Disclaimer: the characters and concepts in this story are the property of Marvel and their related affiliates. This is an amateur writing effort meant for entertainment purposes only.
Summary: You know you've got problems when Frank Castle is lecturing you on the importance of friendship.
Or: how Matt's broken leg becomes the least of his concerns.
Warnings: Spoilers for season 2.
Author's Notes: I don't actually have a lot to say about this chapter except that it surprised me. I usually go into writing dialogue with a very specific end in mind; I have to, otherwise characters won't say anything of value. But then something got said that completely derailed what I thought was going to happen. I hope you enjoy it.
Readers, dear Readers, you are wonderful. I love hearing from you. Thank you so, so much for the support! I hope all is well! Cheers.
"There's a drumming noise inside my head
That throws me to the ground…
I swallow the sound and it swallows me whole
Till there's nothing left inside my soul
As empty as that beating drum
But the sound has just begun."
~Florence + The Machine, "Drumming Song"
Chapter Twenty-Seven
After. The after's always unsettling. Dust settles, air clears, fires die down, and Frank takes stock. What's he working with? What's changed? What's next?
Red seems to have the same idea, he's just bad at it. The car drive back to the Bronx is anything but quiet. No more dumbass questions like that one in the elevator. Kid's got practical concerns. But as nice as it is to know that the kid can strategize, or try to, his efforts are aggravating.
"You're sure Sato didn't tell them about your apartment?" Red asks when he's told where they're going. Frank replies that yeah, he's sure, and wants that to be the end of it. He doesn't want to talk about Sato. But Red powers through like he has a fucking quota to meet. "How can you be sure? What are you going to do with the car? How did you find me? Have you spoken to Lantom? Pull over: I want to know if they're following us."
"Calm your shit, Red," Frank says for all the good it does. He checks the rear-view mirror again and sees Harlem's silhouette growing smaller behind them. "We're clear."
Hard to believe with the way Red acts. He's out of the car before it stops to search the apartment parking lot, dodging attempts to herd him inside. Frank gives up and leaves him wandering. Nothing on the rooftop but cold air and moonlight. There ain't no way the ninjas got into the apartment while they were gone, not without repercussions. The building is just as shitty as he left it. So Red can hobble around all he wants until he's sure that for now, at least, they're free.
Frank takes the steps two at a time to his apartment door, gets inside, sets about disarming the place. Unfastening tripwires from the windows and the doorknob. Red's waiting outside on the fire escape by the time Frank finishes. The kid looks harried and haggard at the same time, slouched on his crutches. But he doesn't bother to come inside. He grips the rail, facing down the night. Ready to pounce. Frank exits out the window to join Red for a few moments in the aftermath.
The cold gnashes its teeth, full and furious with, as usual, everything the kid isn't saying. Everything Frank isn't saying. It's too damn hard and useless to shake the feeling that the war's not over, that it's never over. One battle begets another. And that's good. That's grounding. Let's you know you're alive to fight again. But it also leaves people standing on fire escapes waiting for ninjas that aren't coming.
"She isn't going to stop," the kid states in his defence.
Frank hopes this is the last obvious fact the kid wants to voice tonight. Probably isn't. God damn lawyer. "Tell me something I don't know."
The kid doesn't say a thing. There's nothing to say. They both know. Instead, he stands, shivering. Frank does the same. Lying in wait while the night does the same.
Takes for-fucking-ever for him to go inside, and when Red finally does, it's not even by choice. He's got that crumbling look on his face, the stone expression flashing embarrassment, fear, pain. His chin dips intermittently towards his broken leg as his lips curl like he's about to chew the limb off. "Can I have an Aspirin?" he asks quietly.
An Aspirin. One. Singular. And the way he speaks, he's making the tallest order in the world. Even after everything that's happened. Maybe because of everything that's happened. Red doesn't want to ask for more when he's already been given so much.
Frank doesn't want to hear it. He shoves two T3s at the kid with a glass of water and looms until he stops making that fucking face and takes the damn pills.
Whole lot of not-sleeping happens. Frank checks through his most recent text messages, fiddling with the menu to delete the images he finds there. Grainy photos of Elektra's apartment building including the exterior, the foyer, the elevator, and the penthouse floor. The pictures were a clear map of every guard inside her place. All Frank had to do was bring enough ammo; the images led him straight to Red.
He finds the text that preceded them, the one with Elektra's address, and he deletes that too. The name of the sender burns into his retinas. He snaps his cell phone shut and tries to ignore the urge to go back out again. There's no use in starting the hunt, which is precisely why the pictures got sent when they did. But the thought nags that the fight isn't over. If this was any other night, he'd be out there.
Can't leave the kid, though.
Red tosses and turns on his cot. He occasionally sits up, listening hard. Rubbing at his face and hair like a fussy kid about to meet the boogeyman. Frank stops reminding him, "Nothing out there." Not like it's doing any good. Eventually, Red's reserves do give out. That measured breathing he's so fond of settles into a sweeping rhythm. When Frank starts getting up to face the day, the kid's lying on his stomach. His silk sheet spills out from the base of his neck like a cape.
Frank doesn't waste time. He grabs his coat. The stitches on his back pull from the movement, stinging hotly. He leaves the apartment, blue in the pre-dawn glow, expecting Red to wake up from the sound of the door latching, the locks snapping. But the sleepy creaks of the building are the only thing waiting for him on the landing.
He descends the stairs quietly. Heads out the front door and makes a point of checking the fire escape on the way to the car. Nothing. The bathroom window is shut. Front door's locked. Red must really be out.
The neighbourhood is quiet. Frank takes a drive around the block, inspecting the rooftops, window sills, and fire escapes. He keeps his building in view, monitoring its stillness for any signs of life. There aren't any. The ninjas are obviously licking their wounds after having so many of their knees shot out from under them. Red's Girl is going to have them out in full-force, and her next move is going to be harder to predict than her first. But the Bronx is gonna notice a bunch of white-collar ninjas spider-crawling over the walls of their buildings in broad daylight. They got some time, at least.
He parks with his apartment in eyeshot. Whips out his phone. Hits redial.
Karen answers immediately. "How is he?"
"Fine. Sleeping."
She releases a breath. Settles back onto her pillows by the sounds of things. "I wish you called me last night."
Frank's glad he didn't. Red doesn't know of Karen's involvement, and Frank wasn't going to have that fight with the kid waiting for his ex- and her ninjas to bust through the ceiling. Last thing Frank wants to hear is how much danger everybody's in with Elektra around. That he, Frank, should have kept Karen out of this, kept everybody out of this. How Red had this covered by his broken self. Blah, blah, blah.
"He wasn't much for talking," is what Frank says instead. "Sure he'll want to talk to you in a bit."
Karen sees right through that shit. "Yeah, right. He's not going to want to talk to anybody."
She sighs and he feels it: exhaustion. A current of it, flowing under his energy and attentiveness, straight from her through to him. But where hers is from four days of work, Frank's is from the sudden absence of that. He doesn't get tired when he's on a damn job. He gets tired when he isn't. When he comes home from a tour, when the Blacksmith is in pieces, when Red's back in the apartment and the ninjas are down for the count. That's when Frank feels four days of no sleep, chasing leads. Subsisting on Karen's shitty coffee and take-out. Waiting for a barrage of images he couldn't know were coming, so he could shoot his way through a small army of ninjas to leave the queen sitting pretty, planning her next move.
His apartment building is quiet in the distance. A decaying lump of bricks in the pale, autumn dawn. Not a soul in sight.
"What happened?" Karen asks. "Elektra, is she…?"
"Alive." The word leaves a foul taste in his mouth.
"I was going to say 'after him'. Is she still after him?"
Nevertheless, Frank's answer has brought some of life back into her voice. He's glad that she doesn't make him talk about it. "I don't think she ever won't be."
"He can't stay with you forever."
"No." Hell no, fuck no. Frank shifts in his seat, skin crawling from the thought. He's got shit to do. "I told him until he's back on his feet."
Thankfully, she doesn't point out that they're after him; he's well aware. "That could be months."
Don't remind me. "You got a better idea?"
Karen flusters. She doesn't. Even her standby of having Matt come back to Hell's Kitchen falls by the wayside and remains an unspoken wish. "Okay, but what then? He comes back to Hell's Kitchen? Tries to fight a ninja army on his own?"
"What do you think he'd be doing right now, he didn't break his leg?" Christ, sometimes everybody forgets who this kid is, the things he does. Elektra tries to convince him to stay; Karen tries to guilt people into helping him. Meantime Red's doing exactly what he's always been doing, and damn it, there's no stopping stupid once it gets going. "Being here buys him some time. I'm not letting anything else happen to him. Not letting anything happen to his God damn leg."
He mutters the last bit. Doesn't mean to. It's the leg. It's always been about the stupid leg.
White noise buzzes softly between them. Karen is still on the line. He can hear her shuffling around in her blankets, rising to face the day. God damn it, he doesn't want her to ask, but Karen's a dog with a bone. She doesn't stop till she reaches the marrow. "What are you planning on doing?"
"Whatever it takes." What else?
"Does Matt…?" she doesn't know how to ask this question, and neither does Frank. He leaves her to sound it out. Karen, to her credit, realizes she already knows the answer. "Matt isn't going to let you do…what you do."
"He's not going to have a choice."
"Well, what did he say yesterday? I take it you didn't just walk into Elektra's building. She can't have been unguarded."
The images in his phone play through his head. Seven in the lobby. Three in the hallway to the penthouse. A map of carnage straight to the kid. Karen got him to the address, but those texts got him inside.
Frank chases her off: "I took care of it."
"And Matt didn't-"
"He didn't say anything." Except "Thank you. Thank you, Frank, for not killing those fucking ninjas" in so many fucking words.
Karen's disappointment registers through the white noise on the phone. It grates against Frank's eardrums, an ambient, nattering hum. He's struck by that look on her face, the one before he closed himself in with the Blacksmith. The light fading from her eyes, the strength draining from her face. May as well have been her in the shed with him, the way she was torn apart.
Frank bangs a hand on the steering wheel. Oh, Jesus, she's going to hear it from Red anyways. "I shot 'em in the kneecaps."
She has to work her way back into the conversation. "You…left them alive?"
He is not answering that directly. God damn it, this was a mistake. "Even if they weren't last night, they would be by now."
But the line is more tired than he is. Frank's aware of the shift in Karen's mood. The call takes on the same self-satisfied air as the elevator he shared with Red last night. What's more is the lilting buzz coming from her end of the line, one that speaks softly of vindication.
All due respect to Karen, though, Frank needs them to both lay off. It's not gonna happen again. "Fucking ninjas can resurrect themselves. Put one in their head or one in their knees, it's all the God damn same. Besides, I'm getting another chance at 'em."
Karen takes a long time to answer. "I don't know what to say."
"Don't say anything." Don't say a God damn word. Kid's going to wake up and start with the questions again, and for fuck's sake, one bullet, one kill. One bullet, one kill. Not next time, this time. Every time. The second he has a shot, he takes it. "I gotta go. Murdock'll call you later."
"Frank-"
He hangs up on her. The phone is heavy in his hand. He chucks it into the passenger seat – "One bullet, one kill" – and gets the car going – "One bullet, one kill" - and makes another trip around the block before heading home.
Red's on the fire escape when he gets back. Rina is on her way out the front door. She's dressed for work in a rumpled sundress, a blue cardigan hanging loosely from her bony shoulders. Cream-coloured bag under one arm. Her blond hair looks white under the sun. She gives Frank the slightest of waves on her rapid walk past him towards the bus stop. He waves back without looking at her.
"Um, Frank?"
She has mostly stopped in the parking lot. One foot at a time, though, she's inching away from him, no matter how resolute she appears to want to stay in one place. Frank makes out her sharp profile beneath the plaits of her hair. She's giving him the slightest of glances.
"Ma'am?"
Her hand rises between them defensively. "It's none of my business, I'm sorry-"
Frank sighs. "Ma'am…"
The rest of it spills out of her, "-but your brother is on the fire escape, and it's chilly outside, and he's been sick, and he doesn't have a jacket. Or a sweater. And I'm sorry. I thought you should know." She whips around, back towards the bus stop, and practically runs away from him. "Have a good day."
"You too," Frank mutters in her wake.
"Oh."
He looks up, Rina has turned around one more time and is pointing to her head. "He could…" she gestures to her scalp some more before tugging her hands into a polite knot on her stomach. "His hair, it is…" she thinks better of it. Waves dismissively. "Nevermind. Forget it. I'm sorry. Good day."
Frank shoots a glance between the fire escape and Rina's retreating form. He gives his mind a minute to quit sputtering. Lets go of the one bullet, one kill thing; the stuff about Red's ex; that proud silence on the phone with Karen that sounded too much like reclamation; Rina's concerns about Red and how they're his concerns now even though it's the leg. It's supposed to be about the fucking leg.
He marches up the fire escape stairs to find Red there in sweats and a t-shirt, leaning against the rail. Crutches at his side. Hair in disarray. "I'm not cold," he says by way of greeting. Because of course he could hear Rina. His brow furrows. "Everything alright, Frank?"
Guess it isn't just Rina he's hearing. "Quit listening to my heart." Frank dips into the open window, stalking through his bathroom all the way to the far side of the apartment. He's almost at the punching bag before he circles around, scrubbing at his head. At the one bullet, one kill that took Frank Castle away. Red's in the bathroom window when Frank looks back.
"What is it, Frank?"
"Told you to stop listening to my heart."
"I don't have to listen to your heart to know something's wrong. Where were you this morning?"
"Don't. Don't do that, Red."
"Do what?"
As if he doesn't know what the fuck he's doing. As if he has no idea. God damn it, no. Frank can't. He walks to the kitchen. He shoves and slams and prods until the coffee's brewing, hoping it'll end the conversation.
The counsellor makes his way to the living room to continue. He's gearing up for a real defence by the sounds of things. Frank gets himself geared up too. Fucking lawyers.
"I'm sorry, Frank."
That gets him. Gunfire and explosions light up inside Frank's skull. He rounds the corner, charging the kid. "What the hell did you say?"
"I'm sorry."
The words make as much sense as the sickening crater blasting open in Frank's chest. It's D-Day inside him, everywhere. Sand and blood and bullets, and it takes everything, fucking everything, to hold himself together while his body tears itself apart. "What the hell do you mean? What the hell do you mean, you're sorry? Sorry for what, Red? You're sorry for catching that ceiling on your leg? For finding the doc that sold you out to your ex? For almost dying more God damn times than I can count-"
"Yes, Frank! I'm sorry! I'm sorry for all of it!"
"You take that back, Red."
"I'm not going to take that back."
He advances towards he kid, closing that last little bit of distance. It doesn't feel close enough. There's no getting closer than he already is. "You take it back!"
Red doesn't flinch. Doesn't buckle. He rises to his full height, perfectly at home at the mouth of a loaded gun. "I'm not going to take that back!"
Frank pulls back, pacing. He's got trenches running through his limbs and his chest is No Man's Land and it's blaze of glory time but the only thing getting shot are fucking kneecaps and that's unacceptable. Unacc-fucking-ceptible. These ninjas get a tomorrow, as many tomorrows as they God damn please. Red should be happy. He should be gloating. Instead, he's apologizing.
Said it before, Frank'll say it again: "You're an idiot, Red."
The kid nods. Accepting. "Yeah, I know."
Why isn't he fighting back? "An idiot, Red."
More nodding. "Yeah."
Frank spells it the fuck out for him. "You're apologizing to me for saving my life."
Red gives a small toss of his shoulders. "Apologizing for messing up your life, actually," he offers.
"You're not making any fucking sense. Messing up my life…" Frank finally says it out loud, the thing that has him burning. "You got me doing exactly what you've wanted."
That thought does not seem to have crossed Red's mind. "I've put you in danger. Brought you into this."
Frank balls his hands into fists. "I brought you into this."
The tendons in Red's arms twitch to attention. He isn't making fists, but he can be any time. "I should have made you take me to the hospital."
"Got your ass captured by ninjas sooner."
"Saved you from having your ass kicked by ninjas."
"Oh, and left me to kill Fisk. Didn't think about that, did you, Red?"
The way he sidesteps that talking point is the only answer Frank needs until Red states, "You don't want me here, Frank."
Frank scoffs, fists unclenching. He drifts out of Red's orbit. "You don't want to be here."
"I'm sorry."
The shelling inside Frank goes quiet suddenly, and he finds himself listening. Really listening. His brain connects the dots from Red's initial "I'm sorry" to "You don't want me here" to finally "I'm sorry", and Frank has to retreat. He wanders back into the kitchen. The distance is necessary, a relief even, because Red repeats himself, "I'm sorry, Frank."
"Shut up, Red."
Miraculously, the kid does as he's told.
Frank grips the edge of his countertop and pulls until the bundles of energy knotting up his shoulders finally gives. He nabs the coffeepot, pours himself a cup, dodging the onslaught of things he doesn't want to think about. Shit about as useless as Red's apology and twice as hard to shake.
He comes back to find Red still standing there, waiting. The words finally come to Frank then. "Got nothing to be sorry for, Red."
"Frank-"
"Wouldn't be here if it wasn't for me."
"I decided to push you out of the way. I re-broke my leg. I wouldn't have gotten an infection if-"
Frank stops him before he can get to the parts with the ninjas. "Apologizing make you feel better?"
"I want to make this right."
"Does apologizing make this right?"
Red's brow furrows. He looks so young, too young. Frank never wants him to take off his glasses again, especially when he rolls his eyes in miserable defeat. "No."
"Then stop. You make this right by getting better. Keeping your girl off my ass till you are."
"She's not-"
"Yeah, yeah: not your girl." Frank takes a drink of coffee. Jesus Christ, that's not the point. "You get back to what you do, I get back to what I do-"
"You don't have to go back."
The rage is knotting up in his shoulders again. Frank dismisses it. No use throwing punches over shit like this. He knows who he is. "I never left. That shit last night isn't me, see? Put on a good show, is all. And the show's over."
Red starts looking like a grown-up again. Worse than a lawyer. He's got the resoluteness of a priest. "I don't believe that."
"I don't care what you believe."
Frank finishes his coffee. Heads back to the kitchen for another. Gonna be a long fucking day. Red's eye roll – incredulous this time – nips at his heels.
"You got your ass kicked for me."
The slash on his back flares into a fresh burn. "Didn't get my ass kicked."
A laugh, a light one. "You got your ass kicked."
Frank isn't going to waste a punch on that shit neither. "They worked me over a bit."
The kid smiles knowingly. "I've gotten my ass kicked enough to know it on other people."
"Well, those senses of yours are misfiring, you sense one on me."
"Your dressings need changing."
"I'll do it later."
"My dressings need changing," Red sighs, loathe to admit this next bit, "And I can't do that myself."
Frank comes to the doorway of the kitchen again. He's being played, he must be, and that alone almost sends him packing. But Red's got his head bowed, his shoulders curled. He's on the defensive. Manipulation really isn't his style.
The anger Frank's been holding onto drains out of him cautiously. He says it again to himself: manipulation really isn't the kid's style.
He sighs, nodding. "I'll get the kit."
Happy reading!