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i.
“…I see you made a friend,” Foggy says when he answers a knock at his door and finds Matt leaning heavily against a large man who is definitely a superhero. You cannot have that many muscles and not be a superhero, Foggy is pretty sure it’s a law.
Foggy should probably be a little more concerned about the fact that Matt doesn’t seem to be able to stand up on his own, but he is alive, conscious, and not bleeding openly so Foggy is going to count it as a win.
“I think he’s concussed,” the man—Jesus, he is like two feet taller than Foggy, where did Matt find this guy—says helpfully.
“Of course he is,” Foggy says, stepping back to allow them in. “What else is new.”
“I resent that,” Matt says, but there is a little slur to his words that sets Foggy’s injured!Matt senses off and proves his point. Foggy doesn’t even bother responding verbally, just rolls his eyes as the mystery muscle man basically carries Matt over to the couch. (Seriously, Matt’s feet definitely leave the ground, and Matt is usually like a cat that hates being carried and will violently claw anyone who tries, so Foggy knows that he is not okay.)
Muscle-man settles Matt gently on the couch, careful not to jostle him. “What happened?” Foggy asks.
“I think he was mugged,” the man says. He has this honest, earnest expression and Foggy could almost buy him being just a good Samaritan helping the poor injured blind guy home if he didn’t know Matt’s track record for accepting help from anyone, much less a stranger.
“Uh huh,” Foggy says. “Matt, how hard did you hit your head? Oh, and who are you, by the way?” he adds, because that’s maybe a question he should ask.
“Luke Cage,” the man answers, while Matt frowns.
“Hard,” Matt finally says and Foggy sighs.
“Thanks Matt, I appreciate the thorough answer. Do I need to call Claire?” he asks. Then he registers what the other man said. “Wait did you say Luke Cage. Like, the Luke Cage?”
“Yeah,” Luke says.
“What’s Claire going to do for a concussion?” Matt scoffs.
“Make sure you don’t die?” Foggy replies, even though Matt probably has a point. He’s a little distracted though, because Luke Cage, bulletproof hero of Harlem is standing in his living room and that is awesome. He stares at Luke for a long moment, then very carefully reaches out and pokes his arm.
Luke stares at him, apparently not knowing the proper reaction in this situation is.
“Sorry,” Foggy says to him. “Sometimes I need to verify that my life is real.”
From the couch, Matt groans. “Foggy, did you just poke him.”
“I plead the fifth,” Foggy shoots over his shoulder. To Luke he says, “So, thanks for saving my best friend’s stupid ass, would you like a drink?”
ii.
There is something about Hawkeyes and dumpsters, Foggy thinks, eyeing the lump of person half buried in the dumpster behind their office. It’s the color that gives the identity away—that shade of atrocious, eye-searing purple can only belong to a Hawkeye. Hell, Matt is blind and he can probably still sense the color somehow. Maybe he can taste it, what does Foggy know.
Now he’s wondering what the color purple would taste like, and the Hawkeye still hasn’t moved.
Really, Foggy thinks as he casts around for something long and pointy, he should just start carrying around a stick to poke people with. A cane or an umbrella, something that he can incorporate into his look. Foggy Nelson, professional superhero poker. He’ll write up business cards with that as his title.
There is a broken paint stirrer sticking out of the dumpster, so Foggy grabs it and prods at the Hawkeye. “Hey, Hawkeye, you alive?”
He gets a groan back and then the trash shifts enough for him to see black hair, confirming that it’s the other Hawkeye. Foggy gives her another poke, this one to her calf, and she emerges from the pile of trash enough to look at where she is, look mournfully at him, and say “ew.”
“Yeah,” Foggy agrees. “I mean, it’s better than the ground I guess, but you guys really need to stop aiming for the dumpsters. I can’t imagine what your dry cleaning bills are like.”
“Horrific,” Hawkeye number two (or is she number one and Clint is number two?) confirms. “I don’t suppose you want to give a girl a hand?”
Foggy eyes her warily. “I’ll give you a hand but not if I have to climb into the dumpster. I have people that I call for that kind of thing, that is not in my job description.”
She grins. “Fair enough. How do I get one of those?”
“Ten years and not nearly enough tequila for the amount of bullshit I encounter, there have to be perks at some point. Let’s get you out of there.”
iii.
“Your ex-girlfriend is either unconscious or dead in our office,” Foggy says flatly.
There is a loaded silence. “…Which one?” Matt finally asks.
“The fact that you have to ask that question means you need to think about your life choices,” Foggy says.
Matt makes a pained sound that is not a disagreement and Foggy looks around for something long to poke her with. He does not want to be within arm’s reach and he knows it, but he still needs to make sure she’s actually alive. He thinks she is. He’s pretty sure.
Like, eighty percent.
“Do you have more than one ex that’s a ninja?” Foggy asks.
“Does Natasha count?” Matt asks, and then adds “do not poke her.” Foggy looks guiltily at the broom in his hand. “You were about to, weren’t you,” Matt says. He sounds resigned. Foggy knows the feeling. “Jesus Christ, Foggy, she will snap off your finger and shove it down your throat before you know what happened.”
“I was going to poke her with a broom, come on Matt, I’m not an amateur. How am I supposed to tell if she’s alive otherwise,” Foggy defends.
Matt says some words that he is definitely going to have to do penance for later and hangs up. Foggy assumes that means he is on his way and takes a seat at Karen’s desk, eyeing Elektra warily. She is not to be trusted, Foggy has known this since they were in college and Matt came home from his first date with her looking like a cat doped up on catnip. She’ll probably wake up like a zombie or a movie monster, silently appearing behind him with a knife or something. Hell, she might be a zombie, Foggy is really not clear on the details, and he doesn’t actually want to find out.
(She wakes up about five minutes before Matt gets there, sitting up like the freaking undead, and Foggy flails enough that he knocks over the chair. Elektra is still sniggering when Matt gets there.)
iv.
“This is complete bullshit, Castle,” Foggy says when he finds the Punisher crumpled in a bloody heap in the alley next to his favorite Chinese restaurant. “You’re not even a superhero, you’re just a dude with guns and bad ideas, wake the hell up.” It has been raining off and on for three days now, leaving the city soggy, so Foggy has his umbrella in his hands. He has taken to carrying a long one these days, for occasions like this that he has given in to the inevitability of. Foggy prods at the Frank Castle’s foot almost angrily. “Come on, you’re leaving bloodstains on their wall and you attract bad things, Mr. and Mrs. Liang make the best eggrolls in the city and they do not need this kind of shit from you.”
At another prod, Castle groans, then coughs painfully, the sound rattling in his chest like gunfire. Foggy jumps back a few paces, out of punching range, ready to dart around the corner if he sees a gun. Instead, Castle’s eyes open blearily, narrow at him, and then close again. “You gonna brain me with an umbrella?” he asks roughly.
“Thinking about it,” Foggy answers truthfully.
Castle bares his teeth in a grin that comes across more as a bloody grimace. “You’re a sucker for damsels in distress, aren’t you Nelson?” he asks, trying to lever himself to his feet and making it only part way up the wall.
“Like you’re a damsel,” Foggy scoffs. “Oh, just stay down, you are making a pathetic attempt right now, really it’s painful to watch. I’ll call for help.”
“No cops,” Castle says, and it would be threatening if Foggy thought he could do anything more than lift a pinky at the moment. Foggy rolls his eyes.
“Yeah, yeah, I know the drill, it’s not my first rodeo, Castle.” He pulls out his phone and hits the speed-dial for Matt.
“Did you remember the extra eggrolls?” Matt asks when he answers on the second ring. “Karen’s going to steal yours if you didn’t, you know she will—“
“If you want eggrolls I need you to come collect your trigger-happy friend from the alley outside Liang’s,” Foggy says, cutting him off. “Honestly, I would just leave him here but if anyone else sees him they’re going to call the cops and that’s just going to be an even more unnecessary delay in us eating food.”
Matt sighs. “Frank?”
“Yep.”
“Don’t antagonize him. If he shoots you before I get there it’s not my fault,” Matt says and hangs up.
Foggy glares at the phone and then at Castle. “If you shoot me I really will brain you with the umbrella,” he warns.
Frank rolls his eyes. It looks like it hurts. “I’m not going to shoot you. Probably.”
“See, things like that are why you have no friends,” Foggy says.
v.
The proper way to greet an American icon is probably not “holy shit, you’re Captain America.”
Then again, it’s not every day that an American icon crashes to the ground about three feet from you.
It is every day that Manhattan gets attacked by something though, really Foggy should have known better, nothing good happens in Manhattan.
“Yeah,” Captain America agrees from the ground, and then groans in a way that sound painful. Foggy rushes to his side.
“You okay man?” Foggy asks, which is a stupid question because he just got thrown fifty feet by a—is that Doombot? Of course it is, it’s a Tuesday, everyone knows Victor Von Doom likes to try and take over the world on Tuesdays—he may be a superhero but that’s still gotta hurt.
“I’m fine,” Cap says, but that fact that he’s still on the ground suggests that he might be lying. He groans and pushes himself up. “You need to clear the area, it’s not safe—“ he says, staggering to his feet.
“Whoa,” Foggy says, because there is a significant chunk of metal sticking out of Captain America’s side. Then, “whoa, whoa, okay I got you buddy,” as Captain America’s knees buckle and he drops straight back towards the ground. Foggy catches him before he falls, helps ease him down onto the street.
“I’m fine,” Cap says again, but he winces as he says it. “Go, it’s not safe—“
“I mean, I’m not disagreeing with you, Captain,” Foggy says, “I’m really not, you are one-hundred percent correct about the safety thing, but I’m also not going to just leave you here.” He glances down the street in time to see Iron Man nearly crash into a building and recover at the last second. Not exactly reassuring, but at least there is nothing moving towards them. Foggy bends his head to look at the wound, prodding gently around the edges. “I don’t think it’s too deep, but I’m a lawyer, not a doctor, what do I know.”
“It’ll heal, it’s fine,” Cap says. “I have to help them,” he adds and makes to climb to his feet again.
Foggy keeps him down with a hand on his chest. If there is one thing he’s good at, it’s keeping wayward superheroes from running off to injure themselves more. For at least five minutes, anyway. “I think they’ve got it, Captain,” he says, because there was just an explosion down the street and he’s pretty sure the Doombot is now in five or six pieces. “Also, you’ve got like part of a car hood in your side, you should probably not be punching things right now.”
Cap sighs in a very Matt-like way that means both you’re probably right and I would gleefully ignore you if you weren’t here. “Thank you,” Cap says after a moment. “For helping.”
Foggy grins. “Any time, Captain.”
It’s barely another minute before a red-headed figure is heading their way, tired and covered in dust but otherwise unruffled. “Hello Foggy,” the Black Widow says.
“Hi Natasha,” Foggy replies. Yeah, he’s on a first name basis with the Black Widow, he’s cool.
“You two know each other?” Cap asks. Natasha crouches down next to him, looking over his wound with a critical eye.
“Mr. Nelson here has a talent for finding stray superheroes,” she replies. “Medical’s on the way, Cap.”
“It’s not a talent,” Foggy protests. “They find me, not the other way around.”
Natasha smirks at him. “Whatever you say.”
vi.
Foggy’s head hurts.
He’s not sure where he is, and his head hurts, and the last place he remembers wasn’t great so Foggy is not really a fan of the whole opening-his-eyes thing at the moment, but he’s pretty sure there is a pillow under his head so at least that’s an improvement.
He makes himself open his eyes. He still has no idea where he is, there is a super unhelpful white ceiling over him, but it is also definitely not the cracked concrete ceiling of his previous unwanted residence, so Foggy is counting it as a victory. He lifts his head up a little—ow—and lets out a breath he didn’t know he was holding.
Matt is crumpled in a chair at his bedside, bent forward with his cheek pillowed against Foggy’s stomach. His glasses are off, folded neatly on the table near Foggy’s head, and he is fast asleep. From the downturn of his mouth and the crease of his forehead it isn’t an easy, peaceful sleep, and from the way he doesn’t even twitch when Foggy moves, he must have been exhausted.
Foggy considers leaving him asleep for half a second, then prods Matt’s cheek with his finger.
Matt goes completely still, then sighs. “Hey,” he says. His voice is sleep rough.
“Hey,” Foggy says, and winces.
Matt jackknifes upright. “What’s wrong?” he demands, “what hurts?”
“Headache,” Foggy says. “Where the hell am I?”
Matt gives him an almost sheepish smile. “Avengers Tower.”
Foggy stares at him. Looks at the ceiling over his head. Looks back to Matt. “You called the Avengers?” he asks. He certainly does not screech.
Matt glowers at him. “You got kidnapped,” he says flatly.
Yeah. It’s a thing that happened, it wasn’t great, Foggy is really glad that it’s over with. “I’m okay,” he says. He’s not sure if he’s trying to convince Matt or himself.
Matt lays a hand on Foggy’s arm. “You’re okay,” he says.
Foggy squints up at him. “How many days did you not sleep?” he demands.
“Two,” Matt says, trying for an innocent look. Foggy remains pointedly silent until Matt sighs and says, “four.”
“Go to sleep,” Foggy says.
“I was until someone poked me,” Matt says. He’s not actually complaining. He sits back down, slumping in the chair.
“Don’t you have a bed somewhere? This is Avengers Tower, are you telling me that Tony Stark doesn’t have more than one bed?”
Matt scoffs. “You got kidnapped and you honestly think I’m leaving your side? Clearly, you are not to be trusted alone.”
“It was so not my fault,” Foggy protests. Then, softer, “we’re in the safest building in the city, Matty, I’ll be fine if you go sleep in an actual bed.”
“This building gets attacked at least once a week,” Matt says incredulously.
“You know what I mean.”
“Nope,” Matt says, and flops forward so that he’s half on Foggy’s bed again, smushing his face into Foggy’s stomach. “Don’t get kidnapped,” he orders, and closes his eyes.
“I’ll do my best,” Foggy says dryly, and follows Matt’s example.
+
(The next time Foggy wakes, it is to Matt poking him with a spatula.
“I need you to get up, Captain America is worried about you and the Avengers are trying to make me have breakfast with them.”
“What,” Foggy says, because what has happened to his life.
“Thor likes pancakes, apparently,” Matt says, as if that explains anything.
“What,” Foggy says again.
“Up,” Matt orders. “I think Natasha is trying to recruit me, I need a lawyer.”
“You are a lawyer,” Foggy reminds gently.
“Then I need a better one,” Matt says, and makes a flapping up, up motion with his hands.
Foggy gives up and heaves himself out of bed. “You did say pancakes, didn’t you?” he asks, as his stomach growls accordingly.
Matt grins. “I did.”
Okay then. Breakfast with the Avengers, that’s a thing that is going to happen in his life. At this point, Foggy is just going to roll with it.)