Chapter Text
When Foggy arrived at Matt’s apartment, he’d been expecting some injuries. After all, he knew he’d just been on patrol. But he wasn’t expecting this.
Matt was splayed out on the floor, beaten all to hell. His wounds were bad, worse than… worse than when Foggy first found out. Foggy knew that Claire wasn’t an option, and he was panicking.
Before he could register what he was doing, he was pulling out his phone and dialling 9-1-1. Matt would hate him for it, but Matt wouldn’t be able to hate him if he was dead. And Foggy preferred that cold shoulder over a permanent blanket of silence any day.
“Hi, my friend is hurt really bad, he’s breathing but he’s unconscious, I-“ Foggy was rambling into the phone, his hands shaking as he tried to find the worst wound to press his hands against.
The operator soothed him to the best of her abilities, and Foggy managed to give her Matt’s address. It wasn’t long before Foggy could hear sirens.
When the knock came, he rushed to answer it. Everything from then to the hospital was a blur, from climbing into the ambulance to climbing out. He followed the gurney in, and pushed through people trying to stop him from following Matt.
He wasn’t losing him again. Not after he was presumed dead the first time. Fuck this, Foggy was following this through. He was still standing in the trauma room, words sounding muffled as every sense of his was focused on Matt, when hands grabbed his shoulders.
“Sir? Sir, are you alright?” Foggy tore his vision away from Matt at the voice, his eyes landing on a man with salt and pepper hair in front of him.
“I- I’m fine. Help him. And call me Foggy.”
The doctor nodded. “We are helping him, I promise. I’m Dr. Whitaker, we just need a medical history and how this happened. Our.. our hospital is working with analog right now, so we can’t pull anything digital up.”
Foggy let out a breath, his eyes returning to Matt. He was being led out of the room with a steady hand on his shoulder from Dr. Whitaker, and all he could see was Matt. Always Matt.
“Are you family? What’s your relationship with..?”
Foggy sighed. He really had to go over everything. “Matt Murdock. Closest thing to family he’s got.”
“Okay.” Dr. Whitaker jotted something down. “Are there any pre-existing health problems? Anything that is relevant to right now?”
“He’s blind,” Foggy said almost automatically. They would have to know that. He was working on autopilot, filling in anything they needed to know after being prompted by Dr. Whitaker.
“Lastly, just because we need to know—how did Matt get these injuries? Most are quite severe.”
Shit. Foggy knew this was coming, of course he did, but he still wasn’t prepared. He hadn’t thought up an excuse. He’d been too focused on Matt, too centred on the fact that he might die.
“Um.” He stared at the floor, not looking at the man sitting in front of him. He needed something, anything.
“Take your time, si- Foggy.”
And all Foggy could do was imagine Dr. Whitaker’s expression of suspicion. So Foggy tried to tell the truth. Some warped version of it.
“We’re lawyers, y’know? So um- we get threats sometimes. Sometimes those threats turn into action. I think- I mean, I don’t know, but I think that’s what happened,” Foggy lied. All of a sudden, he was very grateful for his ability to make up bullshit. Even if it wasn’t the most convincing.
“Alright. I’m gonna head in, that’s all we need for now.”
“Yeah. Just, um. Just update me, okay? I need to know that he’s okay.” Foggy’s voice cracked, and he barely noticed as Dr. Whitaker left. His hands, so smooth and clean compared to Matt’s calloused, coming up to hold his face.
The waiting was the worst part. The noise that dragged on for an endless amount of time, not quite silent but muffled enough for Foggy to barely register it at times. In other instances, all he could do was sit while the noise pressed down around him, sucking the air from the atmosphere as he did the only thing he could do. Nothing.
He had to call Karen. Foggy knew that he had to call Karen, but he was frozen except for the bouncing of his leg, an ever-present rhythm that filled the space. Or the slow, anxious picking at his skin, bits flaking off like crumbs of a croissant. He barely even felt it. He needed to call Karen. He couldn’t call Frank, because he was too recognizable and Matt might never truly forgive him for that. But Karen had to know.
It was a mantra that Foggy repeated in his head, yet not budging as he just sat. Helpless, like he always seemed to be. Matt always rendered Foggy helpless.
He had to call Karen. And with great effort, his hands shaking as he gripped the phone, barely able to dial her number, he did. And it hardly even had to ring.
***
Jack had come in early, always eager to be doing something other than waiting. And now he was hunched over an unconscious patient, treating wounds that could only be caused by a very violent man. The deep bruises and cuts proved that.
“What do you have for me, Whitaker?” He asked as soon as the door opened, head popping up only for a moment to see the younger doctor’s expression.
“His name is Matt Murdock, he is blind, and this was apparently done by someone angered by his lawyerly duties. It feels like the man with him is hiding something, but I can’t be sure.”
Jack tutted softly, looking over Matt. These were bad wounds. It could be from something like that, sure, but there were older bruises, and scars that had been there for a while. Whitaker was almost definitely right. Something was amiss.
“We can’t find out much more until Mr. Murdock wakes up. Start suturing some of these wounds, will you? All of these wounds haven’t hit anything major, the main issue is blood loss. Get another intern to bring some blood over, and I’ll be back,” Jack instructs quickly, pulling off the gloves covering his hands and finding Robby. He needed to talk this out.
Briefly passing the room Whitaker had stuck—Franklin Nelson, it might’ve been?—Mr. Nelson, inside he could see the man on the phone, pacing. A pretty neutral thing, not a green or red flag unless Jack knew what he was saying. Which he did not.
“Hey, Robby!” Jack called. It was all he could do not to say some lewd thing, a grin on his face even in the case of what he had to ask.
The other man turned towards him, expression one of exasperation. “Yeah, Jack?”
“Oh, don’t look so worried. I just need to talk through a case. Something’s a little weird.”
Jack explained the situation, following Robby around the ER as he did so, watching every minute furrow of the brow or narrowing of the eyes. He didn’t like it any more than he did.
“I’m planning on waiting for the patient to wake up and then I’ll call Kiera, but..” He trailed off, leaving room for input, but Robby gave none. He just nodded, muttered a quick ‘sounds good,’ and kept working.
Jack sighed. Robby had been in a less than pleasant mood for a good amount of the day, though he couldn’t grasp the concept of why. He’d figure it out eventually, though. Skipping lightly to quicken the pace but not put any more pressure on his leg, he heads back towards Mr. Murdock. Who seems to have another visitor, a young blonde woman standing with Mr. Nelson.
“Ah, is this more family of Mr. Murdock?” Jack asked, head tilted as he tried to find any minor expression that could give something away.
“Karen Page,” the woman introduced herself, holding out a hand of which he took.
“Jack Abbot. We’ve stabilized your friend, nothing major was damaged.”
The group of two breathed a sigh of relief, almost in sync. Mr. Nelson still had the faintest trace of panic on his face, as if the news wasn’t enough to quell his worry for his friend. Or something else.
“Is he awake? Can we talk to him?” Ms. Page asked, seemingly more capable at the moment they were in.
Jack shook his head. “He’s still unconscious, and before you see him we have to perform an evaluation to make sure no impairments were made to his mental state. A doctor will get you as soon as he is awake.”
He waited for their agreements before moving back into the chaos of the emergency room. Pager buzzing constantly, always another thing he had to tend to. When Jesse came up to him to tell him that Mr. Murdock was awake, Jack was at least relieved he would be able to be in a quiet room.
When he arrived, the patient in front of him was not one of grogginess or confusion. He was tense, head darting around, face scrunched up in something akin to pain.
“Mr. Murdock?” Jack started, but the man’s head swivelled to face him and he couldn’t get another word out before a single question was asked.
“Where’s Foggy?”