Matt crouched on the fire escape, waiting for Healy to exit the building. Nothing about Healy's trial over the past few days had gone the way he'd wanted; he hadn't been able to find out the who the employer of the man who'd hired him and Foggy to represent Healy was, or even the name of the man who'd hired them for that matter, and Healy was getting to walk, despite being obviously guilty of murder.

He couldn't fix all of it. He couldn't take Healy back to trial, couldn't get the guilty verdict that he deserved. But Matt could make him talk.

The door leading into the alleyway creaked open and Healy walked out. His pace was unhurried, his muscles relaxed, the beat of his heart calm. Obviously certain he'd gotten away with his actions. Matt shifted. He was going to remove that idea very quickly.

As Healy closed the trunk of his car, Matt moved. At the last second, Healy spun out of the way, and Matt landed on the car, the windshield cracking under the force of his landing. Matt didn't pause, spinning round with a kick that Healy just managed to duck under before coming at Matt with blows of his own. Healy was fast; faster than he'd expected.

Healy managed to get a grip and drag Matt off the trunk of the car. He grunted as his back hit the ground. Healy's weight shifted, and Matt moved his head just far enough to the side that when Healy's boot came down it missed. Matt wrapped an arm around Healy's ankle, locking him in place, and then knocked his other leg out from under him. Healy stumbled back into the car instead of falling to the ground, but it gave Matt time to get back on his feet.

Matt pressed his attack, but Healy kept his ground, at least until Matt managed to land a kick to the side of Healy's face. Healy went down, landing in some bags of trash at the side of the alley. He was only down for a second though, lunging to the side to snatch up a metal pipe laying near him.

Suddenly Matt was on the defensive as Healy swung the makeshift weapon at him wildly. He backed up, rounding the car, dodging as he went, waiting for the opening that was sure to come with Healy's wild swings. The moment it did, Matt took advantage, hopping on the hood of the car and landing another kick. Healy stumbled back and Matt lunged, twisting the pipe out of his hand. The pipe clattered to the ground and Matt shoved Healy against the wall. Healy slammed his arm down on Matt's, breaking his grip so he could twist away.

They went back to trading blows, working the rest of the way around the car to get back to where the fight had first started. This has to end. Matt hooked his leg, got a grip on his arms, and threw him across the alley. Healy hit a mirror that was leaning up against the other wall, the sound of shattering glass echoing through the alleyway. As Healy scrambled back to his feet, he snatched up a large piece of broken glass, swinging it at Matt like a knife.

Matt dodged back and Healy pressed forward with his makeshift weapon. Then Healy swung too wide, and Matt grabbed his arm and flipped him around, landing Healy on his back and twisting his arm so the glass was pointed at Healy. He tried to jerk against Matt's hold, but this time he wasn't getting out of it.

"The man that hired your lawyers," Matt snapped, keeping Healy pinned in place. "Who does he work for?"

"You think I'm afraid of you?" Healy asked. Matt could hear the steady beat of his heart; Healy was right, he wasn't nearly scared enough. Not yet.

Matt shifted his weight, and the glass stabbed into Healy's shoulder. Healy cried out, his hand trying to push back on Matt's wrists. After a few seconds, Matt let the glass slip out of his shoulder, shifting it so the jagged edge pressed against Healy's neck. And now, now Healy's heart was beating out a pattern that Matt could almost dance to. Now Healy was afraid.

"Who does he work for?"

"I can't," Healy gasped out, and Matt pressed the glass just a little harder at Healy's neck, just hard enough to nick the skin.

"I want a name!"

Healy gasped, still trying to push ineffectively at Matt's wrists. Matt leaned in just a little more, and then, "Fisk! His name is Wilson Fisk!"

Matt instantly let go, pulling back and allowing Healy to roll away. Fisk? Where have I heard that name? He knew he'd heard it somewhere before, but he couldn't place it.

He stood, looming over Healy still. "You get in your car. If I ever see you in Hell's Kitchen again – "

"No," Healy said, pushing up to his knees.

"You do not want to test me," Matt warned.

Healy pushed himself up. "You think this is still about you? I gave up his name; you don't do that, not to him."

Matt tipped his head, listening. Healy's heart was still going, as scared as he'd been when Matt had made it seem like he'd be willing to kill him for Fisk's name.

Suddenly, it clicked. Matt remembered where he'd heard the name Fisk before. The woman, the one he'd saved from the mugging almost two weeks ago now. When he'd run into her at the police station, Brett had called her 'Ms. Fisk', and so had the man waiting for her outside the station to drive her home.

Healy stood, but nothing in his posture or heart rate indicated plans to attack. "He'll find me," Healy said, his voice flat with certainty. "He'll make an example of me. Then he'll find everyone I've ever cared about, and he'll do the same to them. So that no one ever does what I just did."

"If you leave tonight," Matt started, but Healy was shaking his head already, drifting away from Matt with slow steps.

"It won't matter. He'll find me." Healy paused, turning his head in Matt's direction. "You should have just killed me. You coward."

Matt finally registered what Healy was about to do, but it was too late. He barely managed half a step before Healy impaled his face on a spike protruding from the iron fence that bordered part of the alley. Matt froze, the sudden silence left behind as Healy's heart stopped seeming to echo around him. He had never meant for…

His hands clenched into fists. It didn't matter what he'd intended. This was what had happened, and there was nothing more Matt could do about it. He used a fire escape to climb to the roof of one of the buildings. Once there, he paused, thinking through his next move.

What were the chances that the woman he'd saved had some sort of connection to Wilson Fisk, the mysterious figure he'd been trying to track down? It was hard to imagine her doing anything to hurt others, though that could just be because of how helpless she'd seemed the night he'd saved her. He didn't actually know anything about her. Just because she'd been targeted by a mugger didn't mean that she was automatically a good person.

Can't hurt to look into her at least.

She was the only lead he had for Wilson Fisk at the moment, and Matt remembered that she'd entered an apartment building not too far from where she'd been attacked. The night was still young; he could go there, find her, and see if he could figure out what - if any - connection she had to Wilson Fisk. If she was connected to him, well, Matt would figure out his next move from there.

He traveled to her apartment building via a path of rooftops and back alleys, wincing at times as jumps made the ache of his injuries worse. He hadn't quite fully recovered from his fight with the Russians to rescue that boy, and fighting Healy tonight had only served to aggravate his partially healed wounds. Mostly, though, he ignored the pain. He'd be fine.

When Matt made it to the roof of her building, he went to the center and crouched down. This was the part where things were going to get tricky. He'd payed enough attention to Ms. Fisk when she'd run away to note that she'd made it safely into the building, but he hadn't payed attention to where she'd gone once there. He was going to have to search for her.

Matt let his mind settle, preparing himself. He normally filtered out a lot of the background information that he could pick up on, but in order to find her in a building full of people, he'd have to open himself up to everything.

It was always a moment of near overwhelm when he did; conversations happening on top of each other, footsteps, a baby crying, vacuum cleaners running, the hum of electricity, different types of music playing, movies and TV shows blaring through speakers. Smells hit him too; baby powder, dozens of different perfumes and colognes, soaps and shampoos, cleaners, dozens of different types of food, the smell of pets.

He caught a whiff of a particular brand of coffee, the kind that had been hanging around Ms. Fisk when he'd bumped into her at the police station. Matt narrowed his focus into that, following it to a small one-bedroom apartment on the fourth floor. There was a woman in the apartment, sitting on the couch, surrounded by stacks of papers. She'd mixed liberal amounts of some kind of peppermint and chocolate creamer in her coffee, which she sipped slowly as she scribbled something on one of the papers. "Oh, come on," she mumbled. "That should have been an easy question. Why are so many people missing it?"

It's her. Matt was sure of it. He settled in, prepared to listen for a while. She didn't move much, taking care of whatever papers she was dealing with. Eventually he figured out she was grading tests, based on her occasional mumbled comments.

She's a teacher.

Matt filed that tidbit of information away. After a while she tossed her pen down on her coffee table and started gathering up the papers. It sounded like she was stacking them neatly. Then she picked up her by then empty coffee mug and carried it into the kitchen. Based on what he could hear, it sounded like she was starting to clean up her dinner dishes. She hummed while she worked.

He frowned. This could take a while.

She clearly lived alone, so there was no one to strike up a conversation with her that might inadvertently reveal something useful to Matt – like whether or not she actually had a connection to Wilson Fisk. He'd have to wait and hope someone dropped in to visit her, or called her. Or if she went out in the evening, he could follow her. Though it didn't seem likely she was going anywhere tonight.

She finished cleaning the kitchen and went back to the living room, over to her bookshelves. "Which one tonight?" She ran her hands over the spines of books. "Ah, this one." She sounded pleased by her selection, whatever it was. Book in hand, she settled back on her couch, tucking her feet under her.

Matt sighed and shook his head. He wasn't getting anything tonight, clearly. He'd come back tomorrow. It was a Friday; hopefully she'd have something more interesting going on. Maybe something that actually involved talking so he could get information.

There's got to be a faster way of getting information form her. He wouldn't entertain the idea of interrogating her. There was a chance she didn't have any connection to Wilson Fisk at all, and the shared last name was just coincidence, and Matt wasn't about to frighten an innocent woman. Especially not one that he'd previously saved. But this method, following her around and eavesdropping on her activities could take days, maybe longer. He didn't have that much time to spare, not when he also had to keep putting pressure on the Russians to make sure they didn't find Claire.

Matt frowned as he considered his options. Maybe, if he wasn't willing to use the methods that typically came with the mask to get information from her, then the mask wasn't his best option. Perhaps this information might be better gained as Matt Murdock, though he was still a little fuzzy on how he'd manage it. But there had to be something more effective than this.

He pushed back to his feet, wincing a little at the protest of his muscles. Just go home, go to sleep. I'll figure this part out tomorrow.

Kids were fidgeting in their desks, eyes darting to the clock hanging on the wall, the eager anticipation for the weekend's beginning thick in the air. Heather decided to give in for once. "Okay, you can start packing your things."

There was an excited clatter as the kids started packing away their books and papers. Heather drifted through the classroom to Jason's desk. He'd come back to school midweek, and she'd been keeping a careful eye on him to make sure he was doing okay. He seemed to be doing well. A little quieter than he'd been before, but that was the only change Heather had noticed in the classroom. He was putting the finishing touches on a picture he'd been drawing on a sheet of construction paper.

Heather leaned over his desk slightly. "Hey, Jason, what are you working on?"

He glanced up at her and smiled a little. "It's the masked man," he said. Heather studied the picture. Jason was a pretty good artist, especially for his age, and the figure on the paper was recognizably the masked man. He'd also drawn himself in the picture, holding the masked man's hand.

Heather tapped the paper. "And who are these people?" she asked, indicated the figures he'd drawn at their feet.

Jason's smile dropped. "Those're the bad people."

Heather nodded. "I see." She wasn't surprised by the content of Jason's drawings. He was naturally an artist, and still a kid, so trying to process the traumatic event he'd been through in pictures was to be expected. "Are you going to give the picture to you Mom and Dad?"

He squirmed, looking unsure. "Actually, can I give it to you? When I draw the masked man, it makes Mom sad. She doesn't say it, but I can tell."

Heather doubted it was the masked man that made Mrs. Holloway upset. More likely it was the reminder of what Jason had been through; what his parents hadn't been able to protect him from. But Heather just smiled at Jason. "I would be thrilled to have one of your pictures."

Jason beamed up at her and handed her the paper. The bell rang, and Heather quickly set the paper on her desk as the kids scrambled to line up at the door. Once they were lined up properly, Heather walked her class outside so they could be collected by their parents, or loaded on their buses to go home. Once her students were taken care of, Heather hurried back to her classroom to straighten up and collect her things. She was as eager for the weekend as her students had been.

Once she had everything loaded up in her leather satchel, Heather slung the strap over her shoulder and headed out. She usually took the subway to the stop nearest her home, but the day was bright and beautiful, and Heather had extra energy, so she decided to walk. She'd only gone a few blocks before her phone rang with the tune she'd set for Maria. Heather dug it out of her bag and answered.

"Aren't you supposed to working still?" Heather asked by way of greeting.

"I'm on a smoke break," Maria replied.

"But you don't smoke," Heather said.

"I know that, you know that, my boss doesn't. Besides, it's hardly fair to give extra breaks to people making poor life decisions instead of people making good life decisions."

"Sure, sure," Heather said. "Why are you calling?"

"Movie night, me and you," Maria said. "Tonight!"

"In or out?" Heather dodged a business man going in the opposite direction on the sidewalk.

"Out, obviously," Maria said. "You probably haven't left your apartment all week."

"You know, I actually like being in my apartment," Heather said. "It's very cozy. And I can dress like a hobo and no one will judge me."

"Dress like a hobo if you want!" Maria said. "No one judges in this city."

"Pretty sure everyone judges," Heather said. She went around an older woman walking slow. "Especially if I'm with you and you're dressed in all your fashionableness."

"Not sure that's really how you're supposed to use that word," Maria said. "But I'm going to take that as a yes. Meet me at our usual theater at seven. Don't eat dinner. We're going to stuff ourselves on movie snacks like we're still in college or something."

"Okay," Heather laughed. "Wait, what movie are we seeing?"

"Bye!"

"Maria, wait!" The call ended. Heather lowered her hand and glared at the screen for a moment. When Maria refused to tell her what movie they were going to see, it was usually because it was a genre that Heather would typically say no to. Maria said she needed to 'expand her horizons'. And okay, occasionally the movies actually turned out to be good. But usually Heather ended up not liking them almost as much as she expected.

Her distracted thoughts and looking down at her phone turned out to be a mistake. Heather walked into someone, her foot catching on something in the process and sending her towards the sidewalk. The man she'd walked into managed to get an arm around her waist halting her fall, though he dropped his paper cup of coffee to the ground in the process.

"Oh my gosh, I am so sorry," Heather said.

"It's fine," the man said, helping her settle back on her feet. His voice was familiar, and Heather looked up at him, eyes going wide as she recognized him.

"It's you!" she blurted out. He was the same man she'd run into at the police station. Wait, does that mean… She glanced down, and sure enough, he had his cane in hand, and that was what she had tripped over when she'd bumped into him. Heat suffused her face. What were the chances that she'd literally run into the same blind guy more than once?

His head tipped to the side. "I'm sorry, have we met?"

Ground, if you were ever going to open up and bury me alive, now is the time to do it.

The ground refused to oblige and swallow her, so Heather was forced to actually respond. "Um, sort of. I'm uh, I'm the woman that ran into you at the police station."

"Ah, yes," he said, "I remember that." He flashed a grin down at her. "Is this a habit of yours? Running into people?"

"No," Heather said, with an embarrassed laugh. "No, it's um, really not." Her face was going to be permanently red, she could feel it. She glanced down at her feet and saw the spilled coffee on the ground. The amount told her his cup must have been nearly full when she'd knocked it out of his hand. "Oh, your drink! I can replace that."

"No, it's fine," he said. "I probably don't need the caffeine anyway."

His polite refusal only made her feel worse. "Please, I insist. I know the importance of caffeine."

He laughed a little. "Well, if you're insisting. The coffee shop is this way." He nodded his head to the right, and when Heather looked she spotted the one he meant.

"Okay, great," she said.

He turned back toward the coffee shop, and Heather fell into step beside him. "I'm Matt, by the way," he said. "I don't think we were properly introduced last time."

"No, we weren't," she said, brushing loose strands of hair behind one ear. "I'm Heather."

"It's nice to properly meet you, Heather," Matt said.

"Yeah," Heather said, "though it would have been nicer if we'd met without me almost knocking you down."

"I think I'll survive," he said.

The came near the door, and Heather moved ahead to open it for him. A bell dinged as the door opened, and he smiled in her direction. The bell must have tipped him off about what she'd done. Matt led the way to the counter, and the teenage girl behind it seemed surprised to see him. "Back already?" she asked.

"There was a bit of an accident with the coffee, I'm afraid," Matt said.

"I owe him a new drink," Heather said, digging through her satchel to find her wallet.

"Oh-kay," the girl said. "You had a large coffee, black, right?"

"That's right," Matt said.

"Anything for you?" the girl asked, looking at Heather. She paused, glancing up at the menu. She hadn't planned on buying coffee on her way home, but she was here, and she had a couple more blocks to walk in the cold.

"Sure, I'll take a large vanilla latte," Heather said.

"Whip cream with that?" the girl asked.

"Please," Heather said. She held herself back from ordering extra. If she was going to eat a bunch of junk food at the movies tonight, she didn't need the extra sugar now. Besides, she'd already given Matt enough reasons to judge her. She didn't need to give him another.

Heather paid for the drinks and the girl smiled brightly at them. "Your order will be right out."

They shifted down the counter to wait at the pick-up area. Now that they'd ordered their drinks, Heather found herself at a loss for what to say. She bit her lip, trying to think of something. It felt awkward to stand there in silence, but her mind was blank. It was almost a physical relief when Matt spoke up.

"You know, it's kind of funny, running into the same person more than once in this city," Matt said. "Are you new to Hell's Kitchen?"

"Um, no," Heather said. "I grew up here. Kind of hard to imagine living anywhere else, honestly."

"What, you've never dreamed of living somewhere far away?"

Heather shrugged a little, toying with the strap of her satchel. "Maybe a little, when I was a teenager. Turns out I'm a bit of a homebody. Besides, my family is here, and I can't see me leaving them behind."

"Sounds like you've got a big family."

Heather shook her head, only belatedly remembering that he couldn't see the movement. "Um, no. It's just me, my mom, and my brother."

"You must be close then, with only three of you."

Her heart skipped a beat at the comment. She thought of her mother, living in the best care facility Wilson could afford, who on her good days recognized Heather, and on her bad days thought she was one of the staff. She thought of Wilson, and how she never had a conversation that went deeper than the surface levels with him, and how lonely that felt.

There was no way she was going to say any of that to a complete stranger though, so she smiled and forced cheer into her voice. "We are. I can't imagine life without Mom or Wilson."

His head tilted slightly. "That's good."

"Here're your drinks," an employee said, a welcome distraction from the conversation.

"Thank you," Heather said, accepting both of the proffered drinks. She held Matt's out for him. "Here you go."

"Thanks," he said, holding out a hand but not actually reaching for the cup. Heather felt her face flush again as she realized of course he wouldn't, he didn't know where it was. She carefully pressed the cup into his hand, only letting go when she was sure he had it in his grip.

"You're welcome," Heather said. Now please let me get out of this before I do anything else to embarrass myself.

They walked out of the coffee shop together. "Well, it was nice meeting you officially, Matt," Heather said.

"It was," he agreed. "Maybe we'll bump into each other again sometime." The grin on his face told her that his word choice was absolutely deliberate, and she groaned.

"Hopefully not." It took about .2 seconds for Heather to realize what she had said. "No! I didn't mean – I just meant not – not literally, I don't want to run into – I mean, trip over…" Her words stumbled to a halt at the look on Matt's face, as though he was trying valiantly not to laugh at her. "You know what, I'm just going to leave now. Have a good weekend."

"You too," he said, then turned and walked away. Heather slowly did the same, heading in the opposite direction.

Of all the days not to take the subway. I had to pick today.

AN: I can't take much credit for the opening scene; you likely recognized the fight with Healy from episode 1-3, Rabbit in a Snowstorm. And, here we get the first major Matt/Heather interaction! I had an absolutely delightful time writing that scene, so I hope ya'll enjoyed reading it :)

Hope everyone celebrating Thanksgiving had a fun and safe holiday!