Matthew Murdock was likely one of the most observant blind men in the world. Perhaps not the most, if a certain asshole from his past was still alive, but definitely way up there. However, it didn't take a guy with preternaturally enhanced senses to tell that the street performer on the side of the road was a minor. Sure, no other blind man would have even noticed the girl was there, but everyone with light registering eyes could tell. To them, it was the fact that she was thin and still growing, that her face held a youthfulness that was absent in adults. Perhaps they could just feel, instinctively, that she was not eighteen.
To Matt, it was her heartbeat that first exposed her. Too fast to be an adult's, but slow enough that he could assume she was used to exercise. Then it was, as creepy as he realized it sounded, her scent. Even from several yards away he could smell the indescribable youth that clung to her, mixing with the scent of herbal teas and dust that hung close around her skin.
But what alarmed him, besides the fact that there was a minor performing what seemed to be a mix between dance and contortion in the streets alone, was the temperature he could feel coming off of her skin when he focused on her. It wasn't normal, it was hovering right around ninety degrees— at least seven degrees lower than it should have been. How the hell was the girl even conscious? Ninety-five degrees was the temperature indicative of hypothermia, and since it was the beginning of summer in New York it was unlikely that she was freezing from her spot dancing in the sun. In fact, in complete opposition of the human biology, she seemed to be the absolute poster girl for health at the moment.
"Matt?" The concerned voice of the blind man's best friend, Foggy, drifted over to him through the slight bustle of the morning around them. "You've been looking towards that girl for the past minute. Something up?" Something seemed to occur to the other lawyer then, causing him to step closer to his blind friend and whisper; "does it have to do with double D?"
"What? No," Matt whispered back, eyebrows furrowed and visible over his round glasses. "There's something weird about her. And if she's out here, she probably could use some money."
"So could we," Foggy reminded him, mouth turned down at the corner like it did whenever he thought about their firm's money issues. But, as Matt predicted, the fact that the girl was clearly only a teenager softened the guy. "What do you wanna do about it? She's probably running from CPS if she's out here alone. The moment she sees that we're lawyers, she's gonna book it."
"Maybe," Matt agreed, tilting his head slightly in thought. "How about you go ahead to meet our client? She's less likely to run if the lawyer talking to her is blind."
Foggy let out a long suffering sigh, rubbing his forehead in exasperation. Whenever Matthew Murdock got the scent— literal or figurative, take your pick— of someone in need, Foggy knew he was impossible to stop when it came to helping them.
"Fine," the blond finally agreed reluctantly. "But don't bring her back to the office. Give her some classic Murdock advice, maybe some money, inspirational one-liners maybe. But we can't take in a stray, Matt. We barely have enough resources to take care of ourselves right now."
The smirk on Matt's lips was not reassuring. "Yeah, Foggy. Don't worry about it, I'll just talk to her for a minute and see if I can help her at all. I swear, I won't bring her back to the office."
Foggy shook his head, deciding that was probably the best he could hope for and took off towards their newest client's house. Matt stood there for a moment, listening to the slightly staticky music coming from the cheap battery-run speaker that the girl had playing until the song ended. He took the lull in performance to walk over, getting the girl's attention when she straightened up from collecting the money that had been dropped in the bowl she had set up. He could instantly feel how her muscles tensed upon seeing him, probably from the suit he wore. But she didn't instantly flee, which meant she had picked up on his blindness and decided to give him the benefit of the doubt.
"Hello mister," her cautious voice floated out to him. It was smooth and slightly dark, like an auditory version of brown sugar sprinkled with innocence. "You lookin— eh, trying to find me for something?"
Matt chuckled softly at her fumble, not at all offended. "Not really. I'm not from CPS, if that's what you're asking," her muscles instantly relaxed a bit, and Matt caught a sigh of relief come from her lips. His own inched up into a smirk. "I take it my friend was right, then? I'm Matt. A defense attorney. But I really just wanna help people, and you seem like you need a little help."
She was, justifiably, a bit suspicious and distrusting. Matt distantly registered that she was a mouth breather, though it wasn't noticeable and surprisingly wasn't annoying either. Her breaths were still soft, more quiet than most despite not going through her nose.
"Yeah, that doesn't sound creepy at all Mister," She drawled sarcastically, her body straightening to telegraph confidence. "You got ten bucks? It'll buy me food for the week."
How somebody could buy a week's worth of food with ten bucks escaped him, but he figured she was resourceful enough to find a way. Especially if she was homeless like he suspected. Homeless people were extremely resourceful, more so than people gave them credit for. Matt knew he shouldn't push his luck, he didn't want to come off as a predator. A young girl like her probably had to deal with more than her fair share of that sort. No, he decided, he couldn't help her very much as Matt Murdock yet. But he'd keep an ear out for her when he was out at night, Daredevil was better equipped to help her out anyway.
"If you come back to this spot sometime next week, I'll give you another ten," he said instead as he pulled out his wallet and took out what he was pretty sure was the right bill. She didn't correct him when she took it and her heartbeat didn't change, so he figured it was right. "Just to make sure you're safe. And if you ever need legal help, or really any help at all though I really hope a teenager like you won't," he handed her one of his business cards too. "You can always call us. Doesn't even have to be me. My partner Foggy or our Secretary Karen will also be happy to help you. Even if all you need is a quiet place to sit for a bit and a free cup of coffee."
"Coffee is very tempting, no matter how many times I'm told it'll stunt my growth," she slowly replied, still sounding cautious. The fact that she took the card at all made him feel a bit better though, so he decided not to push his luck too far and nodded a friendly goodbye before turning to head the same way Foggy had went a few minutes earlier.
He could feel the girl's eyes follow him until he was out of sight.
—*—*—*—*—*
I watched the red headed lawyer until he turned a corner down the street, the business card he gave me heavy in my hands along with the five dollar bill he had accidentally given me. Perhaps I would have corrected him if it had been bigger than a ten, but my dancing had gotten me a pretty good amount of tips so I figured it wasn't a big deal if he gave me less than he thought he was. I could milk a lot out of five bucks, after all. It helped that my metabolism was currently far slower than a normal human's, allowing me to survive on a lot less than most. As long as I was careful to avoid empty calories, I'd be fine.
Deciding I had loitered long enough, I picked up my cheap speaker and dumped the money I had gotten into my bra. I had specifically worn a size bigger than I needed to keep it from looking weird when it was stuffed haphazardly with cash. With that done, I left the cash bowl on the ground and ducked into a familiar alley.
It didn't take long for me to get to the secluded dead-end alley that I made into my makeshift home. A complicated system of ropes hung down from the slightly unstable fire escape on the side of one building, holding up my large hammock that I used to stay away from the worst of the rats and roaches on the disgusting New York ground. I might be homeless, but I liked my hygiene. Plus, my various genetic abnormalities occasionally got out of hand. Unlike most mutants or mutates, my abilities getting out of hand didn't mean any kind of mental overload or possible public destruction most of the time. The less chance my instincts had to try to devour a New York rat raw, the better in my opinion. My abilities were odd enough to malfunction that way.
Making sure I hadn't been followed, though I had kept a careful eye on that the whole way home, I climbed into my dusty hammock and emptied out my money from my first location of the day. Reaching for the ropes that held my hammock up, I carefully pulled myself up the slightly fraying tendrils so I could grab the box carefully attached to the underside of the fire escape landing above my hammock where nobody could easily see it. Settling back down on my cheap cotton home, I gently pulled the lid off the metal box. I took out the orange, paper towel filled with blueberries, and small satchet of herbs for tea before placing my newly earned money in the newly emptied spot. I kept the five dollar bill the lawyer had given me, planning on using it for some hot water and maybe protein. Beans were most likely, but maybe I'd get lucky and be able to have meat.
Putting away the thirty-six dollars I was saving back in the tin, I climbed back up the ropes and secured it back into the blind spot taped under the fire escape. By the time I was done taking my sweet time eating my meager meal of fruit, it was one in the afternoon. I sat on my cheap cotton makeshift hammock, tilting my head back and closing my eyes to just listen to the city around me.
It was hard. My hearing wasn't the best. I wasn't deaf, but some hearing aids would probably help me out a ton. Then again, my eyesight was also pretty poor and I could also benefit from decent glasses. But, I was homeless. And therefore, dirt poor. There was no way in hell I'd be able to afford either of those things, but…
Part of me didn't want any, anyway. I didn't mind a slightly blurry sight. And having bad hearing meant that I wasn't constantly overwhelmed by the noise of New York. I had other things to make up for it, anyway. I didn't need perfect hearing or sight.
Regardless, it was nice to sit back and try to listen to as much as I could hear when I got a quiet moment to do so. Right then, on my slightly swaying home, I could hear the muted bustle of countless conversations, countless voices. I could hear the rumble of vehicles and the occasional bark of a particularly close car horn. I couldn't discern any single sound from one another, but they blended together in a way that was beautiful in its own way. A new sound, a symphony of the city. Every sound blurred together to make something new.
Yeah. Screw hearing aids, this was just fine.
I sat there for who knows how long, in a mostly meditative state as I listened to the slightly muted city. I could feel the heat of the sun farther along in the sky, which eventually told me that I had sat still for long enough. Basking was fun and all, but it was time to go back to performing to see if I could squeeze any more money out of the busy people in the city.
Pushing myself slowly out of my hammock, I sighed. People made me nervous, I didn't like being around too many at a time. I was a loner. But survival was survival, I'd bite the bullet for now. Maybe I could sneak onto a high school campus to get hot water, they had to have a microwave in the teacher's lounge. If I timed it right, I'd be fine. After all, I was supposed to be in school anyway.
Speaking of which, I needed to remind myself to be on the lookout for truant officers.
Wait. Hot water. Coffee was made with hot water.
Tugging a certain card out of my pocket, I smiled. A quick trip wouldn't hurt, would it? After all, I needed my daily tea.
—*—*—*—*—*
Okay. The trip to the law firm had been uneventful, nobody had been inside when I slipped in the small area and stole some hot water. Ironically, that had been the part of my day I had been most worried about. It was new. New people, new territory, unknown dangers.
But it was something I did every day that ended up screwing me over that night. I had just finished my last street performance of the night, my new twenty-two dollars in my bra as I slunk into the darkened alleyways just after midnight. My mouth was open, allowing me to navigate the nearly pitch-black areas with ease as I deciphered the information being processed by the sensors inside and around it. The scent of my dandelion and chamomile tea from earlier still hung heavy around me though, making me slightly more vulnerable that usual. My fault for making such an herbal blend that time around.
Because of that, I almost didn't notice the block of human heat around the corner only a few feet away from me once I had made my way through the inky alleyways for at least ten minutes. The shadows clung heavily around every wall, denying me the ability to see the person with my eyes. But I didn't need to. The pits hidden just under one layer of skin on my lips could easily sense his heat, could easily give me a mental image of his ninety-eight degree body standing with perfect stillness right around the building's bend.
I froze as well, identifying easily that the person— male, he smelled like a male— was likely not a friend. I opened my mouth a bit wider, allowing my tongue to slip closer to the edge of my lips to better catch his scent.
Beer. Dirt. Sweat. Leather— that scent was low, so probably just his boots. Metal. Gunpowder.
He was leaning against the wall. Taking as silent of a breath as possible to gather my wits, I carefully stepped over to the building he was hiding behind. Placing my hand on the grimy brick of the wall, I closed my eyes and focused.
There. I could feel his heartbeat vibrating, first through his own body and then through the brick. A steady thump, not nervous or afraid. Collected. Calm. Pulling my hand away, I felt my lips tug down into a frown. The only people who held loaded guns while hidden around the corner of a building past midnight without any hint of nerves was a professional. And even with Fisk behind bars, professionals weren't uncommon in New York or Hell's Kitchen. But they weren't common, either.
Walking home that late at night was one of the only routines I allowed myself. I never took the same path, but I went at the same time every day. I could take care of myself better than most adults. But this presented a problem; he was standing at the lip of the dead end that held my hammock.
I had been followed. Someone had tracked me, somehow, until they had found the paths I could not change up. Until they located my end point.
Fuck.
The threat to my territory, my territory! Forced an instinctual hiss from the back of my throat. Unfortunately, the alleys were silent enough for that sound to make its way to the hidden gunman, who wasted no time swinging himself out of his hiding place and opening fire.
Silencer. Muffled shots rang out, the heat of the bullets in the air offering me enough warning to just barely dodge their path. But more heat signatures, ones that must have been just barely out of my range, started dropping from rooftops or running down alleyways. There were only four new people total, but that was already a bit of a handful for me. They all had guns.
Abandoning my attempt at stealth, I threw myself towards the original attacker, throwing my arm out in what would have been a clothesline for anybody else, but instead of staying straight my arm coiled inhumanly around the man's throat, my torso twisting so my right knee could knock his gun out of his hand before he could fire. My ears were able to pick up his strangled gasps since his head was so close to my own, but I doubted anyone else would be able to hear them.
But. Well. After another moment of close listening, I realized I had misjudged my strength and had snapped his windpipe. I frowned, but unwound my arm to let the man drop—not before kicking his gun far down the alley of course— because he likely was in too much pain and struggling too much to breath to attack me again. Sure enough, he crumpled to the ground like a rag doll.
I wasn't allowed any time to collect myself though, two of the new assailants showing up at the same time with their guns aimed. Neither had any hesitation with shooting at me.
I dove to the ground, but their bullets followed. Unfortunately, the guy with the broken windpipe ended up in the crosshairs with at least three bullets in his chest that had been meant for me. The scent of his blood perfumed the already musty air.
That made me curse under my breath. I was by no means a stranger to death, but I had hoped to avoid seeing it or being around it again as much as possible. Add that to my list of failures.
I twisted and leapt and ducked around the bullets, but not even the split second forewarning I got from the bullet's heat signatures could just magically make me fast enough to dodge them all.
So when two bullets made twin grazes on my shoulders, a primal hiss ripped itself from my throat.
No. Shit. I haven't eaten any protein today, and my metabolism is already slowed as much as possible. This situation isn't helping— I can't let it come out!
I could feel the primal source of my abilities trying to claw its way up, not thinking that I was capable of survival on my own. It might have earned me another graze on my leg, but I still took the time to push it down as far as it could go.
My foot found the night vision goggles of one of the men, shattering it and sending shards into his eye. The shriek echoed across the alley, silenced by my kick to his temple right as the last two assailants turned the corner.
That wasn't good. I was better at ambush, at one-on-one or two-on-one battles. Being outnumbered wasn't something I was great at walking away from in good shape.
But I would survive. I had to. Apparently they had decided I was more risk to them alive than I was beneficial. Not surprising.
I was able to get close enough to wrap my leg around the barrel of one gun and my arm around another. Ignoring the discomfort and vulnerability of my current position strung between the two men, I constricted my limbs around the weapons, leaving crumpled barrels in my wake.
I dropped from my precarious position, instantly trading punches with the two men who had discarded their guns without a second thought.
One of them had passed out after I landed a particularly hard punch to his forehead, but when I whirled around to face my last two attackers I ended up frozen in shock.
Perhaps I should have recognized the lack of gunfire from the last man to join the fray, or the suspicious extra seconds I had had to knock out the guy I had just finished with without getting hit from behind, but I hadn't.
And I definitely hadn't expected to see Daredevil landing one final hit onto the guy that I had been about to finish off. Five bodies lay in the alley now, one dead and four unconscious. I was suddenly hyper aware of the fact that I had only taken down three of those men.
"You would have had a bullet in your stomach if I hadn't shown up in time," the Devil's rough voice barely made its way through the thick air to my weak ears. "It was a good idea to get rid of the guns, but doing it the way you did just left you way too open."
It sounded like a harsh scolding despite the hints of praise and relief that seemed to be sprinkled throughout.
"Yeah, I'll admit that fighting against more than two people at once isn't my strong suit," I admitted slowly, keeping my mouth open and my eyes locked on the vigilante. I didn't have the cleanest record in the world, especially for a fifteen year old, so I didn't know whether or not he was gonna rough me up next. "When did you even get here?"
The man's head tilted to the side, and I felt as if his eyebrows would be raised if they weren't hidden under his red mask.
"I didn't exactly try to keep my fighting quiet when I landed down here. Didn't you hear me?"
I flinched, grimacing. The way he raised his head back up showed that he noticed.
"You didn't hear me," he said it as a statement, which made me huff.
"I'm not deaf, if that's what you're trying to ask. But yeah, I'm not that far off from it either."
He was silent for a moment. "So not only are you a teenager capable of taking several armed men down," he poked the guy he had just knocked out with his toe for emphasis, "but you're hard of hearing, too?"
I just stared at him for the moment, slowly backing up. This was already too much excitement for me for one night, I didn't need to be interrogated by the Devil of Hell's kitchen, even if it was a relatively peaceful interrogation.
"Look, we've obviously established the fact that I'm not normal. Good. Awesome. Now, I'm gonna pack up my stuff and move to a new alley and you're going to go punch up more bad guys. Alright? Sounds like a plan to me," I turned and walked straight to my hammock, hoping he'd take my hint and leave. I didn't need any extra craziness in my life, it was hard enough for me to get by as it was.
I had just finished climbing my hammock ropes to grab my cash box and landing back on the ground when I felt his hand on my shoulder. Of course I hadn't heard him come up behind me, damn jerk had probably taken the new information about my hearing into account when he decided to sneak up on me.
But when I instinctively turned to ram my metal cash box into his face, his hand was quick to catch me by the wrist. That contact was enough for me to figure out what was going on, and I growled lowly in irritation.
"What? Don't just sneak up on me like that!"
"Maybe you should be more aware of your surroundings," he retorted, letting go of me and letting me finish packing up my meager belongings. "You need to get off the streets. I can't let you just go to another alley, these guys are organized, dangerous. Their group has recently taken over more of Fisk's leftovers, they'll find you no matter what alleyway you hide away in."
I turned around, taking a deep breath in preparation to give him a serious tongue lashing. But the rain of sarcasm and sass never came, because in that instant his scent filed my mouth.
"Holy shit," I whispered, looking up at him with wide eyes. I had smelled that very scent twice already— once when it approached me in the middle of the day, and again when I entered the office saturated in it. "You're that lawyer— the blind— oh my god," I whispered in a rush, unable to control my word vomit. I did, however, notice the man's muscles suddenly tense and I took a corresponding step backwards.
"How did you find out?" The man's rough whisper barely made its way to my ears, and I quickly forced my breathing so calm down so it wasn't muffling his voice. "C'mon, if it's that easy for you to pick it up, I need to know!"
"N-no, nobody else would be able to figure it out the way I did," I whispered back, flicking my eyes to the mouth of the alley where the passed out gunmen lay. I wasn't too worried though, even if they woke up we were speaking too lowly for them to hear. Probably. "I— Okay, this will sound really weird and I can't totally guarantee nobody else can tell this way, but it's super unlikely," I rambled, but he was patiently waiting for me to get to the point, arms crossing over his chest. "Uh, well," I cleared my throat. "It's, Uh, your scent."
"My scent," he said again, not necessarily sounding confused, but rather very caught off guard. His arms loosened and dropped back to his side. "Your sense of smell is heightened?"
I felt myself instantly straighten when he got it right on the first try, blinking a few times in surprise before I nodded— and then remembered he was blind, and confirmed it out loud; "Yeah. It… it works oddly with me though. I can only smell when my mouth is open."
"Well, that is weird," he confirmed, his mouth slightly tipping up into a smirk for a split second before disappearing. "Look, it really isn't safe for you here. We can talk more about this once I get you somewhere more secure."
I felt myself instantly lock up, my jaw dropping instead of clenching like most people's would when they were stressed— the better to sense my surroundings. "Look," I said slowly, then winced at my wording before continuing forward stubbornly. "I'm used to running. I'm used to fighting—"
"But you shouldn't be," he cut me off gently, frowning. "I understand you being cautious when you thought I was just some random guy being suspiciously kind to you. But now that you know I'm not a pedophile or anything—"
"Technically speaking I still don't know that for sure, but continue."
After what I figured was a glare (it was hard to tell with the mask), he continued. "—You know I won't hurt you. I won't. You're not a criminal, and you need someone to help you. I just helped you fight off five guys with guns. Just… trust me a little bit?"
I glared down at my ratty tennis shoes, frowning in thought for a long moment. I didn't do very well with trust. But he wasn't affiliated with organized crime, his firm took down Fisk. And he took down Fisk in his costume. As Daredevil. Who was offering to help me. Daredevil wanted to help me. And he was a lawyer by day, so he might be able to keep CPS off my back for a little while. And… and there was probably not very many people more well qualified to keep me safe than he was. At least, nobody else that would actually waste their time with a street rat like me.
"And I can identify people by scent too."
I jumped at his voice suddenly cutting through my thoughts, and stared at him in shock that I could feel resounding through my very bones when his words sank in. "Huh?" I squeaked lamely. He shrugged.
"Y'know, just thought you'd feel a little more comfortable if I shared another secret of mine."
I couldn't help but shake my head, not quite understanding why he was going through all this effort. But he was. Nobody had ever put that much effort into making me feel comfortable before, into legitimately and honestly trying to gain my trust.
But still. I didn't survive to age fifteen by trusting strangers on a whim.
So I reached forward, ignoring the stiffening of his muscles as I gently laid my hand on the center of his chest. I tuned into the vibrations of his heart, nearly overwhelming with my proximity to their origin. But that was good. The more easily I could tune into it, the easier I could pick up on fluctuations.
"You don't plan on hurting me, or turning me in to CPS or anyone else?" I asked softly, eyes closing to better focus in to his heartbeat.
"No," he answered immediately. His heartbeat stayed steady.
"You just want to keep me safe?"
"That's the plan."
Not a single fluctuation.
I slowly peeled my palm away from his suit, sighing and running a hand through my hair. "Yeah, okay then. Thanks for not lying, now let's go before the goons wake up."
Maybe this was a good thing. Maybe this was a very good thing, because my most vulnerable week of the month was coming up in just two days. And no, I did not mean my period.
—*—*—*—*—*
Matt didn't have very many instances where he felt caught off guard. But when he was, it was usually because of some criminal or another. Not from the realization that a fifteen year old had just tuned in to his heartbeat to see if he was lying, just like he did on a near daily basis. It clearly wasn't through her hearing, obviously, but it was still the same tactic.
He just stood there, keeping track as the girl bundled her dusty makeshift hammock into a ball with her cash box in the center, holding the whole lump under one armpit.
"Do you usually channel your inner polygraph?" He decided to ask, one eyebrow raised under his mask despite the fact that he was actually pretty pleased by the realization. He couldn't help but wonder how similar her senses were to his, obviously there had to be differences if she could see and was fairly hard of hearing, but the thought of finding someone other than a certain asshole geezer that could somewhat relate to the way he observed the world made him very nearly giddy.
His comment earned a snort from the girl, and he could sense the muscles in her face move in a way that suggested she was smiling or smirking.
"Only when I need to, it's hard to do it all the time. I'll explain when we get to wherever you're taking me."
He nodded, accepting that answer as she fell in step slight behind him, Matt leading her out of the alleyway just as sirens could be heard heading in their direction. This made Matt glad that he didn't have to be facing the girl to be able to observe her, and he focused in on what he could sense of her to try to gauge just how bad her hearing was.
The sirens were nearly deafening to the masked man before the girl tensed and sped up to walk by his side. "You called the cops?" She hissed, sounding panicked. He put a hand on her shoulder.
"I wasn't going to let those guys get off easy, they need to be picked up. Maybe they can do us a favor and stay locked up. If you're that worried, we can always take the rooftops. The cops won't see us up there."
He carefully refrained mentioning the corpse that he couldn't just let rot. He knew it hadn't been her fault, and he didn't want to remind her of that guy just yet.
The girl stayed silent for a moment, then nodded.
"Rooftops sound good. I like heights anyway."
Matt felt himself smile, and his chuckle was just loud enough for the girl to hear. It didn't take long for the two to make their way up a fire escape and keep to the rooftops.
"Watch your step, it's easy to lose balance here," the vigilante warned her about one particularly wide jump as softly as he could while still being heard by her, earning a short snort from her.
"Don't worry about me, Double D. My balance is perfect," she gloated quietly right before taking— and perfectly sticking the landing to— the jump. Matt just shook his head with a small grin, and they ended up in his living room only ten minutes later.
"So, this is your safe place, huh?" The girl commented idly, walking around and getting a good look at the apartment. "So, who lives here? Or is this just a safe house of yours?"
"Oh, this is my apartment," he said casually after he closed and locked the window they came in through. He pointedly ignored how quickly the girl turned to him, or how her heartbeat picked up briefly in shock. "I figured this was the safest place for you to be," he explained as he peeled off his mask. Normally he wouldn't end his patrol for another two or three hours, but the girl was more important for the moment. "Come on, I'll help you bandage up those grazes of yours. And don't try to lie just because you know I'm blind now, I can smell the blood."
He heard her curse softly under her breath, which made him grin as he fished out the constantly re-stocked first aid kit. "Anyway, I know you went to our office and hung around the coffee maker for some reason, so you probably already know, but I'm Matthew Murdock. You can just call me Matt."
The girl nodded, and Matt could feel her gaze on him as he started to clean and bandage her wound. Her lack of reaction to the sting of the antiseptic made him frown— in fact, her lack of reaction to bullet grazes in general was concerning.
"I have to be in the right mood for coffee," The girl's voice was tentative, as if she was just trying to test out the waters. Now that the adrenaline had had time to wear off, she was awkward. Obviously she wasn't used to casually being around other people, which was also concerning. "But I like tea a lot. Which, Uh, you probably know. Even after being shot at you can still smell the tea on me," Matt had to laugh at that a little, because it was true.
And wow, it was a little surreal to be able to talk about something like that with someone who understood. For both of them.
"So you used the coffee maker to heat water for your tea?" He asked as he switched from one of her shoulders to bandage the other. She hummed and nodded in confirmation. "You know, dandelions are loaded with pesticides."
The girl laughed, a lot more freely than she had up until then. "Pesticides? You really think that's high up on my list of worries?" She asked with a large smile he could tell was on her face. "I'm homeless, I'm a hormonal teenager, and I'm being chased down by guys with guns and you think I'm worried about pesticides in my tea? But no, I stole the dandelions from an organic rooftop garden."
"Stole?" he asked, raising an eyebrow, but was just rewarded with a shrug that almost ruined his current wrapping on her shoulder.
"I'm homeless. Can't really avoid stealing sometimes. Besides, I make sure to only take what I need and not a single flower more. At least I don't pickpocket or anything."
"Okay, I'll give you that."
It wasn't until he was disinfecting the last bullet graze on her leg that he realized something rather important.
"Oh," he raised his head so he could look in the direction of her face. "I just realized I don't know your name."
The girl chuckled. "I was wondering when you'd ask. I'm Hebi. Hebi Teal."
"Teal? Like the color?"
"Yep."
"Well then," Matt finished wrapping up her leg. "Don't think we're not going to talk about your homelessness, Hebi. I meant it when I said I want to help you. That means getting you off the streets for more than just a night or two."
—*—*—*—*—*
A/N: Hello! This is not going to be directly related to the events in the TV series past the first season. Because I like Nelson & Murdock and stuff. The best avocados at law. This is going to probably have a weird mixture of TV, Comics, and MCU canon in it. Because I can't do things simply, apparently. Everything has to be complicated as shit.
So yeah, this is self indulgent as hell and probably isn't the best, but I hope you like it anyway! I have no idea where this is going but maybe we'll all get lucky and it will turn out good.
See you next chapter~
