Who: Matt Murdock daredevil What: Killing Time When: Tuesday, May 31 Where: A Local Park Rating: General Audiences Warnings: Random Daredevil Status: Complete Upon Posting
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Matt had found himself with plenty of time to kill lately. He was always trying it, killing time, in a new way, whatever way he could since he had no choice other than to move forward, move on. Was it more apt to say it was killing time for him? He killed things. Or did he kill things in that other world? It seemed to be more like he was tidying up the bad guys for the good guys. They always seemed to come right when he wanted them to collect the trash he was cleaning up on his city streets.
His city?
Hell's Kitchen was no more than a location on the map for Matt Murdock in this incarnation. All he knew of the place could fit on a single side of a single sheet of notebook paper. In his dreams, Matt was a crusader for the place though because he felt a kinship with it close to being a part of a family. The city was his family. Matt wanted to kill people for his city, to protect his city, his family.
Was that the fate awaiting him in the future? Was he going to become a murderer?
Matt knew he was far enough outside the city's eyes for no one to care if he started running in the park. The paths were clear; his cane folded up neatly inside his pocket to bang against his chest as he ran, strangely in sync with his heartbeat. They were happy. All the people who were still around the park, picnicing with their families, spending time passing time with each other. Matt wasn't too fond of scaring anyone which was why he was grateful no one was looking as he raced along his merry way.
A hop, skip, and jump took him off the path, over a fallen log, and onto a ragged excuse for a trail. Matt would have never tried it before the Dream. There were horrible nightmares where he lost his sight for the first time; there were horrible memories which weren't his own of a man he could barely recognize as himself fighting brutally for the city he called his own. Matt knew running around wild outside the carefully marked trappings of society wouldn't change his fate or his memories or make him any more or less himself from either world.
It helped to run all the same.
He reached up to capture a branch with his hand, putting faith in his upper body strength to swing himself forward over another fallen tree. The world was falling down around him, wasn't it? Matt thought it was fitting he was letting himself fall apart outside the carefully constructed world he had believed himself a part of only to find out he was something apart from it all, not because he was blind but because he could truly see in a way no one else could.
Matt ran and ran until his world narrowed down to his heartbeat thundering in his ears and his footfalls hitting the ground as heavily as the sound of nails being driven into a coffin. He ran until he could barely breathe and then he kept running because he could still do it. The taste of the air was different to him. Everything was different. The Dream made everything different. Matt wasn't certain he wanted to believe he was the man in that world, but he was certain he had no choice except to accept regardless.
He could run all he wanted, but running wouldn't do him any good when he was running from himself.
All the running accomplished now was killing time---and Matt was learning to become more comfortable with the idea of it being exactly that: killing time.