AN: I know Netflix shows don't do mid-season finales, but they're also not this long. I like the idea of it for this story, so here it is.

MID-SEASON FINALE

Things that Matter to Me

"Ultimately, it taught me the value of life of hard work of never giving up on the things that matter to me." -Danny Rand

SUNDAY, AFTERNOON

"Joy."

They allowed her a half hour to sit and battle with her own thoughts and emotions, but the time was here to try and get through to her themselves. She had to be assessed a non-risk factor before they could give Kuo their full attention. Last thing they would need was her causing further problems for them.

He contemplated leaving her to Ward, but was concerned after what she'd already accidentally done to him it wouldn't be all right. He worried the older Meachum looked somewhat dejected as well, and the lack of response from getting shot bothered him. It could be nothing, or it could be giving up. Earlier, Ward seemed ready to learn to be a fighter, and now...

The woman lowered her hands painted red, peering up at her brother. His expression was easily readable. He was hoping to speak to her and have her finally hear him. She wasn't quite there.

"I was protecting you. I'm so sorry."

Danny blocked out the repeated excuse and eyed the bloody clothes Ward was still wearing. He'd cleaned the splatter off his own face and changed his shirt. The other man should probably do the same and he told him as much.

Hearing the suggestion, the traumatized woman jumped up suddenly, startling her brother who stood right in front of her. It didn't escape his notice that Frank appeared prepared to do harm if she looked at anybody the wrong way. She faced Danny, reaching out to grip Ward's forearm as though for strength or balance.

"Danny, you have to watch out. He'll steal-"

The lights went out causing her to cut off mid-sentence and the window shattered. Confusion reigned but Matt, who didn't require light to see clearly, shouted warning there was a man in the apartment with them. Danny couldn't see anything and cautiously drew near the window.

A body slammed into him and they fell to the floor. Chest to chest with his assailant, a hand covered his face and applied painful pressure. He released a growl from his throat as he struggled to find a grip to remove the weight.

"Worst-Iron Fist-ever," his attacker muttered.

"Davos?" he uttered, and then screamed as blinding white-hot pain flooded through him.

His entire body was burning, excruciating pain paralyzing his thought-process. It stopped seconds later as a well-placed kick tossed the man away. A hand reached to help him up and he took it, finding himself side by side with Matt. Together they turned toward the assailant but he was no longer where he was.

Matt was excellent at tracking though, and shifted his head toward the door. More sounds of fighting could be heard and Danny's instinct was to go help but found he couldn't. He was feeling exhausted.

He noticed the man who helped him had disappeared, moving into the darkness.

"Get away from the door!" yelled Matt in warning.

There was movement, scraping and thuds, and then an explosion. The back-up generator kicked in, lights flickering on, revealing smoke flooding the immediate area by the front door now laying open. Matt was coughing and cursing, dragging up to stand from where he'd fallen.

Danny observed him listening for a lengthy moment. He slammed his fist into the wall to vent, and turned back to the inside of the room. His observation expanded to the rest of the room and its occupants, noting everyone seemed okay. But he wasn't.

"It's gone."

Ward heard his utterance as Colleen was coming over to check on him, peering at him curiously.

Devastated, he fully realized. "Davos took my power."

"You knew that guy?" asked Ward, absently scratching at the drying blood on his neck. "Wait. What do you mean he took your power?"

Colleen seemed equally confused. "That can't happen, can it? Are you sure it's gone?"

He nodded weakly. "I feel like a piece of my soul was ripped out. It's gone."

Drained, he made his way to the couch and sank into it, forgetting the Meachum siblings who were both now standing, and right next to his chosen spot. Colleen sat beside him and placed a hand on his shoulder, her expression wholly concern and puzzlement. He didn't know it was possible to completely steal away the Iron Fist power either. He'd lost it.

"I didn't ask to be the heir to your daddy issues. Do you remember when you said that to me, Ward?"

Danny glanced at the disgruntled Frank when Joy spewed random nonsense. He held the least amount of patience for her antics and was trigger-happy. Seeking distraction from his terrifying predicament, he looked to the siblings.

Her brother did seem to recall the moment in discussion, saying, "Joy... I was dealing with my own shit then. That was me yelling at myself."

"Well, whatever way you meant it, you were right. I ignored your struggles and expected you to be perfect. God, our lives are a fucking mess. Who has the kind of money we have and still manages to be incapable of real happiness? We are pathetic, aren't we?"

Joy slipped one of her blood coated hands into Ward's bloody hand. He held it and smiled tenderly at her. Sad eyes met his and then she made eye contact with Danny. Aware everybody anticipated the woman better be having answers for them, he prayed she would and he wasn't disappointed.

"He spoke so confidently about the danger you posed, not just for my family, but for the world. I believed him. The past few days… I.. I don't know anymore."

Matt stepped up. "If you know something, anything at all that can help, share it. You have to at least suspect their intentions may be malicious, and not just for Danny."

She frowned downward at the floor, thinking. "Davos is from the same place you came back from, Danny. He said he was like you, but called 'Steel Serpent'. Swore elders from K'un-Lun sent him to kill you."

He glowered over what she was saying. "Steel Serpent"? It was too dark to get a look at his chest, but did Davos have a symbol there? Was it as his was, without the additional wings? The symbol from K'un-Lun used by Gao on her drugs as an insult to the place that banished her. He refused to believe the elders would send someone to kill him.

Luke shoved his hands into his sweatshirt pockets and sauntered closer. "Why would he steal Danny's power?"

She hesitated, perhaps part of her unwilling to be convinced she was wrong about everything. But she did answer, and he preferred to accept that mattered most. It did for now anyway.

"Dad called-.. Harold called to tell me what happened to Ward. How these Heart people took my brother and he helped you guys save him. I didn't know who those masked soldiers were until it was too late to give my input, make any difference. I was in protective custody when Davos went to meet with them. He told me there was a deal between him and Heart. If he opened a portal to K'un-Lun, they'd make sure Danny died." In full confession mode, she divulged, "I don't trust Kuo and decided to separate from Davos's mission. Figure things out myself."

"And by figure out, you mean killing Danny?" Colleen demanded, ticked off. "He saved your brother from that warehouse, not Harold. Harold might have told us where it was, but without all of us, Ward would still be there. Did you know they were torturing him? Your father helped them capture him in the first place. Know that?"

Joy's eyes were welling with tears again. Danny didn't have time for a breakdown. He cared about her but he couldn't do this now.

"Look, if there's anything you can tell us… Start making up for what you did to your brother by telling us."

She sought her brother's gaze and nodded once upon meeting it. "Okay. Davos seems to think your father knew about K'un-Lun. He even built his company on top of an entrance to the place."

Ward gawked at her, releasing her hand to step back and get a good look at her face. "Our building?"

A mute nod in confirmation. His father knew..? Gao hadn't been lying? There was an entrance to K'un-Lun beneath Rand Enterprises? It couldn't be possible. This wasn't true.

"There's a door supposedly leading to a power room, but it's a staircase down, and then a ladder that descends into a deep cavern system. That's what Davos said," she revealed to them. "I didn't go check myself."

He eyed Joy warily. It was unlikely for her to lie now, to be cooking up some elaborate scheme to get him killed. But she was also the person who nearly killed her brother trying to murder him less than an hour ago.

Only one sure-fire way to find the truth.

"The Defenders will go see the entrance ourselves. If it's there, we should assume Kuo and Davos will also be there."

"I'm going with you," insisted Colleen.

He shook his head to disagree. "No. I need you to go with Claire."

Claire looked at him quietly, mulling things over in her head no doubt. She was present enough to be looking questioningly though, so he made himself clear.

"I want the two of you to get Joy back to the safe house."

Ward opened his mouth and Danny put up a hand to silence him before he could get any kind of protest or complaint out. His girlfriend appeared equally ready to begin an argument against his plan.

"You're staying here with Frank, if it's okay?" he tacked on the query to be certain the not entirely sane man was on board playing body guard for his friend.

He received a nod of affirmation and relieved, continued on to explain his reasoning.

"It would be safer for her to be somewhere else. We don't know if they'll try to grab you again."

His enemies, his power stolen. Kuo remained a remnant of the Hand and therefore it was his duty to defeat him. As for his old friend, should he allow people with ill-will toward K'un-Lun inside, there was no way he'd remain in good graces with the elders. This was his life and position as Iron Fist being dismantled. It was his mission to set things right.

So heavily Ward was frowning in his direction, he couldn't resist pursuing the issue. "What, Ward?"

"What do you think he wants from that place? Kuo likes the idea of poetic justice. It's why he's using everything against itself, like the wealth and corporations running society. And now he's taken your power to enter a place he was expelled from. Is there anything he could do that..I don't know, kinda has a tragic poetry to it?"

There was no possibility he would go searching for any of the elders to take them on in combat. It was too risky and likely he would lose among the entire force of the city. He might try to take the immortality substance from bones again. That didn't seem "poetic" to him, but it seemed like a Kuo move.

Danny vowed right then and there if the portal lay open, Kuo would suffer severe and immediate retribution for his actions. The Iron Fist would see it done. He felt the urge to hurry. Every minute they wasted was a minute Davos traveled closer to the entrance of K'un-Lun.

/

SUNDAY, LATE AFTERNOON

"Where does he get all these karate guys?"

"Years of physical and mental training. He's very convincing as a good leader and mentor. It wouldn't be too hard to collect followers if you recruit in the right areas."

"Thanks for the lecture, Danny," Jessica snapped, "But I was looking to express my annoyance."

She kicked a guy in the stomach and there were audible breaking bones. He watched her race off into a pitch black area. Crazy woman, but when she was determined, there'd be hell to pay to try and slow her roll.

"Think you're doing a fine job at that by the trail of disabled bodies you're leaving all over the place." Luke shouted from somewhere to his left.

"Do we really have to chat now?" grunted Matt, sliding past on one knee to avoid the bullets of the few idiots down in the dark firing guns.

Danny ducked low in case he was in danger of being targeted by a firearm, tracking his ally momentarily before rushing forward to assault a pair of guys headed for him.

His fist connected solidly to the ridge of a cheek. He spun and landed fists into a stomach until it gave, then lashed out to kick upward, walloping the side of a head. A lucky strike hit his chest and he swiftly retaliated with a swinging punch. It was blocked but a flurry of consecutive blows weakened the man's stance, and he managed an uppercut to his chin, flipping him backward and unconscious.

What appeared to be a broken piece of concrete smashed into the face of a third opponent wielding a handgun. It looked like it had really hurt as the guy dropped to the dirt. He searched the spot it came from and Jessica strolled into view smirking and giving him a little wave. As if he needed the help.

"No problem."

"Come on!" Matt called from a passageway with light leaking in somewhere ahead. "This way!"

He could just feel it. The portal was open and it was his fault. He ran forward to follow Matt farther inside the expansive foundations beneath Rand Enterprises. Fury encouraged his speed.

Another passageway, this one long, and the four of them arrived. The tall, rectangular entrance was indeed open. A man he recognized well, stood outside it, peering into the portal but refraining from entering.

He belonged to K'un-Lun. He was zealous about protecting it. Why was he doing this?

"Davos!"

Danny positioned himself for combat, not at all interested in hearing whatever explanations the man deemed fit to give him. They were past talking after this betrayal. He fought to steady and find his balance as his former friend turned around.

The first thing his eyes perceived was the serpentine tattoo emblazoned on the man's chest. What was it Joy said he called himself..? It came to mind in the next second. Steel Serpent.

"Danny!" he called back. "I'm astounded you discovered us so quickly."

He caught the insult and glared furiously. Behind him, Jessica muttered for him to distract his friend and they would get into the portal to stop them. Right, focus and remember the mission was protecting K'un-Lun above all else.

"You stole what is rightfully mine. Give it back."

Advancing forward a couple steps, Davos matched him step for step. A serious gaze met his glare and then Danny shifted attention to the fist he raised up, glowing. He seemed confident the power was his to use and use easily at that. He'd show him how wrong he was.

"You never should have had this power," he claimed. "An entrance to K'un-Lun was under your nose and you didn't even know it."

Danny attacked, concentrating his whole being into the weapon it was, power or no power. The glowing fist narrowly missed smashing into his chest and he gripped the wrist, jabbing a hand into an exposed throat. Unsatisfied merely watching Davos falter away clutching his neck, he resumed the assault, landing a few more hits.

He switched to defensive when his enemy fought through the pain and sparred on an equal skill level with him. The glowing fist occasionally cut through the air to make its mark and he had to constantly keep an eye out to avoid. Still, a leg swinging up to knock his arms to the side allowed Davos the opening he required to use the fist.

Quick enough, he was able to dodge a full hit but the brush of it against his arm sent him spinning. A leg swept under him as he scrunched his eyes shut, working to tolerate the surge of power that just glanced off him, and he fell. Rolling out of its path, a second blow from the glowing fist cracked the ground.

At the rate he was using power, Davos would be drained in no time. He was obviously not accustomed to the limits one had as the Iron Fist, especially when it was a newly acquired ability. Breathing heavily, he put some space between them and noted the other man had to catch his breath too.

He opted to spend the recovery seconds to taunt much to his dismay.

"How does it feel knowing your years of training amount to nothing? Defeating the Undying gives way to nothing!"

Danny edged closer to his opponent, sighting his friends must have gone in because they were nowhere to be seen. This encouraged him to slap down the anxiety he was feeling, sensing the hatred coming off Davos. He allowed himself to ask one question.

"Why did the elders send you? I don't believe they would want me dead."

"They do."

"I don't believe you. I'm the Immortal Iron Fist."

"You're a failure who abandoned your training and the city you are meant to protect. You betrayed your destined purpose and now that duty is mine."

"You lie!"

He reignited the fight, charging into the other man at full speed. They grappled, each struggling to gain the superior hold, and Danny angrily wrenched free when neither won. He took a step back and saw he was gathering his energies to bring out the power again. Would it even work?

Not really ready to see it happen, he ran in for another attack, screaming at him, "How can you speak of duty when you've let the wolf in through the gate?"

Conveniently, the clamoring call distracted his concentration and Davos barely prevented his fist from connecting. The fast defense was weak and he broke through it to propel his forearm against his jaw. He drove home a punch to his stomach and a spinning kick sent him rolling across the ground.

Exhaling his pain and frustration, the man rolled up onto a knee and lowered his gaze, clenching the fist. Danny hesitated where he was but there was nothing to fear. He'd drained the power.

"I'm the one who achieved victory and earned the power, Davos. Please, return it to me so I may protect the city."

He growled and stood. "Our home? Or would you waste your talents on the likes of the unworthy inhabitants of this place of filth?"

"If the way is shut," Danny argued. "K'un-Lun remains safe on its own. New York needs people like me to protect it."

"You can't protect what's already defeated."

Masked men in their gray uniforms barreled out of the entrance at a dead run. His eyes widened, frozen by uncertainty of where the priority might be. He forgot all that as he caught sight of Bakuto emerging into the wide cavern the pair of them stood within.

A memory of when Davos stabbed the wounded man lying on ground in pouring rain filled his mind. The resident of K'un-Lun was fanatical for the defeat of their enemies and protection of their home. To be allied with that same man, however temporarily it might be, was disheartening. He couldn't see right from wrong, only the mission. It made him lesser somehow.

Danny angled into a position that allowed the portal to lay in his line of sight. He could see trees of a forest, no bones in view. And Luke, fighting a couple of gray uniformed soldiers swiping at him with their curiously effective blades. His tension relaxed when he beat them both down and continued his journey to the exit.

Recalling the different name, he yelled out to the man smiling his conceit.

"Kuo! You won't get what you want this way!"

The man didn't seem concerned. The best he could garner was a little irritation. That would mean they interrupted him, yes? Maybe they got to them in time. But then he'd look less composed and more desperate.

As he was starting to suspect, the man confirmed, "I have the main prize. That will have to do for now."

Instantly angered, he retorted, "But you're still mortal. There's no coming back again when you're dead."

"Oh? Are you finally willing to do what you must to achieve victory? Or…" His smile turned into a sneer. "Will you have your girlfriend do it?"

He was coming closer, removing his arms from behind his back to handle his sword. His eyes wandered briefly, possibly searching for any sign of Colleen. Removing the sword out of the sheath, Danny kept his guard up but monitored the entrance too.

Luke and Jessica were outside the portal now, exchanging words with Davos. He was expecting blows so it was perplexing when that didn't occur. Where was Matt? His interest in his friends did not pass unnoticed by his enemy, who remarked upon it.

"They should have chosen an Iron Fist with less baggage."

"That baggage stopped you getting your hands on the substance," he pointed out.

A flicker in his eyes let him know he was correct on that, but his satisfaction wasn't to last.

"It also gained me access in the first place. Perhaps I should be pleased instead. That man would disobey his masters to see you dead."

Danny was disappointed and saddened to know it was true. He turned his own friend against him so badly he wished for him to die. He didn't know how to fix it. Davos didn't understand him and that was why they fell apart. To leap to murdering him as solution, however, was madness. To try and convince Joy it was necessary for him to die also, was unforgivable. He was ruining people in his path to achieve vengeance.

More soldiers in gray and a few of Kuo's personal followers poured out of the high doorway. They encountered the two Defenders while Davos stood passively by, before he walked toward the entrance. Danny was relieved to catch a glimpse of deep red color amid the gray passing through the portal. He'd lost him once in a deep hole. He had no plans to do it again.

"What did you take?" shouted Davos in outrage.

Kuo paused a mere yard from Danny, in the process of bringing the weapon against him. They looked across the distance between them and witnessed the errant warrior reseal the entrance. His gaze locked with Kuo's, who put a smile on despite the harassment showing in his eyes and posture.

"They are so reliant on their coveted Iron Fists," he said. "Take that protection away and what will they trust in its place?"

The man took off, running into at least a dozen of his loyalists standing ready by the edges of the cavern. He didn't know how long they'd been there waiting. It was clearly a strategized exit. Danny chased after them and was waylaid by the gray uniformed ones. One of them tried to shoot him at close range, angering him. He ripped the gun from his hand and bashed it against an ear.

By the time they culled the herd of enemies and cleared the chaos to take in their situation, Kuo and Davos were missing, as were plenty of the pawns used to slow them down. Did Davos pursue the Heart leader? He wasn't happy and Danny thought he knew why with what Kuo said to him.

There was an egg to birth the dragon, the Undying, and the Immortal Iron Fist was granted their powers by defeating the Undying. But if a dragon didn't hatch because the egg was stolen away… Bringing something like that onto this plane, he couldn't begin to imagine what that might mean.

He tried to find respite in the safety and well-being of his friends.

/

"Must be nice to afford a place like this."

Danny didn't think the attempt at easing the burden of failure quite worked. Still, they weren't in as low spirits as they could be. The entrance to K'un-Lun was in a public area, just very far below. It was astonishing no one saw anything that happened today.

The elevator continued to ascend and he glanced at the other two. Luke was acting stoic per usual, and Matt was fiddling with the mask in his hands, appearing a shade nonplussed. They suspected there had to be a much larger plan unfurling and they were yet uncomfortably clueless.

It was a loss, but they returned to his apartment building thinking it was salvageable. They would need to locate Davos and get him his power back. For the time being, there was slim chance Kuo or Davos would return to the entrance, especially since the Defenders were aware of its existence.

The elevator reached his floor and the doors opened into carnage. Horrified, none of them got off at first. When Matt pushed past him to start moving to the doorway ahead, it served as a wake up for the rest of them to move.

There were bodies lining the hallway, a few limbs separated from torsos. Blood splattered floor to ceiling. It looked and smelled like a slaughterhouse. He progressed along the hallway, stepping over puddles of blood and corpses. Assault rifles lay here and there and he recognized one of the dead just short of the door that lay open.

Dominic Calburn, the crime boss he met in the parking garage battle, and then later on the dock when they took Ward. His head was twisted at an odd angle, a probable broken neck. Frank's doing most likely. Oh, shit. Ward!

Shoving the door open, smacking it into a body as he did, he glanced down. He breathed a little easier when he saw it wasn't Ward, but then he looked again. There was a fair bit of damage to his face, but he would bet the dead man was the company driver, a member of Heart.

Danny walked inside, searching for where Matt had gotten to. Jessica and Luke pushed in right at his heels. Everyone alert, monitoring for signs of life. He did find Matt and they hurried to the spot near the bathroom where he was checking on a badly beaten Frank Castle.

"Is he alive? Is he okay?"

"Yes and no," answered Matt simply.

Outwardly he was calm, but Danny could see the rage boiling beneath. He rolled Frank onto his backside and felt around, visibly utilizing his powerful senses to identify injuries. Looking down at him in shock, he listened to some of the condition rattled off in an almost detached manner.

"Gunshot through and through to his right thigh, second gunshot has the bullet lodged in the upper left shoulder, and a third grazed his side pretty good. Some broken ribs, fractured forearm-"

"We got it. He's fucked up." Luke said, dismally. "He gonna live?"

They would call his hospital. They'd have to give him a fake name of course, keep it under the radar. With his money, it was an easy task. He resumed his scan of the room, seeking Ward. Why couldn't he find him?

A cough drew his attention back on Frank. He was opening his eyes, or at least attempting to do so. There was a lot of swelling going on that looked awfully painful.

"They took him," he uttered in the vague direction of Matt's concerned face. "The lawyer bitch and business suit asshole. Motherfuckers took the kid."

Frank's eyes shut as he passed out. Panic threatened to overwhelm him and then rage and then..nothing.

He searched his friends and allies for hope. There was only desolation. Danny stared into emptiness, echoing the exact words his former friend spoke in demand of Kuo's crime. His voice had been full of rage, but his own was despairing and aimless since Kuo wasn't present to hear him ask.

"What did you take?"