A/N - this story is inspired by this kinkmeme prompt:

"Foggy is temporarily blinded

This wouldn't have to be a romantic thing, just them being v close friends if you absolutely prefer, but in any case I would love something where Foggy is temporarily blinded by something and neither he or Matt knows how long the blindness will last (or if it's even temporary at all). Maybe while working on a case someone attacks Foggy or kidnaps him to make a point, maybe he's just in the wrong place at the wrong time. In any case, Foggy being temporarily blinded and Matt having to essentially save him and then trying to comfort him/help him."

The case was going well, thank God. It was the only one they had and they had agreed not to charge if they lost. They were barely going to charge if they won, just take a small cut of any compensation they were hoping the judge would award when they sued their client's evidence planting employer right back again. Matt had agreed all this. In front of the client and without discussing it with Foggy first. He was still a little pissed about that.

Okay, a lot pissed, but Matt had been right about one thing at least; it gave him the motivation to fight harder for the client, whom Matt was a hundred percent sure was innocent. Foggy wasn't so sure himself, but he trusted Matt. Doubly now that he knew he could detect a lie at a hundred feet. Trusted him to detect lies, that was, not to tell the truth himself. Besides, the client would never have been able to afford to pay without the agreement. He would have have been stuck with an overworked public defender who probably have assumed he was guilty and wouldn't have cared one way or another what happened.

One of these days though, they were going to have to go looking for clients who could pay them actual money. The kind that they could use to pay off the debts they were beginning to build up.

He stopped at the coffee stall and ordered his and Matt's usual, and a latte for Karen. It was going to be a long day, they needed all the energy they could get.

And then there was pain. Searing agony. A flash of white, or maybe yellow. Did it matter? He wasn't sure. Pain. His eyes. His face. In the background, somebody was screaming. Was it him? He wasn't sure. It didn't sound like him. Had he ever heard himself scream before? He wasn't sure of that either.

Sirens. Police? Ambulance? Fire? He didn't know. It sounded like they were all around him. Hands touching him, lifting him. Voices screaming, speaking, telling him things that he didn't have the capacity to understand. Pain.

His eyes.

"I'm fine," Foggy said, not for the first time.

He was aware of fidgeting next to him, feet shuffling nervously on the floor, squeaking against whatever material it was coated with. Matt didn't believe him. Of course Matt didn't believe him. Even if he didn't have his abilities, he was intimately acquainted with an approximation of how Foggy would be feeling right now, and okay definitely wasn't it.

"You're not fine," Matt said. "I can tell when you're lying, remember?"

Foggy sighed. He may be a smart guy, but sometimes he wished his friend would just play dumb once in a while, like he'd used to before Foggy knew.

He was so far past not fine that he wasn't even sure it mattered any more.

"What did the doctor say?" Matt asked. He had arrived less than five minutes ago. Foggy had him listed as his emergency contact, but when he had arrived at the hospital, the staff had been more focused on patching him up than checking through his phone to find someone to call. Foggy had had other concerns too, for that matter.

Foggy shrugged. He felt dizzy, he didn't know whether that was a result of the explosion or the painkillers he had been given when he had woken up screaming. "Whole load of nothing. Vague, not wanting to commit to anything. You know, wait and see." He paused, brushing his fingers across the bandage covering his patched eyes. "Or not, depending."

He tried to keep his tone light. He was failing badly.

"Okay, I'm going to go and talk to him," Matt announced. Foggy heard him rise from the chair next to the bed and begin to walk toward the door. "I can probably get a better read on what he's thinking, give us some idea…"

"No." Matt's footsteps paused. Foggy imagined him turning back to face him, maybe he did, maybe not. Wasn't like it would mean anything to either one of them. "Don't," Foggy told him. "I don't think I wanna… I mean… what if it's bad news?"

"What if it's not?"

Foggy readjusted his position on the bed. He took a deep breath and released it as a sigh. One way or another, the doctor probably had a better idea than him which way this was going to go. He didn't want to commit to a definite answer because there were no guarantees. They did the same thing with their clients; you don't tell someone how you think the trial is going to turn out, no matter how certain you might be. You could be wrong.

He shook his head. The back of his head rubbed against the pillow behind him as he did, and he was fairly certain that Matt would notice the gesture, by the sound if not in the other way. If the doctor was feeling optimistic, that didn't mean things wouldn't go wrong unexpectedly. If he was pessimistic, Foggy really didn't want to know at all. "No," he said.

"Alright." He heard Matt sit back down, and relaxed instantly.

"I'll be okay," he said. "Seriously, Matt, it's not that bad. It'll clear right up." Probably. Maybe. "They're sending me home tomorrow to wait it out, why don't you get out of here, get some sleep or something. You can come back and mother hen me in the morning."

He heard the chair creak next to him again, but he still flinched at the unexpected touch on his shoulder. He tried to cover by shifting in the bed again but he was almost completely sure Matt wasn't fooled. The hand on his shoulder squeezed supportively. He took another deep breath in, attempting to calm himself.

"I'm okay," he repeated, as though saying it again might make it true.

"I know. I'll see you tomorrow," Matt told him, and even coming from him the words hit him like a punch to the stomach.

He heard Matt's footsteps pause as though he had noticed the reaction. He turned and stepped back toward him.

"Foggy, how much could you actually see, before they put the bandages on?"

Foggy thought back. The memory was clouded with pain. Even now, after they had brought out the good drugs, his eyes throbbed under their bandages. He took comfort from that, if they hurt, it showed how much healing they still had to do.

"Technically more than you, I suppose. I don't know, I could barely open them, and whenever the doctor did it for me, he shone a bright light in there. I could see that, feel it too." He winced at the memory. "Blurs, colors. Nothing useful. Hey, if it's bad news, how long will it take for the superpowers to kick in?"

"Nothing?" Matt's voice caught a little. He ignored the poor attempt at humor and stepped closer.

"It'll be okay," Foggy said, for what felt like the millionth time. It wasn't fooling anybody, but right now all he wanted was for Matt not to be there any more. He wanted - needed - to be alone.

A squeak of shoes on the floor again as Matt stepped away from him. "Yeah," his friend told him, "You're… you're probably right. It'll be fine."

"Go home, Matt," Foggy told him. "And I mean home. If you turn up tomorrow beat to a pulp, I'm going to…" he paused, there wasn't a lot he could do at the best of times, right now it would be a miracle if he even noticed. "…be pretty angry with you," he finished ineffectually.

He heard the hint of a laugh before Matt answered. "I promise I won't get beat to a pulp." Coming from him, that didn't mean much. He briefly imagined Matt turning up bruised and battered and arguing that pulping had not been involved.

Foggy listened to the sound his cane tapping on the ground in front of him as he left. He tried not to think about whether that would be his future. He remembered Matt's stories, mostly humor mixed with a hint of remaining bitterness as he had recounted learning how to do everything for a second time. Learning how to get around without injuring himself, how to read, to navigate the city, cross roads without winding up beneath the wheels of a car or bus. Of course, Matt had had one hell of an advantage. But he had also been a kid. Foggy couldn't imagine being robbed of his sight at such a young age. He couldn't even imagine it now.

But then, he didn't have to imagine it. He was going to be fine.

Matt concentrated of the beat of Foggy's heart as he walked out of the hospital room and down the corridor. He allowed the rest of the world to fall away to background noise and listened to the steady, but too fast, rhythm. He felt sick. He felt as though the room were spinning around him and it was all that he could do to keep from falling.

"Sir?" A hand touched his arm. Foggy's heartbeat slowed just slightly, still the far too fast tachycardia of panic. "Sir, I said are you alright?"

Matt blinked. He needed to sit down. The hospital smell of disinfectant mingled with the odor of blood. Bad memories rose unbidden to the surface of his mind and he struggled to squash them down. He pushed the well meaning arm away and didn't bother to try to aim his gaze in the direction of the speaker. "I'm fine," he said. He wasn't.

Foggy's heart was racing again, his breathing quickening. Matt touched the wall to orient himself and then walked away as quickly as he could get away with without drawing curious glances.

The cool air outside stank of gasoline fumes from the carpark. Out here, he could no longer differentiate the beat of a single heart over the roar of the world beyond. He felt his hands tighten around the top of his cane against his will. He wanted to punch somebody, but there was nobody to punish, not yet. He would find them, sooner or later.

He tried to calm himself. It didn't work. Instead, he walked home, slowly, meditatively, counting his footsteps and concentrating on the sound his cane made as it touched the ground before him.