Chapter Text
Matt was already out of breath half-way from the church, now he was practically wheezing for air as he finally reached their hideout. In his mind that long walk was only possible because of the bitter-sweet memory of Foggy Nelson talking about mercy all these years ago, well... more logically speaking, it was probably the significant amount of adrenaline flowing through his veins at the moment. Either way Murdock was finally here with Poindexter's dead-weight on his shoulders. The man passed out few minutes ago after Matt had to push both of them to the ground trying to avoid being seen by some passerby. Now he waked up and was doing his best to stay that way. It wasn't an easy thing to do. The blood loss made him weak and woozy, holding onto Matt or keeping his head up wasn't possible no more. He was totally dependent on him and his mercy.
With much force Daredevil kicked open door to the hideout. Karen was inside, her heartbeat raised at the sound, then it raised even more when she looked his way. Matt tried to get the wounded man off his shoulders as carefully as he could, trying not to disturb the still bleeding gun shot wound even more. With the little energy that Dex still had in him he gripped his torso and forced his legs to the ground. Despite him trying to stay up on his own most of his weight was still resting on Matt.
"Little help?" The words seemed out of place as soon as they left his mouth, but he just couldn't think about anything better at the moment. During his trip from the church he was too focused on staying alive and monitoring Dex's breathing and heart beat to come up with any encouraging speech that could convince her to help. Karen just stood there shocked at first, then really really angry. Matt knew that there was no time to argue with her, not when Dex was slowly dying in his arms. "Please." He used his most pleading tone.
Karen shook her head in disbelieve. "You can't be serious right now..." She was breathing heavily not only from of her boxing session. Her eyes were locked on Dex, he was bloody and dirty from all the beating, running and wallowing on the street. "What the hell happened? Why would you bring him here? Are you out of your fucking mind?!" Matt had things to say in his defence but now wasn't the best time for it. Poindexter's heart was slowing down, and he was still bleeding profusely from the gunshot wound. They needed to stabilize him as fast as possible.
With great difficulty he slowly lowered Dex to the floor. It wasn't an ideal rest place for a gunshot victim but Matt didn't have any more energy to hold him up. He was starting to feel consequences of jumping through windows. "Karen I need you here" He knelt down next to Poindexter and pressed his hand over blood-soaked cloth that covered his wound. The man hissed in pain but didn't really fight to stop Matt. He was either to exhausted to do so or he simply stopped caring. "He's been shot and I need him alive..." He grabbed his half-red half-black headpiece and put it aside. "I'm too weak to take care of this on my own..." He turned his head towards where she was starting. "Please. Do it for me not for him." Convincing her to help him patch up a man that tried to murder her multiple times with his puppy eyes was an filthy move. But, according to the subtle change in Karen's heart beat, it worked.
"Jesus Christ" Her voice cracked when she said those words. She took a deep breath and quickly walked over to the bed. Underneath it there was a big first aid kit. Fabric of the overused bag was ripped in many palaces, picking it up normally would result in scattering its content all over the floor so Karen pushed it closer with her foot. When the bag found itself next to Matt he grabbed a pair of bandage scissors from it. He had to get rid of the top of Dex's outfit if he wanted to dress the wound properly, pulling the shirt off normally would be too troublesome in his state. It also wouldn't hurt to take a look at other injuries he definitely has.
Karen kneeled down on the other side of Poindexter, with hands on her knees, she looked over his broken body indifferently. She was as angry as before, but she still trusted Matt enough to help him with his bullshit. "What do I do?" She asked.
"Get some disinfectant and a gauze. You will have to put pressure on the wound." Murdock's hands were shaking from exhaustion, but he trusted himself with cutting Poindexter's shirt open. He revealed others man wide bloody chest as he pushed the fabric aside. Karen immediately used the gauze, she just took out from the first aid kit, to cover the wound on Dex's abdomen. The sudden contact caused him to groan in pain and shuffle his legs.
"Stay down you motherfucker..." She said under her breath and pressed on the wound jest a tiny bit more. Bullseye's didn't argue, his condition was bad and Matt could only hope that it wouldn't get any worse. The idea of having to get rid of a body after all that effort was just... devastating. He couldn't fail. Not again.
It took few long minutes of pressing and a bunch of gauzes to fully stop the bleeding. Now was the moment to figure out how bad the damage was. According to the little change Karen's heartbeat made when she put the bloody gauze away the entry side didn't look the best. "What do you see?" He asked her.
"Um... It's swollen. A little red on the edges." She kept her poker face but hat to swallowed thick saliva that suddenly appeared in her mouth. "Isn't it a bit early for an infection?"
"He landed in a sidewalk puddle after he got shot."
"Jesus. No wonder it looks like that."
"Can you see any shards?"
She fished out a small flash light from the first aid kit and examined the wound carefully. "No shards... Skin around it looks intact too." She sighed and put the flash light away. Murdock could only hope that there was no serious organ damage. He would have no problem with smelling out a broken intestine but if his kidney or a big blood vessel got injured? He wouldn't be able to tell.
"Good. No need to worry about stitching then. You have the disinfectant?" Without saying a word she reached over and threw him a small unopened bottle of hydrogen dioxide. It should be enough to clean sides of the wound and disinfect the surrounding skin.
Matt opened the bottle and poured out some sharp smelling fluid on a cotton swab. He started with the skin around the wound to not startled the half conscious man. After what he believed was a good cleaning he changed the swab for a fresh one and touched the side of Dex's wound. The other man reacted immediately by grabbing his wrist and groaning in pain. Laying down must have given him the rest he needed because for the first time since they got here he raised his head up.
"Wh-what the fuck?" He groaned out quietly as he looked around the room confused. His eyes were wandering from Matt to Karen. It took him a moment to realize what is going on but after he understood his situation he started to laugh. Or more like tried to laugh, it sounded like a dry coughe but the intention was clear. "You're an idiot..."
Karen looked at him angrily and her hands curled into fists, Matt had to put a hand on her shoulder to calm her down. He couldn't let her rough him up ever more, not now. His other palm was still right next to Dex's wound with the other man squizzing his wrist. Well, squizzing might be a big word for what Poindexter was doing, there was no power in him to use much force, so he was more like holding him with his fingers softly curled up over his wrist. His eyes were half-closed as he watched his every move.
"Matt?" Karen snapped him out of his thoughts. "Clean the wound." That was a command Matt didn't dare to not fulfilled. He ignored Dex's hand on him and moved closer to the injury. Cleaning it definitely burned, his abdominal muscles were tight and his breathing changed as Matt worked over him.
It didn't take long to take care of the wound. After he finished with the hydrogen dioxide he putted a tick layer of gauze over it and then added a big plaster on top to keep the gauze in place. The last part was the bandage.
"Can you hurry up?" Karen asked. She got up a moment ago and was now treading in place. She was keeping distance between herself and Dex while still watching him carefully.
"Just a moment..." He grabbed a clean bandage from the first aid kind and unfolded it. Matt needed to secure the dressing so it wouldn't come right off the moment other man starts moving. He put his hand on Poindexter's waist and tried raising it up to put the bandage under. "Arch your back" He demanded.
Bullseye's heart rate raised up, but he did as he was told. Ignoring the weird feeling in his chest, Matt was done in a moment. He used up the whole bandage and secure the end of it with a metal pin. Now before taking care of the rest of his injuries he had a moment for Karen. She was standing there with her arms folded and her head up. She was stressed and impatient. Her muscles were tight and her heart was beating fast. "Can we talk now?" She asked coldly.
Matt got up from the floor and joined Karen on the side. She breathed out heavily as soon as he found himself next to her. "Why did you bring him here?" She asked quietly.
"I couldn't leave him out there Karen" He put a hand on her shoulder, trying to comfort her at least a little, but she just tensed up even more. "I wanted but I couldn't. I had to help."
She shook her head in disbelieve. "You had to help?" Dry tired laugh that left her mouth was not a nice thing to hear. "You had to help someone like him?" She pointed a finger at Dex that was still laying on the ground few meters away.
"Hey... I know what you're thinking but you need to understand me, I couldn't just leave him there. I'm not a kind of person that just leaves others to die when I can help..." He tried putting hand on her cheek, but she pushed it away.
"Don't bullshit me with your code now Matt." She took a step back, creating more space between them. "We saw him hurt people we love, people we care about! He was trying to kill us at least three times each!" Karen wiped off tears that suddenly have gathered in her eyes. Despite all these years, the memory of Foggie's death still burned the same. "How much more innocent people have to die before you realize that as long as he is alive he will never stop?"
Murdock had to take a deep breath to clam himself down. "So what? You think I should just let the Anti-Vigilante Task Force take care of him?"
"You want to know what I think Matt?" Karen seemed to clam down a bit. "I think that if you really cared about all the people he murdered you would just get rid of him yourself."
Her words cut like a knife. That heavy dull feeling appeared in his chest almost immediately. And the worst part? She wasn't lying. Her heartbeat didn't change even a bit when she said those hurtful words.
Karen didn't look his way no more. Her whole body was turned away. "I'm not staying here if he is Matt."
It took him a moment fully understand her words. For him there was no right answer to this problem. "I'm not throwing him out Karen... It would be a death sentence."
"That's what I thought..." She dried her tears up with her sleeve. Then she walked over to a table and grabbed a bag with her things.
Fear spiked up in Murdock's heart as he noticed her walked closer to the door. "Wait, wait, wait!" He took a step closer to her, not blocking her way yet. "It is not safe out there right now. Please, Karen." His hand softly landed on her shoulder.
"Matt." Her tone was strong. "I can take care of myself." She pushed past him and grabbed the handle of the door.
"At least tell me where are you going."
"A place that I feel safe in."
And that was all. She left. Matt put his head on the door and listened to her heartbeat as she walked away. He knew that she could take care of her self but the anxiety was too strong. He listened to her heart until she was too far away. Murdock would stay leaning against the door for much longer if Dex didn't decide to speak up.
"She was right" His voice was rough and hoarsed. Matt turned his head toward the other man. He looked miserably at best. Laying on the floor clenching his bandaged side, wet from sweat and blood. Just barely alive.
After a moment of silence he finally dared to ask. "About what?" He took his forehead off the door and fully turned towards Dex.
"I have hurt people you love..." He groaned under his breath as he tried to change position from his back to his side. That was a risky way of moving, wound in his abdomen could be easily re-opened. " And-ugh I tried to kill you.'
"Don't move." He quickly walked over to his side to aid or at least try to do it. He grabbed Poindexter's shoulders and pushed him back down.
"You should have left me there Matthew..."
"Oh believe me I wanted to do that."
"But you didn't... And now you're regretting it..."
"I need to take care of your other wounds" Matt changed the subject. Without waiting for Bullseye's answer he grabbed the bandage scissors and started cutting through one of his sleeves. A nasty glass scrap was just on the top of other man's arm. Matt could more or less map out injuries on his body. The smell of blood, even thou most of it had time to dry out, marked the places of his wounds. Sound also helped, when he ignores Bullseye's rough breathing he can hear broken ribs shifting against each other.
Few pieces of gauze and a whole the bottle of hydrogen dioxide was enough to cover rest of the injuries on Dex's chest, arms and head. Murdock only needed to put bandage on one other spot which, considering the amount of injuries, was a pretty good result. A small cut on his head was the last thing he has taken care of. He realized that he was probably responsible for most, if not all, injuries on the other man's face. There was no way for Matt to tell if bruises already started blooming, but he ran his fingers over his cheekbone to check it anyway.
"Getting soft now?" Poindexter asked pertly and smiled in his usual sick way. If Murdock didn't just put him together he would beat his ass once more. For now, he decided to just ignore every provocation that leaved his mouth.
"C'mon get up." Matt threw the other man's arm over his shoulders and tried putting him in a sitting position. It would be easier if he at least tried to cooperate.
"Why? It doesn't even matter..."
"I told you before. It matters to me."
"I matter to you?" Dex asked mockingly. It was yet another provocation, he was trying to make him react, to make him hate him even more. It was all for no use.
"You matter to me" Matt didn't think these words out, they just slipped out. But he doesn't think he is lying. His day was getting just more and more complicated.