The Guilty Party
Part 11
Foggy began to tremble so badly that his knees buckled and he collapsed to the floor. His heart thudded violently in his chest, sweat broke out all over his body, he wanted to throw up, but worst of all, he felt as though he couldn’t breathe properly. He was choking, he was suffocating, no matter how he gulped for air, he wasn’t getting enough.
“Foggy?” Somehow Matt was there. “Just breathe, Foggy, just breathe.”
Easy for Matt to say, he wasn’t retching and gasping at the same time. And Foggy’s heart had stopped thudding and was now doing some weird kind of cardiac gymnastics, what did they call it, palpitations, what happened if it stopped altogether, it couldn’t keep going like that, it had to stop eventually or it would burst, he was going to die, oh, g-d he was going to die!
Foggy didn’t know how long it took before his breathing became more measured, his heartbeat became more regular, the acute nausea disappeared, and his trembling body finally stilled. But eventually, he became aware that he was curled up on Matt’s kitchen floor, covered in cold sweat, his head resting on Matt’s leg, and tears flowing from his eyes.
“It’s all right,” Matt was repeating as he rubbed Foggy’s back. “I’m here with you. You’re not going to die. You’re safe.”
“I remember,” Foggy whispered. “I remember everything.”
“I know. But that was then. It’s over now, and you’re safe. I’ve got you. You’re safe.”
Foggy pushed himself up into a sitting position. He wanted to run away from Matt’s tenderness, but sitting up was all he could manage. He felt as drained as though he’d been lying there all night. Maybe he had.
“You’re okay,” Matt told him. “You’re not dying.”
“Wish I were – I wish I were dead,” Foggy murmured. He wiped his cheeks with the back of his hand. Matt reached out and found the kitchen towel hanging from the oven door handle, then tossed it to him. Foggy caught it automatically and blotted the rest of the moisture from his eyes.
“I was right,” he whispered. “I didn’t want to know. I knew it would be bad, and I was right, I was right, it’s worse than I ever imagined, oh, g-d, I wish I didn’t remember! I wish I’d died – I wish I’d let them kill me!”
“It’s okay, Foggy—“
“How can you stand to even be in the same room with me?” Foggy demanded, interrupting. The tears started to flow again, and his voice caught. He couldn’t even look at Matt, and so he turned his head away as the words tumbled out of his mouth. “I betrayed you, Matt! No, I didn’t just betray you. I begged them, just like they wanted me to. Let me tell you everything about Daredevil, oh, please pretty-please! I thought I’d be braver and stronger, but I wasn’t. I was so weak and so cowardly, I actually begged and said please!”
“They were torturing you, Foggy. Whatever you did, you did because you wanted to survive,” Matt said. He sounded like he was crying, too, but Foggy didn’t look over to see. “You weren’t a coward and you weren’t weak. If you hadn’t given in, they would have hurt you even more. Don’t ever feel guilty for acting in self-preservation.“
“Daredevil wouldn’t have given in,” Foggy said.
“That’s not true,” Matt said. “I’m not immune to torture. I would have given in.”
“Yeah?” Foggy scoffed. “I’ve seen you on video, Matt, you can even jump out of the way when people shoot at you! If somebody tried to kidnap you, and said, put this blindfold on or we’ll shoot you in the arm, you would have just flipped your way out, dodged all the speeding bullets, and leaped a tall building in a single bound.”
“That’s not fair, Foggy,” Matt protested. “I’m not Superman.”
But Foggy went on, “Superman, super senses, what’s the difference? You wouldn’t have given in, you wouldn’t have put that blindfold around your own eyes, you wouldn’t have – you wouldn’t done anything they told you to. You wouldn’t have been like me!”
Then Foggy couldn’t stop the sobs any longer, and buried his face in the towel. Matt scooted closer and placed a hand on his shoulder, keeping it there although Foggy gave a little shrug of rejection. Foggy didn’t want to admit it felt good. Nor would he admit he liked the way Matt’s thigh was warm against his own. He told himself he was just too weak to wriggle away. Physically and mentally, just too damned weak.
Matt waited until Foggy stopped sobbing of his own accord before he spoke up again. “Yeah, I’ve got heightened senses, and I’ve had training that helps me fight. But I’ve got weaknesses, too.”
Unable to think of a coherent reply, Foggy settled for a snort of disbelief.
“Remember two weeks ago when I woke up in Avengers Tower and Clint answered my phone and you thought he’d kidnapped me? I heard you say you’d do anything to keep me safe,” Matt said.
Foggy groaned; he should have known Matt would hear him jumping to stupid conclusions.
“And I’d do anything to keep you safe,” Matt went on. “If anybody ever threatened you, I’d give in. I’d do anything – whatever they wanted. I’d even put earplugs in my ears.”
The thought of Matt voluntarily giving up his most important sense was enough for Foggy to lift his head from the dishtowel and stare at his friend. “You’d do that? For me?”
“Yes,” Matt declared. “Yes, Foggy, I would.”
Foggy considered many variations of that scenario, but they always ended in the same way. “Yeah, until you found a way to get free and beat the living shit out of them.”
“Only if I could do that without letting you get hurt,” Matt said. “But otherwise … yeah.”
“That’s – good to know. Thanks,” Foggy said, trying to make it sound casual and not desperate, or heaven forbid, sarcastic. After a moment, though, he couldn’t help asking, “Matt – would you be scared? I mean, does Daredevil ever get scared?”
“Yeah, I get scared,” Matt admitted. As though needing comfort himself, he put his arm around Foggy’s shoulders and leaned closer. “And I’d be even more scared without my hearing. But last night, when I heard you screaming, I was terrified.”
“They told me you’d never hear me down there. I didn’t think you’d come, I thought I’d die down there and you’d never know,” Foggy remembered, and after a moment, he thought to ask, “Are your super senses really that good, that you could hear me from all the way up here?”
“I was outside at the time,” Matt mentioned, “and much closer to where they had you.”
“Wasn’t that a little early for Daredevil?”
“I could hear somebody harassing the Mormon missionaries just down the block, so I went out,” Matt explained.
“Seriously? You put on the suit because somebody was harassing those Mormon guys?”
“Mormon girls,” Matt clarified. “Sister missionaries. And the guys were pretty crude, and wouldn’t let up, and I was afraid it was going to escalate from sexual harassment to sexual assault. I put a stop to it, and made sure the sisters got safely to where they were headed, and that’s when I heard you.”
“Huh,” said Foggy. He’d seen Mormon missionaries before, as easily identifiable as nuns in their own way, with their clothing styles and their name tags, but he’d never really taken much notice. Now he’d never be able to look at them again without thinking of how they’d unknowingly played a part in his rescue. It was unknowingly, right? “They didn’t hear me, too, did they?”
“No,” Matt reassured him. “Just me.”
Well, at least he wouldn’t have to worry about being embarrassed if he ever ran into them. He sighed, and rested his head on Matt’s shoulder.
“Funny,” Matt said after a moment.
“What?”
“You’re sitting there feeling guilty because you think you betrayed me and I’m sitting here feeling guilty because it’s my fault that you were kidnapped in the first place.”
“You’re feeling guilty?” Foggy asked. “Because of what happened to me?”
“Yeah,” Matt admitted. “And I can honestly tell you that your guilt doesn’t count, because you were tortured, Foggy, and you were just trying to get through it, but you can’t tell me that my guilt doesn’t count, because it does. Nobody’s forcing me to go out and try to make my city a better place.”
“At least you’re trying to do something for the greater good,” Foggy said. “I was just trying to survive by throwing you to the wolves. I should have been a better friend, even under torture.”
“Oh, Foggy, how many times will I have to tell you it’s okay, that I don’t blame you?”
Foggy shrugged, not sure how to answer that. Matt hesitated, then asked, “You want to come to confession with me and talk to Father Lantom about it?”
“I’m not Catholic, Matt.”
“I know. I just thought it might make you feel better.”
“Does it make you feel better?” Foggy challenged.
“Sometimes.”
“I never thought the word ‘sometimes’ could rhyme with ‘no’ until I heard you say it, Matt.” But Foggy was intrigued. “Does he make you say Hail Mary’s and stuff like that? You know, penance?”
“He suggests stuff like that, yeah,” Matt said. “But once he told me that sometimes the most effective penance was just to suffer the consequences of your actions.”
“Wise man,” Foggy mused.
Matt smiled a little, then touched Foggy’s head with his own. “You feeling better now?”
“I guess not being dead on the floor with the rest of your trash counts as ‘better.’”
“Foggy, don’t say things like that.”
Foggy didn’t bother to apologize, and after a moment, Matt asked, “You want to eat?”
“Yeah – oh, g-d, the casserole, it’s probably burnt by now!” Foggy scrambled to stand up, but Matt said, “It’s okay, I got it out of the oven in time.”
“Oh.” Foggy didn’t remember Matt opening the oven, but the casserole was right there on the counter, not even steaming anymore. He gave it a suspicious little poke to confirm what he’d already guessed. “It’s gone cold already. Sorry.”
“You’re more important than food, and anyway, we can heat it up again.” Matt reached up. “Give me a hand, will you?”
As Foggy helped haul his friend to his feet, he asked, “You didn’t twist your knee on the stairs, did you?”
“No,” Matt admitted. “It’s just a bullet graze. I’ll be fine in a day or two.”
“Matt …”
“I didn’t want to tell you because you were already suffering from amnesia and I didn’t want to make things worse.” Matt shuffled around him to reach for the plates. “Here.”
Foggy took them. “Oh, go sit down, Matt, or you’ll make me feel even more guilty than I already do.”
“I told you, Foggy, you don’t have to feel guilty. It wasn’t your fault, it was mine.” But Matt limped obediently around the counter to the nearest chair and sank into it.
“Dammit, Matt, I can feel guilty if I want to!” Foggy slammed a serving of casserole onto a plate with such force that the sauce splashed in all directions.
“In fact,” he went on, putting the plate in the microwave and pressing the buttons, “you know what, Matt? You know how it’s called a pity party when you sit around and feel sorry for yourself? Well, we’re going to sit around this evening, eat this casserole, drink that beer that I made you buy, and feel guilty together, and we will call it a guilty party.”
Matt laughed out loud, the first time Foggy had heard him do so in weeks – months, maybe – and it startled him.
“What?” he asked, ready to become more grumpy than he already was.
“Nelson and Murdock, the guilty party,” Matt repeated, and only then did Foggy realize what he’d said.
“Damn,” he said, unable to stop himself from smiling, too. “I didn’t mean it like that. Or maybe I kinda did. But anyway, we’re gonna do it, and we’ll worry about to-morrow, um, to-morrow.”
“You know what, Foggy?” Matt asked, regarding him with a look of fondness on his face. “I think you’re going to be all right. Not right away, maybe, but with a little time, I think you’ll be okay.”
The End
Written June 2015
Return to Daredevil Fanfiction
“Foggy?” Somehow Matt was there. “Just breathe, Foggy, just breathe.”
Easy for Matt to say, he wasn’t retching and gasping at the same time. And Foggy’s heart had stopped thudding and was now doing some weird kind of cardiac gymnastics, what did they call it, palpitations, what happened if it stopped altogether, it couldn’t keep going like that, it had to stop eventually or it would burst, he was going to die, oh, g-d he was going to die!
Foggy didn’t know how long it took before his breathing became more measured, his heartbeat became more regular, the acute nausea disappeared, and his trembling body finally stilled. But eventually, he became aware that he was curled up on Matt’s kitchen floor, covered in cold sweat, his head resting on Matt’s leg, and tears flowing from his eyes.
“It’s all right,” Matt was repeating as he rubbed Foggy’s back. “I’m here with you. You’re not going to die. You’re safe.”
“I remember,” Foggy whispered. “I remember everything.”
“I know. But that was then. It’s over now, and you’re safe. I’ve got you. You’re safe.”
Foggy pushed himself up into a sitting position. He wanted to run away from Matt’s tenderness, but sitting up was all he could manage. He felt as drained as though he’d been lying there all night. Maybe he had.
“You’re okay,” Matt told him. “You’re not dying.”
“Wish I were – I wish I were dead,” Foggy murmured. He wiped his cheeks with the back of his hand. Matt reached out and found the kitchen towel hanging from the oven door handle, then tossed it to him. Foggy caught it automatically and blotted the rest of the moisture from his eyes.
“I was right,” he whispered. “I didn’t want to know. I knew it would be bad, and I was right, I was right, it’s worse than I ever imagined, oh, g-d, I wish I didn’t remember! I wish I’d died – I wish I’d let them kill me!”
“It’s okay, Foggy—“
“How can you stand to even be in the same room with me?” Foggy demanded, interrupting. The tears started to flow again, and his voice caught. He couldn’t even look at Matt, and so he turned his head away as the words tumbled out of his mouth. “I betrayed you, Matt! No, I didn’t just betray you. I begged them, just like they wanted me to. Let me tell you everything about Daredevil, oh, please pretty-please! I thought I’d be braver and stronger, but I wasn’t. I was so weak and so cowardly, I actually begged and said please!”
“They were torturing you, Foggy. Whatever you did, you did because you wanted to survive,” Matt said. He sounded like he was crying, too, but Foggy didn’t look over to see. “You weren’t a coward and you weren’t weak. If you hadn’t given in, they would have hurt you even more. Don’t ever feel guilty for acting in self-preservation.“
“Daredevil wouldn’t have given in,” Foggy said.
“That’s not true,” Matt said. “I’m not immune to torture. I would have given in.”
“Yeah?” Foggy scoffed. “I’ve seen you on video, Matt, you can even jump out of the way when people shoot at you! If somebody tried to kidnap you, and said, put this blindfold on or we’ll shoot you in the arm, you would have just flipped your way out, dodged all the speeding bullets, and leaped a tall building in a single bound.”
“That’s not fair, Foggy,” Matt protested. “I’m not Superman.”
But Foggy went on, “Superman, super senses, what’s the difference? You wouldn’t have given in, you wouldn’t have put that blindfold around your own eyes, you wouldn’t have – you wouldn’t done anything they told you to. You wouldn’t have been like me!”
Then Foggy couldn’t stop the sobs any longer, and buried his face in the towel. Matt scooted closer and placed a hand on his shoulder, keeping it there although Foggy gave a little shrug of rejection. Foggy didn’t want to admit it felt good. Nor would he admit he liked the way Matt’s thigh was warm against his own. He told himself he was just too weak to wriggle away. Physically and mentally, just too damned weak.
Matt waited until Foggy stopped sobbing of his own accord before he spoke up again. “Yeah, I’ve got heightened senses, and I’ve had training that helps me fight. But I’ve got weaknesses, too.”
Unable to think of a coherent reply, Foggy settled for a snort of disbelief.
“Remember two weeks ago when I woke up in Avengers Tower and Clint answered my phone and you thought he’d kidnapped me? I heard you say you’d do anything to keep me safe,” Matt said.
Foggy groaned; he should have known Matt would hear him jumping to stupid conclusions.
“And I’d do anything to keep you safe,” Matt went on. “If anybody ever threatened you, I’d give in. I’d do anything – whatever they wanted. I’d even put earplugs in my ears.”
The thought of Matt voluntarily giving up his most important sense was enough for Foggy to lift his head from the dishtowel and stare at his friend. “You’d do that? For me?”
“Yes,” Matt declared. “Yes, Foggy, I would.”
Foggy considered many variations of that scenario, but they always ended in the same way. “Yeah, until you found a way to get free and beat the living shit out of them.”
“Only if I could do that without letting you get hurt,” Matt said. “But otherwise … yeah.”
“That’s – good to know. Thanks,” Foggy said, trying to make it sound casual and not desperate, or heaven forbid, sarcastic. After a moment, though, he couldn’t help asking, “Matt – would you be scared? I mean, does Daredevil ever get scared?”
“Yeah, I get scared,” Matt admitted. As though needing comfort himself, he put his arm around Foggy’s shoulders and leaned closer. “And I’d be even more scared without my hearing. But last night, when I heard you screaming, I was terrified.”
“They told me you’d never hear me down there. I didn’t think you’d come, I thought I’d die down there and you’d never know,” Foggy remembered, and after a moment, he thought to ask, “Are your super senses really that good, that you could hear me from all the way up here?”
“I was outside at the time,” Matt mentioned, “and much closer to where they had you.”
“Wasn’t that a little early for Daredevil?”
“I could hear somebody harassing the Mormon missionaries just down the block, so I went out,” Matt explained.
“Seriously? You put on the suit because somebody was harassing those Mormon guys?”
“Mormon girls,” Matt clarified. “Sister missionaries. And the guys were pretty crude, and wouldn’t let up, and I was afraid it was going to escalate from sexual harassment to sexual assault. I put a stop to it, and made sure the sisters got safely to where they were headed, and that’s when I heard you.”
“Huh,” said Foggy. He’d seen Mormon missionaries before, as easily identifiable as nuns in their own way, with their clothing styles and their name tags, but he’d never really taken much notice. Now he’d never be able to look at them again without thinking of how they’d unknowingly played a part in his rescue. It was unknowingly, right? “They didn’t hear me, too, did they?”
“No,” Matt reassured him. “Just me.”
Well, at least he wouldn’t have to worry about being embarrassed if he ever ran into them. He sighed, and rested his head on Matt’s shoulder.
“Funny,” Matt said after a moment.
“What?”
“You’re sitting there feeling guilty because you think you betrayed me and I’m sitting here feeling guilty because it’s my fault that you were kidnapped in the first place.”
“You’re feeling guilty?” Foggy asked. “Because of what happened to me?”
“Yeah,” Matt admitted. “And I can honestly tell you that your guilt doesn’t count, because you were tortured, Foggy, and you were just trying to get through it, but you can’t tell me that my guilt doesn’t count, because it does. Nobody’s forcing me to go out and try to make my city a better place.”
“At least you’re trying to do something for the greater good,” Foggy said. “I was just trying to survive by throwing you to the wolves. I should have been a better friend, even under torture.”
“Oh, Foggy, how many times will I have to tell you it’s okay, that I don’t blame you?”
Foggy shrugged, not sure how to answer that. Matt hesitated, then asked, “You want to come to confession with me and talk to Father Lantom about it?”
“I’m not Catholic, Matt.”
“I know. I just thought it might make you feel better.”
“Does it make you feel better?” Foggy challenged.
“Sometimes.”
“I never thought the word ‘sometimes’ could rhyme with ‘no’ until I heard you say it, Matt.” But Foggy was intrigued. “Does he make you say Hail Mary’s and stuff like that? You know, penance?”
“He suggests stuff like that, yeah,” Matt said. “But once he told me that sometimes the most effective penance was just to suffer the consequences of your actions.”
“Wise man,” Foggy mused.
Matt smiled a little, then touched Foggy’s head with his own. “You feeling better now?”
“I guess not being dead on the floor with the rest of your trash counts as ‘better.’”
“Foggy, don’t say things like that.”
Foggy didn’t bother to apologize, and after a moment, Matt asked, “You want to eat?”
“Yeah – oh, g-d, the casserole, it’s probably burnt by now!” Foggy scrambled to stand up, but Matt said, “It’s okay, I got it out of the oven in time.”
“Oh.” Foggy didn’t remember Matt opening the oven, but the casserole was right there on the counter, not even steaming anymore. He gave it a suspicious little poke to confirm what he’d already guessed. “It’s gone cold already. Sorry.”
“You’re more important than food, and anyway, we can heat it up again.” Matt reached up. “Give me a hand, will you?”
As Foggy helped haul his friend to his feet, he asked, “You didn’t twist your knee on the stairs, did you?”
“No,” Matt admitted. “It’s just a bullet graze. I’ll be fine in a day or two.”
“Matt …”
“I didn’t want to tell you because you were already suffering from amnesia and I didn’t want to make things worse.” Matt shuffled around him to reach for the plates. “Here.”
Foggy took them. “Oh, go sit down, Matt, or you’ll make me feel even more guilty than I already do.”
“I told you, Foggy, you don’t have to feel guilty. It wasn’t your fault, it was mine.” But Matt limped obediently around the counter to the nearest chair and sank into it.
“Dammit, Matt, I can feel guilty if I want to!” Foggy slammed a serving of casserole onto a plate with such force that the sauce splashed in all directions.
“In fact,” he went on, putting the plate in the microwave and pressing the buttons, “you know what, Matt? You know how it’s called a pity party when you sit around and feel sorry for yourself? Well, we’re going to sit around this evening, eat this casserole, drink that beer that I made you buy, and feel guilty together, and we will call it a guilty party.”
Matt laughed out loud, the first time Foggy had heard him do so in weeks – months, maybe – and it startled him.
“What?” he asked, ready to become more grumpy than he already was.
“Nelson and Murdock, the guilty party,” Matt repeated, and only then did Foggy realize what he’d said.
“Damn,” he said, unable to stop himself from smiling, too. “I didn’t mean it like that. Or maybe I kinda did. But anyway, we’re gonna do it, and we’ll worry about to-morrow, um, to-morrow.”
“You know what, Foggy?” Matt asked, regarding him with a look of fondness on his face. “I think you’re going to be all right. Not right away, maybe, but with a little time, I think you’ll be okay.”
The End
Written June 2015
Return to Daredevil Fanfiction