A/N: Minor spoilers for the end of season 2 of the Netflix Daredevil series, but nothing much I think, this is just a hurt/comfort idea I had for Ed to meet Daredevil.
Chapter 12: Hellish night
Edeline strolled along the abandoned streets of nighttime Hell's Kitchen. It was only a few short blocks from the Tower right on the other side of the Theatre District – another shady neighborhood no one in their right mind would have wanted to walk alone in at night, especially if they were a girl, but such concerns weren't exactly applicable to the alchemist. She could take care of herself, thank you very much, despite what some of her superhero friends might have thought.
Steve was the worst of them, acting like an annoying and overprotective big brother she never asked for, despite the spectacular display of her capabilities when she subdued none other than Iron Man in like three minutes tops.
So what if she was unfamiliar with many things in this world? It's not like she hadn't had her fair share of unusual back home as the Fullmetal Alchemist… I deciphered the secret behind the Philosopher's Stone and fought a bunch of homunculi for Truth's sake! I can figure out a few oddities that might come my way! So in a fit of pent-up frustrations and with many threats aimed at F.R.I.D.A.Y. if it were to reveal her absence, the blonde had snuck out of the tower to explore the city a bit. Without "adult" supervision. Although you could hardly call Spider-Man an adult if you considered the fact that he was only a short three years older than her.
To be completely honest she had another motive too. Namely the fact that she was itching to get into some action. Ed could hear and see that the city always seemed to be in a constant state of uproar, police cars, ambulances and/or firetrucks constantly zooming around since there was always something going on. She wanted to help. Make a difference even if a small one.
The Avengers didn't concern themselves with such "trivial" tasks, they were only called in on larger scale threats, ones that involved massive alien attacks, where the stakes were usually all or nothing. Spidey, on the other hand, was always on the streets, handling small-time criminals, and the alchemist suspected he wasn't the only masked vigilante out there.
So she looked up which part of town was the most crime-stricken, and that's how she found herself east of the Hudson River in mid-Manhattan. Two would be muggers were already confined and taken care of, purses returned to their rightful owners, and the police notified about their whereabouts through an anonymous call from a public payphone, without much the use of alchemy (only for the confinement part) or even breaking a sweat. Piece of cake.
Edeline was just about to call it a night when movement caught her eye behind one of the dumpsters in the alley she had just passed. She warily approached, expecting maybe a passed out drunk or druggie, perhaps a homeless or two. She was certainly not prepared for a man covered head to toe in deep red getup – couldn't really call it spandex, more like a very close fitting leather light armor, except it definitely wasn't made out of leather, but something much more durable.
The mask he was wearing was definitely something else, covering only the top half of his face, adorned by two little devil's horns. If it weren't for the fact that the man was lying there passed out and clearly injured, she would have chuckled to herself. Finally a kindred spirit in the choices for designs!
She was relieved it wasn't that crackpot Deadpool she had met only a few days prior with Spider-Man, whom she had thought of when she first caught sight of the hue of the outfit, but the finer details quickly cleared that worry up. The merc with a mouth was undoubtedly someone she had no patience for at this moment. Now the only question was, who the hell was this?
Okay, not the only question. Ed quickly checked if the slumped figure was breathing or not, and much to her relief he was, even if it was a little shallow. She carefully placed him from his half-sitting posture to lying flat on his back on the pavement, then checked him over for injuries. A couple of fractured, possibly broken ribs and a head wound judging from his bloodied face and labored breathing was all that she could ascertain without removing his clothing or mask and waking him up.
As Ed reached for the mask the man's hand suddenly shot up from his side and stopped hers.
"Don't," he stated in a leveled voice, clearly trying not to let his pain show.
"Fucking vigilantes and their fucking secret identities…" Ed mumbled under her breath almost inaudibly, thinking the guy wouldn't hear her in his dazed state but he caught every word of it. "Look, I'm one of you and not from around here, so I don't have any reason to reveal it to anyone even if I did find out," she continued in a calmer tone after taking a big breath. "On the other hand that seems like a pretty nasty gash under the mask, judging from the amount of blood, maybe you even have a concussion, and I think you might have a few fractured ribs…" the alchemist ranted on with a sense of urgency. In the meanwhile, she was also trying to employ every bit of medical knowledge she had picked up from the Rockbell household and her own studies in human transmutation.
"I know they are fractured, but it's only a crack or two," the man winced as he placed his hand on his chest. How did he know for sure?
"In any case, you need a doctor," the blonde insisted although she could very well understand the aversion that was clearly showing with the grimace that now occupied his lower face. "Or not, but you still need a place to recuperate…" she was already thinking up possible reasons and excuses to smuggle him into the Avengers Tower.
"Just help me get to my apartment, it's only two blocks north from here," the masked vigilante grunted after a few beats. Unbeknownst to Ed, he had been listening to her heartbeat all this time to see whether she was lying or having ill intentions toward him but he could detect none, not even during that little speech regarding the mask. The girl was just frustrated and clearly worried.
As she helped him up with a disapproving shake of her head and they started slowly for the redbrick down the street, Daredevil tried to get a better read on his rescuer. She seems awfully young, teenager probably, how can she be "one of us"? What did she mean by that? Masked vigilante? Someone with… "special" powers? Despite her relatively small frame, she is supporting my weight quite easily, the way she carries herself speaks of rigorous training, but her footsteps aren't the same, her left foot catches the pavement with a heavier, almost a metallic thud…
Now that he thought about it consciously, he could hear with his hyper-sensitive senses the movement of every gear and bearing in her leg, and smell the motor-oil lubricating the mechanics. Artificial limb… also her right arm… He deducted. How did I miss this before? There was also something else about her… almost as if electric energy was coursing through her veins, unlike anything he had ever experienced about anyone else he had encountered before. Just what did she mean by not being from around here? The way she stressed it made the impression on Matt that she wasn't talking about New York, but maybe not even America or Planet Earth, but that seemed… just too crazy for the Devil of Hell's Kitchen to consider with his blood rushing in his ears because of that head wound the girl – I don't even know her name – was worried about. Yeah, a concussion was a definite possibility.
"This one right here," Matt breathed out with a pained huff when they reached his building. It seemed like an old factory or warehouse that was converted to loft apartments. Ed waited for him to fumble around for his keys without a word, keeping a lookout. She suspected this wasn't the way he usually returned after a night of… vigilance… but he was in no shape to make his access from the rooftop, and both of them knew it.
The journey up the stairs was painfully long, but fortunately, no neighbors stuck their heads out on the hallway to check on the commotion, not that they were very loud, but at 1 AM every out of place sound was ten times louder.
When they finally made it inside the apartment, Edeline helped the man to the couch to lie down.
"Do you have a first aid kit anywhere?" was the only thing the blonde asked.
"Top left cabinet in the kitchen," he replied in a resigned tone. Ed went over there, noting the broken drinking glass by the wall, instinctively wanting to fix it but thought better of it until some familiarity was built up with the man. She didn't want to alarm him with her abilities.
The man meanwhile was starting to have a strong sense of déjà vu to the time when Claire had found him in a similar situation. He had no other option but to let her care for him then, ultimately dragging her in a lot of danger just by association alone. He didn't want the same fate for this little girl, but what choice did he have. She did say she is one of us…
By this time the girl had made her way back to the couch and lowered herself on her knees by his side with the box containing the medical supplies.
"I really do need to take a look at that head wound," the alchemist stated in a flat voice.
Daredevil sighed, which made him wince because of the way his muscles pulled on his fractured ribs but let her take the mask off anyway.
Ed got the disinfectant and some gauze and began to clean the wound but quickly panicked when she saw that his eyes stared into nothing, clearly not focusing on her or anything else in the room.
"Don't worry about it, I'm blind," the man stated sensing her increased worry, guessing at the cause of it.
"Why do I get the sense that there is a but in there somewhere, because you are clearly able to navigate the world without too much trouble if you are out there beating up bad guys. Although looking at your state now maybe not," the blonde frowned at the injured man before her.
"Tonight was kind of shit," he admitted.
"No kidding," the alchemist snorted with dark humor. The head wound was cleaned out, wasn't as deep as she thought at first and placed a big bandage on it. "Do you feel nauseous or anything?"
"No," he answered curtly.
"Can't really ask if you are seeing double or not…" Ed continued hesitantly.
"Don't worry, I've had worse a couple of weeks ago and survived," Matt mentioned as if it were nothing.
"Do I want to know?" she quirked a brow.
"Shot in the head at point-blank range, the only thing stopping it was the mask," Daredevil revealed flatly. It was as if nothing could really faze him, or it didn't matter. He doesn't really have any regard for his own health… Ed deadpanned. Her inner Al added quickly: Sound like anyone you know?
"Really wishing I had studied medical alchemy…" the worry was evident in her voice. Concussions were actually worse if they came soon after another.
"Alchemy?" Matt turned his head slightly toward her, his interest piqued but he was also confused.
"You could say that's my ability. I would show you…" Ed hesitated. Would he be able to sense anything of the whole demonstration without his sight?
"Does it have anything to do with this electric current type of feeling I'm getting from you?" he inquired.
"I guess, although nobody ever felt anything different about me before," the alchemist perked up at the notion. Maybe he will be able to sense the transmutation after all… "There is a broken glass by the wall over there, I could fix it."
"Yeah, I dropped that weeks ago, but haven't had the time to clean it up…" Matt trailed off sensing that the girl had already gotten to her feet making her way over to the said spot. He could hear her clap then the whole electric current feeling that was only a low hum until now intensified tenfold. As she touched the glass shards, he could feel it pulsating through the room, illuminating everything in his weird sense of the world, everything felt sharper for a fraction of a second, then it died down. It was kind of amazing, he had to admit.
With the newly repaired glass, Ed trotted to the kitchen to pour some water in it and returned to the masked vigilante's side offering it to him. It was good as new he realized, not even the fracture tension present in the material where they should have been if it was just glued together or something. The whole structure of the glass seemed to have been remolded as if it was reheated and reformed in a glass forge.
"Thanks," he mumbled as he took a tentative sip. Ed took the glass from him when he was finished and placed it on the floor by her side, noticing the horned mask again.
Picking it up, she examined it more closely, running her fingers on the material, studying it. The alchemist had never encountered the material before, but she was sure it could have withstood a small caliber bullet even from close range. The man was really lucky it hadn't been pointed to his lower face though.
"I'm sure you know by now who I am," Matt commented darkly, being fully aware of what the girl was doing.
"Not at all, actually. Told you, not from around here. I do like the horns though," she finally let herself chuckle at the notion. Matt just grimaced at that.
"They like to call me the Devil of Hell's Kitchen, so I thought why not cater to their wishes," he remarked, still in that dark, sour mood.
"And what do you like to call yourself?" Ed inquired, already dreading the cheesy name he might have thought up if her other friends' names were anything to go by.
"Nothing. They have a few other names for me though, Daredevil just to mention one," Matt informed unemotionally.
"Well you can call me Ed… it's short for Edeline," she added quickly before he could question the decidedly non-feminine nature of her nickname.
"Matt," he breathed with a ghost of a smile. For some reason, he thought he could trust the alchemist with that piece of information.
"Well, Matt, we should really get you out of that suit to check on the ribs just to make sure. It can't be comfortable," Ed quipped nonchalantly, but she was a bit touched by the honesty. Even Spider-man hadn't trusted her yet with something like this, and she had known him way longer.
"There should be a pair of sweats on the bed in the room to your left," Matt told her, already trying to sit up and reach the back of the outfit, but grunted against the pain.
"Men and their fucking egos…" the blonde huffed at the stubborn action, not that she was one to talk, but in the past, she had other reason to not let anyone touch her. "I'll help just wait a sec," and she was already heading for the sliding door to retrieve the comfy piece of clothing.
Once she got back, they peeled the suit off carefully, and she helped the pants on. For a moment Matt wondered if this was appropriate with a teenaged girl, but he couldn't sense any kind of reaction from Ed at the sight of men's boxer briefs and his almost naked body. She was either in full caretaker mode or men had no effect on her in this sense.
Edeline carefully fingered the ribs where a massive bruise was already forming and was pleased to find that they really were only cracked. Still painful but at least no danger of punctured lungs or hemothorax if he didn't aggravate it.
Just as she sat back down on her heels, her phone went off, causing her jump startled.
"Fucking Steve and his constant worrying…" she muttered as she fished the cell phone out of her pocket and picked it up. "Yeah?"
"Where are you? It's past 2 AM!" Matt could hear an anxious male voice with his heightened senses on the other side of the line.
"With a friend. I'll be back later," Ed rolled her eyes as she stood up to walk over to the kitchen to at least have the semblance of privacy, although she suspected Matt could hear every word Steve said too, given the expression he was carrying just a second ago. Something mixed between mild amusement and disapproval. Why does everyone think I need a guardian?
"I'm going to kill Tony for letting you sneak out like that!" Steve seethed.
"For one, you are not my father, two, Tony had nothing to do with this," the blonde rubbed the side of her head already regretting picking the call up.
"F.R.I.D.A.Y. refused to track your phone or inform us that you are gone, so I'm pretty sure he had everything to do with it." Okay, maybe not regretting it. That option was way worse and if she didn't give any sign of life then sooner or later they would have persuaded the AI into cooperating despite the threats she had made to the computer's well-being. She had found the server room not too long ago and was intent on doing a little hardware damage if she was not left alone.
"No, that was my doing. Look, I have to go, but I'm fine and will be back later, so stop fucking worrying like I'm some helpless little girl. You know full well I can take care of myself. Goodnight, Steve," and with that she ended the conversation, pushing the red icon on her touchscreen.
"Boyfriend?" Daredevil asked with mirth. His young rescuer turned out to be quite entertaining.
"No, just my friends that I'm staying with who think they have the right to baby me and disregard everything they know about me because I have only been in this world for less than a month," Ed huffed while staring at her phone, contemplating whether to turn it off or not. She finally decided against it and just pocketed it, only to have it buzz with a text. It was from Wanda.
"I told Steve you were fine, but you know him. Have fun ;) W"
Great… another totally wrong assumption. – the blonde groaned internally.
"Another friend?" Matt inquired from the couch, guessing based on the entirely different reaction to the text message than what she gave earlier to that fellow called Steve.
"Yeah, she thinks I'm out partying or getting laid or something…" Ed scowled as she pocketed the phone again.
"And you weren't?" Daredevil deduced. To tell the truth, he was wondering what the girl could have possibly been doing out this late at night in the neighborhood himself.
"No, I told you. I'm one of you guys. Although I'm not sure knocking out two would be muggers meant too much in this part of town," the alchemist's frown deepened. It didn't really matter in the grander scheme of things what I did after all, right?
"Do they know, about… you know?" he tried to get to the bottom of the reason they might have worried about her.
"Of course they do, they are the Avengers," the blonde revealed. Maybe that should have been a secret, but it's not like their little gang hadn't made the national news a couple of times already. Their identities were never really concealed. Especially Tony's, who had gone and announced to the whole world he was Iron Man even before joining Fury's little pet project. Ed had seen the video of the press conference online. Ego-maniac.
Now that was a piece of news Matt was not prepared for, he had heard about them on TV and radio before, and although there was never a mention of someone with a similar name to Ed's, she was clearly not lying. And she did mention something about only having been in this world for about a month.
"You don't believe me," Ed stated – not asked – based on the frown Daredevil was adorning on his face that she noticed as she made her way back to where he was lying down.
"I believe you. I would know if you were lying," Matt tried to assure her.
"May I ask how you would know?" the alchemist inquired. She was wondering about the extent of the blind man's capabilities anyway.
"Heartbeat," he stated with a small smile.
"Just how good is your hearing?" Ed asked warily. That phone conversation was definitely overheard. Not that it mattered, just a little embarrassing that she had an overbearing brother figure in her life.
"Good enough that I can hear the faucet dripping in the bathroom of the apartment two floors down and at the other end of the hallway," Matt confirmed.
"Huh," the alchemist hummed as she processed this. "I'm guessing then my auto-mail is no secret either."
"Auto-mail?" Matt asked although he could guess.
"Artificial limbs from my world," Ed affirmed his suspicions.
"Yeah, I can hear the mechanics, although it's quieter than I would have assumed. But the smell of motor-oil is telling too," Daredevil added. Ed tried to sniff at her right arm inconspicuously if she really smelled that strongly of motor-oil. It was unavoidable, that was the reason she wore black usually too to avoid staining.
"I doubt anyone else would be able to notice it," Matt chuckled with a little wince at the self-conscious act of the girl.
"I think we can safely assume you are not going to choke on your own vomit from concussion by now so try to get some sleep," the alchemist commented as she crossed her arms.
Noticing her new found friend's evident physical discomfort from talking, she deemed it time to actually rest, although until now it had been convenient that the conversation just flowed between them precisely for the reason mentioned above. It had kept the masked vigilante awake and alert, making it easy to spot sudden changes that might have occurred in his condition from the injuries.
"You can sleep in the bedroom if you are staying," he offered as he slowly closed his eyes, exhaustion evidently claiming him.
"I'm fine here, better to keep an eye on you just in case anyway," not to mention she had no intention of sleeping in a practically stranger man's bed.
Ed didn't receive a reply to that, and she went to position herself on the relatively wide window sill. It overlooked the side-alley by the building so didn't give much of a view, not to mention that they were pretty glossed over – not that it mattered to a blind man.
Her firm determination to stay awake lasted till about 5 AM when the first rays of the morning sun were starting to lighten the night. Her head lolled to her shoulder, her temple supported by the cold glass. She had slept in more uncomfortable places before anyway. On trains… Al's armor…
Ed jolted awake when she heard the couch creak as Daredevil sat up.
"Light sleeper I see," Matt commented as soon as he noticed her change in breathing. Ed gave him an amused raise of her left brow at his choice of words then looked at her phone, it was only 7 AM. He gave a small smile with equal mirth, having caught the slight change in her exhale that would have been a snort if it were more forceful.
"How's the head and ribs?" the blonde inquired when she caught him hugging his side with his right arm.
"Been worse. You don't have worry about me," he brushed her concerns off as he got up slowly and shuffled to the bedroom, only to return shortly after with a loose hoodie pulled over his upper body.
"Right," Ed replied in a clipped tone. She could sense that her help was no longer wanted or needed, and she didn't really want to impose. Just as she got up to leave, Matt whipped his head towards the window, highly concentrating.
"I'm going to have company in a minute," the brown-haired man announced after having recognized the distinct footsteps on the pavement outside the building that belonged to his girlfriend, or ex, or whatever Karen was after everything they have been through. He hadn't seen her since he broke the news to her that he was in fact Daredevil.
"Should I jump out the window or prepare to fight?" Ed tried to guess if this visitor was a good thing or not, but she couldn't decide based on Matt's troubled expression. Within seconds he could smell her perfume in the building, so they had maybe twenty seconds before she reached the door.
"Neither, it will be fine, I'll just talk to her," Matt waved her off.
"Her, huh," Ed huffed in amusement. "You look like a mess."
"It's fine, she knows," he said as he walked over to the door to open it although his unexpected guest hadn't even knocked yet.
That knock came at the exact same time he made it there. Ed was impressed, to tell the truth, for a blind man he had a better understanding of his surroundings than 99.9% of the population.
"Matt, we have to talk…" Karen began in an urgent manner but halted as soon as she saw the state he was in. "Oh my God, what happened to you?" her voice changed instantly to that of intense apprehension.
"It's nothing," he tried to appease her, only to earn a huff and what Ed would have guessed an annoyed roll of her eyes since she didn't have visual on her yet because of the corridor wall. That soon changed when her clicking heels indicated that she was making her way into the apartment, Matt closing the door behind her with a heavy sigh.
Karen stopped in her tracks, frozen in her place when she saw Ed, the two blondes staring at each other for a bit.
"Karen, this is Ed," Matt informed as he went for the bookshelves on top of which a pair of red-tinged glasses lied. It was apparent he was more comfortable wearing them around the girl.
A hint of jealousy was probably what flickered across Karen's face at the sight of the golden-eyed blonde at first, but her tomboyish and very teenager-like looks quickly dissipated it.
"Don't mind me, just a random hero buddy your boyfriend met just last night and who pulled him out from behind a dumpster and made sure he didn't choke himself on his own vomit from a concussion or give himself hemothorax from punctured lungs," Ed added dripping with sarcasm. Matt threw her a thoroughly unamused look for giving out the details of his condition he desperately wanted to avoid.
Karen stared at her a bit dumbfounded, trying to figure out if she was joking or not, but her guess was that she was not, just annoyed a bit with Matt, which notion she clearly shared.
"Thank you for looking after him," gratitude won out at last as she gave Ed a warm look of appreciation.
She was pretty, Ed decided. In an understated, girl-next-door kind of way with her fair skin, light blue eyes, but pretty nonetheless. A bit like Winry… though her eyes are a much more vibrant shade of blue and she is more muscular in build with all that auto-mail building whereas Karen was like a slender, delicate flower.
"You are welcome. And don't be that hard on him, he is a good guy just too wrapped up in his ill-perceived sense of duty and guilt," Ed whispered to Karen conspiratorially – knowing full well that he heard as well anyway but just had to put the thought out there – and patted the taller blonde on her arm as she passed her on her way out.
Trust me I know the feeling… The alchemist threw one last glance at Matt who looked shocked by the revelation that Ed saw through him so quickly. Like she was reading his heartbeat the same way he had done to her. Ed, of course, had done no such thing, but it was hard to miss the signs of a burden like this being carried when she had done the same for so long.
With a light tap on the wall and a nod that she knew he would catch despite his lack of sight, she was out the door.
Just in time for another anxious phone call.
"Steve, for the love of Truth! One more call where you act like my mother and I'm running away from home!" she huffed exasperatedly.
"Fury had just called regarding a strange piece of intel that reached his ears about a blonde, golden-eyed girl running around New York, apprehending petty criminals with some weird electricity looking energy that comes from her hands with a clap. Do you happen to know anything about that?" Captain America informed her in a way too emotionless voice for him.
Ed stopped right in the middle of a flight of stairs.
"Am I in trouble?" she asked finally as she continued on her way, pushing the front door open.
"Actually no. He said to keep on doing it if it keeps you happy, just make sure you wear your contacts when not running around doing that, and have your hair up in a different style or something. Maybe emphasize on your boyish side while playing Fullmetal Alchemist, if you want to have some semblance of privacy when not," Steve explained with a sigh, apparently not agreeing with the judgment of the director.
"I'll see what I can do about that…" Ed grinned from ear to ear.