The Avengers might give him crap for it, but Clint really did like perching on random building roofs. It let him really see the city. Gave him some perspective and allow him to clear his head. It beat the hell out of hiding in the vents of Stark’s tower, at least there was a breeze on the roof tops. And occasionally, something would wander across his path.
Clint didn’t hear her at first. His hearing aids might be top of the line Stark tech, but nothing can replace an actual functioning eardrum, so Clint had no idea how long she had been there when he first noticed. She was sitting on the edge of the building, feet dangling into space, empty liquor bottle laying forgotten behind her. She was hunched forward, her strawberry blonde hair falling over her shoulders and shielding her face. Her hands were in her lap, cradling something. A cold weight settled in Clint’s gut as he realised the familiar glint of a firearm.
A single inebriated person with a gun would be no match for the Hawkeye, but Clint’s special super soldier skills told him that this woman was no threat to the people around her tonight.
Clint plonked down next to the woman and eyed the gun in her lap. Her long fingers were resting gently on the grip of the handgun, well away from the trigger. Clint cleared his throat gently, ‘So, come here often?’
The blonde looked up at the superhero, clearly unfazed by the sudden appearance of a short, armed man at her side. ‘Not too often. Good place to think.’
Clint nodded, ‘I do quite like moping on rooftops. I see better from a distance.’
The blonde nodded, but said nothing, tapping the grip of the handgun idly. Casting an eye across the sleepless city, Clint pushed on.
‘So I was mind fucked by an alien demigod, what are you brooding about?’
The woman chewed at her bottom lip, not meeting Clint’s eye, ‘How do you do it?’
Clint laughed, ‘You are going to have to be a bit more specific. How do I do what?’
‘How do you live with yourself?’
Now that threw him for a loop. Clint hesitated and the woman continued, ‘I know who you are, you just told me you got fucked over by Loki and I’m assuming you’ve killed people.’ She looked at Clint and met his eyes, ‘So how do you live with it?’
Clint considered it, ‘To be honest? Sass and keeping busy. If I let myself think about it for too long…’ Clint sighed, ‘Can’t change the past, y’know?’
The woman nodded and returned her gaze to her lap. ‘I don’t know if I can live with it anymore.’
Clint noted that her grip on the handgun tightened. ‘You gotta try sweetheart.’
She cocked an eyebrow, ‘I am NOT your sweetheart.’
Clint offered a shrug and a chuckled apology, ‘No offence intended, but I don’t know your name and I can’t keep referring to you as “sad blonde” in my head.’
The sad blonde smiled gently, ‘It’s Karen.’
Clint smiled and offered a hand, ‘Hi “it’s Karen”, I’m Clint. So, wanna tell me what really brings you up to a rooftop, with a gun and an empty bottle of whiskey?’
Karen’s smile faded, ‘I’m kind of a reporter, I stuck my nose where I was told it didn’t belong and people got killed.’
A few dots lined up in Clint’s brain, ‘Karen, as in Karen Page? Got caught up in the Union Allied thing?’
Karen offered a half-hearted salute in recognition and Clint eyed her shrewdly, ‘There were a lot of very dangerous people tied up in that. You can’t be held accountable for other people’s murders.’
Karen offered a dark laugh, ‘What about my own?’
Clint shrugged, ‘Some people need to die.’
Karen narrowed her eyes at him, ‘How do you know he deserved it? Maybe I am a cold-hearted killer.’
‘Karen, cold hearted killers don’t sit on roofs and wallow in guilt.’
She offers Clint a shrug, ‘The guys I work with, they are all about justice and honour. Matt, he’s a bona fide guilt machine, I don’t know what he has ever done to feel guilty over, but just being around him… I feel like it is killing me slowly. He keeps saying things about how lucky I am that I will never have a reason to feel the guilt that eats some of our clients alive. I can’t be the person they think I am.’
Clint nodded, ‘Yeah that sounds shit.’
The blunt reply shocked a short laugh from the blonde, ‘You are not wrong.’
Clint pieced the information together and made a mental note to track this woman’s friends down and make sure she was cared for.
‘So who’d you kill?’
Karen ran a hand through her hair, ‘One of Fisk’s guys. He had me kidnapped and I shot him in the chest. Several times.’
Clint shrugged, ‘Sounds like a decent response to me. What’s the issue?’
She dropped her head into her hands, ‘If you are killing in self-defence, are you meant to like it?’
‘Ah. Yeah… Depends I guess. I like killing. Not in a “I enjoy watching the light leave their eyes” kinda way, but in a “Threat neutralised” kinda way. Killing a guy who kidnapped you and worked for Wilson Fisk doesn’t really seem like a great loss to the world.”
Karen scrubbed a hand across her face, ‘I just feel like I am in too deep now and I can’t get out. I got my friend killed. I’m putting Matt and Foggy at risk. I’m jumping at shadows and looking for threats around every corner. I’m exhausted. I can’t keep going on like this.’
Clint turned to face the blonde, ‘Look, I’ve been there. You can’t turn it off, you can’t trust anyone. You probably haven’t slept in a month and I’m assuming that that bottle of booze didn’t drink itself. But it passes. The panic fades.’
Karen opened her mouth to respond, but was interrupted when a jarringly loud ringtone cut through the quiet of the night. She sighed and fished a cell phone out of her bra, ‘Yeah Foggy, what’s up? … No, I’m not doing anything… Yeah, I can be there in 20…’
By the time Karen hung up, Clint was gone.
◦O⃝O◦
Karen steeled herself to traverse the streets to the office of Nelson & Murdock. For the millionth time, she wished driving in the city was easier, because walking at night creeped the hell out of Karen, but getting a cab… At least on the streets there were other people around. So by the time the office came into view, her feet were protesting loudly and her stocking had a hole in the back. Foggy was waiting by the front door looking mildly stressed.
‘So, what’s the emergency?’
Foggy sighed and opened the door for his secretary-slash-friend, ‘Apparently, someone broke in, smashed a window and riffled through some stuff. Brent called me to tell me, his guys have already been through. Said it was nothing major, I... Just... didn’t want to check it out alone.’
Karen smiled, ‘Fair. Where’s Matt? Why didn’t he come?’
Foggy’s face darkened, ‘Matt is busy tonight. Couldn’t make it.’
Karen raised an eyebrow, whatever was going on between Foggy and Matt was their business, but it was starting to cut into work. Matt was always late and communication between the partners was stilted at best. Karen opened the door to the reception area. It certainly looked like the place had been gone over. Broken glass from the window, paper all over the place, over-turned chairs.
It was a good thing she never left any of her research laying around.
‘Well, on the plus side, you guys have no clients, so it’s not like there is sensitive info laying around. And since we have no clients, we have no money, which means our computers are from the stone age. Looks like no one bothered to nick those either…’ Karen catalogued the rooms with a careful eye, ‘Is there anything that you can think of that would be worth stealing?’
Foggy huffed out a laugh, ‘Nah, we’re kinda broke and our shit is worthless.’ He paused and glanced over the ransacked desks, ‘Should probably make the place look presentable in case we have clients in the morning.’
Karen tucked her hair behind her ears and dropped her purse next to the desk, self-consciously jumping at the thud that came from the handgun weighing the bag down, ‘Alright, let’s start with the glass…’
◦O⃝O◦
When Clint had taken his leave, he went straight back to the Avengers Tower to grab his ‘blending in, while being ready’ gear. He had already had Jarvis track down Karen’s friend Matt. She had no family in New York, no close friends. From what Jarvis could dig up, it seemed that Karen’s only friends were the two men she worked for. The ones who had cleared her name after she was framed for murder.
It wasn’t hard to track Mathew Murdock down. He was a well-known face in Hell’s Kitchen. Who could forget the son of Battlin’ Jack, tragically blinded and then orphaned? And word of Nelson & Murdock, top graduating lawyers who had chosen to help the poor and down trodden instead of pursing wealth, had spread surprisingly far. So, no, finding Murdock’s apartment had not been hard. What did surprise Clint, was what he found when he got there.
Clint climbed quietly up the fire escape on the outside of Murdock’s building. Halfway up, it occurred to him that in this situation, he probably could have used the door, but where was the fun in that? He found the window to the apartment open, and all the lights were off. Not surprising for an apartment owned by a blind man, but irritating when you relied on sight for basically all of your work.
Clint paused at the threshold and suddenly the relative silence of the night was broken when two men burst into the small living space. One man, Murdock from the build of him, stumbled backwards and fell heavily over the arm of the couch. A taller, more heavily built man stalked forward. His eyebrow was split and bleeding and an impressive bruise was forming over that eye. Clint moved without thinking, rushing into the room to defend the smaller man.
Who the hell beats up a blind guy?
As the intruder (the big one, not Clint. He is a good intruder) leant forward and pulled back a fist, Murdock kicked out and caught the larger man in the jaw. He pushed off the couch in a smooth and efficient motion and bore down on the other man, fists swinging and reacting much faster than someone should without the aid of sight. Clint furrowed his brow and leant against the window frame.
Curiouser and curiouser…
If Murdock didn’t need his help, Clint wasn’t going to offer it. Much better to stay out of the way and not get punched. If he broke these hearing aids again by getting hit in the head, Stark would kill him.
As Clint watched, Murdock gained ground over his opponent, though at some point he must have become aware of a third person in the room, because Clint barely ducked in time to avoid a knife between the eyes. The blade was lodged in the wall, clearly thrown from the kitchen, where the fight was currently drawing to a close. Murdock ended it with swift and judicious use of a cast iron frying pan and the larger man crumpled to the ground.
Clint watched as the supposedly blind lawyer bent to check the pulse of his opponent, appearing satisfied, he straightened and turned toward Clint.
‘So, you with him, or do you want me for something else?’
Clint chuckled, and noticed that Murdock was facing him, but his eyes weren’t meeting his. So the blind lawyer was blind, but clearly hiding some secrets.
‘Nope, not with that guy. No idea what he wants. Here on my own mission.’
Murdock nodded and quickly bound the hands and feet of the big guy with plastic ties he pulled from somewhere. Propping his captive up in a corner, he made his way, surefooted and confident towards Clint.
‘So, if you aren’t with him, who are you and what do you want? Since you watched that little display, you must realise that I’m not going to be an easy target for a robbery.’
Clint smiled, ‘No, I actually wanted to talk to you about your secretary.’
Murdock froze for a moment and then hardened, ‘If you have hurt her, I swear I will make your life hell.’
The cold, calculating ferocity of the blind glare gave Clint pause. And he lived with Natasha ‘I’ll cut you’ Romanov. ‘Trust me. I haven’t hurt her. Just had an interesting chat with her on a roof and I wanted to make sure that she was safe.’
Murdock cocked his head and Clint stifled a laugh. The man looked like a confused puppy.
‘What do you mean “had a chat with her on a roof”? What was she doing on a roof? What were you doing on a roof?’
Clint sat on the window ledged and crossed his arms, ‘I like perching on rooves. It’s what I do.’
Murdock narrowed his eyes, ‘Who are you?’
‘I tell you mine if you tell me yours.’
‘You know who I am. If you found me to talk about Karen, and found my apartment, then my identity must not be a secret to you.’
Clint smiled again, ‘Sure, but “Mathew Murdock, Attorney at Law” doesn’t really cover how you became highly proficient at hand-to-hand combat. Let alone knife throwing.’ He turned to inspect the blade still buried in the wall, ‘At least, I’m assuming that was you?’
Murdock grimaced, but ignored the question, allowing Clint to continue, ‘So since I know basically nothing about you, you don’t get to know anything about me that you can’t pick up from right there.’
Murdock’s mouth twitched, ‘Well from right here… I’m going to guess you are an archer. You smell like feathers, fibreglass and nylon. I’m also pretty sure you are wearing hearing aids. You got in quietly enough that I didn’t pick up on you straight away, and you have a thing for roof tops. Piecing it together, I’m going to assume that I am being graced with the presence of an Avenger.’
Clint’s jaw totally did not hit the floor. He had way more decorum than that. He did, however, make a mental note to have Jarvis run a deeper check on this guy. There was definitely something weird going on and it was basically his duty to get to the bottom of it.
‘Whatever. Not the point. The point is that your secretary is kinda fucked up.’
Murdock cocked an eyebrow and leant against the arm of the couch, mirroring Clint’s position against the window. ‘How do you figure?’
‘I found her sitting on the edge of a building, gun in lap, talking ‘bout not being able to live with the guilt anymore. She looked like she had consumed half a liquor shop. I talked to her awhile, but someone, Foggy? I think? Called and she had to go and meet him at the office. Some emergency.’ Clint stopped and examined the other man. He no longer carried himself with the calm arrogance of someone who knew he’d win the fight. Now he just looked tired.
Murdock ran a hand over his face, ‘Did she say what she was feeling guilty about?’
‘Yeah. She did.’
Murdock’s mouth twitched again, ‘Care to share with the class?’
‘Are you seriously telling me that you have no idea what is going on in your friend’s life?’
‘I’ve been a little busy.’
Clint rolled his eyes, ‘Doing what? Going to Fight Club? One of your friends, who you see every day, is falling apart and you really have no idea why.’
The humorous vibe to the meeting evaporated faster than the other guy hit the floor after a fry pan to the head. Murdock pushed off the couch and began to stalk over to the archer, ‘You have no idea what my life is like. You have no idea what I am dealing with. Once I took down Fisk..’
Clint cut him off, ‘Fisk? He was taken down by the Daredevil…’
Matt basically heard the penny drop in Clint’s mind, he cursed himself for losing his temper.
Clint closed his eyes and huffed out a breath, ‘Ok, fine. You know what? Let’s do this. Great, your life is shit and you are risking life and limb saving the world while trying to keep the people you love safe. Yeah, you are right. I have literally no idea what that is like. I especially have no idea what it is like to have the people I love run head long into said danger because they are stupid and won’t sit and stay safe like I want them to. You are the only one with shit and the only one with a saviour complex. You are totally alone in this and there I no one else who could possibly understand.’
Clint was standing toe to toe with Murdock now, he would be surprised if the other man couldn’t feel the irritation and anger coming off him in waves. ‘There is no point in protecting your friends and family if you let them destroy themselves. Wallowing in guilt like a good Catholic boy won’t help anyone, by it certainly isn’t helping Karen. She is tearing herself apart and you are letting her.’
Murdock was standing stock still. Clint swears the man had stopped breathing.
Then he sighed, folding in on himself slightly, ‘You are right. Fuck. I knew something was wrong. She’s always so jumpy and her coffee always has booze in it… Fuck.’
Clint took a step back and nodded, ‘So go and find her and fix it. Just, this is about her. Don’t spend the entire time apologising. That’s not going to help anyone.’
‘Can you please tell me what she did? I need to know so I can help her.’
Clint paused, he barely knew the woman, but sharing this felt like a betrayal of trust. But sometimes you need help to communicate when shit is really bad, ‘She feels responsible for the death of a friend. Said she pushed him into a situation he wasn’t comfortable with and got him killed.’
Murdock nodded, ‘Yeah, Ben. I know it was Fisk who killed him, but I didn’t know Karen felt directly responsible.’
‘She also killed someone.’
Matt actually looked shocked, ‘What?’
‘She said that someone kidnapped her, and she shot him several times in the chest. Didn’t say who it was though.’
Murdock’s mouth was still open, ‘When the hell did that happen?’
‘How should I know? I only met her one time! She’s your secretary!’
Shaking his head Murdock rubbed his eyes, ‘Ok, ok… I can fix this. I’ll at least make sure that she isn’t a danger to herself.’ He paused, ‘And maybe take the gun and trade it for some mace…’
Clint nodded, ‘I think that’s probably a good idea.’ He turned to leave, but looked back at the lawyer-slash-vigilante, ‘Y’know… If you ever want to chat, you can find me at the tower. Sometimes you need someone who gets it…’
Matt smiled, ‘Thanks. Probably won’t, but I appreciate it all the same.’
Clint nodded and made off into the night.
◦O⃝O◦
Karen was at work on time the next morning. Or, more accurately, she never left after helping Foggy clean up. No professional working woman was without a change of clothes (no one forgives a coffee stain) and a makeup bag and so when 8am rolled around, Karen walked out of the small office bathroom relatively pleased with her appearance. With clean clothes, a hasty sponge down in the sink and a brush of makeup, there is no way Foggy and Matt would be able to tell that their secretary spent the night tucked tightly into the corner of their waiting area. Bottle of something in one hand and the other on her gun.
Truthfully, Karen would rather hole up in the office alone than make the trek across town at 3am. Foggy would have gone with her if she had asked, but the man needed his sleep. Karen was just a secretary, didn’t matter if she was off her game. The firm couldn’t risk screwing up because one of their lawyers was too tired to pay attention in meetings. So she pretended to head towards the subway, and once Foggy was out of view, turned tail and barricaded herself in the office. She didn’t get any sleep, but at least this place had security, unlike her piece of shit apartment.
Mentally, shaking herself, Karen plastered a smile on her face when she heard a key turn in the lock and the door open to reveal Matt Murdock. She immediately made her presence known, shifting in her chair and smiling, ‘Morning Matt, ready for the day?’
Matt smiled, used to, and aware of the way Karen always made sure he knew that she was there. She rarely tried to sneak past him unnoticed, not that she could, but Karen had no idea of his night time activities.
‘Morning Karen,’ Matt paused and sniffed the air, ‘no coffee this morning?’
Karen mentally kicked herself, because OF COURSE Matt would realise that she didn’t have a coffee from the cart on the way to the firm.
‘Nah, not this morning,’ she lied smoothly, ‘decided to cut back on the caffeine. That shit’s not good for you y’know.’
Matt smirked and placed a hand over his heart in fake shock, ‘What? Who are you and what have you done with Ms Page? Are you sure your body can cope with the withdrawal?’
Karen rolled her eyes, ‘Hardy-har-har. Very funny.’
Matt smirked some more as he made his way over to his private office, silently noting the slight smell of bourbon floating through the office and the stale smell of unwashed clothes. As he walked, he determined that the smell was coming from Ms Page and from her oversized handbag. His lips twitched as he pondered this information.
‘Foggy’s going to be in late today I think,’ Karen snapped Matt out of his contemplation, ‘someone broke a window here last night and we were up kinda late cleaning up the broken glass.’
Well that explained the 5 missed calls from Foggy. By the time Matt had finished with The Amazing Hawkeye it had been two hours after the last missed call and Matt had decided it would be better to speak to him in the morning.
‘How come you are here then? And sans coffee no less?’ Matt waited, listening for an uptick in heart rate that would determine the truth or lie in her words.
As expected, her heart sped up slightly, he could hear her breath come more rapidly, but shallower. The smell of bourbon grew stronger.
Karen offered a fairly genuine sounding laugh, ‘Well you know me, I like to be on time. Especially if someone is planning on saving all of Hell’s Kitchen’s poor and underrepresented.’
Matt smiled, gotcha. ‘Of course,’ he replied. Now his suspicions were all but confirmed, it was just about waiting for the right moment to talk.
While he waited, he actually did get some work done, and when Foggy dragged his sorry ass into the building at 11:30am, Matt asked to speak with him. Foggy was unexpectedly angry with him, but then Matt explained about his late-night visitors and this partner in law plopped down on Matt’s desk in shock.
‘So I’m sorry I didn’t get your calls, really, I am,’ Matt concluded, ‘if I had just been out “Daredeviling” I would have answered, but then one of the goddamn Avengers swings through my window and tells me that our secretary is practically suicidal. And then I come in here this morning and she smells like bourbon and if I didn’t know better, I’d say she was here all night.’
Foggy ran a hand over his face, and huffed out a breath, ‘I guess we really didn’t check in with her after all the Union Allied stuff went down. She just seemed to bounce back totally fine and I was so caught up in worrying about you and your nocturnal habits that it never occurred to me that Karen might not be as ok as she looks.’
Matt nodded, ‘It might not have even occurred to her to talk to us, she’s so…’
Foggy smiled, ‘Professional.’ He sighed again, ‘How the hell do we handle this? Did your new Avenger BFF tell you what the main thing causing her issues was?’
Matt grimaced, ‘Guilt. Apparently between her trying to deal with everything alone, and some unfortunate comments we made,’ Foggy’s head snapped up to look at Matt.
‘What comments?’
Matt bit his lip, ‘things about her not needing to feel guilty over anything, not knowing what that would be like, not having to deal with the ghosts of people you’ve caused the death of….’
Foggy’s lawyer brain snapped into gear, ‘Has Karen killed someone? Matt if you know something, you need to tell me so we can help her.’
‘She feels responsible for Ben’s death. Told Hawkeye that she kept pushing for Ben to investigate the whole Fisk thing and that it was that that got him killed.’
Foggy sighed in relief, ‘Well that’s not actually something she can be charged for.’
Matt’s mouth twitched, ‘No, that isn’t.’
Foggy paused again, ‘Why do I feel like there is a huge “but” coming?’
‘Because she told Hawkeye that she shot someone. Several times. In the chest.’
Foggy closed his eyes, ‘Of course she did. Any idea who?’
‘She didn’t give Hawkeye a name, but apparently she was kidnapped and interrogated about UA and Fisk, and putting the pieces together I think she killed James Wesley. Also known as That Guy Who Was Super Shady And Came Here And Offered Us All A Lot Of Money To Never Talk About Union Allied Again.’
‘Right, well he’s been dead for a while now right?’ Matt nodded and Foggy continued, ‘And it was a mob thing, so the police are unlikely to look to hard for a killer, so that’s a positive. Jesus, how long has she been dealing with this alone?’
Matt shrugged, ‘I don’t know. Though I do know that she nearly always smells like some sort of booze. Hawkeye’s guess was that she is drinking to deal with the panic that comes from never feeling safe.’
Foggy was nodding and sighing when Karen chose that moment to get back from her lunch break, sticking her head through the door she smiled at her bosses, ‘Hey boys, what are we talking about?’
Foggy grimaced, while Matt’s face remained a perfectly smooth mask, ‘Karen, Fog and I wanted to have a chat to you about something. Do you want to come in and have a seat?’
Karen’s face fell, ‘I uhhh, I don’t have a choice in this do I?’
Matt smiled sadly, ‘No, I’m sorry, you don’t.’
Matt waited until Karen was seated in the client chair across from him, and Foggy turned his body so he and Matt presented a united front. Karen felt like she was being interviewed by disappointed parents.
Clearing his throat to break the tension, Matt spoke, ‘Karen last night I got a strange visitor to my apartment. He had some very interesting things to tell me.’
Karen’s blood ran cold. She had no idea who Matt was talking about, but her short list of options was not looking good. ‘Uhhuh,’ was the witty reply she could muster.
‘He told me that he was concerned about you, that you were carrying a lot of guilt and were not coping with it very well. He told me that he was worried that you were a danger to yourself and that someone needed to check in on you.’
On Karen’s short list of possible ways this conversation could have gone, this was the worst. Now not only did her BOSSES know that she was a killer, but they were looking at her like she was some wounded animal.
When Karen spoke, it was with more venom in her voice than she intended, ‘Well thank you for your concern, but I am perfectly fine. I don’t need your help. I am handling it.’
It was Foggy who replied, ‘Really? Is that why you were drunk when you showed up here last night, why yesterday’s clothes are stuffed in your handbag and you have been jumping at every little thing? Also don’t think we don’t know you keep a gun in your purse.’ Matt’s head snapped towards Foggy, now he knew where it was, he could get it away from the twitchy woman sitting opposite him.
‘I live in a rough neighbourhood,’ Karen spat back at him.
Foggy rolled his eyes, ‘We all do, hell we work in a rough neighbourhood. This is different, this is new.’
Matt spoke and his voice was gentle, ‘Karen, the man who came to talk to me said that you felt responsible for two deaths. One I am assuming is Ben’s. The only person who should feel responsible for that is the man who killed him. Your actions, whatever they were, did not make Fisk kill Ben Ulrich. The blame begins and ends with him. If Ben’s wife can’t find it in her heart to lay the blame on you, then I cannot believe it is in any way your fault.’
Karen’s eyes were fixed on her knees, in a small voice she muttered ‘you don’t know that…’
‘We do, he does,’ Foggy replied as Matt pushed on.
‘My visitor also told me that Fisk had you kidnapped and you did some things to get out that you are having trouble living with.’ Matt listened to Karen’s body closely, she didn’t move an inch in her seat, though her heart sounded like it was about to burst from her chest.
‘If someone kidnaps you, and holds you at gunpoint, then I think we can happily call that self-defence,’ he turned to Foggy, ‘right?’
Foggy nodded, ‘Right.’
‘We have no intention of mentioning this to anyone, and we both certainly think your actions were more than justified. Though I have to ask, what did you do with the gun?’
Karen seemed to have folded in on herself, knees tucked up to her chest and face buried in her lap, ‘I threw it into the Hudson… I’m pretty confident no one saw me.’
Foggy closed his eyes and thanked the universe for small favours.
‘The other thing that needs addressing is slightly more complex to explain,’ Matt began, earning him a quick look from Foggy. ‘I’m blind, right? And you know how they say that if you lose one sense the others become heightened? Well that is true, at least for me. So, I’ve got an excellent sense of hearing and also of smell.’
Karen’s brow was crinkled, this was an unexpected turn of conversation.
‘Now while this isn’t the same as seeing, it means I get around better than most people think I can. It also means I ‘see’ the world in a different way. In some ways, I see more.’
Confused, Karen interrupted him, ‘While that’s cool, I’m not sure where you are going with it.’
Matt smiled kindly, ‘What I am trying to say is that I can smell when you add spirits to your coffee and I can smell when you were drinking the night before you work and I can definitely tell when you stay overnight in the office.’
All Karen offered was a small ‘Ah.’
Foggy arranged his face into the most understanding expression he could muster, ‘Do you want to tell us what that’s about?’
Matt listened to Karen, how her heart seemed to stutter and she began to sniff and swallow more frequently. How her breaths became wetter and constricted as she wrapped her arms tighter around her knees. Matt stood and walked over to their secretary and crouched in front of her, placing a hand on her foot, ‘If I had to hazard a guess, I’d say that you are on edge all the time and the constant stress is wearing you down to nothing. I’d say that you never feel safe and drinking is the only way to let go for a moment and the only way at all you can sleep.’
Matt heard Karen close her eyes and sniff as a tear dropped from her eyelash and rolled down her cheek. He shuffled closer and Foggy came to stand at her side, hand on her shoulder, ‘Karen we are here for you. We want to help you.’
Foggy rubbed gentle circles on her back, ‘I think it would be best if you stayed with Matt or me for a while. Just until you find your feet again. What do you think?’
Karen lifted her head and bit her lip, ‘I wouldn’t want to impose.’
Both Foggy and Matt laughed, ‘Trust me,’ Matt said, ‘I can’t speak for Foggy, but having you closer would actually make me less stressed. I don’t want to think about you freaking out on your own.’
Karen looked from one man to the other, ‘Only if you are sure. I really don’t want to be a burden on you, but… I can’t stand being on my own at home. Especially at night.’
Foggy smiled, ‘Well then it is settled. How about we all camp out at Matty’s for a few nights and then go from there?’ He looked at Matt for confirmation.
‘I think that would be the best plan.’ And it would give Matt a chance to find out if there was a current threat to Ms Page, and protect her as best he could.
Karen was biting her lip again, ‘I appreciate it Matt, but some of the people I’ve pissed off, they are dangerous. I don’t want to bring that to you. You can’t defend yourself.’
Foggy laughed, ‘Like I could do any better? The Nelsons are not built for fighting.’
Matt smiled even though the unintentional barb stung. He hated when people assumed he was helpless because he was blind.
‘Look, Karen… I’d just feel better if I could keep an eye (yes, yes very funny) on you.’
Karen ran a hand through her hair, ‘I really can’t have anyone else getting hurt because of me.’
‘Trust me, I can handle myself.’
Foggy was the one rolling his eyes now, ‘Matty, just tell her. She probably deserves to know where you sneak off to every other night anyway… And I’m getting sick of keeping your secret.’
Matt clenched his jaw and thought seriously about throwing his best friend out of the window.
‘Matt? Tell me what?’
Matt sighed, ‘So firstly, I AM blind. But the other senses did more than just make up for the vision. I can hear heart beats from an astoundingly long way away and I can kinda use echolocation to get around. And by get around, I mean parkour off buildings.’ Matt was smiling despite himself. Of all the ways, he thought this conversation would go down, comforting his secretary over her murder guilt was not on that list.
‘Uhhhuuuhhhh… Ok… So, what you are saying is….?’
Foggy sighed, ‘He’s the Man in the Mask Karen. I am seriously kicking myself that none of us picked the voice.’
For a second, Matt was worried that Karen’s heart had stopped. She was too still, shock freezing her in place.
‘But I’ve seen him fight…’
Foggy was still talking, ‘Also, why does no one find it weird that the mask covers his eyes, with no eye holes, but not his mouth? Like, it’s a stupid as fuck mask to choose if you rely on sight…’
‘Why didn’t you tell me?’
Matt sighed, ‘Because I didn’t want to put you, or Foggy for that matter, in danger. But since the people who are after you, are the same ones who are after me… There isn’t a lot of point in keeping things a secret anymore.’
Karen’s voice was barely a whisper, ‘No, of course there isn’t.’
Matt placed his hand over her own, ‘The point is, I can look after myself and I can protect you. You won’t be bringing any danger that I don’t already bring to myself and I didn’t want to lie to you.’
Karen was nodding, Matt could hear the slid of her hair over her shoulders.
Foggy clapped his hands and everyone jumped, ‘So, this has been an emotionally draining morning. I suggest that we go to Karen’s and pack her a bag and get settled in at Matt’s. I’ll pick up some ice-cream on the way...’
(Matt totally did not repress a shudder at the thought of ice-cream)
‘… And we can start setting up some solid plans on how to deal with all this. Thoughts? Feelings? Input?’
Both Matt and Karen shook their heads and Foggy grabbed both by the arm and pulled them into a bone crushing group hug. Matt wrapped his arm around Foggy and tucked Karen under his chin, forming a nice Karen sandwich. He whispered, ‘You can always come to us Karen. We are your friends and we will protect you. Please never feel like you can’t turn to us when you get stuck.’
Nodding gently, Karen allowed herself to be squished between the two most caring men she was ever likely to meet. Maybe, just maybe, this would all turn out ok.
◦O⃝O◦
Clint Barton was hiding in the air duct that lead off his room. The air duct always seemed a little larger here, almost like someone had designed it for hiding in. Wouldn’t put it past Stark, sneaky bastard that he was…
‘Mr Barton?’ A smooth english voice interrupted Clint’s musings, ‘Yeah Jarvis? What’s up?’
‘Mr Barton, there is someone in the lobby for you, a Mr Murdock from ‘Nelson & Murdock’. He is insistent that he contact you.’
Clint smiled and dropped out of the vent, ‘Excellent. You can send him up J. I feel like we will be seeing a fair bit of Mr Murdock in the future.’
‘Very good Mr Barton. I shall enter his biometrics into my databanks.’
Clint strode over to the elevator, knowing that the Devil of Hell’s Kitchen would be stepping out any minute.
The doors opened and a well-dressed man in red glasses stepped out, Clint took the fact that he was smiling as a very good sign. ‘So, decided to pay us a visit after all?’
Murdock smiled wider, ‘Well I don’t get to spar with someone worth my time who isn’t out to kill me very often and I thought my workout routine could use a shakeup’
The two men quickly made their way to the gym and Clint noted that when Matt mentioned Karen in conversation, it wasn’t with an overlaying tone of concern, but rather of hope. He smiled and dropped into a fighting stance as soon as they made it onto the padded floor.
‘Now, don’t go easy on me just because I can’t see you,’ Murdock smirked.
Clint rolled his eyes, ‘As if. I know better than to underestimate my opponent.’
Murdock’s smirk turned into a full-blown grin, ‘Well, what are you waiting for then?’
Clint launched himself at the newcomer and quietly resolved to talk to the other Avengers about knocking off the teasing re: his perching habits. Clearly, they were of some use. Not only did he possibly save a life, but he identified the Devil, but more importantly, brought a new human into the Avenger’s training regime.
He’d never grinned so much as he was thrown to the floor by his opponent. The breath rushed out of him, but Matt was already offering a helping hand up. Clint grabbed it and used it to throw Murdock off balance.
‘Let’s go again.’