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Rain on his skin and a stone wall against his back. The smell of blood and dirt and piss somewhere further down the alley.
Ringing in his ears.
He digs his fingers into a wound on his thigh just to feel something but it's not enough. The goddamn ringing is drowning out every other noise and not even the pain can stifle the panic that's dwelling up in him. He can't hear.
Matt isn't used to feeling helpless. Not anymore.
He tries to get up once but his sense of balance is all over the place and his left leg is hurting like hell. Even though he's keeping one hand on the wall, he manages only two steps before stumbling and collapsing against it. He should be able to do this. He's lost his hearing before but he has been able to navigate just by his other senses. But right now, everything hurts and the explosion left him disoriented and shaken. He's lucky enough he even managed to drag himself away from it.
Matt lets out a panicked breath which he can't hear, and he needs to get his breathing under control. He presses his palms against the floor. It helps a little. He tries to focus on the rough surface of the stones and the dirt beneath his fingers. He can sense the vibrations of cars driving by in the distance. His hand finds a shard of glass and he presses it, once, until he feels it cut skin.
All he has to do his wait this out. His hearing will return and he will find his way home. It's happened once already, and he's been fine. This will pass. He can only hope it does before anybody finds him.
He's been stupid. He'd know it was a trap, he had heard the timer ticking after all. But Daredevil wouldn't abandon a warehouse full of civilians about to blow up, even if it meant endangering himself. And whoever set the trap had known that.
He's been too late though. The horrible smell still clogs his nostrils.
Matt forces himself to take deep, slow breaths and that's when the smell hits him: Gunpowder. At first he tenses up but then he picks up on the underlying note of cigarettes, leather and a familiar aftershave and he's certain.
Frank, he says and he can only hope that The Punisher will hear him. He has to be close for Matt to smell him through the rain.
Frank, he tries again, and again, until finally the space around him is changing, somehow closing in, and Matt knows Frank must be standing somewhere on his left.
I can't hear- my ears- I can't-
He's not even sure whether he's talking at all or just moving his mouth uselessly but he doesn't even stop when he feels Frank's body heat right in front of his face. Only when a warm, heavy hand falls on his shoulder and gives a reassuring squeeze does he shut up. Frank makes to remove his hand from his shoulder but Matt grips his wrist. With shaking fingers, he feels for Frank's pulse. It's slightly faster than normally, but underneath that there's still the heavy, steady rhythm he's come to associate with the Punisher.
He expects the other man to pull away but instead there's suddenly a second hand on his face, turning it left, then right. Checking for injuries? It then gently takes his free hand and leads it until there's a solid chest beneath his fingertips. Frank's heart is beating directly under his hand. It's calm.
The white-hot panic constricting his chest subsides and leaves him exhausted, if still on edge. He tries breathing with the rising and falling of Frank's chest.
The ringing is still there. Maybe quieter. He's not sure.
The presence that is Frank is shifting, pulling him up into a standing position. He grits his teeth against the pain. There's an almost imperceptible stutter to Frank's heart as he hesitates and eventually grabs Matt by the hand that's been clinging to his wrist this whole time. He's tugged forward when Frank begins walking.
Matt hates everything about this. Frank's not rushing, exactly, but they can't afford to be too slow. Matt keeps missing small obstacles and his whole body hurts. He is being dragged along more than anything. He feels blind. He trusts Frank to get him somewhere to safety because they developed a kind of respect for each other, a kind of comradeship, but everything about this is unsettling and leaves him on edge.
They continue like this for a few minutes at most before Matt is being hauled up into a pair of arms without any warning. He tries squirming out of it at first, because what the hell, but he's tired and Frank's heartbeat is next to his ear and every step hurt. There's a faint rumbling that he guesses is Frank talking to him. Probably cursing him.
And he tries to stay awake, he really does, because he should at least try tracking where he's being taken. But the steady rocking of Frank's footsteps eventually lulls the Devil of Hell's Kitchen into unconsciousness.
Frank lets Daredevil's unconscious form drop onto his couch unceremoniously. Getting him here had been a pain in the ass. Sure, it's in the middle of the night, but he couldn't exactly let people see him carrying around the passed out vigilante, in full armor at that. So he had to stick to deserted alleys and even climbed into his own apartment over the fire escape.
Max comes scrambling towards him as he closes the window. The Rottweiler slobbers all over his hand before turning his attention to their guest, sniffing curiously. Frank pushes his snout away from Red's face because he probably won't appreciate waking up to Max's drool all over his face.
He pulls off the horned mask without hesitating – he's seen Murdock's face already, that night on the rooftop when the Japanese attacked. He's been wondering, afterwards, how his blind attorney managed to pull off the whole Daredevil performance. If maybe the blindness was a farce. But after tonight, Frank's positive the kid isn't faking his blindness.
“Jesus, Red,” he mumbles while taking off the Devil's suit piece by piece methodically. There's no room for false modesty in situations like this. There are burns all over Red's torso – he must have been near that explosion that drew Frank's attention in the first place. Apart from that, there are a few lacerations and bruises. Frank can work with that. He doesn't know about the rest though... about the hearing loss or if maybe there's a concussion.
For now, it's probably for the best that Red's passed out. Would make it easier for Frank to treat his wounds. He doesn't need him disoriented and panicked halfway through the whole ordeal, like he's been when he had found him in that alley.
God, how he'd muttered Frank's name over and over again. He's been completely out of it but somehow Red had recognized him before he'd even stepped foot into the alley. Son of a bitch.
When he's finished patching Red up, he shakes him awake. He doesn't really want to because Red tends to be a pain in the ass when awake but he has to, with the possibility of a concussion.
The kid comes to drowsily and immediately tries pushing himself in an upright position, touching the foreign material of the couch under him.
“Stay down,” Frank orders and shoves a pillow under Red's head.
Too late does he realize Red probably can't hear him and considering he keeps trying to get onto his elbows, he didn't. Or maybe he's just a stubborn ass. He pushes him down by his shoulders. “You're not gonna ruin all my hard work,” he grumbles and gets no answer. Red looks... on edge. Not quite as panicked as earlier but definitely considering fight or flight right now.
Aw crap, he's not trained to deal with stuff like this. But touch helped earlier, so he tries that again. Takes Red's hand and puts it over his heart – the kid visibly calms down and he wonders why it's this, of all things, that does the trick for him. Frank really has no clue how Red even works.
“Frank,” he utters and it's not a question. He knows. Frank gives his hand a short squeeze to confirm anyway. Red pulls away suddenly and Frank smirks at how embarrassed he looks. Max startles the kid by licking his hand at which Murdock immediately recoils in disgust, then strokes the Rottweiler's muzzle somewhat sluggishly. He looks ready to doze right off again.
Frank hands him a glass of water and a package of painkillers – for the first time he appreciates that meds are labeled with Braille, too. Red takes the water but refuses the painkillers.
“Of fucking course you do,” Frank mutters but if Red's insistent on suffering then that's his decision.
Murdock sinks back into his pillow and he seems entirely too small and lost. Max settles right next to him and bumps his head into the hand hanging off the couch from time to time.
The next morning, Matt wakes up to the smell of coffee and the acute awareness that a Max has squeezed himself between him and the back of the couch. The dog's body is warm and it would almost be nice if he didn't also smell of... well, of dog. He also picks up Frank's heartbeat in the room, as well as the clattering of dishes. It's only when he actually hears Frank's voice that he realizes he's no longer deaf.
“You're a little shit, Max,” the Punisher mumbles, “you know you're not allowed on there.”
That makes him smirk and Frank stop in his movements.
“You're awake,” he states, “and you hear me?”
He groans as he pushes himself into a sitting position. The burns hurt. He also seems to have bruised rips and several lacerations, probably from shattered glass. He winces at the memory of the explosion.
“Loud and clear,” he answers, “am I in your flat?”
It's a stupid question. Of course this is Frank's flat. The Punisher's flat. Wearing one of Frank's shirts, by the smell of it. Matt feels like he's intruding all of a sudden and tries to get up from the couch without waking Max or hurting himself too much. Two hands on his shoulders push him back, though, and he's instantly reminded of how he woke up the first time in Frank's flat and freaked out.
“The hell do you think you're doing, Murdock? Didn't stitch you up for you to mess everything up the next day.”
Ah. He'd figured Frank knows who he is by now but him actually using his name... it makes him all the more aware of the fact that he's just himself right now. Without his suit and, maybe even worse, without his glasses and he knows how weird his eyes must look without those.
“I'm sorry about this. You really didn't have to bring me here. I appreciate it but-,”
“Stop talking shit, Red. Of course I had to bring you here. If you would've seen yourself, you would know that. You still look like shit by the way – must've been pretty close to that explosion.”
He bites back a retort about his sight being non-existent. Instead he shrugs and tries to sound more unconcerned than he actually is, “Yeah, well. Not as close as the six people who died in it.”
Frank doesn't offer any false words of comfort, just says, “I know. I was there after it happened. Any idea who it was?”
“Someone who has it out for me. That's all I know so far,” he retorts.
“Guess you'll have to wait a few days before finding out, though. Those burns need time to heal.”
“Meditating usually helps me regenerate faster,” Matt waves it off. Frank places a cup of coffee in front of him on the table and he takes it gratefully, even though it's way too bitter for his liking. The other man sinks into a creaking chair opposite of him. “I know you want to ask something. So do it.”
Frank laughs his rough laugh at that, a little surprised but covering it well.
“You know. Ever since I've known it was you under the mask, I've thought the blind thing was an act. To protect your identity. But after last night … shit, how do you do it?”
“It's kind of complicated. The easy version is, my other senses make up for my blindness. Last night... it usually isn't like that. It shouldn't. But I fucked up and my senses were all over the place. I haven't felt blind like that in a long time,” he admits.
“But you still recognized me.”
“Your smell, mostly, but with the rain and the smoke of the fire- well, feeling your heartbeat was my most reliable source of input at that point, I usually listen for that” And it isn't embarrassing at all, remembering how he'd acted like a scared, needy child last night.
“Huh. I'm not sure what's more fucked up. You actually smelling people and listening to their hearts, or the fact that mine managed to calm you down.”
Hours later, when Matt's dozing off again to the rhythm of that steady, strong heart, he doesn't actually find it that surprising at all.