Between Sinners and Saints
Summary: Matt couldn't risk Foggy or Karen to an unknown threat. The thought of calling them, to face their anger, their disappointment...The only other number fresh in his mind was…he licked his lips. Jessica.
Warning: Swearing
It was the mix of smells that stirred Matt to a low-level of consciousness: incense, old furnishings, and Murphy's soap. It was familiar, comforting; but something else permeated the air, the scent of rubbing alcohol and dried blood. His blood.
His breathing quickened while he struggled to figure out where he was.
He lay flat on a single bed, the sheets smelled of cheap detergent, but he couldn't feel the fabric, his skin felt desensitized. Matt sucked in a panicked gulp of air, causing a dull ache to spread under his ribs, across his chest – the pain signals were muted – like he was drugged.
Matt tried moving his arms and legs, but they were heavy and sluggish, all he managed to do was curl his fingertips.
His heart raced.
Lub-dub-lub-dub lub-dub-lub.
He remembered the roar of ten tons of cement and steel crashing down all around him, of holding Elektra between his arms, her lips against his skin, the taste of grit then copper inside his mouth.
Lub-dub-lub-dub lub-dub-lub-dub-lub-dub-lub-dub-lub-dub-lub-dub.
"This is what is what living feels like."
Then the roar became a terrifying deafness, the air a thinning chokehold around his throat.
Lubdublubdublubdublubdublubdublubdublubdublubdublubdublubdud.
Fingers touched his face, petting his hair. "Shhhh, it's okay, my son, it's okay."
Matt tried pursing his lips, but his tongue was fat and unmoving as he sank into nothingness.
LINEBREAK
He wasn't beneath the city anymore, or nestled against Elektra's warm body. He was nowhere. A shiver ran down his spine, cold seeping into his bones.
Matt had failed her again, had failed Stick.
God, Stick was dead, Matt's grief was like a knife in his chest. Elektra killed him and Matt had still tried to save her. Stick would be so disappointed.
Moisture welled up in his eyes and trailed down his cheeks. He'd ignored every warning, kept things from his friends and still screwed-up. Still angered those he loved and the people he'd really begin to connect with.
He'd failed at everything.
Matt struggled against the heavy pull of drugs, the chemicals dulling his senses. It felt like he was trapped inside a bubble, the only thing he could make out were two voices drifting over him.
"Don't you think he is well enough to be moved?"
"No, he's better resting here."
"He is weak, Sister, but he's no longer in grave danger –"
"Our Lord has blessed him."
"Sister Maggie, it's been two days…he needs better care."
"You know I have experience to treat him?"
"You were a nurse over 20 years ago… what if you do something wrong?"
"I have supplies from the hospital, an IV and drugs he needs. I will not allow those who led him to this great harm to get near him again."
The air shifted as the woman nearest to him moved. Matt didn't know what she was doing until he felt warmth enter a vein in his arm, spreading like Novocain through millions of nerve-endings. Every muscle in Matt's face slackened until his head lolled against the pillow.
It took years for Matt to map out and master the stretch and pull of his tendons, to understand how far he could push himself, how to listen to his brain. A needle tore a hole in the skin near the upper part of his elbow where an IV was inserted supplying him with fluids and narcotics. Based on the healing wound next to it, the IV had been moved more than once.
He still floated inside the bubble unable to make any coordinated movements. While he didn't have full command of his muscles, Matt was learning how to overcome the effects of the painkillers.
"He'lo?"
His voice was razor-thin, but it still echoed off the surface of…he struggled to focus on the way his words reverberated, the density of the surfaces. The walls were wooden.
He was not inside a hospital.
Focus. Focus.
But whatever coursed through his blood depressed his nervous system and he felt himself slipping under a wave of oblivion.
No, no, - but it was more than the drugs; it was lethargy from depleted energy, his body broken and weak.
"Help," he whispered and drifted back into darkness.
Matt balled his hand into a fist then flexed his fingers, repeating the motion over and over again, trying to get the blood pumping. Anything to help clear his system of the morphine and buy himself more time.
There were layers of bandages wrapped around his middle, the dull ache in his side beginning to throb, every laceration and cut stinging beneath ointment and stitches. He pressed his fingers against a tender spot, increasing the pain, the fog inside his brain dissipating.
Matt licked his lips, tasting the residue of tap water with familiar levels of chlorine. He was still in Hell's Kitchen.
How long had he been unconscious? Had the others made it out, was the city…
A floorboard creaked as one of the women from earlier entered the room, the arteries in her heart were mostly blocked, and her bones grated together from arthritis. She was in her seventies; her lungs had a touch of emphysema.
"You're awake."
"Who…are you?"
Chair legs scraped against the floor as she took a seat next to his bed. "Sister Maggie."
She took his left hand between her warm ones. "I'm so glad that you're feeling better."
"Where am I?"
"The Lord brought you back to me."
"How…"
"Ssssh, you're safe now, Matthew. We removed the suit, we –"
A sharp spike of fear shot through him. "How do you know my name?"
Sister Maggie's breath caught in her throat, her sinuses clogging as she stifled a cry. "I'm so sorry, darling, I'm so sorry."
She caressed his face and he flinched at her weathered touch. Her actions were more than a little creepy, but he had to remain calm. "Sister, do you have a phone? I need to…"
"You need to rest."
He pressed down on his hands and tried to push himself up, the throb in his side turning into a searing pain. Matt groaned; he could feel the color drain from his face.
"No, Matthew."
Matt heard her reach for something on a nearby table and fill a syringe with liquid. "I'm fine," he said, trying to bat the drug away.
But Sister Maggie was efficient and injected the morphine into his IV. Matt tried to pull out the tubing, but the drug entered his bloodstream, the sedative decreasing his hard-fought awareness.
"No, please…" he said, his lips going numb along with the rest of his body.
Matt didn't monitor time like everyone else; he measured the force of air pressure against his skin. His circumstances were difficult given his injuries and how apt his caregiver was at keeping him constantly medicated.
Every four hours Sister Maggie injected him with pain medication, cleaned his cuts and wounds, and changed his bandages. And each time, he adjusted his breathing, manipulated his metabolism and adrenaline levels –
The Murdock boys always got back up again.
He focused, stretched his mind, and ignored the scent of burning oil and fading paint, searching for lithium compounds, an electrolyte allowing ionic movement – components of a lithium-ion battery.
There… he concentrated on the smell of leather and old brass, a trunk on the other side of the room, his cell phone was inside, along with his suit. All he needed to do was get out of bed and grab it.
"Do you think you could eat?" Maggie asked him.
"Yes." Matt needed fuel for his recovery.
Maggie and another nun helped him sit up, placing four pillows behind his back, the change in elevation making him nauseous. But he fought against his stomach, clinging to every moment of wakefulness. He needed to meditate and redirect his energy to his healing, so Matt acquiesced to his caregiver's ministrations.
Maggie guided a spoonful of oatmeal to his lips. Matt reached out with a shaky hand and gripped the utensil, taking back a smidgen of control.
"I know this must hard on you, but you need to regain your strength," Maggie said.
Despite holding him captive, Matt could tell in her vocal inflection how sincere she was…Maggie wanted him to get better. But the rest of her behavior was unsettling and he needed to gain her trust and prevent any more morphine injections.
"You're right," Matt said, eating another bite.
The spoon wobbled in his grip, but Matt continued eating mostly without help, Maggie occasionally directing his hand toward the bowl that sat on his lap. "I've got it, thank you."
"Of course, you've always done so well for yourself."
Her hints of familiarity with him were unnerving. "Have we've met before?"
Maggie's pulse jumped. She picked up the bowl, the spoon clattering against the ceramic while it shook in her hand. "I'm so sorry, Matthew, please forgive me."
"For what, Sister?"
Rising to her feet, Maggie swallowed, her voice breaking. "For leaving you when you were a baby."
Matt's breath hitched, shock then disbelief stealing his ability to form a coherent thought. "What?"
"I never stopped thinking about you, I prayed to God everyday for forgiveness."
He sat up straighter, his heart thrumming against his breastbone. "No," he growled.
"Please, Matthew, calm down. You're not well."
Sitting up tugged at the wound to his side, stretched the skin to the healing laceration across his chest. It was the first time he noticed the fractures to his fifth and sixth ribs. He wrapped an arm around his middle, bracing against the pain from moving too fast.
"You're going to hurt yourself," Maggie admonished.
He leaned most of his weight on his right hand, struggling to center himself. "I think you need to leave."
The movement pulled on the stitches of his sensitive skin, breaking several. He pressed down where it started to bleed. Matt noticed the shift in air and the noise of Maggie searching for something in her pockets. By the time he was able to lift up his other hand; Maggie had injected his IV again.
"No," Matt gasped. He collapsed back against the bed before he could yank it out.
"Ssssh, sweetie, you'll feel better soon I promise."
Matt clawed his way back to consciousness and lay unmoving, listening to the ambient sounds all around him; the flickering of candles, people moving across the room on the floor above his head, the creaking of the walls.
He took slow deep breaths through his nose, feeling his abdomen expand and contract, ignoring the pain it caused. Matt continued the exercise for ten minutes, humming until he was completely out of breath, then he repeated the routine five more times until increased levels of oxygen flowed through his body and soothed his nerves.
He only had one chance.
Matt pushed up with his hands and waited out the resulting vertigo from the accumulation of drugs and lack of physical movement. Time wasn't on his side. He swung his legs around until his bare feet touched the floor, his body trembling from the effort. Swallowing, Matt found the IV needle and pulled it out, hoping he could reinsert it when he was done.
Using the little table to his right for support, Matt stood up, focusing on his muscles. He took one step than another, his legs wobbling as he walked toward the trunk. Breathe in and out, in and out.
Lurching forward, Matt found the wall and leaned on it as he took the last few steps to the trunk in the corner. He went to his knees and fumbled with the latch, opening the trunk where his suit was stored. He searched the pieces of his suit until he found the holster that stored his baton and his emergency burner phone.
It was a good thing he kept it turned off to preserve the battery. As he powered it on his mind flashed to the precious few options available to him. While nuns were not obvious sources of threats, he'd been drugged and held captive, Maggie was unstable, she couldn't be his….no, he couldn't go there.
Matt couldn't risk Foggy or Karen to an unknown threat. The thought of calling them, to face their anger, their disappointment…
The phone beeped, letting him know it was on.
The only other number fresh in his mind was…he licked his lips. Jessica.
Matt dialed the cell number he'd memorized after taking her on as a client. It rang two times, three…four…
"Yeah, who is this?" Jessica answered.
He closed his eyes in relief. "Jessica...it's Matt."
"What the hell?"
"I need your help."
"This is a sick fucking joke, asshole."
"Don't hang up, Jessica…please…" Matt gasped for breath, moving around hadn't been a good idea. He leaned on top of the trunk. "I wish I had your scarf right now."
"Fuck... Matt?...How –"
"I'm at a church," he said, trying to remain awake. "In a room in the lower level."
"Which one?"
"I...I don't know." He smelled food from one of the windows on the floor above him. "It's near a….hot dog stand." He hadn't moved out of bed in a few days, his head began to spin. "Jessica, they're...keeping me drugged."
"Drugged? Who is? Matt!"
His pulse raced inside his ears; he wouldn't last much longer. Matt shoved the phone back inside the trunk and closed the lid to hide the fact he'd used it.
Then he started crawling back toward the bed, his body giving out before he reached it.
Matt had been returned to bed, morphine a stinging sensation in his vein.
"Please Sister Maggie; we should call for an ambulance. He needs proper treatment."
"I am going to take care of my son. I will not abandon him like I did before. Never again."
A vibration woke up Matt, the walls shuddered from something. He lifted up his head, the motion making him feel like he was under water.
Something smashed to the ground, a table maybe. Heavy footsteps walked across the floor above him, three different heartbeats increased in fear, a woman shouted, another one shrieked.
Matt rolled onto his right elbow and yanked out the IV, blood poured down his arm. Someone entered the room, their pulse jumping. His eyebrows rose in a pleasant, shocked surprise.
"Oh my God," Jessica said. She crossed the distance across the room in seconds. "Fuck, you look terrible."
Matt's body weight was too much for one elbow and he fell back against the bed. "I kind of feel terrible."
"You asshole, you remained in that pit knowing that bomb was about to go off."
"I'm sorry," Matt panted; he was too exhausted to argue.
"You better be."
It was raining outside; Matt could smell the water in the creases of her leather jacket. Her boots thumped as she walked to his bed side. She hesitated a moment. "Where are you not hurt?"
"I think I can walk with some help."
"Yeah, right. Keep telling yourself that."
Matt propped himself into a sitting position so he could slide his feet onto the floor, but Jessica wrapped one arm around the back of his shoulders then slid the other arm under his knees.
"Don't get your masculinity in a tizzy," she said and lifted him off the bed.
It was the strangest sensation to be carried. Matt didn't even have time to comprehend what was happening before he heard the frantic footsteps of another person enter the room.
"Leave him alone!" Maggie yelled.
"I will," Jessica announced. "As soon as I get him out of here."
"You're one of the ones who hurt him!"
Jessica breath caught in her throat. "I'm trying to help him."
"Please, Matthew," Maggie begged. "Don't let her take you away from me."
"I don't who you are," Matt rasped. He squeezed his eyes closed; he couldn't handle this, not right now. "Jessica, please…"
"I did not miss all this crazy bullshit, Murdock."
Matt was braced from any jarring movement by the way Jessica kept him secured against her. She moved efficiently out of the tiny room and up the entire flight of stairs until they were outside.
Gooseflesh spread across his skin, the crisp night air a shock to his body. Matt shivered.
"Shit. I didn't think about grabbing a blanket or anything, I'm sorry," Jessica said, holding him tighter. "We're almost to a friend's car."
The outside was a stark contrast to the warmth from inside the church, the sudden change of environment almost too much stimuli for Matt to process.
"Hey, you okay?" Jessica asked concerned.
But his body temperature dropped along with his blood pressure.
Jessica had the opposite reaction, the temperature of her skin increased as her blood pumped harder. "Whoa, don't you start fading on me, not after I saved you from a bunch of nuns."
He wanted to chuckle, but the drastic change was too much for him to compensate, and his entire body gave in to exhaustion.
There was too much noise and stimulus to keep track of. Sixty different people were within twenty feet of Matt, talking, crying, in pain. Hundreds of fluorescent lights hummed in the ceilings above and he gave up trying to keep up with all the droning, beeping equipment.
"Who treated him before his arrival?" a man asked.
"I don't know," Jessica replied.
Matt flinched every time another person touched him, or manhandled a part of his body, wrapping a BP cuff around one arm, inserting another damn IV into another. Latex gloves peeled away the bandages to his side and across his chest, pulling at his skin.
"Do you know what caused these wounds?"
"A sword I think, the other stuff I don't know," Jessica said matter of fact. "A building fell on him."
Matt tried honing in on the timbre of her voice, blocking out all other vocal pitch. Jessica's voice was blunt with a heavy baritone.
"Do you know his medical history?" the male voice from earlier asked.
He recoiled when a set of fingers peeled open his eyelids to flash a light he couldn't see.
"Hey, he's blind; not deaf," Jessica snapped. "It might help if you talked to him instead of me. Tell him what you're doing so you're not actively scaring the shit out of him by poking and touching him without communicating."
The staff obeyed, taking to him, asking Matt various questions. It was too much.
So, he focused on Jessica, on the way the blood flowed in and out of her heart, the way her ventricles contracted, how the center of her heart muscle pumped loud and strong. And he focused on it when one of the nurses forced her to leave and escorted Jessica out and into the hall.
"I know you can hear me," she said under her breath. "I'm not going anywhere, just so you know."
He nodded even know she couldn't see it while the ER staff worked all around him.
Matt could navigate a city, he did it every day, but hospitals were full of noise and emotions, a constant bombardment that had to be filtered out one layer at a time, an effort hampered by pain meds.
He turned his head in the direction of his IV and tried focusing past the smell of the plastic tubing.
"They're giving you fentanyl. I know you were being drugged before, but this time it's being monitored by sane people with medical degrees."
Matt jerked his head in the direction of Jessica's voice and gave her a worn smile. "It's better than morphine."
"I'm not going to ask how you can tell the difference."
"It's more about the amount being given." Matt rested his head against the hospital issued pillow. "Thank you."
Her pulse increased. "Yeah, well, if I'd known you were actually alive, I would have helped sooner."
"I'm sorry…I…"
"Don't apologize for being held hostage by nut balls." Matt waited for the inevitable outburst, steeling himself for the upcoming reprimand. Instead Jessica wrapped her fingers around his. "I'm sorry I didn't realize what your plan was in the cave so I could stop your dumb ass."
She let go of his hand, but remained in the seat next to his bed.
"Don't you have some better place to be?"Matt asked.
"Doesn't being inside here mess with you?"
"A little."
"Then no, I don't."
Matt didn't think about life's grand plan, he'd spent too much time ignoring other people's expectations. But now that he was alive and relatively free, he didn't know if he'd be walking out of the hospital with or without handcuffs. Planning the next step wasn't something he was prepared for.
The fact that Jessica wasn't in jail was a good sign and she told him that Luke, Danny and Claire had survived, but Detective Knight had been badly injured, another horrible casualty of an evil war.
And when his thoughts drifted to his latest choices, his actions with too many consequences, he heard the racing heartbeats of those he might have affected the most.
Karen stood at the foot of his bed while tears streamed down her face. "Matt!" But she didn't say anything else, her emotions like waves of erratic noise.
Foggy stood on the other side of his bed, his grief and anguish punctuating his every rapid breath. "I can't…my God Matt."
Their fear and relief was raw and unfiltered, the scent of adrenaline and thick in the cramped hospital room, then once the shock and joy wore off, Karen and Foggy succumbed to worry.
Matt rubbed at the oxygen cannula, fiddled with the edge of the bed sheets, nodded and answered questions the best he could. He didn't remember how he got out, or where Elektra was. Matt had no idea how he ended up at the church.
"What's going to happen next?" Foggy paced. "People have examined you; the staff will have to file a police report."
Karen started pacing at the foot of his bed, her movements in the opposite sync of Foggy's. "You can't lie your way out of this one, Matt. They probably have pictures…"
"Actually they don't." Jessica stood up from where she'd been sitting in the chair beside Matt, her pulse increasing with every minute. "I deleted all the scans and x-rays."
"You did what?" Foggy asked. "You just re-implicated yourself in this whole mess by destroying medical records –"
"With the help of the head nurse and attending on duty," Jessica retorted. "This hospital is owned by Danny Rand, an annoying mutual friend."
"What?" Karen asked. "That doesn't matter. How did they –"
"Because they're smart and they suspected who they were treating based on the scars and the fact I was the one who brought Matt into the ER."
"So, you and a few of the hospital staff conspired to cover Matt's admission?"Karen asked incredulous.
"Which could get their license revoked," Foggy added. "No matter how rich their boss is." He ran his hands through his hair.
"Yeah, it could, but the people who work the ER; they've seen the worst in society. Victims of robbery, domestic abuse, or a good old fashion mugging, some leave here with invisible injuries that will never heal. So, maybe they wanted to help the guy who has prevented countless murders and assault," Jessica growled. "You may not respect what Matt does when he puts on that stupid devil mask, but a hell of a lot of other people do. It's the life he's chosen, and you know what? He's really fucking good at it." She folded her arms. "And if you guys can't value his choice, then maybe you're the ones who need to reevaluate things."
"We care about Matt, and we don't want to see him end up in the hospital again," Karen said her voice warbling. "Or worse."
"If you care, then maybe try supporting him more."
Matt raised his eyebrows at Jessica's continued defense of him, too taken aback to join in the conversation.
"I think maybe we should leave," Foggy said. He turned toward Matt and touched his arm. "I am really glad you're alive."
"I know." Matt's voice sounded like grit. "Thank you."
"Do you know when you're being released?" Karen asked.
"I don't know, hopefully soon." Matt would do everything in his power to make it tomorrow.
Karen hugged herself. "Feel better."
Matt listened to them walk away and turned is head toward Jessica as she sat in the plastic chair again. "That was…" he licked his lips, searching for the right words.
"Don't get all sentimental on me." Jessica pushed down the railing and rested her boots on the edge of the bed. "They needed a good dose of truth."
"And what if they're right?" Matt swallowed. "I haven't exactly made the best decisions of late."
"Who the hell do you know who hasn't made poor life choices?" Jessica scoffed. "Get in line, counselor."
Jessica kept her feet propped-up and leaned back in her chair. Her phone made clicking sounds as she played with it.
"I think it's against the rules to have a cell phone in here."
"I'll add it to the list of misdemeanors I've committed today."
Matt let out a chuckle, then closed his eyes and focused on lub-dub beat he'd memorized, allowing it to help him tune-out everything else around him.
It'd been two weeks since Midland Circle, since the destruction of countless lives and meeting three very different people…"I'm glad you found others." He couldn't believe how much he missed Stick.
Matt walked down the hallway of the old building with his cane, counting the number of apartments he passed until he reached the last one. He knocked on the door.
Jessica opened it and stood there, sounding displeased based on her annoyed grunt. "You're late."
"I'm sorry, I got hung-up with –"
"Save it, you've got five minutes before I have to go on a stake-out."
Matt followed her inside and took a seat across from her desk. He adjusted his glasses before playing with the handle of his cane, waiting.
Jessica tossed several folders onto the floor and dumped an empty bottle of bourbon in the thrash. "What do you need?"
"I want to hire you."
"So, you said on the phone. What's the case?"
He took a deep breath, his ribcage expanding with very little pain. "I need you to investigate Sister Maggie." Matt could tell she was staring.
"The nun who held you hostage?"
"She did take care of me," Matt added.
"Uh-huh."
"She also claimed that she was…" he struggled for the words, working his jaw. "That she was my mother." It hurt to say the words, the implications ripping open old wounds.
"Is there any part of your life that doesn't sound like a soap-opera?"
"I also need to go back and retrieve my suit."
Jessica sat back in her chair, her voice softening. "Are you going to start wearing it again?"
He'd thought the choice was going to hard to make, but it had only taken Matt a few minutes to reach the decision. "Like you said, it's what I'm good at."
The muscles in Jessica's face stretched slowly into a smile. "Yeah, it is." Then she grabbed a pen and started scribbled something on a notepad. "All right, I'll start tomorrow. But you do realize you could ninja your way in and out before anyone noticed?"
"I've leapt into things without thinking before. This time I want to be prepared."
"Thinking things out first sounds like sane advice."
"Yeah, well, I've recently learned that sometimes it's better to ask for help."
"Yeah, okay, I've reached my limit for sap for today." Jessica stood up and grabbed her bag. "And what are you going to do in the meantime?"
"Foggy called me the other day; he wants me to meet him for lunch."
"For more lectures?"
He rose to his feet as Jessica came around the desk to stand next to him, her leather jacket wrinkling with the movement "Not this time." Matt shrugged. Foggy had sounded conciliatory. "He and Karen are the only people I have left."
Jessica folded her arms, sighing under her breath. "If you think that's true, than those freaky skills of observation need a lot of improvement."
Matt quirked an eyebrow and Jessica offered her arm. He wrapped a hand around her bicep and they started walking out of her office. "I think you're getting soft on me."
"I'm going to guide you in front of a bus."
He couldn't help the smile that escaped his lips. For the first time in almost two years, Matt felt at ease with what he needed to do protect his city, and that he didn't carry have to carry that burden all alone.
fini-