into the belly of a whale; [Arrival]

[matt_murdock]

WHO: Matt Murdock
WHERE: Fountain, then along any street
WHEN: 22 September
OPEN TO: Frank & OTA
WARNINGS: Nothing yet
STATUS: Closed

---

For Frank;

For Matthew Murdock, there is no gentle upward tug, no gradual pulling back of the pleasant mantle of sleep, not on this day or most others, anymore. His torpor is stripped from him with ruthless efficiency, the image of Wilson Fisk's red smile still swimming hazily in his mind as he trips, body heavy and graceless, and knocks face-first into concrete with a rattle of his teeth.

Blood fills his mouth as he hisses a curse, hands instinctively rising to palm against the curved barrier, a wet smear beneath searching fingers as he swallows the taste of copper and shudders out a breath. His head tilts jerkily, birdlike, catching sound like cotton, everything a crimson blur pulsing with his own rabbiting heartbeat.

He drags in another breath, and then another, and takes an outward step. Trembling hand at the end of an extended arm, his fingertips at last brush against another wall, more subtly curved and cool to the touch. Slowly, he walks the circular perimeter, listening to the soft scuttle of leaves against the lip of the hole he's found himself so suddenly at the bottom of.

The darkness pulls in at his periphery, a creeping, misty threat, a window fogged with shadows.

There are cracks spidered along the outer wall of the cylinder, but nothing substantial enough for a handhold. A running jump is not enough to angle off the inner wall and out; his feet are sluggish and he tumbles, back smacking solidly to the ground.

"Fuck," he bites out with the breath left him, and pushes himself to his feet, frustration threading through his already precarious composure.

"HELLO?" he raggedly calls at last, bracing himself, prepared for the worst.


OTA;

Matt is still not convinced he has not, at long last, cracked his thick head hard enough to produce an incredibly convincing hallucination. He likes to think that if he were in a coma, he'd be nice enough to let himself see, or at least to not shack him up with Frank Castle, but in truth, that sounds like exactly the sort of masochism his subconscious would cook up when let off its leash. His everyday dreams are filled with Wilson Fisk beating him bloody; it isn't that far a leap to where he's at now, when you think about it.

But more to the point: Coma or otherwise, he is diminished, curtailed, knocked down about a hundred pegs, senses constantly straining for acumen they no longer contain. He is scuffing down a dirt street with a branch in hand, the bark still on and a few leaves, too, far too short for the job of sweeping before him so that he has to hunch like someone's granddad just to put one foot in front of the other.

Somewhere, Stick is doubled over laughing at him; this Matt is utterly assured of.

Comments

ota: YO MURDOCK

[upinhisnest]

"You need something better'n that," Clint calls out, watching Matt move down the street with his barky branch. He's not trying to be a shit or insulting, it's just a fact as far as he can see it.

And it's not like he's not sympathetic to those who need a little bit more assistance to fight their way through life - he gets that on a number of levels. At the very least he can try to help this guy out.

"You wanna sit down for a minute? I don't gotta knife on me, but there's enough rocks, I can find one to scrape the worst of the bark off for ya."

[matt_murdock]

"I'm really okay," Matt is quick to promise, which is pretty far from the truth and probably obvious, at that. But his smile is easy and instinctive, if chagrined, and he's glad enough to stop and uncurl his spine with a satisfying pop.

"I mean, unless you've got a legitimate cane on you that you failed to mention, in which case, I'm in terrible shape and can't do without it." His smile quirks, his head tilted as he strains to listen.

[upinhisnest]

Clint doesn't bother to muffle the chuckle that prompts. "Man, if I had one, you could have it," he says. "Sad to say, I don't think there's anything like that around here. That's why I offered to make that a little less rough, you'll get blisters using that one much."

Whoever brought them here is a serious dick. For a number of reasons, but come on - a blind guy?

"I'm Clint, by the way."

[matt_murdock]

"Matt," he replies. "Murdock."

He has to wonder at the ease of the conversation, as if they're just two guys who happened to meet on the street anywhere. His mind is still having difficulty with what Frank had told him and has, in the interest of sanity, tucked a lot of it away for later contemplation. Even so, it's a little weird to be part of this placid exchange.

He considers the branch and moment, and then holds it out, purposely far to the left of where he intends.

"You do make a reasonable point. But just so you know, you break it, you bought it," he says with a smirk.

[upinhisnest]

Clint has that effect, sometimes. He tries to stay low-key as often as possible for his own sanity, and it ends up making other people more low-key sometimes. They're just two guys who ran into each other in Crapsville, population 30-something probably, and are having a nice chat.

Clint grabs the branch and tugs just a tiny bit so Matt knows he can let go. "If I break it, I'll search as far as the arbitrary limits of our movement in this shithole place will let me to find the perfect replacement." He's being melodramatic, but only a little. He leans over the edge of the porch steps to grab a chip of some sort of flint-like rock (and hell, it might actually BE flint, he's noticed some around here. It'll be good for arrowheads.) so he can start at least scraping off a section of bark for holding on to, if nothing else.

"So, you're new," Clint comments. It's not a question. "How're you liking it so far?"

ota

[womanofvalue]

Peggy sees the man's strange walk from where she stands, understanding quickly enough what he's doing. She's seen enough men who've been robbed of their eyesight from shrapnel or other causes thanks to the war and she can even halfway understand the branch. Still, it doesn't look properly fitted to his height, which is why she vanishes inside of one of the nearby houses where she knows a decent sized headboard to live.

Once she's broken off the large post that seems to be long enough, she's back on the street and it takes her a bit of a run and an estimation of direction, but she finds him easily enough, slowing her step as she gets closer. "I'm going to put out something in front of you," she tells him. "It might suit you a bit better."

[matt_murdock]

He sees her coming in a vague, entirely frustrating smear and stops, straightening, head tilted as much in curiosity as an attempt to better hear.

"Alright," he says, going with it easily enough, her voice polished but genuine, well-meaning. An uncertain smile flits across his face as he reaches, fingers sliding over what might be some kind of post. It's too unwieldy, honestly, heavy and long, but beggars can't be choosers.

"Thank you," he says, touched by the gesture, and then softly laughs as his fingers explore the smooth wood. "Did you take this off a bed?"

[womanofvalue]

"And if I did?" is her curt reply, furrowing her brow as if she's being called to task for her choice of walking aids. "I can always bring it back to the bed, if you don't like it," she says, but she's still there at his elbow to watch him carefully, unable to help herself as she hides a smirk on her lips.

"I thought maybe it suited your height better than what you'd found, but if the bed is in truly more dire need than you, we can swap back," she insists.

[matt_murdock]

"No, no, I definitely like it," Matt is quick to counter with a slight shake of his head, eyebrows arching in emphasis over eyes that skim across the middle distance. "I was merely complimenting your ingenuity. And possibly your freakish strength; I didn't see the bed, so that's a more difficult call to make," he adds with an affable smile.

"Regardless, thank you," he repeats. "It's definitely a step up. I'm Matt."

[womanofvalue]

She can't help the way she ducks her head to smile at the notion that she pried it off with her bare hands. "Well, lucky for me, the earthquake already broke off more than enough furniture to give us a whole fortress' worth of walking sticks. And I'm Peggy," she says, staying by him cautiously to make sure that he won't trip over anything. "It's good to meet you, Matt, and I assure you, if I do have freakish strength, I would be putting it to far more use."

"I haven't seen you around, have you been here long?"

[dnr]

Up above, there's a scrape of boot heel against dirt and pavement, muffled by heavy weight but even and unrushed. Then a shift of a hand balancing a lean against the same concrete Matt has just gotten up close and personal with, ten, maybe twelve feet higher.

A beat passes. There may be some squinting involved.

"Oh, for Christ's sake," comes a familiar lament. "How'd you even--"

No, you know what, never mind. He's pushing off from the side of the fountain again.

[matt_murdock]

"Frank?" Matt calls, freshly bewildered and blinking, head tilting one way and then the other but finding no clearer answers.

"FRANK!" he tries again at the retreating scuff of footsteps, ignoring the way his desperation shakes the edge of his syllables, stepping forward to the edge of the hole with his hands pressed to the wall as if that gets him any closer to liberation.

[dnr]

"You wanna talk, or you want a rope?" comes the answer from a distance. Talking is apparently not on Frank's to-do list, apart from cursing under his breath as he walks out of earshot. It's lucky Matt isn't the first to turn up in an empty 15-ft hole; it takes a few minutes, but eventually those footsteps come tromping back with a new mass of cloth.

"On you right," he says, before a wumph marks the drop of the end of a sheet rope down beside him. Boots shift against concrete again as Frank braces a foot steady against the edge of the fountain.

[matt_murdock]

That's one question answered, although instinctively it had seemed unlikely that Frank, despite his veneer of ruthlessness, would purposely and deliberately deposit Matt in a hole in the ground in the first place.

...well, maybe for safekeeping, if he was about to do something he knew Matt would absolutely not approve of, which is admittedly most of what Frank does on an average day, as far as Matt can tell.

But the question is answered, and as he wraps his fingers around the makeshift rope, there's a degree of relief with it that has nothing to do with finding an escape route.

Feet lifting to the curved edge of the wall, Matt begins a slow, hand-over-hand walk, feeling heavier than he should, hands less sure of themselves as he at last hefts himself over the edge of his prison and stumbles across uneven pavement.

"What the fuck is happening?" he pants, annoyingly winded.

[dnr]

Frank clamps a hand on the other man's shoulder reflexively, to steady him as he stumbles to a landing. Matt's already managed to smash up his nose, after all, Jesus.

"Kidnapped." A beat. "Not by me," says Frank, apparently having already considered the prospect of tossing Matt into an empty hole in the ground. Not today, at least.

"Don't know who they are or what they want, but about thirty of us have shown up so far. Mostly civilians."

OTA;

[hawkeyesniper]

What Riza lacks in cooking skills she tends to make up for in her ability to organize and clean. She's a well put together woman and presents herself in a certain way. It's because of this that Riza had taken over some of the cleaning duties of the Inn so she could feel like she was contributing something to its upkeep. Granted, it was difficult to convince Kate sometimes to let her help, but she'd managed all the same and was even now using Kate's impromptu broom to sweep the front area. It may seem silly to clean a place like this, but Riza reasons that it keeps her occupied and makes the other people stuck here feel a little more like they're at home and not trapped in some unfortunate experiment. Besides, it's times like this that make her think of the more pleasant memories from Manhattan, like Giselle cleaning the Strand from top to bottom and singing her happy song.

Riza isn't one to hum though, she keeps her ears peeled for approaching visitors. Everyone tends to make it by the inn at least once a day and Riza likes to keep her ear on the latest finds from the surrounding woods and river. The village, as always, is quieter than where she's from, so she picks up on the sound of someone approaching fairly early on. She looks up though because the footsteps sound unsure and there's more than just feet on the road too. Her eyes immediately fall on the stooped man making his way uncertainly down the path. At first she thinks he's injured and is using the staff to help himself walk. However, after watching for a moment she realizes he's using the stick to help navigate a little and that must mean he's blind.

It takes her a minute to assess the situation and decide what she will do. He must be fresh out of the well and is likely trying to get an idea of where he is by walking the village. She steps forward, gauging the distance and then speaking in a clear voice that he could probably pinpoint fairly easily, "If you turn to your left about 15 degrees and walk 20 paces you'll be at the town's inn. I'm not sure if that's what you're searching for, but it tends to be the place everyone congregates eventually."

[matt_murdock]

She is a smear of lighter color across the haze of dark red that remains of his abilities, her footsteps announcing her before she speaks. It's a good excuse to pause and uncurl his back and roll his stiffened shoulders, and he offers a mild yet genuine smile.

"Thanks," he says, head politely, obliquely tilted, gaze perpetually fixed on the middle distance. "I was more just exploring than looking for anything specific. Getting my bearings. But that's definitely good to know."

[hawkeyesniper]

Riza can't help but appreciate the smile. It's hard to believe someone can smile like that after climbing out of the well and walking around hunched over a tree branch. Somehow that's what makes it even nicer.

"That makes sense," she replies, considering it had been one of the first things she had done as well. "Well, there isn't a lot to run into on the path you're on. If you continue the way you were going you'd wind up passing by more of the homes around here. A few of them are claimed, though there aren't enough of us here for them all to be occupied. Quite a few of us have even opted to just stay in the inn here."

As she spoke, she moved a little closer. There was no sense in shouting from the Inn's entrance to have a conversation. "My name's Riza Hawkeye. I take it you recently climbed out of the fountain?" That or there had been a blind man hiding out under their noses for a very long time.

[matt_murdock]

"Nice to meet you, Riza," he politely replies. "I'm Matt, and yes, that—" He pauses with a soft laugh. "I guess that's what you'd call it."

Distantly, he's aware that he's coasting on the familiar. Be pleasant, meet people, get to know the community. That Hell's Kitchen is closed to him now is a reality he's not yet allowed to sink in. Willful obliviousness has always been a particular talent, after all.

"Have you been here very long? I have a—" He falters, casting briefly for an appropriate box to slide Frank into, and fails. "A friend. He said it's been months for him."

[hawkeyesniper]

"Nice to meet you too, Matt," Riza replies, it's good to find familiarity in the pleasantries and small talk. She'd learned that in a situation like this it actually becomes nice to fall back on things like that. It's reassuring.

She doesn't ask for more detail on his escapes in the fountain. If memory serves the fountain was still dry and that meant someone had likely pulled him out. However, Riza had never been the sort to pry and if Matt didn't want to discuss the details of how he got out she wasn't going to ask. It wasn't really that important anyway and he was chuckling about it so it couldn't have been all bad. He'd gotten out that's what mattered -- though the space outside of the fountain wasn't exactly the most welcoming.

Riza hums thoughtfully, closing her eyes as she calculates the days. Like many people here, she too had taken to counting days and kept them marked under her bed. She could visualize it when she closed her eyes and tallied the marks in her head. There wasn't exactly a dated calendar to go off of. "Not as long as some...at least a month I think," she says as she opens her eyes. "There aren't exactly calendars here, so it's mostly been counting when the sun comes up," Riza admits. She tilts her head slightly, "If your friend has been here for months, it sounds like he might have been one of the first here then. There's a handful that's been here that long and they all came in around the same time. I suppose it was a mass arrival for whatever reason. The rest of us have been showing up in spurts since then."

She smirks as a thought occurs to her. If Matt just arrived then he's probably shaken up, even if he's doing a good job of hiding it. Riza decides to share her amusement and says, "I guess it could be worse. I can't imagine what they would have done if they'd arrived in the fountain in it's current state. They would have needed a human pyramid to get out."

[seekingcrocodile]

He hasn't been paying as much attention to life in this place as he knows he should be. There was a meeting, he knows that, but mostly he's been focused on returning his life, and Emma's, back to some state of relative stability after the earthquake.

So he may have missed a few things in there, like the fact that there even are new arrivals. Which he's assuming this man is, given that he's not familiar at all, and by now he figures he's come across all the residents of this place.

He's not sure what the point of the branch is supposed to be, either; his best guess is as a walking stick, and it doesn't seem to be effective enough at that right now.

"Do you need some assistance, mate?"

[matt_murdock]

Acutely aware of how ridiculous he must look, Matt manages to not wince, but only just. Instead, he huffs out a soft, self-deprecating laugh and straightens, spine popping, wondering if he should just give up on the branch altogether and leave his path to God.

"I think I'm alright, but thanks," he replies with an affable smile. "I'm used to something a little longer than this," he adds, gamely avoiding the 'that's what she said' tagline that begs to be tacked on the end.

[seekingcrocodile]

If Killian were at all aware of that particular reference, he'd be making it himself right now. Thankfully he's not.

"There must be something longer around here. Would you like me to take a look?"

[matt_murdock]

Matt falters slightly, although he can't say why he's surprised by the generosity. It isn't as if he's gone without it, even back home. Perhaps it's the casual way it's given; New Yorkers are just as benevolent as anybody else, they've just got a reputation to keep.

"Yeah, sure, that— That would be amazing, actually. If it's not too much trouble."

[seekingcrocodile]

He certainly hasn't spent enough time in New York to pick up any habits from there. He's trying to be more helpful, especially since he knows that in situations like this, they'll all need to rely on each other as much as they can.

"Wait here then." There are no trees nearby, so he hurries to the closest area of woods. A minute of scanning the ground and he's found an appropriate branch. "Here we are. This should help."