A/N: I'll have the next part out tomorrow. I'm re-working the last section because I'm not quite happy with the way it ends yet. Enjoy this one, though. Again, thanks for the response to this story. I don't necessarily reply to the reviews - I'm currently in the middle of exams and it's getting busy at work - but I promise, I read them all. They give me a warm-fuzzy feeling, as I'm sure everyone who has ever posted something knows well. Now, enjoy:

Part 3: Forward Bound

Matt's careful examination of the rest of Foggy's body had revealed that Foggy had a nasty compound fracture of his left lower leg where it had slammed against the side of the car, and three ribs were fractured and two more badly bruised from the seatbelt and car door.

The rest of him was one big bruise, but that he could live with. What was scaring Matt the most at the present moment was that Foggy kept fading in and out of consciousness. Matt wasn't sure if it was because of the pain or something worse. He hadn't expressed any signs of nausea, but Matt knew from experience that was probably only temporary with such a head injury, and he was displaying other familiar signs of a concussion. Matt had no way to tell how bad it was, but it definitely wasn't a little one.

Matt felt his watch. They'd left the campsite just after dinner, which had started at six. Dinner had lasted maybe an hour. Matt wasn't totally sure. They'd driven for at least an hour before Foggy had said they were lost, which meant the accident had most likely occurred between eight and eight thirty. It was now almost a quarter-past nine. Had they really been out here for almost an hour? Time felt like it was both leaping like the jackrabbit and inching like the turtle.

But that was beside the point; Matt dragged his thoughts back. It was getting harder and harder to stay focused as his body ran out of endorphins. His limbs were getting heavy and he wanted nothing more than to close his eyes and sleep, but he ordered himself to keep his eyes wide open. Even if the view never changed, if he closed them, he would be one step closer to going to sleep, and that meant one step closer to not getting them out of there.

Matt shook his head and was rewarded with another stab of pain from his neck and cheekbone. The cut above his eye reopened and started bleeding anew. He used the pain to center himself back on his goal.

"Foggy?"

"'M awake," Foggy mumbled.

"Good, because we need to get out of here."

"Duhhhh," Foggy drawled sleepily.

"The way I see it—"

"How does the blind guy see it?" Foggy asked, suddenly sounding wide-awake. Matt felt a twinge of annoyance at the interruption, but continued without acknowledging his partner.

"We have two options. I can leave you and follow the road until I come to an emergency phone or a house or ranger station or something—"

"You think there are Power Rangers around? My little sister loves them! Think they'd give me an autograph? Can they autograph your face? My sister would love to have your face, especially if it's signed by the Power Rangers," Foggy interrupted again.

"Foggy, focus. Can you do that for me?" Matt's head pounded in time to his thumping heart, and his arm throbbed between each beat. It was becoming more difficult to be patient. Matt was relieved when he sensed Foggy's nod, and then felt a stab of shame when Foggy hissed in pain from the motion.

He continued. "Or I can drive us both to the nearest access of civilization."

Even in his confused state, Foggy's heart sped up at Matt's words. "Matt, can you see me?"

"No more than I ever could," he answered honestly.

"Then how are you gonna drive? A blind man driving! That sounds like the name of a horror film. Could you write the script? I'd act in it. I bet I could play the blind man really convincingly. Better than you, 'cause you've got superpowers. No one'd believe you were blind."

Matt couldn't help himself. He raised his eyebrow. "Fog, I am blind."

"Then why do you want to drive?" Foggy asked, completely seriously.

Had Matt's body felt less like a major-league baseball bat after the World Series, he would have put his head in his hands in exasperation. This was getting them nowhere closer to getting out of here. Both of them needed medical attention, fast, Foggy especially. "Look Foggy, I don't want to drive, I need to drive."

"What about you go look for the Power Rangers?"

It took Matt a second to remember to what Foggy was referring. "I don't want to leave you alone."

"I'm okay. See? You should go find the Rangers."

Matt cocked his head and listened to Foggy again. His breathing had evened, but it was still too shallow, likely because of the broken ribs. His heart was beating faster than Matt would have liked, but that wasn't what was worrying Matt. For the first time, Matt realized how cold Foggy had become, and how much the man was sweating. He reached out and touched Foggy's hand. It was clammy. Foggy was talking more, but he was making less sense. He was going into shock.

"Shit. Foggy, there's no more time. I need to get you out of the car." Matt didn't wait for Foggy to respond before reaching behind his partner's back. "Move with me, please, Foggy."

"Huh? What?" Foggy didn't make any motion to help Matt. "I've just gotten comfortable. Things don't hurt much anymore."

Matt nodded, ignoring the resulting pain. "One more reason to move. Pain is good. Pain means you're alive. You don't want to die. Now prove to yourself you're alive." Matt didn't want to think about the consequences of Foggy not moving. He couldn't lift Foggy out with only one hand, and the thought of using his right arm for anything involving moving was out of the question. The two pieces of his ulna were rubbing together in such a way that had he not been "ninja trained" (Foggy's words, not Matt's) to fight through the pain, he probably would have been curled in a fetal position at this point. His ribs didn't even hurt any more in comparison to his arm.

"I'm alive already. I'm speaking to you, counselor. Bad opening argument. Filled with fallacies. Professor Callin would be ashamed," Foggy's words were beginning to slur. Matt could tell he was going to go unconscious again, and this time, he'd likely go into shock before Matt could wake him up.

"I know. But please, do me a favor and get out of the car. You can lean on me, I promise. Please?" The night's activity had weakened Matt's control. Tears of frustration and fear were threatening to burst free. He could fight fifty men and jump off a skyscraper without feeling anything more than an adrenaline rush, but now the Devil of Hell's Kitchen, the Daredevil, the Man Without Fear was filled with terror. He had to work to push it down.

"Please, Fog. Please do what I need," he whispered. It was the best he could do for now.

Matt's control broke and his eyes were wet in relief when he sensed Foggy shift his weight toward Matt and out of the car. "Here, I got you."

Foggy screamed in agony as Matt helped him stand. Had Matt not been there, supporting most of his weight, Foggy would definitely have collapsed in a dead faint. As it was, his respiratory and heart rate skyrocketed, and Matt could hear every broken bones shift in unnatural ways and his other damaged bones creak like an old staircase. It was a terrible cacophony of sound that almost made Matt vomit. The amount of guilt he felt for putting his best friend through such torture was enough to crush him. He felt like he was suffocating. His only lifeline was the knowledge that he had to help his partner into the passenger seat.

"Breathe, Foggy. Are you ready? We're going to move," Matt asked. Foggy didn't respond, but Matt didn't have time to wait for him. He looped Foggy's left arm over his shoulder and Foggy all but fell against him. He was quickly losing consciousness.

"Lean against the car and swing yourself forward, okay?"

Foggy groaned deep in his chest, but followed Matt's directions. As they slowly made their way around the car, Matt talked continuously.

"I know it hurts, counselor, but the trick is to focus on your other senses. Breathe in as deeply as you can—" Foggy's breathing hitched as he tried to do as Matt had suggested "—now do you smell that? What do you smell?" Foggy didn't respond, so Matt moved on.

"I smell dirt. Naturally fertilized dirt. I can't tell you what kind of animal did it, maybe a raccoon? Do raccoons live around here? I've never actually smelled a raccoon, I think. Movies always say that they go for dumpsters, so I suppose they would like the city. I can always smell a ton of garbage, I'm sure you can too. Or can you? I can't remember exactly what you can and cannot smell. I know I used to have the same sort of senses as you, but it's been so long, it's hard to recall what my limits were back then."

Matt couldn't describe how good it felt to finally reach the passenger door. He paused his monologue to position Foggy against the car and then quickly levered the other man into his former seat. Foggy's skin had gone colder and he was starting to shiver, but the temperature outside hadn't changed. He barely moaned as Matt gently guided his feet into the car, even though Matt had to touch the broken leg.

It was only after Matt got into the driver's seat that he found another flaw in his plan. Even with all the windows open, the car was an isolated box. It didn't completely deflect all of Matt's sensations, but it certainly limited them. Admittedly, Matt had never tried to drive, but he'd spent some effort once or twice trying to identify obstacles in front of the car in which he was riding. He knew that the sounds were always distorted when they came in through the windows, and the "images" were blurred as a result. It was like how Matt remembered looking at writing behind a jug of water—stretched to the point of being almost unidentifiable.

Matt wanted to give up. He wanted to put his head on the dashboard and go to sleep. Maybe then he'd wake up and find this was all just the result of a bad plate of claims or even a really hard knock on the head during some nightly patrol. But Matt knew that was the dream. He wouldn't wake up in his bed or sprawled on the concrete this time.

"Solutions, Matt. Think solutions," Matt muttered to himself.

"Have you finished the problem set, yet? I forgot… Why math?" Foggy drawled from the seat next to him. Matt ignored how muddled the words were and that he had no idea what Foggy was talking about. He had to concentrate.

It hit him all at once. The problem was that he couldn't "see" what was coming, because his ports of information were at his sides. He needed to make the information come from in front of him. He needed to get rid of the windshield.

This presented with another problem: how could he remove the windshield with only one good arm and without getting glass on Foggy or the driver's seat?

A groan escaped Matt's control when he realized it was going to hurt. A lot.

"Foggy, I'm about to do something stupid. If for some reason I pass out before it's done, I need you to wake me up, okay? Slap me, or press right here," he gestured to the middle of his forearm, where he could feel the two pieces of his ulna bone rubbing together. "It'll wake me up fast. Got it?"

Foggy nodded painfully, clearly struggling to remain lucid.

"Good. Here I go. You ready?" Matt took a deep, calming breath. He leaned forward and felt the windshield, looking for any weak spots. His fingers found the sizable crack that he'd heard when he first regained consciousness. It was a fault-line that began at the bottom corner of the glass and spidered almost to the middle of the pane. He could work with that.

Matt reached down and felt across the side of the seat. It didn't take long for his fingers to clasp around the position adjustment levers. To his immense relief, the levers were mechanical, not battery operated. He yanked at one of them, and pushed off from the dashboard to give himself the most room. The back of the seat dropped out from under him, making his head spin at the sudden change. His cheek, which he'd all but forgotten about, began to throb again in vengeance. He grasped the other lever and repeated the movement, this time rewarded by the whole seat rolling back. He pushed until the seat was as far away from the dashboard as possible. It wasn't that much room, but there was about a foot between the seat and the steering wheel. It would have to do.

He twisted around, ignoring the scream of protest from his ribs, neck and arm, and leaned over the top of the now almost parallel seat to reach for the backpack he knew he'd left on the passenger side. After an excruciating moment, he found the pack. He quickly unzipped the main pocket and pulled out the sweatshirt he'd stuffed in at the last minute. It was one of his favorites, but sacrifices had to be made.

He rolled one corner of it as best he could and grasped it in his good fist. He then held that up to his mouth and used his teeth to wrap the hanging edges around his wrist. It took a little coordination, which ended up straining his neck even more than the whiplash had, but his hand was finally protected.

Matt was about to stand in a modified power stance when Foggy spoke again.

"Car…drive?"

Matt's heart skipped a beat. His whole plan depended on the car actually starting! "Fuck," he swore. He couldn't help himself. He wasn't usually one to use curse words—his father had drilled into him the importance of keeping his mouth clean—but now was not the time. "Where are the keys?"

"Board?" Foggy replied faintly.

He relaxed his grip on the sweatshirt and shook his wrist until his hand was mostly free. Matt ran it along the dashboard and his thumb hit Foggy's keys where he'd tossed them after shoving the beach ball valve into this partner. Awkwardly, he felt for the rental car's start key. He recognized one of the keys as the key to their office because he had an identically patterned one on his keychain, but he wasn't sure which of the other two was to the car and which was to Foggy's apartment.

He made a guess and shoved one of them into the ignition. It went in with a little resistance, but not too much. Matt awkwardly turned it, his left hand folded over the steering column to reach. It took a heart-stopping moment and a couple of desperate twists, but then the car roared to life.

Matt released the breath he didn't know he'd been holding. He didn't dare turn off the car in case it didn't start again. He rewrapped his hand, his neck hurting more this time, but equally ignored.

He stood as tall as he could. His head pressed hard against the roof of the vehicle, and his front thigh was uncomfortably close to the underbelly of the dashboard, while his back leg was wedged between the middle console and the driver's seat, but he was as stable as he was going to get. Yet again, he ignored the protest of his neck muscles and the sharp twinges from his ribs.

Matt tensed his chest muscles, bore down into his legs (sort of), pulled his broken arm to his side, and jabbed directly at the weak point in the windshield while yanking his right fist back behind him to channel the rest of the force into his good left fist. He heard a crack as spiderwebs appeared along the point of impact, even as pain exploded behind his eyes from just about every injury, and for a second, the world spun on its axis. His legs threatened to buckle and he had to battle the urge to vomit once more.

"Not yet!" he growled at himself. He wasn't sure if he'd done it out loud or mentally, but all at once, he felt clammy warmth against his bracing thigh. It took precious moments to register that it was Foggy's hand. He focused his energy on just the comforting pressure of his best friend until the pain receded once more.

Then he did it again.

This time he was rewarded with the sound of glass raining down on fiberglass. While there was a hole in the pane in front of Matt, Foggy's side of the windshield had fractured but not broken. Just as he'd planned.

The air bags suddenly deployed. Matt was shoved backward into the seat and the air violently ripped from his lungs. Matt more felt than heard his previously just hairlined ribs pop under the impact. The pain was intolerable.

He forced air into his nose and out of his mouth, once, twice, three times, ignoring the horrible smell of talcum powder and grease from the air bags. Again, he felt Foggy's hand on his thigh. He focused on Foggy, making sure that the airbag hadn't caused any more damage. Foggy was lucky; it sounded like he'd been relaxed enough that the airbag had just been painful, not harmful.

He used his teeth to remove the sweatshirt that had protected his hand to some extent. Matt was pretty sure he'd bruised the knuckles, but at the moment, everything hurt too much for him to be able to tell. The pain gate wasn't allowing him to feel his left hand in comparison to the agony of the rest of his body.

Matt fought the desire to lean back once more. Matt didn't dare lie back into the reclined position of his seat. If he did, he was sure he'd never get back up. Instead, he slowly grasped the lever to move the seat forward and scooted his butt forward to drag it closer to the steering column. The he yanked at the other lever to have the seat back leap into place directly perpendicular. It wasn't comfortable, but it would work.

At that point, he did what he'd sometimes dreamed about doing, when his friends at school had started to learn. He felt around himself for the gearshift and yanked it two positions down, as he'd heard Foggy do when they'd started the trip. He assumed that meant that it was no longer in park and hoped it wasn't in reverse. He took as deep a breath as he could and readied himself to start. Foggy's voice stopped him.

"No. Wasn't...in park."

Matt paused and then returned the shift to where it was before. He was glad he hadn't pressed the gas yet. He wasn't sure what would have happened had he done that.

He returned his left hand to the steering wheel and pressed one of the pedals. He heard the gears lock.

"Break," Foggy murmured, unnecessarily.

"Right." Matt laughed. Suddenly his blunder was the funniest thing in the world. He couldn't help but giggle like a teenage girl at her first school dance. His ribs protested painfully, but Matt couldn't stop. Until Foggy slapped him, all-be-it weakly, on the only thing he could reach, which was unfortunately Matt's chest. Matt hissed in renewed pain, but nodded his thanks.

"So this is the gas?" He pressed it, and the car jerked forward and began to complete the turn Foggy had started when they'd collided with the animal.

"Straight!" Foggy wheezed. "Turn left!"

Matt startled and yanked the wheel to the left, twisting it frantically.

"Too hard! Stop!" The force of his words caused Foggy to start to cough.

Matt pushed down on the break pedal and the car slammed to a stop. "Crap!"

Between coughs that Matt could tell were causing Foggy's broken ribs to shift unnaturally, Foggy softly gasped. "Gentle…half-rotation…sensitive."

Matt nodded and gently pressed the gas while he turned the wheel. The car slowly straightened. Matt had to remind himself to breathe. He softly pumped the breaks in an attempt to mimic how he'd heard Foggy and cab drivers do it. The car rolled to a stop.

"Now what? We're not on the road, yet, right? We're on the shoulder, I think. The trees on that side 'look' closer to us." Matt gestured to his right. "Do I need to turn more to the left? Get back on the road?"

"Yeah," Foggy agreed. "Slow…"

"Got that." Matt bit his lip in concentration. He thought he'd broken that habit a long time ago, but it had resurfaced. Matt decided to let it go for now. He had bigger things to deal with. "Here we go."

Like last time, he eased the wheel to the left until he heard both front tires on the asphalt. Then he pressed the breaks. "More to the right, now?"

Foggy nodded, and Matt heard his hair rub against the faux-leather interior. "Straighten…forward."

"Got it." Matt did as Foggy had instructed, turning the wheel slowly until he heard both front tires rolling in parallel lines. Then he let the wheel roll in his fingers like he'd heard some taxi drivers do until it had unwound. Then he pressed the gas again. The car leapt forward.

"Sorry," Matt mumbled in response to Foggy's yelp of pain as his back thumped against the seat when Matt jammed on the break to slow the speed of the car. "This really isn't as easy as I'd always imagined it would be." Foggy didn't respond, and Matt broke his focus on the sounds of the forest and smells that he was using to keep straight to 'look' at his partner. His heart and shallow breathing told Matt that Foggy had lost his fight for consciousness.

Matt was completely alone.