CH7: Try, Try Again.

Matt 'stared' at the knocked out teenager that had crashed through his ceiling and into his coffee table.

His very nice coffee table, Matt added to himself, that Foggy had gifted him for his wedding.

"I'll admit," Matt said, not really moving. "I'm a little annoyed."

"Why, because of the ceiling?" Karen asked, also staring at the teenager.

"No, I can get Rogers to fix it," the man was always looking for an excuse to put himself to work. "The table was really nice, though."

Karen hummed. "Is he fine? It's dark, so I can't really tell."

"I can smell blood and chemicals, so probably not."

They snapped out of it and hurried to help. Karen called the Night Nurse and Matt rushed to lift up the boy and laid him down in the pull out couch (said couch had seen its fair share of bleeding, masked idiots).

"Linda's on her way," Karen said. Matt nods, not really paying attention.

His radar was a bit rusty, but he was still good enough that he could tell the boy had more than a few ribs broken. Nothing untreatable, luckily, but the boy would need to rest for a couple of months.

Matt did what he could to stop the bleeding, but he'd never been the best with first-aid. Luckily, Linda was ringing the bell in no time. Karen let her in, and the Night Nurse stopped when she saw the boy in Matt's couch.

"Honestly, I expected to be treating you again, Murdock," she admitted, already getting her tools ready. She cut away the suit with scissors, still making small talk, "I didn't think you'd really go cold turkey for good."

Matt shrugged.

He watched as Linda started peeling off the kid's mask and, almost without thinking, caught the kid's hand as it was halfway to Linda's neck.

"Who… the hell…?" the kid gasped. Matt was reluctantly impressed, he knew how much it hurt to be in the state he was.

"I'm Matt Murdock, this is the Night Nurse. She helps out wounded vigilantes."

"Oh," the kid said, and then he went under again.

Raising an eyebrow, Matt dropped the kid's hand.

"I really wish I weren't so used to my patients going for my neck," Linda muttered, peeling the mask off completely. In a testament to her professionalism, she didn't even blink at his young features.

Matt asked if he could do anything to help. Linda said no. He still stood guard, even after his wife went back to bed, and after Linda finished fixing up the kid.

He had some questions he wanted to ask.

You know that feeling when you wake up and the first thing that comes to your head is this wave of all-encompassing pain and regret? That's pretty much what I felt.

After some light whining and groaning as I was pulled out of dreamland, my eyes fluttered open.

I then realized that I didn't recognize that roof, nor did I feel my mask on my face.

"Shit," I muttered, "Please tell me I didn't land on some villain's house."

"Quite the opposite, actually."

"Oh, that's actually great," I replied, before blinking and snapping-

OH GOD THAT WAS SO STUPID WHY DID I DO THAT EVERYTHING IS PAIN

I stifled a scream and closed my eyes, holding back tears.

"Why?" I whispered through grit teeth.

"Yeah, I would give moving in general a hard pass if I were you," the voice said, and when I opened my eyes I saw a redheaded man wearing sunglasses sitting next to wherever the hell I was (judging from the 'Living Room feel' I was getting from what I could see, probably a couch).

Wait, back up.

Red hair, sunglasses, opposite of a villain…?

"Daredevil?" I asked, with a slight trembling to my voice.

"I used to be, sure. Nowadays, I'm just Matt Murdock." He gave me a smirk. "Pleased to meet you, kid."

"I'm talking to Matt Murdock," I whispered. "This is the greatest morning of all time."

"It's two o'clock."

"This is still awesome, sir."

Daredevil wasn't all that popular back in my old universe, or at least he wasn't before Netflix happened, but I was always a fan.

Blind hero with super senses and a devil costume? Uh, yes, please?!

Then I blinked and groaned again.

"I crashed through Matt Murdock's roof," I almost face-palmed, but the pain in my everywhere stopped me. "This is the worst morning ever."

"It's still two o'clock."

"This is still awful, sir."

He chuckled. "How are you feeling, kid?"

"Everything hurts like hell," I slowly moved my head to go back to looking at the roof. "I'll be fine in a while. I lucked out; I've got a healing factor."

"Good enough to fix up those broken ribs you got?"

"Eh, first time I broke anything," I closed my eyes and sighed, trying to push back the feeling of pain. "It'll be a learning experience for everyone involved."

"Even the ones that gave you those bruises?"

"Yeah," I smiled. It wasn't nice. "They're gonna learn what happens when you fuck with me."

Silence reigned for a while.

"What's your name, kid? Your real one, I know you're Spider-Man."

"Uh…" I hesitated.

My name? Matt Murdock wants to know my name?

I felt a little panic building up inside me. Jake Fletcher wasn't made of the stuff to chat around with retired heroes. He was the quiet kid that only spoke up when it came to picking fights with the bullies at school.

I was always hesitant to start conversations with people that I didn't know that well. The only reason that I could pull off talking with Murdock was that I wasn't Jake at the moment. I was Spider-Man, and Spidey could do anything.

Beat up villains, talk to random redheaded models (I checked, she wasn't the redhead), pal around with random people like his informants and fucking Daredevil?

It was a piece of cake for The Amazing Spider-Man.

Jake could do absolutely none of that.

(Well, except beating up villains. Beating up people was easy and completely stress free, socially speaking.)

I swallowed nervously. "I'm not sure I can-"

"I can hear your heartbeat racing, it's okay," I heard Murdock stand up and walk away somewhere. "Sorry, I shouldn't have asked in the first place. I assumed that since your mask was off, you'd be okay with it."

My mask was off?

Huh, the roof was rather blurry, come to think of it.

…

"FUCK!" I yelled out, sitting up, yelping in pain, and falling back down. Of course, that didn't stop my swearing. "Fuck-fuck-fuck-me-fuck-shit-mierda-fuck-fuck-FUCK!"

"You kiss your mother with that mouth?" Murdock asked from wherever he was.

"Where the fuck is my mask?!" I tried to get back up, yelped again, and fell back down.

"We had to cut it out to make sure you were breathing, kid. Calm down."

"Who the fuck is 'we'?!"

"Me and Night Nurse," he paused, and I realized he was using the tap. What was he doing in the kitchen? "Technically, it was just the Night Nurse, but I was there."

Night Nurse? Right, she helped out random vigilantes.

My breathing slowed down a little, and I closed my eyes.

I took a deep breath, held it, and let go.

Okay, it was gonna be okay. I had to calm down.

I was with Murdock, it's okay, he won't rat you out.

That wasn't the problem, though. I was Jake without my mask. I couldn't handle being Jake at the moment.

I was gonna have to handle it, though. Panicking wouldn't help anyone, least of all me.

A detached part of me wondered when exactly it was that my mask became a comfort blanket.

I swallowed again, took some more deep breaths, and forced myself to calm down.

"Fuck," I groaned. "Today sucks all kinds of ass."

"That's what you signed up for, kid," Murdock showed up again, and presented me with a glass of water with a bendy straw in. "Here, so you don't have to move."

I nodded gratefully and opened my mouth.

"Speaking of signing up," Murdock continued as I drank. "Why did you?"

I swallowed and spoke up, "Because I had to."

"You had to?"

"With great power, comes great responsibility," I recited, feeling a little dorky doing so in front of Daredevil. "I have to do this, it's my duty."

Murdock didn't say anything, and I didn't feel like speaking up, so eventually I just fell asleep again.

Matt stared at the kid.

He felt some of his old habits sparking up. Measuring up the kid, analyzing his strengths and weaknesses (he was probably doing a bad job, considering he only knew him as he was after a bad fight and crashing through a roof), and even trying to memorize his heartbeat.

(Everyone's heart had the little differences that made it theirs, from things like stress, caffeine intake, smoking, and so on.)

Matt felt like he was staring at a younger version of himself. He'd often thought that it was his duty to apply his intellect to uphold the law, and his senses to break it over the head of those that deserved it.

But this kid…

He was younger than Matt had been when he started.

He couldn't possible handle the horrors of Hell's Kitchen, much less all of New York.

He resolved to talk the kid out of the business as soon as he was fine. Even if it required a beat-down.

(It was probably going to require a beat-down. He really hoped it didn't, he was too old for that nonsense.)

I wake up a second time in much less pain. I mean, I was still in a lot of pain, but I could actually work through it.

I forced myself into a sitting position, cracked my back, and frowned at Murdock, who was still sitting there.

"Are you just staring at me as I sleep?"

"I'm blind, you know."

"I did know that, and it actually makes it creepier." I felt regret as soon as I said it. God damn it, why couldn't I be the shy kind of anxious mess? Why did I have to turn into an asshole like a god damn social werewolf?!

"That's fair." Murdock took a deep breath, and in a singular moment of clarity, I knew what was next. He was going to try to stop me, like all old heroes do (usually the retired ones) and I'd have to say no, then we fight, and then I prove myself.

I wasn't in the mood.

"HEY! Can you hand me my phone? I need to make some important calls."

Murdock seemed taken back, but he still got up and tossed me my phone.

Okay, first things first, I called Peter.

It rang once before he picked up.

"JAKE!"

"Dude, don't yell my civilian name, I'm still on Spider-Business."

"Right, sorry," he cleared his throat and tried again, "SPIDER-MAN!"

"That's better."

"Dude, you didn't show up last night!"

"I kinda went through a roof."

"What?!"

"It's cool, it was Daredevil's roof."

Murdock coughed in the background.

"Sorry, Matt Murdock's roof."

The lawyer nodded.

"Are you okay?"

"Yeah, turns out there a medical plan for vigilantes."

"Wait, seriously?"

"Yeah, the plan goes: call the Night Nurse and pray you don't die before she gets here."

"… That's not funny, man."

I sighed and leaned back, covering my eyes.

"Sorry, I'm kinda maskless and it's stressing me out."

"You lost your mask?"

"My doc had to take it away, you know how it goes."

"Couldn't they just lift it?"

I blinked; then turned to look at Murdock. He coughed into his fist again, visibly uncomfortable.

"Tensions were high, I suppose," I ground out. "Anyway, I just wanted to check in and ask a favor. Two favors, actually."

"What's up?"

"First, I need you to tell May to calm down because I'm not currently dying at a faster than usual pace."

"I'll adapt that, sure."

"Second, I need you to bring my Spider Stuff here. My last suit is kinda shredded, and I ran out of webs."

"Crap, you ran out?"

"Yeah, I haven't reloaded since my fight with the Cape Overdose. That was kinda stupid of me, in hindsight."

"Isn't that the title of your autobiography?"

I laughed.

"What's the address?" asked Peter. I turned to look at Murdock again. He handed me a note, and I relayed the address to my best friend. "I'll be there in a few."

I thanked him, bid him goodbye, and then started another call.

After a few rings, James picked up.

"Yo?"

"James, hey," I smiled despite myself.

"SPIDEY!" he cheerfully greeted. "What's good, man?"

"Meh, you know me, I'm surviving despite my efforts," I joked. "Hey, quick question, what do you know about A.I.M.?"

"A.I.M.? Evil, supposedly secret organization A.I.M.?"

"The very same."

"Jack squat. I know someone that knows a lot, though."

"Great, can you bring him to me?"

"No problem. Where you at?"

"Murdock's apartment. Take a shower before you pop in."

"Murdock? As in Matt Murdock?"

"The very same."

"Damn, Spidey! You've been busy in this last… day."

I laughed as I passed through the address. He bid me goodbye for now and hung up.

"I don't really appreciate you brining friends into my home."

"You could've stopped me. Except you couldn't have, but I'll pretend that you could've to make you feel better."

"Yeah, listen, Spider-Man… this thing you're doing, you should-"

"I'm taking a shower." I stood up (OW) and walked around until I found a room with a shower in it.

I heard Murdock sigh behind me, but I ignored it. I was skipping ahead to the part where I proved my worth.

As I got out of the shower, I caught my reflection in the not-completely-fogged-up mirror.

I stared. I'd gotten some serious muscles on me after spending some time fighting and swinging around, plus the spider bite and all, but that's not what drew my eye.

I'd seen it in the shower but…

Starting from a little under my right shoulder and expanding like an explosion of color over my chest. A thousand little scabs littered the rest of my chest, and some cuts that weren't quite healed were healing again.

My black eyes were almost done curing, and if I tilted my head this way, I could see a cut on the underside of my chin.

On my back, it was more of the same.

I sighed. I knew I was gonna get hurt for real at some point, but this was shocking to actually see.

I dried off, put on the same boxers I'd been wearing (don't judge me, I'm a busy man), put on a towel over that, and walked out.

Peter was waiting on the couch, and he paled when he saw me.

"J- Spider-Man!" He rushed over, forgetting his bag on the couch. "Are you okay?"

"I'll need the rest of the day to patch up, but I think I'll be fine." I paused, and then continued as I walked to the couch. "On that subject, what day and hour is it?"

"Uh, it's Tuesday, dude." Peter checked his phone, "And it's 06:27."

"Hm," I pulled a fresh copy of my suit, my two backup webshooters (I didn't know where the old ones where, and I doubted Murdock was going to hand them back) plus a few web cartridges from Peter's bag. I put on the upper half of my suit. "I'm expecting an informant in a while, so you might want to either get a mask or leave."

"Right, right," Peter nodded, but made no move to, well, move. I put on my spider-pants without removing the towel, removed the towel, and raised an eyebrow at him.

"Peter, are you okay?"

He swallowed and rushed to pull me into a hug. I hid a wince and forced myself to act like I was perfectly okay.

"Please take care," my little brother whispered into my chest. "After Ben's… I can't see you hurt like that."

I hugged him back. "I'll be fine, Peter. You know me, I'm indestructible."

He chuckled. "Okay, okay."

He eventually tore himself off of me and walked out. I watched the door after he left for a little while, before gritting my teeth, putting on my mask, and reloading my webshooters.

"I think you should quit." Murdock said from the corner of the room, getting to the point. "You're too young."

"I think your opinion of my age or my abilities is completely irrelevant, Murdock." I cracked my neck and rolled my shoulders. The stiffness was leaving my muscles, and the pain was fading.

"Kid, I don't want to hurt you, but-"

Someone knocked on the door.

"Hold that thought," I walked over and opened the door. James and a scrawny-looking blonde were standing there. "Hey guys, let's go outside to talk."

"Sure," James follows me, and the blonde follows James.

"I'm Spider-Man, by the way," I say to the mystery blonde. "You are?"

"Oh, I'm, uh, Bob, from Hydra."

I blinked, "The Nazis?"

"It's a living."

"Huh," I shrug and punch in the button for the lobby on the elevator. "Well, I need some information on A.I.M., but if you eventually feel like talking about Hydra, that'd be awesome."

"Oh, sure, I mean, I'm Jewish, so I'm totally okay with telling you everything I know about the evil Nazi organization."

"Awesome," we walk out of the elevator and then the building. "So, before Murdock comes after me or calls a pal from his Cape days to stop me, what do you know about Cape?"

"Cape? Like you?" Bob asks, frowning.

"The new drug," I explain. The name was pretty annoying. "Gives you power for a while."

"Right, that." Bob clears his throat. "My boss is actually pretty pissed about that, they stole the formula from us."

"How does it work?"

"Basically, it induces the X-Gene and triggers it for a few minutes."

"Huh, that's pretty neat, if vaguely horrifying."

"It's stops being 'vaguely' horrifying when you hear what they've been doing."

"Experimenting, I imagine. Making the effects stronger and longer?"

"Not just that. They're trying to make them permanent. They want to put an entire step up the evolutionary ladder into pills."

I frowned, and we stopped to wait for the light to change from red to green.

If they perfected that… those pills would never stay with A.I.M. Others would figure it out, and soon any idiot could find himself with superpowers in a bottle.

Any gang could become a team of Supervillains. You know what's worse than a rapist? A rapist that suddenly got the power of mind control because he paid five bucks for a tiny red pill, that's what.

This needed to be stopped, and it had to be stopped yesterday.

"Bob," I said, tone dead-serious. "Where the hell can I find them?"

After thanking Bob for the information, getting his number, and apologizing to James for ignoring him with a promise of more cookies (the trio loved the last batch, he told me) I swung away.

A.I.M. didn't have anyone in the city as far as Bob knew. He knew that they hadn't figured the trick to the X-Gene yet, but the clock was ticking.

Lucky me, I knew a guy that knew a gal.

And with the purpose of finding him, I found myself once more crawling through the vents at the Roxxon building.

"Note to self," I grumbled. "Next time, crash in through a window/wall."

I looked through a grate and spotted the balding scientist from last night, yelling at some terrified-looking girl, she didn't look much older than me, probably an intern.

I punched the grate open, fell out of the vent, landed on my feet, and asked, "Why don't you pick on someone your own size?"

The balding scientist ran away, a notable stain growing on his crotch. I put a web on his back and pulled, making him fall on his ass.

As I dragged him away, the intern whispered, "Thank you."

"Don't mention it, kid." I replied, walking out into the hallway. The scientist tried to shrug off his lab coat to escape; but I just put a web on his hand and kept dragging until I found a large window.

Looking down, I saw an apparently-empty alley, so I kicked the window open (read: smashed it into fucking pieces) and dangled the scientist out of the window.

"OH GOD!"

"He's not here. It's just you and I, bub."

"OH GOD, HELP ME!"

I sighed, pulled him up a bit so we'd be face-to-face, and slapped him twice with my free hand.

"Listen, tell me what I want to know and I don't drop you. Keep quiet and I do. You got any questions?"

He sputtered a bit, I waited patiently. As he did, I put his other hand with the one I had a web on and stuck them both together, giving me a better hold on him.

"Listen, I'd love to tell you anything, but nothing you do could be worse than-"

"I've heard this before."

I dropped him.

Before he made it more than a couple of stories down, I shot a web and caught his hands again. I heard a sickening sound as his arms dislocated at the shoulder, and he blubbered as I pulled him up.

"So, about those fellas from A.I.M.…?"

He was crying, but he rattled out the address of the warehouse they were hiding at.

I thanked him, tossed him inside, and jumped out of the window as I swung away.

It was time for round two.

It was payback time, motherfuckers!

Matt stood on a nearby rooftop, listening as the kid swung away.

A part of him ached to pull out the old batons, to chase after him.

But he wasn't that man anymore. He'd sworn off it, and he was determined to stay out of the business.

… But he still had friends in high places.

He made the call in no time.

He knew better than to try to stop the kid without getting into a fight. But maybe his old friend could.

Matt lived in hope.