foggy draws the line.
"Alright," he says. "Alright, I'm done. Enough."
Matt has the audacity to look surprised, and then wary, like Foggy's being the unpredictable and crazy one here. God, what an asshole. "Foggy?"
"Don't you 'Foggy' me," he says, but as angry as he is, he only sounds tired. He is tired, too, of course. Anyone would be tired if they had to deal with Matt Murdock all day, every day. "Matt, come on," he says, and it's more pleading than he would like it to be, which is any at all. "Look at you: you're hurt. You've never gotten hurt before - not like this."
Matt stands stiffly for a moment before he adjusts his stiff leg with a fierce scowl, like this uncomfortable situation was its fault. "I just got unlucky," he says.
Foggy rubs his hands over his face, because seriously? "Matt. Unless you've really stepped it up, that's ridiculous. You're either being reckless, or you're being careless. If things have really gotten that bad out there then you're going to have to start dressing the part, and if you're being careless, then - don't."
"I can't just stop now," he objects with a scowl. The anger doesn't overcome his discomfort, though, and Matt sweeps a hand over his face, rubbing restlessly at his mouth even as he edges a step away, turning his face. "I'm doing real good out there."
"I wasn't asking you to stop doing it," Foggy says, though he doesn't like the fact that Matt took it that way - that Matt immediately rejects the option off hand without thinking about it; he supposes it's fair that Matt doesn't consider his thoughts on it, but he's getting hurt now. "I was asking you to be careful. As one human to another, since we don't even count as acquaintances anymore."
Matt literally startles, swinging back around to focus on him. "What," he says, loud and shocked.
This isn't what Foggy wanted to get into with Matt at the moment, he thinks, and he rolls his eyes. "Matt, in the last two weeks, you've been treating me like a stranger. Which: whatever, fine. If you've changed your mind about - whatever this has been-" He gestures to everything, to the space between them and the residence, because there's not even a word for it. There isn't even a word, and upon realizing it, Foggy says, "whatever nothing that it was -"
"It wasn't nothing," Matt objects, still loud as he straightens to his full height - not looming; still daytime Matt, but with that same righteous anger. His brow is twisted with surprise and annoyance. "It's not nothing," he corrects, and gets a mulish set to his jaw.
For a second, Foggy wants to slug him, like there is a bright neon sign to go with that angle of his chin. The urge burns bright and hot for a split second, and then it sputters out and dies; lashing out has never done Foggy any favors.
"Alright, fine," he says, because agreeing is usually the quickest way of getting around it. "Fine," he says, "but I get it. This is not new, it's not news to me. But I need you to call me when you need help, Matt."
"I don't need help, I just - I busted my knee. It's really not that bad, I iced it," Matt says. "If I had left bodies, then I would have called, I swear - but I didn't, so there wasn't a point."
"Do you ever just actually listen to yourself," Foggy says, bright and rash and breathless. The urge to punch Matt is back, hot and bright in his chest, and he's usually much better at controlling his violent impulses. He's never faster or stronger than the people he's taking a swing at, so he does know better - he does.
Matt pulls back slightly, his brow twisting with surprise and reproach. It seems prudent to talk before Matt says something that really makes Foggy try to get violent. Matt is acting like an asshole, but he doesn't deserve a fist to the face, he doesn't, and Foggy doesn't want to be a violent person, so.
"You're really tempting my temper, Matt," he points out, then takes a steadying breath. "Look. Okay. I don't know if you realize this, but breaking the law as a sign of affection is kind of how I was raised, so. I don't normally let weird guys with superpowers climb into my bed at night, and I definitely don't go charging into backstreet alleys to fight criminals my family probably put on the street in the first place."
Foggy hasn't realized just how pathetically transparent he is, not until he's standing there saying it. Jesus, no wonder Matt's suddenly backed off; especially now that they've - not really had sex, but - well, yeah. This is it, he realizes; this is him, getting way too attached way too quickly again.
He takes another breath and speaks quickly, even though it feels like pulling fingernails out of his own hands. "I can't just - stop that, all of that, overnight the way you can, Matt. I respect that you'd rather - not 'all of that', and I swear, we can treat each other like strangers, and I'll deal with it, but at least until the lease is up - I have to know you're going to make it through the night, okay?"
Matt doesn't say 'okay,' he doesn't even say 'no.' Matt doesn't even look like he's listening, precisely. His brow is smooth and his mouth is slightly slack and he says "Oh." He sounds winded, like he's taken a blow to the chest, and then he counters: "You're saying you love me."
It strikes hard and true, and Foggy tries to breathe through it. "Well, not in so many words," he says lightly, pretending that this is fine, that everything is fine. Yeah. Yeah, he kind of is saying exactly that, and it really sucks that he's doing it now, when it's too late, but whatever. They're past the point of denying it.
Matt lunges.
Probably the only thing that stops Foggy from lashing out in a panic is first, that Matt is insanely fast when he puts his mind to it, even with a stiff leg, and secondly, that Matt doesn't look threatening. Or he does, but Foggy sees mostly his slack mouth, cherry red and wet, and the wide splay of his hands which are the furthest things from fists possible.
Matt grabs him, mostly by the front of his shirt, and his body collides with Foggy and it's like being thrown into a brick wall. His hand locks around the back of Foggy's neck and then he's kissing him, rough and biting. It should feel mean, but it doesn't, just overwhelming and desperate and messy and Foggy can't say no, not with his stomach dipping and his chest surging and his nerves all electrified.
"You love me," Matt says against his mouth, his voice dropped low into his chest like the rumble of distant thunder, and Foggy says, "Yeah, I do," and Matt breathes against him, and kisses him again, lips tight and wet. He pulls back just slightly, his eyes shut behind the shades awkwardly digging into both of their faces. "Everything's a mess," Matt says raggedly, tortured and small and very lost. "Nothing's working like it should, Foggy - I can't filter it anymore, I can't - I can't make sense of the world -"
"Hey," Foggy says, hushed and alarmed; the words are bad enough, frightening enough, but there's wetness on Matt's face - Matt's crying, and that's terrifying. Matt's been through a lot of bullshit and Foggy's never seen him cry, and here he is. "Matt, hey, hey, it's okay," he says, and tries to stem the flow, and then just settles for grabbing onto him and trying to pull him closer. It's almost impossible. "It's okay, Matt," he says, quiet and desperate, "It'll be okay. I didn't know. I didn't know, Matt, I'm sorry. Hey. It's okay. We'll figure it out, okay?"
"Okay," Matt says, and swallows, and holds on so tightly it hurts, like Foggy might leave if Matt doesn't stop him. It breaks his heart and he holds on back and mostly says 'hey' and 'Matt'. Matt says, "I don't make sense to myself anymore," and Foggy hushes him and tries to tell him it's okay. It's all okay.
Foggy's a fixer. He fixes things. He'll find a way to make it so.
--
Matt doesn't go back to treating him like a stranger, but neither do they go back to how they were before. Matt seems wary of ending back up in a bed with Foggy, for all that he invades Foggy's personal space during the daylight hours - in private, as he complains about how he can't shut out the commentary in public. He drops remarks, here and there, suggesting things about his hearing or sense of smell or touch that seem downright impossible, but Foggy thinks about hyperventilating in the campus bathroom so far from Matt's classroom and figures sometimes the impossible was reality.
Foggy's not sure how good of an idea it is for Matt to be venturing out at night to beat the shit out of people, especially now that he knows that Matt's struggling with his superpowers. He's pretty sure that Matt must have been struggling with them since this all started, but it's harder now that he knows. Matt comes back, sometimes as late as early morning, decorated in purples and greens and yellows and sometimes reds. Sometimes the reds flow and smear.
It's those times that Foggy thinks about what he'd have been like if his childhood had been more standard. He thinks that if he weren't already desensitized to seeing people beaten half-to-shit, the worry would drive him nuts. As it is, as long as he gets to touch every wound and wrap it up, it's not so bad. It's a compromise they reach startlingly easy, even if Matt often bites his lip and leans into him afterwards, his thoughts obviously a million miles away.
"You're getting pretty beat-up, Matt," he says into dark hair. "What's going on out there?"
"Nothing," Matt says, then grimaces and amends: "People are taking notice, you know that."
"Yeah, I know." There's reports about it on the TV and on websites and newspapers. They've pinned the Masked Man as a university student, but Foggy thinks that was inevitable - it's not like Matt can venture far from campus, not in the space of one night, not on his own two feet. There's not a lot of violent crime in the area - it's mostly drunk students causing problems, but there are other elements, he thinks.
After all, he's here, and people like Bobby Dixon. Dixon isn't so bad on his own - he's a follower, not a leader, and he doesn't have a violent bone in his body, but. Still. What if Matt gets in too deep?
--
It wasn't like Foggy was planning on going home for over the Christmas break, but he gets a call saying that he's expected. 'No' is not an answer he can give, no matter how much he wants to. Matt seems to be doing fine, but Matt had seemed to be fine up until he literally told Foggy he was falling apart, so Foggy doesn't really trust it.
"I'm not actually helpless," Matt points out wryly, an echo of words that he's said before. He's slouched against the doorway of Foggy's room, listening while Foggy packs. Not that he really needs to. It's not like there aren't clothes and toothbrushes back home, shampoo and deodorant and everything else. He kind of wants to take his own, anyway - things he'd picked out with Matt's help, the two of them giggling in a drugstore aisle.
He thinks it was the first true smile, the first real sound of humor that he's gotten out of Matt since he's known him. He remembers popping lids on shampoos and body washes and offering them just to watch Matt recoil with his nose wrinkled and sneezing, and he thinks: yeah, he's in deep.
"Yeah, I've seen proof," he says. "I know you're not, Matt. That's not why I hate this."
Matt hesitates, the neutral slash of his mouth turning down. "You have to go," he says firmly.
"Yeah, of course I do," Foggy says, rolling his eyes. Matt sounds like he thinks Foggy was looking for a way out. He doesn't feel any better for the fact that Matt's dead-set on him going. "I don't know if you were listening, but my family isn't exactly anyone you tell 'no' to." He's certainly never managed, anyway, and all his attempts have gone - poorly.
"Your uncle's a walking cliche," Matt says flatly.
"He's not actually my uncle," Foggy points out. "I know some people actually have nine uncles, but I did figure out I'm not actually related to most of them."
Matt tilts his head. His eyes are hidden behind the dark lenses of his shades, but his face is tilted down. "That doesn't mean you don't care about them," he says, voice low. His face seems to pale a little bit, and there's something distracted, strange and distant and uncomfortable around the edges. Something a bit like guilt.
"Yeah, I guess." Foggy feels faintly uncomfortable with the topic, but Matt seems content to drop it after that. At the front door, Matt stops him, and hesitates again, and kisses him short and chaste and seems distracted and unhappy in a strange way, and Foggy wishes he could stay behind and find out why but there isn't time to waste.
He feels stuck between a lash and a hard place, but Matt pushes him out the door, and he goes. His mom doesn't really care for sloppiness, or tardiness.
--
Over the next couple of days, the house fills with the whole extended family. There's a kind of grimness that hangs over them, but there's laughter, and smiles. Philip hangs his arm around Foggy's neck and pulls him into a card game and it's not so bad, then.
Once everyone's arrived, Mom deigns to show her face. She smiles and puts her hands on shoulders and they go to dinner and then there's very little humor at all, staring at all the empty place sittings. Mom unnecessarily taps her knife against her wine glass and stands.
"As some of you may have noticed, we've been facing a bit of resistance," she says, her eyes lingering around the table. She dresses like a CEO, pretty and prim in powder-blue, blond hair twisted up around her head with a simple pin and looking so absolutely in control. Foggy looks away, and takes notice again of the empty chairs and bare place sittings. "A bit of a disturbance in the ranks, as we're facing a bit of opposition in the streets. Our streets. Our home."
Another person might have said 'family' if they were going to try to call the streets 'home', Foggy thought. It really wasn't Mom's style, and he wonders who it was that had been talking to make her phrase it that way. 'How to Charm Anyone and Win People Over, One-Oh-One', he thinks.
"Naturally, some of you have concerns," she says. "Some of you say that what affects one of us, affects all of us. Or that's what you say when there's prosperity." She smiles, thin and sharp and white. No one is stupid enough to stir under her dark gaze, but they feel it. "Well, you're correct. One hand washes the other. If one hand is in a cast, then no hands get washed. We want our hands washed, do we not?"
Around the table, no one meets her eyes, cringing under her gaze and making themselves small, like children or dogs. Foggy thinks that supper is never so terrible when he sees that he's not the only one that feels like this, and he picks up his glass of wine and drinks.
"Don't worry," Mom says, soft and sweet, "our little problem will be taken care of shortly. Now. Eat up, everyone."
--
Foggy gets back home after the sun has already set. The lights are all out, which doesn't mean much, but the door is locked and so Foggy knows that Matt's not home. The inside feels strangely hollow and unlived in. Matt's not the sort to ignore chores, mostly because of the smell, Foggy thinks, but there's still a strange abandoned feeling to the space inside, unchanged since he left.
He takes a shower to get the smell of the cab off him, and moves some things around until it feels more like someone lives there again. There's nothing to eat in the house, of course, because Matt's picky about food - hates the canned, prefers to buy fresh day-by-day, and so Foggy has to go out to get something to eat. He listens to the sounds of the city, watches the faces pass, and feels more and more like he's lived in again, and lets the feeling soak into his bones.
"Foggy."
There's a masked lunatic in the shadows, literally calling his name. Foggy tells him so, but after a quick glance around, he follows Matt into the alley anyway. There's a bruise leaking down from under his mask, yellow around the edges, and he looks like he hasn't shaved in a week. He smiles with all his teeth and says "Foggy" again, and kisses him in the shadows, hot and sweet.
"I'd tease you about how obviously you missed me," Foggy says, "but I prefer not to call pots black."
Matt huffs against his mouth, says, "Hypocrisy suits you fine when you want it to." He's obviously in too good of a mood to pick a fight, leaning into Foggy, his fingers tight but not desperate as they sometimes are. Foggy picks at them until he's allowed to assess them for damage and finds them mostly unharmed, and Matt nuzzles his temple and makes satisfied, smug noises like the fact that he hasn't busted his hands to the point of no return is something to take pride in. Then again, it's Matt, so it kind of is.
Foggy feels a bit easy and a bit unseemly for the way he responds to that, running warm and feeling a bit loose and lax, like some kind of tension has left him. Matt's like a drug, he thinks, and this is his first hit in two weeks. "Slow night?" He asks hopefully.
Matt stills, pressing his mouth against Foggy's skin. No, he goes on alert, listening with his frankly ridiculous hearing, and then he relaxes again. "Yes," he agrees.
"Oh good," Foggy says, and kisses him. "You'll come home in one piece then."
"I always come home in one piece," Matt says, all faux-offense - and he does, mostly. Mostly enough that Foggy doesn't bother to argue with him about it. Foggy doesn't ask Matt to stay - it's still early in the night, and though it's quiet, he knows Matt still needs to go out. Matt presses his fingers into the dips of Foggy's ribs, mouth turned down, and he says, "get something to eat, Foggy."
"Yeah, yeah," he says. "I'll bring something home that even your weird taste buds will appreciate."
It's after midnight when Matt makes it back home, and there are few enough injuries to look after. Matt eats while Foggy tends to the few bumps and bruises and then curls into his side, warm and satisfied. It feels good, and Foggy hadn't realized there was anything else bothering him, but warmth sweeps through him in a way that it hasn't since the last time Matt had climbed into his bed, and he feels better than human: he feels like himself again.
Matt's warm and relaxed and freshly shaved, and it shows that his cheeks have sunk a bit, but not to the point that Foggy worries about it too much. He does feel the need to ask, "How are you doing, there, Matt?"
Cocking his head, Matt considers the question, and his mouth curves a little bit. "Good, I think."
--
So of course that's when things go to hell.
It starts with a knock on the door at eight at night while Matt is gone. Knocks on the door are few and far between, so Foggy's already suspicious and confused when he goes to answer it. It quickly becomes clear that he hadn't thought things through, had stuck his head in the sand too much. He opens the door and it's Philip, and there's not a lot of reason for Uncle Philip to be knocking on his door in person, instead of being polite and giving him a call.
Foggy feels vaguely like throwing up.
Philip smiles at him, ignoring his pale features, his own wry and pitying. "Oh, Frankie," he says, that way he has that sends Foggy's heart hammering desperately against his ribs because it never means good things. "What have you gotten yourself into this time?"
"Oh shit," Foggy says faintly. He can't think of anything that would have required Philip to visit him, he hasn't done or not done anything as far as he can remember. "What's this about?"
The smile on Philip's face twists, sympathetic and unmoved. He reaches out and curls his thick arm around the back of Foggy's neck, and pulls him forward. "Come on, kid," he says, "the bell's tollin' for you."
There's a car waiting on the street, and Philip packs him into the back seat and settles in next to him. Foggy doesn't recognize the men in the front seat, but he's been away from home for a long time and he hadn't exactly been paying attention. This feels bad, and his fingers are shaking a bit when he mops at the cold sweat beading on his face.
He has always hated it when he comes face-to-face with people who meekly come along, even though they know what is waiting at the end of the car-ride for them. He always thought they should at least try to fight, to escape. As much as he knows that it's impossible to escape, that people will always get found and taken care of, he thought they should at least try.
Foggy gets it, now. He feels like he can barely breathe, let alone try to fight. There's some kind of weight in his arms and legs, pressing down on his heart and lungs, the same one that makes him sit in his bedroom just trying to make it through the next few seconds.
Philip's face is placid beside him, the edges of the men's faces in the front guarded, so Foggy looks out of the window next to him, watching dark alleys and bright lights flicker by, faceless people and faceless places.
Foggy doesn't know where it comes from, but by the time they've arrived at their destination, something is bubbling and popping inside of him. He says, "You're kidding me," loud and sarcastic. He opens his door and slips out, looking around at the construction site with a jaundiced eye. He hears the distant purr of equipment, and wonders at it.
"It's a classic," Philip tells him, standing on the other side of the car. He closes the door with a crisp snap, then inclines his head. "Come on, kid. Time to face the music."
Philip puts his arm back around Foggy's shoulders and guides him toward the building. The goons follow along behind them, and Foggy focuses on other things. The entire site is lit up, bright and white, and he wonders if there will be complaints about that. They're still in the city, after all. This seems ridiculous. Cartoonish.
At the top, Foggy feels his stomach plummet one more time, cold and hard and final. Mom smiles at him, wide and white and insincere. "Oh, Franklin," she says, "you've gotten in too deep."
--
It's just him and his mom, now. Or that's not true, but Philip is staying by the door and the goons are lurking somewhere below, along with likely a dozen more. Mom never ventures out without a least a dozen men to guard her back, not after how Dad was killed. Or she had him killed, whatever, Foggy doesn't know what to believe anymore.
"You know," Mom says, looking out onto the city with a proprietary gaze, "I like to think that I know everything about my business - my people and my city. I've lived here all my life, after all. When I breathe, I feel as though the city breathes with me. It's pulse is mine, it's lifeblood my lifeblood. The veins of my body connect to the ebb and flow of the people. Of the money. It's well-being is my well-being."
"Funny way you have of showing it," Foggy says, and is shocked by his own audacity. He can't remember the last time Rosalind spoke so much to him, although maybe a monologue at the city didn't really count. "You control the flow of drugs on the streets, too," he says. "And run people out of business and all that other cliched shit to make yourself money. You don't give fuck about this city. The only person you've ever cared about was yourself."
Mom's smile is fixed. "Well," she says, "it's a pity you failed to have your own voice until after you've chosen the wrong side."
The hot sputtering in his chest gutters, dies. "What," he says faintly.
"Did you really think your dear Mother wouldn't notice," she asked, cutting him a glance as sharp as steel. "I think I would have preferred to think you were a faithless piece of shit instead of knowing that you've been going behind my back. What do you think one man is really going to be able to do against us, Franklin?"
And he thinks of Matt as blind. He thinks of the empty seats, and Matt's strange remarks about his uncles, and the trap so many months earlier, and he feels dull and cross and furious and hopeless all at once. Of course. Of course Matt wasn't just dealing with street-level gangs. Jesus. He'd known from day one that Foggy had connections to a criminal organization, so Foggy had never bothered to hide it when they called. Matt's senses were ridiculous.
Mom takes his silence as matter of fact, turning toward him with a smile. She's pristine in silver, a thin pearl necklace, silver hoops in her ears. "I've always believed in making complete use of all my available assets," she says. "I think I finally figured out how you'll be of use to me. Philip? A hand, if you please."
Philip, Foggy remembers suddenly, is one of Mom's friends whom she brought in out of the cold. The rest of the company used to be Dad's, before he died, but not Philip. He turns, and watches Philip approach with that same mild look on his face, and realizes just how closely it matches Mom's. "Philip," he says.
"Sorry, kid," Philip says sympathetically. "I know you were digging that whole star-crossed lovers thing you have going on with that blind guy, but did you forget? Everyone dies at the end of that play."
"Oh," Foggy says, and watches Philip take out the duct tape.
--
The thing is, Foggy has never considered himself and Matt to be anything similar to Romeo and Juliet. Mostly because they really weren't, or they hadn't seemed to be. Romeo and Juliet had been stupid kids between feuding families, and Matt and he were lawyers, and yeah, maybe Foggy was the son of the head of a criminal syndicate, but - well. Maybe it wasn't so inaccurate after all.
He thinks even Matt wouldn't hear the snapping of his bones from halfway across the city with construction equipment going. He keeps thinking that and grits his teeth against screaming. Innocent men, guilty men. They all scream the same. They all become the same piles of viscera. Foggy, too, he thinks.
"I really liked you, Frankie," Philip says, patting his broken hand like lightning and wildfires. "Come on. All you gotta do is scream, and it could all be over."
There are tears on his face, and he's blubbering, and now he's laughing, too, because it's that or actually start screaming and he can't risk that. "Like hell it is," he says. "You forgetting I'm usually the one cleaning up after this?"
"Ah," Philip says. "Well, I was hoping you'd forgotten that. People usually do when you start working on their hands."
"Enough chatter," Mom says, cold and impatient. "If his little masked freak doesn't show up soon, he's going to be worth a lot of nothing. Maybe we'll toss him over the edge and leave the body at Murdock's doorstep. Wonder what his senses will make of that."
God, better that than having Matt show up here where there were no shadows to protect him and a whole lot of guns. Philip is almost being kind, for him, starting with Foggy's less dominant hand, the littlest finger shattering first. It doesn't get easier, just because he's already felt one break. Philip takes hold of his middle finger, splayed out on the cinder block. It jars the others, and someone is making some small, hurt animal noises, and Philip lifts the hammer, and he brings it down. The crack is wet, just like the others.
Foggy swallows any noise he might make, or he thinks he does. It's hard to know.
--
The lights go out.
--
He's sore and tired and hurt and swallowing it down (he's good at that. He keeps swallowing. He swallows it down like it's food and drink and swallows and swallows until he's too full to eat). The night is bright and dark and full of dazed things (or just his skull, maybe; something ringing).
Mom is calm. She's always calm, she's on the phone and speaking, clipped and fast. (Familiar sounds from childhood; clipped and fast over the phone, over his head, and 'Franklin, you're in the way' and ' someone move him. Caitlin, won't you-' and softer, gentler hands and a straining jaw and thin skin and thin limbs.)There are gunshots and they seem too close, and there is shouting, but that seems distant, and it's all familiar and in the dark, he forgets he's not home. Philip stands there, hammer held loosely in hand -
(it hurts. It hurts a lot. His hand feels like it's in flames, it is flames, swollen and consuming. It burns, and his mind is white, pure and blank and empty. His chest hurts, but there's nothing wrong with it, he thinks. It just hurts. Everything hurts.)
Is it as dark as it looks? He can barely see his mom and Philip in the dark. Dark as the city is, it has a dull glow, and it casts highlights. He can see the twisted shapes of his own fingers, swollen and gray and washed out. His chest hurts. It feels compressed, something tight, and full, and he swallows. Swallows. Swallows air, and can't keep it.
"Rosalind?" Philip asks, and Mom has put away her phone.
"It seems that our trap was not as well thought out as we expected it to be," she says coolly. "If he survives the next fifteen minutes, I'll make certain for myself that Donald dies."
"We should give it up for a bad job," Philip says thoughtfully. "Cut our loses."
Mom cocks her head, and it's quiet. Too quiet. No gunshots. No screaming. Quiet and dark, and something waiting. "Might be a touch late for that," she says, but she turns, and her heels clack loudly while the city breathes below, sirens and car horns.
Philip doesn't follow. He says, "What do you want done with the kid?"
She doesn't stop, doesn't even hesitate. "Get rid of him," she says offhand, heels clacking. "We don't have time for excess baggage."
For a moment, Philip doesn't move. The clacking grows distant, but he's watching the way Philip's fingers tighten around the handle of the hammer. There's barely enough light to see the man's face, and it's that same vaguely sympathetic look.
"Sorry, Frankie," Philip says, turning to face him. "It was always going to end like this. You never did grow the teeth needed to survive Rosalind, not in this family." He hefts the hammer (and his breath hitches. He can't catch it, but it hitches, high and afraid), and looks down at him. "If it helps," Philip says, "I actually liked you, kid."
"It really doesn't," he manages through gulps of air; it feels like there are knives in his chest, and the thinks maybe he's having a heart attack, which - whatever. Better than what Philip is planning.
There's a meaty thud, and for a confused second, he thinks he's been hit. It comes again, and again, fast like a piston, like a train on tracks, and the sound of someone collapsing, and Philip is shouting, "Rosalind?"
There are feet on the stairs, the scrape of a rubber-soled shoes over grit. The thing that emerges from the pitch black shadows barely even looks human. It moves wrong, all shadows and loose limbs, and liquid drops darkly from it's form, viscous splatters. It's teeth are white and red in the dim light.
"You," it says. It doesn't even sound human, low and torn and vicious, more like the snarl of a mad, beaten dog, frothing and rabid, than human speech. "You're going to regret this," it says. "But me? I'm going to enjoy it."
--
The night has gone still, waiting, almost quiet but not really. There's broken breathing echoing in the hollow shell of a skeleton-building, steel bones and concrete skin.
"Sorry I brought work home, honey," Foggy says to the thing lurking in the dark, and the words are high and thin, faint and distant and tight. He swallows, and swallows again, can't bite them and bring them back.
Near the edge of the floor, no wall to guard the fall, the thing comes back to life. "Foggy," Matt rasps, still struggling to catch his breath, like he's run a hundred miles or maybe killed a dozen people or probably both. He turns and staggers back toward him, and nearly collapses over Foggy's lap - except Foggy flinches and whines because any movement within three feet of his broken hand seems like it's too much. "Foggy," he says, mouth twisting, "they hurt you."
"A bit, yeah," he says, gulping air. "Come on, Matt, we - we gotta get out of here before the cops get here."
"Okay," Matt agrees, but Foggy can see how he's struggling to get back into motion. He's on his last leg, and he's leaving bloodied smears everywhere. His fingers fumble over the duct tape holding Foggy to the chair, and they look clumsy and swollen and numb.
(He still hears the sound of bruising flesh and breaking bone and crackling cartilage, the wet pop of it; grunts and cries and whimpers and desperate breathe gone bubbly. The sharp cry cut short by a meaty thud. He still hears it, but he tries not to.)
At last Matt rips the duct tape free, and then wobbles to his feet. He tugs Foggy with him, avoiding his hand, and pulls him close. He's burning hot, sweaty and bloody and his mouth is wet where he's breathing against Foggy's skin. His heart is pounding so hard that Foggy can feel it, strong and a few beats behind the frantic hammering of his own.
"Foggy," he says, inhaling shakily and holding onto him so hard he's probably going to bruise, "Foggy. I can't - Foggy. I need you - I love you." He feels like he's going to fall over, like maybe Foggy's the only thing holding him up, even though Foggy doesn't think he can do it - can't take his weight, even, let alone Matt's, too. "I love you, Foggy," he says, smearing blood over Foggy's skin.
"I know," Foggy says, and he must have because it feels familiar, and true. "I know, Matt. I love you, too." It's all true, for better or for worse, and he tugs. "Come on, we've got to get out of here."
Matt guides him carefully through the pitch black shadows of the interior of the building, and Foggy doesn't think about the fact that he can't hear breathing in the stairwell other than their own. It doesn't matter, he thinks. They have to get home, and Matt has to get out of those blood-soaked clothes - and so does Foggy, now. The evidence, he thinks, and feels his feet get steadier.
He's got his own two feet, and his own two hands, and a problem that needs fixing.
--
It still relatively early in the morning when Foggy gets the call. He's not one to lay in bed until late just because he has nothing to do that day, but he thinks he can be forgiven for taking advantage of bed rest. Not that broken fingers really need a lot of bed rest, but still.
He agrees to show up, and Matt comes with him, and curls his fingers into the crook of Foggy's arm, his cane held in his other hand. Inside the morgue, Foggy folds his fingers over Matt's, though he's not sure which of them need the touch more, considering. "Yeah," he says, and his voice sounds a million miles away. "Yeah, that's - That's Rosalind Sharpe."
They quickly whisk the sheet back over the body, like that will erase the pale, bruise and contusion marred face from his mind. "Jeez," says one of the attendants, and the officer is saying, "We're very sorry for your loss, Mr. Nelson. Thank you for your help."
The officer says, "Don't worry, we'll catch the asshole that did this," and one of the mortuary attendants says, "God, I hope so. What a psycho."
"Thanks," says Foggy, and smooths his thumb over Matt's trembling fingers. They're probably not even wrong about that, perhaps, except that Matt's generally a good guy. He just got a taste of closure, Foggy thinks, and wants to share what a reassuring feeling it is: like the heaviest weight lifted from your shoulders. "I'm gonna," he says, and "my partner -"
"Oh, right," the officer says. "Sure, you're free to go."
Matt doesn't speak until they're out on the street again, and then he breathes deeply and sneezes. "You okay, Foggy?" He asks, cocking his head to listen. His fingers are still shaking, but Foggy thinks they're getting steadier. The sounds echo less, and even Foggy had been irritated by the chemical smell. Matt had probably been able to smell the decomposition.
"Yeah," Foggy says, and he thinks it's even true. Matt's brow wrinkles briefly, but grows smooth, and he looks a little pleased. "How about you?"
"Fine," Matt says, mouth quirking in a bemused fashion before it smooths. He doesn't release Foggy's arm, and they step out into the flow of foot-traffic and get swept along. It's new, this arm-holding thing, though Foggy remembers worrying about it so long ago. Matt seems reluctant to let him out of arm's reach, but they had a pretty nasty scare, and honestly, Foggy doesn't mind.
"You know," Foggy says, "I don't care what the newspapers say, you aren't allowed to get ideas about this, Matt."
Matt scoffs, but his mouth is curling, and his teeth are white and sharp. "Ideas? What ideas do you think I'm getting?"
"I think you're taking the whole 'devil' mystique to heart," he says, and jabs his elbow at Matt. It doesn't do a lot as it's the one he's holding. "Don't get ideas, Murdock. You can't just run around in a goofy suit and beat up entire crime syndicates whenever you feel like it."
He can tell Matt's not taking him seriously; his mouth is too smug and sharp, and he's got a swagger in his step. Foggy sighs loudly, but gives it up for a lost cause for the moment. His fingers are starting to ache again, and that means he can have another pill, but he'll need food to settle his stomach first.
Foggy really isn't all that worried - even if Matt does take the mystique given to him by the remaining survivors of Rosalind's personal entourage. They had eagerly gone into police custody, trusting the security of bars over hiding spots in the streets - worried what, or who, might sniff them out. 'Save us from the devil,' they said, and Foggy knows what they meant by it.
The thing is, Foggy has loved monsters his entire life. He was raised by them, fed and sheltered and nurtured by them. A monster had given birth to him. So Foggy doesn't really see a great deal of reason to be frightened of monsters.
And this devil loves him. Secure in that, Foggy is pretty sure that everything will be just fine.