Daredevil and CSI: Miami don't belong to me.
A Time For Healing
Father Lantom eyed the two men who were seated in the church. They were so similar yet so different. Both were bloody and hurt, yet they seemed satisfied, like they had accomplished something and much as Father Lantom was loath to admit it and much as he hated their methods, some of the time, he couldn't deny that they had.
He looked at the older man. Lt. Horatio Caine; the CSI had relocated to Miami and was head of the crime lab there, yet he was back in his parish, with his bloody hands and his face all battered. Horatio's head was hung, as if he weighed down by it and he was looking at his bloodied hands. Father Lantom wondered if the fight had taken place in New York or he'd come all the way from Miami with the blood on his hands.
Father Lantom shook his head and eyed his younger parishioner. Matthew Murdock had stiffened when Horatio had entered the church and Father Lantom had thought that he would leave the church but after a few seconds, Matt had settled back into the pew and gazed unseeingly at the altar. Matt was dressed in black as he usually did when he went out at night, his clothes were torn and he had a nasty wound on his side, his face was half-exposed, the mask that usually covered it was torn and there was blood all over his face.
Father Lantom stood up and went to get them some coffee; like he had told Matt, the coffee was quite good.
Horatio didn't look up when Father Lantom approached him.
"Horatio," Father Lantom said, "it's nice to see you."
"Yes," Horatio whispered.
"Have you met Matt Murdock?" Father Lantom asked.
Horatio lifted his head and looked at the bloody young man sitting in the pew opposite the one he was sitting in.
Father Lantom laughed. "Matthew Murdock meet Lt. Horatio Caine."
Matt smiled, although it hurt him to do so. "That must have been some fight, Lieutenant."
"I could say the same for you."
"Did they deserve it?" Matt asked him. He sometimes wondered about why he did what he did.
"They sure did," Horatio said.
"But you have doubts, don't you?" Matt asked.
"Doesn't everyone?" Horatio asked. "Did yours deserve it?"
"They killed a woman and took a little boy," Matt said, "all to get to me and they succeeded."
"Yet you are still here," Horatio told him.
"Yeah, well," Matt shrugged, "they underestimated me."
"They always do," Horatio agreed. "They always do."
The three men sat in silence, each of them lost in thought.
"A mother was trying to manipulate her son into killing her," Horatio said. The case had almost made him lose his head.
"So how did you get those bruises?" Matt asked him.
"I got into a fight with the father," Horatio admitted, "we had differing views about how the situation should have been handled."
"Is he alive?" Father Lantom asked inspite of himself.
"He is," Horatio admitted, "although not because of anything I did." He looked at Matt properly for the first time since he'd entered the church. "You're the one they're calling the devil of Hell's Kitchen aren't you?"
Matt started. He was the one supposed to be pretty good at figuring people out and he wasn't used to that happening to him.
"Don't worry," Horatio told him, "I'm good at seeing things that other people miss."
"So am I," Matt muttered.
"What I can't figure out is how you do it," Horatio said.
"What do you mean?"
"You're blind, aren't you?" He just stated it; no apologies, pity or any of the unease that Matt usually heard accompanying that statement.
"Yes."
"So, of course, your other senses are heightened," Horatio said, "but the way you fight, I've heard stories, it's unnatural."
"Don't tell me you're a fan," Matt replied, "most law enforcement officers aren't."
"I don't like your methods," Horatio admitted, "but they work and I must say I sometimes wish I could operate like you do."
"No, you don't," Father Lantom contradicted him. Horatio nodded in agreement, much as he wanted to take down all the bad guys and save innocent people, he couldn't fight like Matt Murdock, in fact he wondered how long Matt would be able to keep fighting on his own. Suddenly, he was very glad that he had a team to support him.
"Do you do everything on your own?" he asked Matt.
"Pretty much," Matt said.
"Surely you have other people you depend on," Horatio probed, "apart, from Father Lantom."
"I have a nurse," Matt admitted, "She fixes me up."
"A nurse's good," Horatio nodded. "You must be keeping her busy, anyone else?"
Matt turned to Father Lantom. "Did you bring Lt. Caine here to lecture me?"
"No," Father Lantom denied immediately. Matt nodded; he could tell from the priest's heartbeat that he wasn't lying. "But he's right. You need help."
"I'm thinking of getting people to help me," Matt lied. There was no way he was letting any of friends be sucked into the darkness that was his life.
"You don't need people to help you fight," Horatio told him, "you need people to help you heal and live." Even as he said that, Horatio smiled to himself, he was going to invite Marisol for dinner; he had been putting it off, telling himself that it was too complicated but now he decided that those were just excuses. It wasn't complicated. It was life.
"You're smiling," Matt told him, "you're thinking of someone special."
"I am," Horatio admitted.
"You're right," Matt sighed and smiled, "I need to include people in my life, not exclude them."
Father Lantom smiled. He thanked God that these two troubled souls had been able to find solace in his house; that he had been there for both for them.
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