Chapter Text
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i. Matty
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Fogwell's not stupid, and he knew Matty and he knew Matty’s Daddy, so he knows that something isn’t quite right with Matty when he comes back.
Matty’s 19 when he comes back to Fogwells, days before he’s going off to his fancy college because he’d always been the smartest of Fogwell’s boxer’s kids. He’d been the one with the type of tongue that got you punched, and the attitude that made you think that maybe he somewhat deserved it.
But 19-year-old Matty is tall and thin and gaunt, and he’s the ghost of Jack, who came to Fogwell’s side when he was 17 and angry with the world. Fogwell had thought the boy had been a bit of a nuisance back then, with his anger and the Devil his Ma saw in him, but next to Matty, he’s a fucking saint.
Matty plays dirty and punches harder than everyone else. There is nothing sacred about a fight to him; kill or be killed, or some shit. Sure, he’s blind, but he’s one of the best Fogwells seen in a long while, and the little prick knows that the men he fights will be too busy seeing their dead friend in this boy's eyes to even think about questioning where he learned or how he does what he does. Almighty God, that boy is going to be one hell of a lawyer one day, Fogwell tells his misses. She just clicks her tongue and says he’s too skinny for his own good.
Matty disappears after college, coming back once in a blue moon. He starts at Columbia; Jack’s old boxer buddies all wept when they learned that Matty had gotten into Columbia, (An Ivy League, Bill! Our Matty’s going to an Ivy League!) And he starts to look…alive. Better. Happier. A shine comes into his eyes, like the one that Jack got when he saw pretty girls or an opponent he knew he could beat the daylights out of.
And Matty’s so damn smart, so he graduates at the top of his class and starts his own firm. Fogwell wants to clap him on the back and tell him he’s proud of him, but he remembers doing that to a 17-year-old who had nothing but a Catholic mom, three young siblings at home, a sister who hated him because her big brother was dead, and two older siblings who were off making the Murdock name a warning. He remembers that all, that mess of a goddamn family and how it’s ruined so many people, and he holds back.
Something is…not quite right with Matty, though. He comes in late at night, well after hours, and sometimes Fogwell’s still there, so he’ll watch the boy who turned into a man fight like he’s got nothing to lose. (Because he thinks he doesn’t. That boy’s fucked in the head, and Fogwell knows it.) He lets out the Devil onto those bags, and Fogwell doesn’t know what exactly is going on, but he knows there were nine years where Matty was off his radar. Nine years is a hell of a lot of life where anything could happen, where a boy can become a ticking bomb.
Cause that’s what Matty’s become, isn’t it? Fogwell can see the timer behind his dumb smiles, stupid blind jokes that make everyone uncomfortable but make him laugh like his daddy isn’t dead, and his incorrigible desire to flirt with every soul who had the displeasure of crossing his path. There’s a bomb in that boy. And it’s waiting just below the surface to blow.
Then, Matty is in trouble. Matty is getting hurt. Matty is angry, more than Jack ever was. If Jack was angry, Matty is fury incarnate. Jack, who was dealt losing cards from day one, but still managed to carve out something good in his life. Jack, whose big brother died, and whose baby sister thought it was all his fault because he’d always been the angriest of them all. Jack, who knew that he deserved better, but never let it be his crutch. Jack, who knew how to deal with anger, both in and outside of the ring. Sure, it was with violence, but it worked, didn’t it?
But Matty doesn’t know how to do that. Matty is angrier than Jack ever was, and Fogwell can see it in the lean muscles, the tense jaw, the red glasses that hide his beautiful blue eyes that will never see the sky again. Matty is angry and it’s all he knows how to be, and it’s hurting him. Matty is worrying Fogwell, an old man known for tough love.
Matty has been angry for years. He’s lost everything, and Jack comes from a family of pussies who can't even look into their blood and see that one of their own is scared and alone and in a lot of pain because Murdock’s either love or fear god, and the ones who fear him are the ones who don’t talk to little Matty. He’s born of sin, but he’s also alone with very little left. Fogwell almost has it in himself to be angry that they didn’t try when even he did, fighting tooth and nail for Matty to be under the roof of someone who wasn’t scared away by stories of the Murdock boys and their fists that moved faster than their brains.
Trouble is stirring, and Fogwell knows it. The old men, the ones who are first-generation Irish-Americans, the ones whose parents came from the homeland with nothing but their children, the Lord, and their love for the Motherland in their hearts, they’re the ones smoking and talking about it. There's a storm on the horizon, they say, and blow a ring of smoke up into the dying fall air. Old Irish men: the prophets of the new age. Who would have thought?
Fogwell’s the only one who knows that Matty is at the heart of the storm. Because Matty, bright-eyed Matty who could read books faster than anyone else Fogwell knew, who was a self-sacrificial martyr, who was a little shit with a quick grin that was easy on the eyes, was the man in the mask. The misses spoke for five minutes about the man, and Fogwell just knew. He looked at those photos and saw the familiar cut of shoulders, and knew.
Matty is in deep. Matty is being called a terrorist. Matty is in trouble. But Fogwell knew better than to stop a Murdock when the devil was in them or when they were stalking forward, their prey the only thing on their mind. So, he keeps his door unlocked, and lets Matty come and go as he pleases, letting the boy do what everyone's been trying to ignore he can do; He lets the boy fulfil his old croon of a Grandma’s prophecy and lets the Devil out.
Daredevil, they call him soon enough. Hero, Vigilante, Saviour. Some think he’s Lucifer himself, and Fogwell scoffs at the notion, remembering a pretty nun and the sound of Matty praying softly as he wrapped his hands in rope. Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners now, and at the hour of death… The name feels both right and wrong, but Matty is the same. He’s a good, righteous kid, who is not quite right, and who's got the devil in him.
Fogwell knows that the Devil ain’t what they all think, because he’s just a kid who lost everything. But he isn’t sure that the Devil is okay, because honest to God, Matty doesn’t ever look right.
Fogwell comes in one morning, right before dawn, right before others will start coming by for an early morning workout, and there Matty is, sitting crossed-legged on the mat, wrapping his hands in gauze that's slick with blood. Next to him, his cowl sits abandoned, the red lenses casting light onto the floor.
“You gonna clean up that blood?” He asks from the doorway, causing Matty to startle a bit. “What, you didn’t hear me?” He comes further into the gym, picking up a rag the old kid discarded on one of the benches with a sigh.
“No…” the kid says slowly, still wrapping his bloody knuckles, “Just didn’t realise how close you were. Thought I still had a few minutes.”
Fogwell hums, crossing his arms, the bloody cloth in hand. Matty cringes a bit. “I know your daddy taught you manners, Matty. He also taught you some basic rules for when you deal with others, so I’m mighty curious why it looks to me that Daredevil got into a fight and lost.”
“I didn’t lose. Just had a long fight. Knuckles got pretty beat. I need to replace my gloves soon, they’re getting really frayed. Not protecting anything anymore.” he pauses, tilting his head. “How long have you known?”
“Ever since you started making waves. You fight like your old man, kid. I may be getting on in years but I ain’t blind.” Matty squares his jaw. “Now, I’m not gonna tell you to stop. I know you Murdocks, it ain't that simple. But dear God, if you’re going to use my gym as a base, clean up after yourself, young man.” He throws the rag at Matty, who smiles, shaking his head.
“Sorry, Fogwell. Won’t happen again.”
“That’s what they all say,” he mutters. “You have your civvies?” A sharp nod. “Good. You’re gonna help me get ready to open.”
He grumbles something incoherent but slips off the mat and heads to the changing rooms, and soon enough he’s shoulder to shoulder with Fogwell, helping set up some heavy bags and wiping down the equipment, his knuckles covered in bandages. When it’s done, Fogwell looks between Matt and his duffle that holds that damn suit, and says, “Let me see the gloves.”
Matty raises a single brow at him, but grabs the gloves, tossing them over to Fogwell for him to examine, “You use Muay Thai ropes sometimes, yea?” Matty nods, one hand resting on the wall, “See if you can incorporate that in. Will protect the knuckles and pack an extra punch. You got someone who makes this for you?”
“Yeah,” Matty says, lifting a shoulder in a half-shrug, “Little skittish but he’s good at what he does. I owe him my life. Lord knows I wouldn’t have survived some of my fights without the kevlar.”
He runs a finger over the stitching of the glove, humming as he nods. There’s a moment of silence, “Where’d you go, Matty? Those few months where you were gone, a few months back? Everyone said Daredevil was dead or changed, but where were you? What happened?”
“I nearly died,” his face is grim, jaw set, words barely ground out, “I was under that building that collapsed. Spent months recovering, then jumped into the fight when Fisk got out of prison. I barely made it out myself.”
“Where were you?” Fogwell presses.
“Clinton Church. Maggie and Father Lantom saved me–” Fogwell feels his own heart stutter, the guilt crash in as the kid realises something, face twisting up in pain. “You knew about Maggie, didn’t you?”
No use lying. Fogwell bows his head. “I did.”
“Why didn’t you tell me?” Matty snarls, his voice echoing across the stone walls. The Gym opens in ten minutes. He’s started pacing, but suddenly he collapses against the boxing ring, curling in on himself, glaring at nothing.
Fogwells comes to sit next to him, his old bones creaking with the effort, “Wasn’t my business. Your Daddy never told you, and I didn’t want to tell you for him. And you were gone for a long time, Matty. Wasn’t a lot of time to tell you. And I guess a part of me just assumed you knew.”
Matty shakes his head, voice raw, “She never told me. I overheard her.” He’s picking at the stone floor, blood trapped under his fingernails. “I mean, I’ve begun to forgive her, I know why she left. But she never told me, she never was going to. I just had to overhear that and…fucking hell that hurt.”
“You know why Jack never told you, though, don’t you? Family's always been a touchy subject for him,” Matt nods along, “I met Jackie after his older brother Benny had just died. He was tearing himself up, digging himself deep, and I think that one moment just closed him off to ever talking about family again. Then he had you, but Maggie left, and the walls went back up.”
“He never really talked about his family,” Matty says, voice soft, “I know it hurt him too, and that’s okay. I know I have a few uncles and aunts, but that’s really all. I don’t know their names, I don’t know who they are. I’m not sure I’d ever want to. What right do they have to know me?”
Fogwell looks at him.
Matthew Murdock, who grew up in an orphanage, being told by his peers that no one wanted him, and that's why everyone left. Everyone knew about the youngest Murdock at the time, how his daddy had died, his mommy had left, his entire extended family didn’t want anything to do with him. Fogwell had heard the whispers himself, biting down the anger and the desperation to know what had become of the little boy who’d hang around the gym, starry-eyed and brilliant.
Matty, who's still pretty young in the long scheme of things, almost naïve in his moral convictions, the good he insists can be saved from the sin rotting in the heart of Hell’s Kitchen. A brilliant child turned into a genius man, who boxes like the man that reared him, who died knowing that his son was proud of him.
Daredevil, who couldn’t stand down and kept fighting when all the odds were against him, the vigilante who's made his home here in this very gym. The man who Fogwell found on his mats only a little bit ago, bleeding like nothing else because he was his father's son and would never fall in the ring.
Matt lifts his head, “Someone's coming. I should go, you need to open up,” he stands before Fogwell can say anything, cane tapping in front of him in a steady pattern, blood seeping through the bandages. Fogwell hoists himself up and leans against the ring to watch him go, thinking that if he closes his eyes for a moment, it’ll be Jackie who’s leaving, going home to his son and wife, a happy family.
Outside, Matt Murdock stops, revelling in the early spring air. Less than a year ago, he’d been in Clinton Church still, wallowing in his misery, bitter and angry and wishing he could hold Elektra one more time, whisper confessions against her skin, live the life they should have gotten out.
It’s a Friday, just past dawn. If he sends a text to Foggy and goes home now, he can crash for a few hours and come in for the afternoon, letting Foggy and Karen leave early in exchange. He fishes his phone from his pocket and sends the text, voice soft as he reads to his phone, slowly beginning the walk home.
It’s going to rain soon, he realises as he stops at the intersection right before his building, fingers tightening on his cane as an Ambulance screams by. The bloodied knuckles pull, pain shooting up his arm. He presses on, opening the front door just as one of the people who live downstairs comes down, brushing past him with a mumbled good morning,
He wonders, distantly, what his neighbours think of him. The Blind Lawyer who once had his house raided by the FBI, who talks to no one, and who can never consistently be seen coming in and out of the building. The Catholic man who always says hello to the little kids in his building, who has great candy outside his door on Halloween. The contradiction. The martyr.
He steps into his apartment, opening his closet and the trunk within with careful hands, brushing past his father's old boxing gear as he sets the suit inside. Just before he closes and locks it though, he hesitates over the gear, fingering the silk. With a shake of his head, he closes the box and locks it and the closet, stripping out of his civvies and changing into softer clothes for bed.
He takes a moment of reflection as he lays in bed, the exhaustion slowly crashing into him, listening to the city wake up around him, proof that the world moves on even after he reels himself in for the night, that the world has survived one more day.
The thoughts comfort and lull him into a deep sleep, punctured by memories and flashes of the night's fights, the pain that he craved, desperate for the rush that came along with it. He sleeps through the morning, as the rest of New York goes to work and starts the day, as the people around him in his apartment complex live their own lives.
Eventually, the sleep ends. The dreams give way to blinking awake, groping for his phone as it tells him that it’s eleven in the morning. He’s been asleep for maybe five hours, but that’s enough to get him through work, and if he sleeps a bit before nightfall, he’ll have a semi-successful night as Daredevil.
He takes a hot shower, trying to wake up without the city doing the same around him, gently removing his bandages and trying not to note that they haven’t scabbed yet and he’s going to need to rewrap them, go to work with bleeding knuckles. He tries to ignore the fact that Foggy will see that and his heart will break just a bit, as he walks to the office, stomach rumbling, mind unsettled, and heart heavy.