I haven't written anything A Team based in well over a year. I fear this is probably not very in character but I wanted to write something. I want to get back into writing. This is set in Season 5. I guess by the end it's AU. It's angsty Murdock.
"Men are so necessarily mad, that not to be mad would amount to another form of madness."
-Blaise Pascal
His vision was blurred through gritty eyes rimmed red, shaded purple with the weight of the last thirty six hours. Stubble scratched at his palm as he ran a weary hand over his face. The faucet came to life with a screech, water spluttering before descending into a pitiful trickle. Murdock banged his fist against it, the dull ache spreading rapidly. A hissing curse snarled beneath his breath at the inadequate plumbing. Duly chastised the stream of water increased, allowing him to cup the coldness in his hands and splash it against his face over zealously.
Water still dripped from his hair, a cold trail down his neck as he glanced in the mirror, searching.
Was it visible? Did it stain him like some perversely frenzied mark? He tightened his grip on the ceramic edge, pain bolting through his fingertips.
He couldn't see it.
Maybe he was immune to the madness now. Perhaps it had clung to him for so long he now no longer noticed it. Or it could be like the scent of a person's home, one they were so used to they didn't even smell it.
Perhaps his insanity was like that.
He leant further across the sink, porcelain digging into his rib cage, breath steaming up the glass as he edged closer, his haggard self reflected in brown eyes.
Maybe he'd fooled them all.
Face, Hannibal, Richter, all the nurses. He'd wrapped them all around his finger, insanity down to an art. A couple of rantings here, a raving or two there. Eating paint. Talking to his shoes. Laughing at the stars as he tilted his head back amongst the explosions, the underbelly of a chopper kissing the sky. Talking to invisible dogs and cockroaches. Placing dinosaurs and Indians in Vietnam. Adopting the voice of everyone from Bugs Bunny to Henry Kissinger.
He'd gotten so good at it all.
Born out of necessity, devised between himself and Hannibal, way back in the sweltering jungles of Vietnam. Hushed conversations beneath the canopy, words low and rushed amidst a hail of gunfire, flickers of fire shadowing their faces as it danced around them.
He was the secret weapon, he was the wild card, tucked safely in the VA. On call whenever they needed it. Bust him out, watch him fly. Howlin' Mad Murdock to the rescue.
Hadn't done much rescuing the last time. A little touch of spook 101 had restrained his hand. Virginia stole them away. Stockwell stole them away.
Then he was too good at it all.
Hoisted by his own petard.
They wouldn't let him out. Not after the testimony he'd given at the trial.
Not after the nightmares.
So he ran.
Ran and hid from the dark. Searched for the light his three friends had always provided him.
Anything to keep himself from entering the darkest abyss of his mind. Anything to staunch the steady pulse of guilt and shame. Anything to stop the way his mind was fragmenting without them.
He blinked.
It was never meant to be real.
It was a plan.
A lie.
A game.
He'd lost control of it somewhere.
The rules rewritten,the lie spiralled, no longer comfortable in his hands.
No longer restrained.
BA had seen it. BA had always seen it.
Glass ice cold against his fingertips as he pressed them against the mirror, trying to touch the person he'd become, to see if the madness radiated from every pore in the reflection like it did in the flesh.
He couldn't find his friends.
He scrambled backwards from the mirror, away from pallid flesh, from soulless eyes and a gaping mouth, from reaching hands and tormented screams. From the unrecognisable man before him.
Too many ghosts resided there, in those soulless orbs, bloodied and broken bodies, fire and body bags. Gavels and judgement,Vietnam and firing squads. Voices echoing in his ears, chopper blades buzzing around his brain, and screaming that seemed to never end. Animalistic and raw. Grieving and torn.
Blood pulsating in his ears, throbbing through his skull, a hammer. Never ending pounding. Hannibal, Face and BA's death sentences. Torched villages in Vietnam. One screw up too many, a failure on his part that would never have happened on Hannibal's watch.
Fault. Fault. Fault.
He'd lied so often it had become the truth.
Then blessed relief as his fist made contact, a roar harsh and guttural wrenched from deep within his throat. The memories shattered with the glass, crunching beneath his sneakers.
He sank to the floor, breathing hoarse and ragged, fingers streaming a heavy crimson. Knuckles pained and body taught and trembling from adrenaline and fear.
It had taken him thirty six hours to get from LA to Virginia, to find an apartment, to seek out a job. For the cracks to deepen until he couldn't paper over them alone.
It had taken him fourteen years to fall apart.
To let the darkness that had been stalking his soul since he first touched a Huey, in that blazing pit of Hell, finally catch up with him.
He rested his head against his aching arm and let it claim him.
Surrendered himself to the madness.
