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Hero Business [Defenders -- Sigr & Virginia]

"If they are related and they are not coming after me for me they are really doing a great job fooling me" Karen protested, it was clear that the incident got her close, and judging for how her eyes returned to peek inside her apartment over and over it was clear that there was something in particular that bothered her.

"Is there any particular picture that bothered you?" Matt asked, having caught something strange on Karen's behavior, as she usually was stronger than that. Even then, he kept an awkward distance with Karen and she seemed to do the same. For an outsider it could be seen as people being careful around a blind guy, but it was obvious that there was something wrong with them. Matt wanted to respect Karen's choice of walking away, even if she always seemed within reach, there in the periphery of his life. Karen wanted to stay away from trouble for once, keep both Matt and the drama that floated around him away, but she seemed to have a knack to elicit trouble herself.

"Do you think that this isn't enough to be bothered?" Karen answered the question with another question, loud enough for Jessica to hear. It was clear for everyone around that she was deflecting, but that didn't stop her. "All those faces. My mistakes. Our mistakes..." she argued, "they may as well be a collection of people that you couldn't save, but for me it's a collection of the people I killed" Karen fell silent after that, as if she realized that she talked too much. There was truth on her words, was she really feeling that guilty for the people that died at the hands of the foes they tried to fight?

Matt respected her silence for what felt like too long, considering what to say, how to help, and yet drawing blanks. This was no case he could argue, as he was guilty of all Karen wanted to throw on him, nor was it some thug he could punch, nor sin he could confess. In some other situation he could try to relieve her offering at least his presence, being a friendly ear and then some, but they didn't have a relationship anymore, nor like that, he knew that much. "It's not your fault, those people's deaths are not your fault" Matt said, too little, too late, as Jessica returned from the inside of the apartment.

"The hotel idea is solid, get a new phone too" Matt agreed. "Did you get a look at all the pictures?" he asked Jessica, not knowing that she had taken photos of the scene. "That way we can try to see if there is something that seems odd or points us in some direction" he added, something that made Karen's eyes open a little wider for a moment, something that Matt didn't notice. The pictures spread among bullets around Karen's apartment were generic ones that looked easy to obtain, be it from a newspaper or a google search of the individual, nothing that pointed in any directions. Most of them were civilians or people involved with the Fisk or the Castle case, casualties of the wars that Matt waged, including the psycho ninja girlfriend Jessica had to drag him away from before the building collapsed.

"The cops seem just as surprised as us, tired and bothered by having to deal with such a weird thing" Matt informed, "so I don't think they are involved" he added. Raising her tinted glasses a bit, he pinched the bridge of his nose, sighing. He was feeling a bit lost, as he didn't believe in coincidences, but he wasn't able to guess who was doing that and why. "Karen, can you warn Foggy for me? Tell him to be wary, at least until we are sure of... whatever this is" he said, sounding tired, making Karen nod quietly.

If Jessica thought about it, there were a few pictures that felt somewhat odd, as Elektra's presence between them was somewhat off since she wasn'd directly connected with Karen, but that wasn't the only one. Among them there was one of a bespectacled man whose identity may be known to Jessica or maybe not, but it was the source of worries for Karen as it belonged to James Wesley, Wilson Fisk's right hand man. "So... what now, detective?" Matt asked Jessica, not wanting to seem that lost before her but admitting that this was her area of expertise.
 
It wasn't worth arguing about. If nobody wanted to believe that Jessica knew what she was talking about, fine. Eventually something would turn up to prove her point. This was something she was certain about, and she wasn't easily deterred from what she thought.

When Karen was asked if a certain picture bothered her, the black haired detective stopped half tuning the conversation out, interested to hear the answer to it. Instead she had to listen to deflection, which was a good sign that yeah, there was definitely a picture in the bunch that bothered her more than the others. It was just going to be figuring out which ones. She kept herself out of the conversation, content to listen in and see what she could learn about Karen and Matt both. How they interacted meant a lot, and it would give her some ideas about them. Wouldn't necessarily be immediately useful, but it might be eventually. She was working with Matt and Karen was the... well, she wasn't really the 'employer' because this was a favor case and one that she was pretty sure connected to something larger but couldn't explain yet.

She didn't have anything to chime in about faults when it came to death, because she probably couldn't say the right thing. She didn't only blame herself for the person she'd killed with her own hands, after all. She doubted Matt would either, he was just... trying. And she wasn't good at that.

Matt sure was worried. She got it, but it made her more curious about the nature of their relationship. It wasn't necessarily relevant since nobody should know that he was Daredevil, but she couldn't say for certain it was irrelevant. "A burner phone for a while isn't a bad idea. Don't know yet if you need to get a whole new number, but grabbing some prepaid thing and keeping your phone off wouldn't hurt." As for getting a good look, she let out a casual "yeah." She didn't say that she'd taken picture of them, because that would distress Karen in a way that Jessica actually cared about - the way that made her less helpful and more fidgety and anxious. They were going to have to figure out which picture had reason to bother her the most, and that was, for the moment, probably going to have to happen when the reporter was't actually there. If this wasn't about Matt it was probably going to be about that, but the way Karen was acting meant that she wasn't going to reveal much unless she got dug at and getting all barb-y at Matt's friend while he was there probably wouldn't end well. She didn't think he'd let her do what she might need to do. He'd be too busy comforting his friend.

Right, Matt had two friends. It was good to have one check up on the other, she was making hers stay together, after all. There was no concern about Luke; if they were going after people important to her and Matt he was in danger of getting dragged in either because they were targeting all the people who'd try to stop the Hand or just because he had been close to her. She'd give the man a call but she wasn't exactly worried about someone trying to hurt him. They were welcome to try, they'd be pretty unhappy with the outcome. Maybe Danny should have come to mind too, but honestly Jessica hadn't left that team up with a fantastic view of him and so he didn't come to mind.

"Now I go to the bar and drink. I can't think about anything right now." Too sober. Too close to Karen, who was clearly hiding something and would probably make conversation about the case unnecessarily hard. She wanted to talk to Matt about the photos, maybe describe them to him and see if he knew who everyone was - she knew two, but not the others. She hadn't been the one to actually get Matt, because she had to be the one to haul up the elevator car, but she definitely remembered that particular ninja woman. Jessica had not been pleased with having to save him, but she understood his situation at least a little. She wasn't eager to admit that fact, but she did. "I suggest you come with me, you could probably use it too." It was directed towards Matt, because while Karen could also probably use a drink she'd seriously get in the way of the brainstorming. "You should get your things and go to a hotel." It was directed at Karen, and she hesitated and then offered "if you want me to get some of your shit I will." It wasn't because she was a nice person, it was because Matt was a friend and even more because she wanted to get the wheels on this cart turning and have her butt on a bar stool as soon as possible. And he probably couldn't go do it. Well he could, but between the two of them she was the better option for it.
 
"It seems a day for drinks" Matt voiced with resignation. He shouldn't, but he wanted to, and if Jessica could function with how much she drank perhaps Matt could indulge himself a bit. Karen opened her eyes slightly, but even if Matt drinking was nothing new, whatever that strange team up was felt odd to her. How much did she miss while holed in that police station while those two, together with Rand and Cage saved the day? She felt like their roads had parted while she wasn't looking, but wasn't that her own choice? It was for the better, with Matt keeping his Daredevil stuff as far from her as he could and Frank Castle dead*, Karen would be able to focus on her career, if stupid things like these ones could stop happening to her.

"That would be nice, just a couple essentials, there is a sports bag on the bottom of the closet" Karen accepted Jessica's offer. It was voiced rudely, as expected of her but it was still useful. Probably for both of them, as Karen couldn't help but suspect that Jessica would take yet another one of her drunk detective looks to the place, but whatever her thing was it seemed to work, so Karen didn't want to doubt her prowess. "I'll call Foggy on my way to the hotel, we'll warn you if something's wrong" she added, facing Matt. Once Jessica got out of the apartment with her things, she was ready to be packed on a cab and sent away to supposed safety.

"If this is connected..." Matt mumbled. Should they warn Danny and Luke? Their memories only brought him grievance, not being in the best of terms with them. Maybe it was mean of him, but he decided that they didn't need to know unless it was proven that they were after them. And in that case, Jessica could warn Luke, or so he thought, as they had been... something in the past, although the bulletproof man was with Claire now. It was almost funny how the world turned, it didn't seem that long ago when Claire and him crossed paths-

Noticing that he was distracted, Matt returned his attention to Jessica and her loud presence. It wasn't just how she talked, of course, as having her close allowed Matt to feel her unhappy fidgeting, that complex layer of sounds, movements and smells that formed her presence. "So... do you have a favorite watering hole or do we just crash anywhere?" he asked, understanding Jessica a bit better. He did have the feel to decompress and sort out thoughts, not to mention that drowning the noise that surrounded all that case, or cases, would be more than welcome.



*Since this set before The Punisher Season 1 if I'm not mistaken.
 
Every day was a day for drinks, but that wasn't a thought that got voiced. There had been a long time where she wasn't sure that she could have functioned without drinking as much as she did, it was cheaper and more satisfying than therapy. Trish told her it wasn't nearly as effective, but all the therapist had ever given her were some stupid meditations and reciting street names so that was a point she would be pretty willing to argue. Arguing, incidentally, was something else that felt like it helped. She noticed the look on Karen's face and flapped a hand slightly dismissively. "I'll take care of him, make sure he doesn't fall down any stairs or whatever," she promised. That was almost certainly not what was concerning or surprising about the whole drinking thing, but Matt was a big boy and very few people had more reason to down a glass or three of whiskey than people like the two of them. Their lives were... unique. A huge pain in the ass, honestly. Then again he was blind and if he was running off of his other senses that might get weird when he was drunk. Or maybe he functioned way better than everyone else, who knew.

Jessica would take offense to having her skills referred to as 'drunk detective'ing, because right now she was definitely not drunk. If she had been drunk she still would have done about the same, but the difference in sobriety was an important thing that ought to be factored in and she should be given credit for it. "Right." She was going to take a look through everything again of course, it would be stupid not to, but her intention was mostly to get Karen the hell out of there so that they could talk about her. When she stood around all cute and distressed it distracted Matt, and the reporter would probably try and derail the conversations that needed to happen. Staying too long inside the apartment would have been suspicious so she narrowed things down to what she thought would be the most important. Took a peek behind the medicine cabinet while grabbing a toothbrush and toothpaste, opened her nightstand drawer but didn't move anything around, and then put some clothes in the bag and brought it back out. "Here. Work clothes and comfort clothes." That way it didn't matter if Karen worked to push everything out of her head or chilled out and watched TV, she'd have what she needed. Being thoughtful would help recover points she'd lost for her normal personality, and if Karen didn't like her it would make this investigation harder.

Well, Karen wasn't going to end up liking her anyway, but that could be put off for slightly longer. Once the reporter had been put in a taxi and sent off to the hotel with some similar instructions on contact to the ones that she'd given Malcolm about contact so that they'd know she arrived safe and wasn't saying so under duress. It had probably been unnecessary but she'd done it for her person and she could do it for Matt's person.

She caught his mumble and let out a half irritated sigh, picking up where he was going with the thought. It was the one she'd rolled around her mind and then rejected for the moment, though it wasn't something that could be ignored forever. "We'll work through some of this shit and then decide if they need to know." Luke was still a soft spot and if she didn't have to call him, Jessica would prefer not to. The whole thing still stung a little, though not for the same reasons it had originally. This might be one of those things that she never got over entirely.

He asked if she had a favorite bar and she held up a finger in a 'hold on a second' moment and dug her phone out of her pocket, opened apple maps, and typed in the word 'bar'. "There's one two blocks away, maybe it'll be my new favorite." She needed a new favorite, Luke's had gotten a little bit... blown up. Even if it hadn't, she wasn't entirely sure how welcome she was "And I need you to... listen to descriptions of the pictures that were in her apartment." Even if he could feel out ink bumps or something that'd be useless with pictures she'd taken on her cellphone. "I recognize a few, but not all." They needed to know if the people were connected to Karen, Matt, Daredevil, or some mixture of the three. "She didn't want you to know something and that means we're gonna find out what it is." She shouldn't enjoy doing that sort of thing, but it gave Jessica a tiny bit of pleasure to dig up and figure out someone else's secrets. There was a little bit of power in it and having that was still a comfort. She'd felt a whole and inescapable powerlessness before and it still crept up on her sometimes with a feeling of cold dread. Being active (and nosy) helped.

((Yeah, pre-Punisher!
If Frank was active they probably wouldn't have to worry about Karen, anyone who tried to fuck with her would end up dead.))
 
A surprised and thankful Karen was soon put into a cab, packed to what should be safety with the belongings that Jessica fished for her. She had liked the effort, that was for sure, but it wasn't the kind of situation, or even person, that could mellow for someone by just that. Specially with Matt close, his presence and all the baggage that flooded the room when they were together made even the most harmless moments stuffy, awkward, and that was far from being harmless. Not that Matt dealt well with baggage either, as he was king of weighting his shoulders with all the sins of the world, and the practice didn't made him any better, it just ate him from the inside out.

With Karen out of sight, although hardly out of mind, Matt nodded to Jessica's notion about the rest of the ill conceived team of vigilantes to be informed. It was probably unfair, but Matt didn't want any of the punch first, questions later duo close by, specially after what happened the last time they were together. "I didn't thought she would be keeping secrets from me, I guess that I don't know her as well as I believed" Matt said, slightly dejected and feeling a bit terrible for being judgmental. Of course Karen was entitled to have secrets, it was foolish of him to think otherwise, but that she didn't trust him anymore to tell him what bothered her was painful. And he had only himself to blame.

It was nice that they had a bar at hand not too far away, allowing them to get a bit of a walk that served so that Matt could disconnect a bit. The city with all its noises, all its smells... it could be overwhelming, it once was when younger, but now it was similar to being embraced by his home. That was it, it was his home and his people. Sure, he may have soured his relationship with Foggy and Karen, he was in a tense relationship with the rest of the cities' vigilantes, and the rest of the people he knew were dead, but what he still had wouldn't be taken from him without a fight. It didn't mind that Foggy wanted some distance and Karen didn't trust him, he was going to protect them and the rest of the city all the same.

"Yeah, we can play 'Who's who?' in the bar" Matt said, wanting to clear his mind from self important and severe thoughts, making a joke about the old board game as they approached the place. From what he could garner of the bar, it seemed to be almost empty and had a few tables that would be private enough for a conversation, so it should suffice. "Good choice, can't read the name though" he commented, waiting for her to guide him in, feeling strangely comfortable about the idea of Jessica dragging him around. It wasn't as she was delicate, but she certainly wasn't as rough as her looks or attitude implied. "I'll drink whatever you are having" he said to make things simple, far away from any kind of challenge, wondering what would be her drink of choice.
 
Jessica didn't really figure that Karen would be able to relax and she didn't know or care if the other woman entirely trusted her or not, she just needed the reporter to not distrust her in any way that hindered the investigation or the way that Matt communicated with and listened to her. She wasn't sure that the hero would be as cooperative as she needed him to be if his... whatever Karen was to him told him she didn't like the detective. Whatever they were to each other it was clearly important.

"Oh please, everyone has secrets." She rolled her eyes but didn't feel the need to really continue further. He should know that, though. "You'll have to get over it. Whiskey will help." Actually she needed him to not entirely get over it because they had to figure out what exactly it was being hidden. She mostly accepted that about Trish at this point, though she still did keep an eye on her friend. That was what friends did though, right? She was... pretty sure that was what they did. It was what she did, so whatever. People could take it or leave it. Most were willing to take it, but she tried to make so few friends that she had a pretty good track record. She wouldn't have known what to do with more friends anyway. Didn't have time to maintain that many emotional connections.

She didn't guide Matt there; people walked around him pretty regularly when he had the cane out and all she did was sort of menace anyone who seemed like they were going to try and make the supposedly blind guy go around them. When they got to the bar she took his arm though, because it was the proper thing to do if one was with a blind man who was going into a building he'd never been in before. He had secrets that she needed to be willing to help hide because she had some morals and willingness to help people who weren't paying her. Far more than Jessica pretended that she had. She found a table in a darker corner where she could keep an eye on the door - a useless decision when she had a dude with super senses, but one that made her feel safer and was enough of a habit that she didn't really think about it. "I could barely read it either so I don't think it matters that much." It didn't. Jessica didn't need to know where she was drinking, and that was a pretty good indicator that she'd be able to find cheap shit there.

"Sit and wait." She went up to the bar and ordered, coming back with three shots of whiskey, quality - or more specifically lack of - obviously immediately from the smell if he had much experience in whiskey. "Here." One got set down on the table in front of Matt a little noisily and then she dropped into the chair across with him with her two. She downed most of one glass immediately before dropping her phone on the table unceremoniously. "I recognized that ninja gal from our.... last adventure," they were in a public place so she had to be vague. "There's also some slightly older woman with glasses and..." she lifted the phone back up and zoomed in, "looks like a cross necklace, so she was probably religious. Probably not well off, her clothes looked a little well worn in the original picture. Tanner skin." Everyone was some range of 'tanner' to her because Jessica had the skin tone of an antique porcelain doll, but she wasn't going to take a shot at ethnicity because if she guessed wrong it might cause confusion and make it harder for Matt to guess at it. Not that he probably knew about skin tone, but it might trigger a memory about accent. And he seemed to be able 'see' to some degree so she figured that face details were still useful for him to some degree. "Then a guy with glasses. Serious, probably tired. He's dressed well, like professionalism matters to him. Probably in his sixties. Stubble, probably because he's got better things to do than shave and doesn't care that much, but it might be a legitimate stylistic choice. He's black, if that's a thing you can pick up or if one of your friends often mentions skintones to you."


((goin' for Elena Cardenas and Ben Urich since they got mentioned already and then we'll get to the one neither of them know.))
 
As much as it could irk some people, there was something strangely easygoing on how Jessica handled things. She was blunt and dry, but after years and years of people tip toeing around his disability, and Matt himself having to be careful on how he dealt with people, her no bullshit approach was refreshing. Jessica bossed him around, telling him to sit and wait and handling the drinks herself, and Matt got the vibe that it wasn't just to keep the blind man charade going on, but just because she was used to be clear, expedite. Of course, he could perfectly perceive his glass after the thud it made on the table, how the sounds reflected on the full glass, the potent smell of cheap alcohol, but since she didn't hand his drink, Matt kept the charade, slowly sweeping the table with his hands until he stumbled upon it, picking it up for a sip.

It was nasty and nice, as caustic as the woman that ordered it, and it had that precise heartwarming effect on him, shaving off a tiny sliver of his worries. Jessica's mention of Elektra made Matt visibly wince, and even if it made sense her picture was among the ones in Karen's apartment, it wasn't pleasant to hear about it nor did Matt know why Jessica bothered to mention her. Perhaps she didn't think it twice or she just didn't care? Or maybe she was sizing his reaction up. Whatever it was, it didn't last, and in her professional demeanor, Jessica soon started to describe the pictures at Matt.

"Elena Cardenas" Matt said, his voice escaping between tense lips, drinking half of his glass before continuing. "You should be able to confirm it on Google, as she appeared on the news. I failed her, and Karen took it particularly bad, she was very fond of that gentle woman. Whoever did this can be miserable, maybe Wilson Fisk related" he commented. If all the pictures were like that, they would need more drinks soon, or at least he would. Matt tried to relax a bit while Jessica checked it, but it didn't work and soon there was another picture to appraise.

"Serious, tired, sixties..." Matt mumbled. "Can't be Stick since you knew him... or Leland Owlsley because he was more of a fancy businessman and Karen didn't care for him-" he paused as Jessica advanced on her description. "Of course, how can I be so dense. She's got her actual job after meeting him... Ben Urich, from the Bulletin" Matt finally said. "Those two were more or less public, so anyone can link them to Karen" Matt commented. "Foggy, Karen and I took Elena's case while Ben got Karen into investigative reporting" he explained, remembering the past few years, finishing his drink.
 
Jessica Jones did not have the time or patience to tiptoe around things for long periods of time. She could if it got shit done, but dancing around Matt didn't help either of them. It was wasted time and energy that should go into other things. In this case, that 'other thing' was getting alcohol as quickly as possible. It would have been more efficient for her drinking to sit at the bar, but that made it harder to talk about things so she was going to go ahead and accept the mild hassle of getting up or flagging the bartender and hoping he'd deliver. The only person she ever didn't sit at the bar with was Trish, so this was a little bit weird for her. Most of the time she wouldn't even bother to keep an eye on the front door because she was just there to get drunk, but she was in work mode and knew that there were stakes (plus another person who wasn't super strong and didn't heal a little faster), so this was the best place to be.

"Okay." So things could still be connected to him or to Karen. Maybe both. Matt knew her suspicions about that though, so she didn't bring it up again. Thereuld have been something comforting she could say in response to his words about Elena Cardenas, but she had nothing so she just left it for now. The dark haired detective didn't bother to check, she trusted Matt's word at least in this regard. A better way to phrase it would probably have been that she didn't distrust him, but those were clarifications that she only really needed to make in her head right now. He'd have her back and help her out, but she was still unsure if he'd lie to her. Probably, but she wouldn't feel particularly bad if he lied to her so she had to expect the same from him.

"If it was Stick I would have said asshole." It was a true descriptor, but it was also one she used for approximately 90% of the population. Basically everyone was an asshole in some way or another. "We know they know more than the easy stuff, they have your..." she didn't know what to call Elektra so she just moved on, at least having enough respect not to make jabs at that relationship, "and that's not connected to Karen." She wasn't bringing up Elektra to hurt him or to judge how he responded - though she paid attention to that - it was because the picture had been there and so he should know about it. They needed to figure out the connections, after all. "She's connected to Daredevil if anything, and Karen is only connected to him by a rescue or two and the fact she openly supports him... right?" This was the point where Matt should tell her if he and Karen Page had ever been caught in some kind of compromising position while he was in costume or openly allied in a way that would draw attention from the standard Daredevil nemesis without too much research.

"Next there's a guy with black squarish glasses, styled hair. He's in a nice looking suit, probably expensive. Tie is done perfectly, collar is neat. Probably in his thirties. Professional. Controlled. Maybe weaselly. He looks like the kind of guy who could really quiet someone down with his disapproval. You or someone you know probably wanted to punch him in the face at some point, he's got that sort of expression." Like the descriptor 'asshole', this wasn't exceptionally helpful because much of the world had a face that Jessica would want to punch. While describing the man she was already getting to work trying to get her a stupid reverse image search website to work; they were a mess on her cellphone and the low cellphone reception in the bar wasn't helping. They'd hid an image that Matt couldn't figure out just based on physical description since he was blind and didn't spend all his time with Karen, or he'd lie to her. When she figured either of those were happening she'd just reverse image search her picture of a picture and see if anyone came up. If it didn't she could try again when she got back to her apartment where at least half functional wifi and the rest of her booze was.

She threw back the rest of her first glass and moved on to the second, holding it in her free hand as opposed to drinking it immediately. It took a little extra to get her drunk, so that first glass was basically just priming.
 
"They have met" Matt admitted, tense. "Elektra and Karen. It was why... no, it was my fault" he mumbled, distracted by his own misdeeds. "Elektra is not the reason for the burned bridges between Karen and me. I am responsible of each and every one of those" he confessed, taking a moment to think. The pictures, the bullets. "If there is a message beyond the fear, I can't grasp it..." another pause. "Everything is connected, if anyone did enough digging... after Karen was our client, she worked with Foggy and me in the whole Wilson Fisk thing, a convicted man that a certain ubiquitous vigilante stopped, then Castle... and now she's basically on Ben Urich's office..." Matt commented, slowly realizing how vulnerable they all were. "The only person that is more connected to our... whole thing than Karen is Claire, but she should be safe with Cage" he said, another wince that indicated that the idea didn't fully sit well with him.

"That description fits way too many people I've stumbled upon, specially being a lawyer" Matt said, noticing that the description had caused something to stir on the back of his head, but too distracted with himself to think about it.

Even distancing himself... nothing worked, if a talented enough mind started to pull from the strings... they would come undone. "We have been careless, arrogant. We are like domino pieces, a flick on any one of us would topple the rest. Even Foggy is now working for your..." Matt paused, unaware of what exactly the relationship between Jeryn Hogarth and Jessica was. "For Hogarth, Chao and Benowitz. Didn't Hogarth represent Rand as well?" Matt shook his head. "You are a talented investigator, tell me. How long would it take you to unravel all our secrets, all our lies if you got your mind to it?" he said, reaching for Jessica's hand. "Whoever is behind this could strike on us, but for now they are just playing" Matt said, backing off, reaching for the glass and noticing it empty. "We'll need more of this" he said, dangling the empty drink in the air.

Once he had managed to calm down a bit, he returned to think about the last picture. "I kind of feel that I've met someone like that as a lawyer" he said. "The man of the picture" Matt sighed. "It wouldn't make sense for him to be any DA assistant, wealthy lawyer or corporate stooge, but who the hell does Karen know that fits the description?" he wondered. "Check Daniel Fisher, she was accused of killing him and we defended her... she was almost killed in prison" he tried, even if something inside of him told that it wasn't the case. It had to be someone else, connected to the cases. "Can't be John Healy either, he doesn't match the description at all, why did I think of him?" he mumbled, noticing that Jessica's patience was running thin and maybe she would be the one that wanted to punch him, instead of the man in the picture.

Wait. A face he wanted to punch. Someone that he wanted to punch and yet he didn't.

"The one that brought us the Healy case... he was an arrogant asshole... can't remember his name, he was connected to Fisk" Matt remembered. "Check the press conference Fisk gave, it should be on YouTube" Matt urged Jessica. "Maybe he was there" he tried to remember the name. "Something Wesley? Once Fisk became public he had to be on his paperwork somewhere" Matt insisted. "But... what happened to that man? And why send a picture of him to Karen?" he wondered.
 
Burning bridges was just a thing that happened. She was so entirely used to it that his concern over it didn't really get to her, and Jessica chose to ignore that bit. There was nothing she could say to comfort him over that. The fact that people still saw some amount of value in friendship with her was something she didn't understand and had mostly stopped questioning. Trish was her sister though, she basically had to stick with her. Malcolm knew better but hung around anyway and while she would never admit it, she did occasionally appreciate that fact.

"Damn, calm down." Seemed like Matt was getting wound up and she wasn't exactly the best at calming people down when they got stressed. Usually Jessica made them more stressed out, unless she was really trying. He knew her too well for that to work, she figured. "I'd have to tail you to figure out the Daredevil thing. Did tail you and figure out the Daredevil thing," she amended after a moment because she'd seen him being all acrobatic. "It's possible. But you're the one who decided on secrets and lies in the first place." She didn't hide herself at all. Everyone who looked her up knew what she did, what she could do. It was a selling point when it came to her work these days. "If I hadn't been trying to find out more about you for other reasons I probably wouldn't have connected you to Daredevil," she did say a moment later, offering what as what she hoped was a piece of comfort. It might not have been much, but she was one of the best at what she did so it should mean something.

His lawyer comment got a lazy 'hah' from Jessica, who made quick work of googling Daniel Fisher. "Nope." But that guy was dead and connected to Karen so she filed the face away in her memory to see if it was one of the others in the pictures. "Prosecutors wouldn't really fit the theme I'm seeing here," she confirmed, "unless they died while helping you our or while you were helping them." That seemed to be the general pattern going on here. It did definitely seem like these were targeting Karen specifically, but that didn't mean it was actually about her, not at the end of wherever this mystery was going.

She raised a hand and the bartender glanced over at her. "Can we just get a whole bottle?" He considered for a second and then pulled one off the shelf and brought it over. Jessica didn't say 'thank you', she was busy looking at her phone and probably wouldn't have thanked him even if she wasn't distracted. The video played quietly and she confirmed to herself that it was the man that Matt was talking about before googling 'Wesley Fisk' together to see what happened. "James Wesley." Back to reading from the bright screen and scrolling through information. "Looks like the guy got shot." That didn't give them a whole lot. "I assume you didn't shoot him." She made it sound like a blind thing, but it was far more about who he was as a person. If he could do all the things she'd seen him do while they fought ninja together she assumed he could probably at least take a swing at shooting someone. Taking his glass, she filled it and then slid it back across the table to Matt, only after a moment sort of tapping next to it so that he'd be able to pretend that he needed to know where it was.

"I wouldn't suggest asking her about it until we have more information. I mean, I would, but the relationship still seems important to you." Jessica would do it, but that would still probably damage the relationship. She might pretend she didn't care but she did, at least a tiny bit. "So someone connect to Fisk is possible." There was no reason for them to be hassling her though, and she was still so attached to the idea that this was connected that she didn't know quite what to make of that idea. Maybe they wanted her to be willing to back off when something happened. Which was stupid, she was pretty sure that anyone who dug into her would realize now that she didn't back off of things.
 
"But you were trying to, and you did succeed" Matt groaned, realizing how transparent he could be. It was still true that his blindness gave him a shield against suspicions of him being a vigilante that others didn't have, but with stranger and stranger events happening in the city, even an alibi like that started to run thin. "I need the secret if I want to keep being both a lawyer and... him" he said, wary. While Jessica looked for the press conference, Matt kept his blind man theatrics to find and reach the whiskey bottle the bartender brought and served himself another glass. It was fine, there was nothing wrong with that. If Jessica could drink and work, so could he, after all they were still gathering clues and wondering if both the Malcolm thing and the Karen one were related, right? There was no harm on that.

"Of course!- No, I didn't shoot him" Matt answered too loud at first, then lowering his voice. The mere notion had bothered him, as always did, so he overreacted. "Sorry. No, I didn't. I would never" he insisted, although it was true that he was saying so for himself than for Jessica, specially taking into account that she already did so, at least according to the news. It wasn't that Matt considered her a murderer, specially given the situation she seemed to be in, but he had to repeat that notion to himself so he didn't cross that line as well. The world may be better if Fisk was dead instead of in a prison that he controlled more and more of each passing day, maybe Castle had the right idea, but everyone knew where that had taken him.

"Asking her?" Matt wondered, realizing what Jessica meant, or what he thought she meant. "Do you think that this is what made her to act-" he paused. "You can't really think she has anything to do with this, right?" he continued. "She wouldn't. She couldn't" Matt mumbled, having to think that he wasn't so sure, taking a sip from his glass. "Maybe she knows something about it, but she has nothing more to do with that" he sentenced, "sending her a picture of a Fisk henchman don't make much sense, the other pictures have in common that they would make her feel bad I guess..." he sighed, trying to make some sense about what was going on.

"I guess it is possible" Matt admitted. "But Fisk was also into deals with Gao, and she was Hand" another whiskey sip. "But all our leads are dead, buried" he lamented. "We can't wait until another of our friends gets into trouble" Matt affirmed. "Although... is this a threat about bigger things to come? Or a warning for us to get away from what we usually do?" as much as he tried wrapping his mind about the mystery, he had no clue. "Whoever he is, they seem to know a lot about us, or maybe not so much if they think this will go well for them" he finished, clearly not in a good mood.
 
Ugh, he was really doing this now. "Yeah, because that's what I do. We'd be talking someone with talent or resources," she said it like it was a case of one or the other, not like there were people with both though they definitely existed, "who had some reason to be looking into Matthew Murdock. If you going to have a crisis, I'm leaving." Jessica wouldn't, but it was a threat she basically had to make. She would one hundred percent believe it too, at least until she tried to get up and couldn't bring herself to leave. "I don't have time for that. And I won't be able to make you feel better." Even when she wanted to have the right words, the wrong ones seemed to come out.

It was hard to imagine Matt killing someone, but she would have said that about herself as well. A gun didn't seem like how he'd do it even if he was going to, though. Seemed more like the sort of person who'd beat someone to death. "I didn't think so." And his response confirmed it. Maybe he was a fantastic liar and he and Karen had killed the dude together, but Jessica didn't think so. She knew about his enemies, and the fact that pretty much all of the ones people knew had fought Daredevil were alive - and those that weren't were dead because of non-Daredevil reasons - was decent proof of how he operated. It didn't mean he wasn't capable of it, it just meant that as far as she could tell it hadn't happened yet.

She shrugged. "I don't know the connection. Maybe he got shot for a reason she blames herself for, maybe he got shot by someone she knows, maybe they met on Tinder, maybe he once dated her mom. There's a million reasons. But I think we can agree there's something she didn't want you to know and if it's not related to her apartment or her social life, it's related to one of the pictures in her apartment." Maybe she just had a new boyfriend and didn't want to tell Matt, but that didn't seem right to her. "If everything else seems intended to make her feel bad, then either they made a mistake or it's meant to make her feel bad too." One of these two options seemed much more likely than the other. It seemed more likely that there were competent criminals and someone was keeping a secret than incompetent criminals and no secrets. There were always secrets.

There were always more leads somewhere. It could take a while to find them, but any plot that had multiple people involved had one who could be the loose end. Just had to shake them into it. And find them, which was the hard part. Finding was what she did though.

"I'm not hiding anything. So they know. Clients have offered me extra money to kill someone I got dirt on when they didn't like the results, it's all out in the open." Matt needed to stop including her in his little angst crisis. "And I don't know what it is you think "we" usually do, but what I usually do is drink and work." She wasn't a hero. She'd done two things that some people might think was heroic, and while society only really knew about one of them, responses were mixed. He could be a hero if he wanted, it wasn't a title Jessica wanted. It was a burden, a lot of promises that she didn't know if she could keep. Didn't know if she wanted to have to keep them. Almost as though punctuating the sentiment, the dark haired detective lifted her drink to her lips and tilted it back, letting the liquid burn the back of her throat in a way that was more comforting than painful.
 
Maybe Jessica wasn't able to make him feel better as she had just said, but just being herself and despite her character and warnings allowing him to vent a little bit was fine. He could talk with Karen about what disturbed her another day, if he even ended up doing so or wasn't something that popped up along the investigation. He should respect her privacy though, so maybe it wasn't a good idea. She was scared enough to call him despite how awkward things were, so pressuring Karen wouldn't be his smartest idea. Not that he had a lot of smart ideas as of late, to be honest. Taking another sip that was close to threaten his second glass into emptiness, Matt leaned over the table comfortably.

"Work got us troubles too. Work is how we met after all" he just said, feeling way more at ease after venting and drinking. Work was what made him meet Karen as well. It wasn't like Matt wanted to think of her, or as he thought of Jessica as he once did of Karen. Because it wasn't like that, right? No, Jessica for sure was attractive, that was undeniable, but so was fire and no one would advise getting too close to it. They had worked together in the past and they had done it well, but now, that day... it didn't feel the same. Both had been reluctant about how they approached the whole Hand issue, but despite their differences they had managed to work together better than anyone would have expected.

Maybe it was due to how things had ended, but even Matt didn't think so. It could be a pain to admit, but it wasn't her fault. And after all, after the distance the four of them pursued between themselves, or at least as far as he knew, she had come to him. Maybe it was just a case of having no other to resort to, maybe things were weird with Foggy's boss, Hogarth, but even then Jessica could have turned to a perfect stranger to solve the Malcolm thing. Yet she didn't. She could disguise it as she wanted, but Matt chose to read is as trust, trust that he also felt towards her in a sense. Yeah, that was it, trust and nothing more, right?

Matt finished his second drink without ceremony, not exactly a stranger to drinking. "We are out of work to do right now so then we drink" he said, picking up the bottle and serving both himself and Jessica. "Unless we want to pay a crooked cop a visit" he shrugged, undecided about how should they approach the cop that unlawfully arrested Malcolm.
 
"I never said it didn't." That hadn't even been the first time she'd been arrested. Jessica viewed work differently than Matt did, and she didn't factor in the whole... helping people thing. That was something that she would treat as though it was a huge bother and waste of her time even when she was dedicated to the cause. Most of what she did got her in trouble, and she was caught in a weird position where she both accepted that this was what her life was and tried her best to avoid it whenever possible. She didn't want to get caught up in problems, she just wanted to be left alone to live her life. "I don't count that as work." The whole Hand thing had been something else. Community service, maybe.

Matt was hot, he probably had a smile that made women want to take their shirts off. Jessica had noticed, of course she had noticed. But he'd been her lawyer and then things had gotten weird and now she was one of the people who had helped force him to leave his... whatever Elektra was to him - girlfriend or ex he still felt very strongly for - to die. Sure he hadn't been the one who'd actually hit him and carried him out, but she'd been part of it. Had a hand in the death of another person's loved one. She wasn't meant to be around other people with powers, seemed like. She was three for four on things turning out terribly. Four for five if Simpson counted, but Simpson was a jackass.

There was trust, she supposed. That if he'd accepted he would do everything he could to help her and Malcolm. The question had been about whether he'd do it in the first place. There were still concerns to be sorted out about styles when it came to investigating, but he wouldn't be as hard to work with as Danny had been. She couldn't work with Luke anymore - he probably wouldn't turn her down, but it would hurt too much. Even if she could drink and ignore that away, it would be awkward enough she wasn't sure it'd be useful. Matt had all the skills he needed, what with the whole being an actual lawyer thing. And being sneaky.

"There's always work to do, but drinking helps." She had a case she was supposed to be working on right now, but it was going to have to fall behind this, since Malcolm and Karen were more important. "Can't shake him down without a reason." She would have had no problem with it usually, but this was a cop and beyond the whole getting arrested thing there was the concern about the repercussions against Malcolm. "I want to follow him."Maybe see if she could find anything in his house. Perhaps let Daredevil drop in to have a few words but not take any swings at the man.

Finding out where a cop lived wasn't the hardest thing to do. It was easy to look up if the guy owned or was on the lease for a house or apartment, and if he did they'd have a place to stake out. If he didn't she might have to start the facebook hunt. Find someone in his life who'd taken a picture with an identifying piece of information and work from there. Her phone was still on the table and Jessica picked it back up to get started, figuring that Matt wasn't about to try and call her on rudeness for using her phone. This was why they were together, after all. "Got it." There was his address, front and center and entirely to easy for her to find. Safety was dead, people could find out anything about anyone these days. "Should probably be concerned about how easy that was." But she didn't sound concerned at all. "If you end up drunk enough to fall off a roof later I'll leave you behind."

If he needed her to throw him over her shoulder at pretty much any point to carry his drunk ass out she'd do it, and they both probably knew it.

((I checked to see if I could look up my parents' houses and it was astonishingly easy to find their addresses. I am dedicated to some amount of realism, haha))
 
"I can drink" Matt said monotone. He wasn't bragging on how much alcohol he could ingest nor has he taken offense about yet another of Jessica's remarks. It was just a fact, he had plenty of training either in Josie's or somewhere else. That said, he couldn't compare himself to Jessica, as he suspected she could probably drink him under the table even if she didn't have powers. "So we can follow him or visit his house" Matt commented. "Maybe he made the mistake of having a place too nice for a cop" he added, "such a goon doesn't tend to lay low or play smart" he shrugged. "We can discard the classic stakeout, as neither of us has a car. Maybe you could borrow a friend's, I don't have a license for fairly obvious reasons" he commented, although he could drive given the need.

"Is it a lets do it now thing?" Matt asked, genuinely curious. "I know that private investigators sleep at odd hours, but I was wondering" he smiled, as he didn't had a decent conversation with anyone he cared for in weeks and weeks. Matt would be the first in acknowledging that he hadn't been stellar company since Elektra died, not to mention that his bonds with Foggy and Karen were already damaged beforehand. He hadn't say it, but the thought had crossed his mind. Straight out thought that Elektra died. No euphemisms at all. Maybe it was time he moved on from her for the third time in his life, as Elektra had been like a bad addiction, as toxic as the withdrawal her absence caused. They broke one time, then she died twice. Third time was the charm it seemed, although Matt felt bad about thinking of her like that, he could at least move on.

The matter was to move on towards what, as he had been feeling aimless for a while.

"I'll defer to your expertise" Matt conceded, as she was the investigator after all and too many of his investigative routines required punching the people until he got the answers. "Feel free to call the shots, this is no courthouse" he added. "I must confess I'm aching for some action" Matt said with another of his smiles. He really did mean nothing more that what he said, there was no double meaning in that one as he did want to fix things the soonest as possible and in an expedite way, but what he had commented could be easily misunderstood, as once he felt comfortable Matt was a naturally charming man. Jessica was smarter than to read beyond what he had said, that was for sure.
 
Even if it hadn't been for her powers causing it to take more for her to get where she wanted to be Jessica would probably have been a professional alcoholic. "If he does he's either newly paid off or it's not Kingpin related though, the police purged pretty hard after his arrest." Anyone still in on Kingpin's bankroll was either incredibly smart and adept at hiding both their money and their crimes or new. The other group that could have someone bankrolled was the Hand, and she was hoping it wasn't that. Well was and wasn't. If it was they had a quick answer but had to fight a bunch of ninja and probably some political figure or rich person would turn out to be connected, neither which were her favorite thing in the world. If it wasn't there'd be a lot more work though, which she didn't like either.

"I don't have a license either." For reasons that were obvious to the people who knew her. Plus it was New York, who actually had the money for a car? "I sit on a lot of fire escapes." It was easiest when people were in apartments, houses were harder to stake out. But if she could get on a roof to hide and watch in the dark she would. Following the man would be hard without his schedule, police hours weren't as predictable as office employees. And they'd have to do the whole 'follow that car' thing in a cab or tail him on the subway. That, at least, wouldn't be hard. "We can see if we can follow him tonight. Otherwise we meet up somewhere and then keep an eye on him." Break into his house if they had to.

Was it a 'do it now' thing? "Depends on the plan. I don't have any police contacts so I have no idea when the guy gets off work. That means that if we want to follow him we have to hang around the police department for possibly hours waiting." If he was working the average shift though, there could only be a few hours left on it. "We can head back and see if the guy drives home, but if he does we're screwed." It made the most sense to state out his place - an apartment it looked like from her casual research, good - and see what they could find out like that. Opening things subtly wasn't one of her strong suits though, so if they had to go through the guy's stuff they'd probably want... well, either Matt would have to do it or there'd be a broken doorknob. In theory she could pick a lock but she was a pretty solid door opener on her own so it was a skill rarely needed.

She didn't call him on his phrasing, but it was definitely all over Jessica's face. "Take care of it ahead of time, there's a lot of sitting involved in what I do. And drinking." And then more sitting. Matt wasn't going to be able to help in the picture taking, but his super hearing would come in real handy if they needed to catch a conversation the man was having.

Grabbing the bottle she poured herself another drink, filling the glass higher than any bartender would have. "We'll follow him if possible," she decided after a few moments and draining half her little glass. "You need to get your uniform? Seems like it'd be a little suspicious if we have to get on the subway but if you prefer to be hidden I can wait while you pack it up and meet me at the precinct. I have your number in case he leaves." Or if it turned out the man had already left, so they didn't waste a ton of their time standing around or sitting on benches or whatever. She desperately wanted her camera, but there was nobody to deliver it to her. Malcolm was with Trish and the only other person in the building she knew at all was Robyn and she was crazy.
 
"I do know someone" Matt commented, thinking about Brett Mahoney. He wouldn't give information to Matt Murdock, probably neither to Daredevil, although that depended in a wide number of factors. If he was honest, detective Mahoney was more of a Foggy's acquaintance than his, but at least he knew he was a clean cop. His utility was more to dump information to him than the other way around though, specially if the whole thing concerned their suspicions about a fellow cop. "But he probably won't share information like that. He can be useful to share whatever we find with him, as he wants a clean department more than anyone else" Matt added.

"Unless we foresee some punching I won't be needing my work uniform" he said, slightly amused by how Jessica was not exactly worried, but took into account all sorts of things and possibilities, so it was interesting to see her mind at work. "A tailing job should be easy enough unless he gets in a car. Once I have his heartbeat and/or his smell... its easy to keep a safe distance" he commented, giving his gifts no importance, although he had the feeling that Jessica wasn't entirely comfortable with how much he could perceive, probably due to how she always kept her distance with people. Matt knew that how he could unilaterally breach that distance was unfair, so he tried to keep his intrusions to a minimum, but there was only so much he could do in that department.

"And if things get heated up, I can always borrow your scarf one more time..." Matt said, remembering how he had masked his identity once in an emergency. Maybe it was the alcohol, but it was true that he was feeling more and more comfortable with Jessica. Sure, she could be abrasive as hell, and it wasn't like that would change over time, but as the time advanced one tended to fall into her pace, her way of doing things. That didn't mean to be oblivious to neither her better or worse parts, but it was true that after being with Jessica a few times he understood better how Foggy and Karen had to feel when dealing with his own peculiarities. Maybe Jessica was a bit right about certain things, maybe she did well at keeping just a few people close, but yet not too close.

"Lets get going, grab the bottle" Matt said, perhaps aching for action in a way that wasn't entirely healthy or tried to patch up certain wounds too soon, but he couldn't just be idle. Their friends were at risk, endangered by some kind of invisible threat, and he wanted for once to do something before it got worse, instead of running damage control all the time.
 
"So you don't know someone useful." At least not now. Having a trustworthy cop was a good thing, but they weren't near the point of involving the police in the situation. There was too much that needed to get figured out before the passed the guy off to the cops. Once that happened they wouldn't be able to get the information they needed, after all. Maybe some of it, but there wouldn't be a way to ask questions and demand answers the way she would almost certainly end up wanting to. She wasn't letting the cops handle all that, even if they got an answer they might not believe it or know how to handle it. What if the answer was something the the Hand or... or someone like Killgrave? That was for people like her and Matt. They could give it a shot, but that was going to end in more death. They didn't need that. She... she didn't need that. Couldn't handle it, maybe. Not htat she would admit it to anyone ever.

Oh, she foresaw some punching. Well actually she didn't, but she had learned better. "I used to assume not everything would end in a fight, and then... everything started ending in a fight." She shrugged dismissively, though it did actually bother her a little bit. Jessica just wanted to be left alone to stalk cheating spouses and whatever, but nothing ended up that simple anymore. It was more her than she was willing to admit, so mostly she blamed it on other people. If people weren't such assholes this wouldn't be a problem that she had to deal with. That was just true enough that she could excuse it at least sometimes.

"Smelled weird when you gave it back last time," she complained, but it wasn't a 'no'. There had been the slightly cling of aftershave or shaving cream or something kinda masculine like that and sweat that wasn't hers, which wasn't an actual issue. She couldn't not complain about it though, that would be out of character and she wasn't about to not make fun of him. Now it probably just smelled like alcohol again and he was going to mess it up. "And you look like an asshole either way." His skills would make things easier, they could probably put more distance between them and the guy when tailing, which would be good in case the cop was actually observant. "I know where he lives now." So between his advanced stalking abilities and her different advanced stalking abilities, they should be able to keep an eye on this guy without too much problem.

Well she thought that, but nothing ever turned out as easy as she wanted it.

"That's tacky," she informed him in response to him saying that they should grab the bottle, but she was filling up her slightly dented flask at the same time she said it, which may or may not have been worse than just taking the bottle with them. It was filled the the point that there was concern that it might spill before she screwed the lid on. If she was going to have to share, she was going to make sure that the bottle was holding as much as was physically possible for it. "You got the money to split this, or is feeling like a good person your usual payment?" She was willing to not split the cost of the bottle with him apparently, but only if he was willing to admit he was too broke to pay for it. Either way she would feel like she'd won in some way. Once money was sorted out she stood up, prepared now for the work ahead. The alcohol had lightened the weight a little bit, though her shoulders still felt heavy. "Let's go stalk a guy." Jessica made it sound so normal.
 
"Nobody is ever honest about how I look, thank you" Matt joked, knowing that Jessica was, at least in part, just being playful. "Next thing will be to tell me that the suit is red and has devil horns, I would hate such an outfit..." he added, smirking. Of course, she wasn't fond of costumes and heroics, but that didn't mean that she really thought he looked like an asshole. Because he didn't, right? Damn, he wasn't paying attention out of respecting her privacy and now he wasn't sure how much of what she said was true. "Once we got a full bottle I thought that worrying about looking tacky was out of the equation" he said with a shrug, "Not to mention that... are you filling up the flask? Well, that's... more useful" he said, not wanting to chase the issue nor being in a position to judge anyone's drinking habits.

"I have the money yet" Matt answered, unsure once more of how much of Jessica's act was a play, but he was enjoying it all the same. "Although feeling like a good person is heartwarming and the Christian thing to do" he added, normally not one to joke about religion but he felt lighthearted after shedding a bit of his weight, his fear for his friends and yes, the alcohol sure helped too. "I don't think you'd dare to try the good person thing, not sure if it suits you" he said, of course not being specially serious, but if she approached the issue the other way around Jessica could think that he was saying what or how she should be, and that wasn't on his mind. "Lets go" Matt said, following her after getting out some wrinkled bills to pay his part of the drinks.

Now focused on their prey, Matt's instincts and senses where sharpened, sensible to any change like a feather in the wind. The precinct was almost a living thing, an ant farm where he was aware of every individual movement there and yet, unable to tell one ant from the other or guess the purpose of each one. He would depend on Jessica to tell their mark apart once he left the building, and then he would be able to start trying to latch unto him, get acquainted with every telltale signs that could make him easier to follow. "So... how do we face the stalking?" Matt asked, making time. "Just walking around together normally could be enough, but I need to keep the blind act just in case unless it's an emergency" he commented. "Of course, you guiding me around like before it's too flashy for the task at hand so..." Matt thought of an idea that could help with that and maybe poke some fun with Jessica, depending on her mood.

"Maybe we could hold hands or you could cling to my arm" Matt suggested, his smile reflecting both that the idea wasn't entirely serious even if it could be, but also unable to keep himself from showing his charming side when he was enjoying himself. "That way anyone who noticed I'm blind would see you guiding me around and the rest would look at us like a normal couple and pay no attention" he said. It was probably unnecessary, but even then it could be interesting to see Jessica react. That one time where they chased each other Matt moved without thinking it twice, as the average New Yorker wouldn't care about their fellow citizens so much as to check on normal looking pedestrians, but it was still an idea worth exploring, at least as a talk topic while they waited.
 
"Ears," she corrected lazily when he said 'devil horns'. Jessica would understand the need for something a little more protective than a business suit, but she didn't understand the point of having something flashy. Even when she'd naively gotten into the idea of being a hero she hadn't understood the point of the flashy suits. At least his face cover was attached to the helmet so he couldn't be blinded with it. She'd give him points for that, though she wasn't going to say it out loud. Everyone looked like an asshole to her. They usually turned out to be, but occasionally she was proven wrong by people. "At least you didn't end up with yellow." Had he picked the colors for his costume or had whoever made it handled all the creative decisions?

He asked, and the dark haired detective raised an eyebrow but didn't stop until she was sure no more could fit. "You know full well that I am." There was no way he couldn't absolutely tell based on sound what she was doing. "The flask is an age old, subtle, dignified way of indulging in alcoholism." Or whatever. She tucked it into a pocket and added "if you have objections I won't share." There was a good chance she'd be willing to share otherwise, which wasn't nothing. It was a gesture that put him in at least some part of the inner circle, or meant she figured he had more reason for being drunk than she did.

"If you want people to think we're a couple we'll have to make out in public otherwise trust me, nobody gives a shit." He couldn't top her when it came to this sort of thing, Jessica was shameless. It seemed best to keep up his act, doubly so when they were around the police station; that was where his clients probably came from, after all. People who came to her sometimes came from there too, though for different reasons. They came to her when the police couldn't or wouldn't help them. She had yet to meet a client while on her way out from whatever ridiculous arrest attempt had been made, but it seemed like an inevitable thing if they kept hauling her and her friends in for stupid reasons. If law enforcement wanted to ask her questions about whatever she'd been doing they could just ask her in her office. She was just as likely to share any amount of useful information there as in a jail cell, and at least she'd be more comfortable.

To keep up the image he seemed to prefer he could use his cane or they could link arms, she didn't really... hold hands. She'd hold his wrist if he wanted, but hand holding was weird. She wasn't an affectionate person, at least not in the cuddly show off-y sort of way. "The last time I clung to something I crushed it." They were going to have to take another cab, she was getting real sick of them. Or rather, getting sick of forking over what small amount of cash she had. Everything required being quick today and it would have been far worse to walk back to the station, but it didn't mean it wasn't starting to irk her a little.

Admittedly most everything irked her so that was a bad judge of how problematic something was. She flagged a cab and asked for a place a short block from the police station, helping Matt into the car if he seemed to want it. They could have got out right at the front steps, but Jessica didn't like showing up exactly where she intended to stake out, it was less suspicious to join the people on the sidewalk and get lost in them as opposed to appearing right at the target place.
 
"Considering that it's almost bulletproof I'd have taken it even if it was yellow" Matt admitted, following on the joke. "Although I'd have no way of knowing, but I'm told it's dark red and black" he added, as Melvin had told him. "No, no objections, please go ahead" Matt waved with his hand, not exactly worried about Jessica sharing, but mostly just letting her be, as it didn't really disturb him. Well, and maybe he could need a sip later, you never knew. Even with the slight push and pulling, that was friendly bartering with Jessica, so Matt took it as a good sign. They did trust in each other before this, or Jessica wouldn't have come for him in the first place, but it all happened so fast before they split ways again that they didn't know each other, not really.

"Taking advantage of a blind man miss Jones?" Matt said amused, a joke to hide the slight embarrassment the idea caused. It wasn't like Matt was some kind of charming womanizer, as he didn't go around hooking up with women, it was just something that happened to him when he was at his charming relaxed self. Matt had to admit that such a side of him didn't have much time to shine as of late, but he was aware that his interactions with Jessica were friendly and nothing more. Or so he thought at least. "As strange a part of this already weird day it would be, maybe it's better if we don't have to resort to that" he said, almost immediately regretting it. Matt wanted to keep it professional and he was aware that such a thing could lead to more and end with him confessing his sins the day after.

"Help with the cab I'll accept" he said, keeping appearances when they took it. Maybe he shouldn't have refused her idea so fast with a joke? Matt hardly thought that Jessica would feel harmed because he rejected a make believe making out moment as a cover up, but it wasn't like he could fix it by saying that he was interested or that Jessica was attractive or he would never hear the end of her jokes. That way Matt ended in an uncomfortable middle ground where he didn't exactly know what to do or how to act, just following Jessica and staying way more silent than he was just mere minutes ago.
 
She couldn't tell if he was joking or honestly couldn't see what what his suit's color was. "That's what I figured." Even if he'd tried to bring up a complaint - not that she figured he would have - it wouldn't have stopped Jessica. She didn't care that much what he thought as long as he was still willing to help her. At this point he was invested because of his friend and the fact that he was a good person. A lot of people weren't, but she was confident in her judgment of Matt in that category. Didn't mean he couldn't be selfish and sometimes an asshole if those turned out to be traits of his, but he was, at the end of the day, good. Someone who wanted to help people.

Letting out a snort, Jessica rolled her eyes. "Maybe when we're done. Don't want you getting distracted." Her self confidence was unshakable, at least in this regard. She could fake it most of the time in all others. When it came to flirting though, she was blunt and in control. "You think today has been strange so far?" Cute. "Annoying, yeah." Stressful? Yeah. But she'd spent so long having someone fucking with her that at this point it just seemed normal. This was just what people did to her. She assumed these people were doing it as a power play or because they knew that coming at her head on would end poorly. After Killgrave maybe she was paranoid, but everyone should be. There were people like... well, people like her out there.

By the time they got into the cab, she wasn't thinking about the jokes anymore. It had been amusing but it was over. Other 'heroes' were a bad idea. Didn't matter how hot or nice they were, it couldn't end well, Jessica was pretty sure it was impossible. Romance in general was probably impossible for her. Sex was fine, best with people she'd never met and would never meet again. No emotional connection, no need to see them ever again. And that cut Matt right out, if she ever needed to work with him again. Plus it seemed like he'd be the sort who would make it weird afterwards. He had the whole religious thing going for him, after all. She didn't have the time or energy for that, the best she could do was not be offensive.

It was his turn to pay for the cab, and Jessica helped him out once that was done. She didn't take his hand but she stuck close in a way that could be easily seen as concern, though it all for the image. Matt didn't actually need her to hover, after all. "Right, time for the boring part." Jessica made it sound like this was a totally normal thing that everyone did all the time, not what it was - getting ready to follow and record the actions of a police officer.
 
With both of them being accustomed to work alone, or at least Jessica was as Matt's vigilantism wasn't technically work, the stakeout silence was pretty awkward. Neither of them seemed to feel the need to fill the moment with idle chat, nor were they specially competent at it. Having been drinking a bit and that strange not-quite-flirting thing they just had when it came to disguising his blindness probably didn't help either, as Matt couldn't help but imagine how things would be in that regard with someone like Jessica. He also wondered if she had thought about it, in fact if she was thinking about it, but even with his powers if Jessica had some kind of encounter of a different nature with Matt in her mind, she didn't show. It was indeed the boring part, but after a while that seemed forever the dirty cop finally abandoned the precinct.

Once Jessica gave him a clue, Matt was able to focus on the cop, from the calm sound of his heartbeat to the minty smell of his shampoo, it would be now way harder to lose him in a crowd and they would be able to follow him from a distance. "Lets go, I got him" he commented, as Jessica moved with him on tow. Nothing was suspicious so far, or so it seemed, as the cop was seemingly deep into a leisurely walk, stopping here and there to do some window shopping. The stores he stopped at weren't particularly cheap, be them of masculine fashion, expensive electronics or a jewelry, so it was pretty clear that he had some kind of payday in mind.

"He's... a bit agitated, anticipation? Excitement?" Matt mumbled, unsure of what it was from the distance, as the cop went across the street to a Chinese restaurant. "At least we now know what kind of food he likes" he added, smelling the food as they crossed to be a bit closer. It seemed to be a perfectly normal place, but then a heavy sound made Matt frown. "I heard something big, metallic..." he focused a bit more. The sound echoed in his senses once more, quieting as he lost track of the policeman. "Wait. I lost him" Matt commented. "Maybe a heavy door? Like an industrial fridge?" he wondered, but there was no reason at all for him to enter such a place, unless...

"Jessica, what's the name of the place?" Matt asked, agitated, unable to make the painted sign apart, if only it had some bass relief. "High Golden Palace? Tall Crimson Tower? Something like that?" he pulled out his smartphone, loading an app in a hurry. "Does it have around the name the symbol for high or tall?" he asked, crudely drawing the 高 character. After receiving an affirmative answer he scowled, some of his fears and concerns starting to become true. "It's one of the old Madame Gao's places then..." he sighed.



Either the cop is getting paid or the cop is getting "disappeared", maybe he works for what's left of Gao's people or for other branch of the Hand and they have lured him here, feel free to tackle the scene as you want.
 
Silence wasn't awkward for Jessica, it was nice to not have to try and hold a conversation with someone. She wasn't great at small talk and she didn't really have much interest in trying to get better at them because it was in general a huge waste of time. It wouldn't work to just sit there because that was suspicious, so she would direct Matt around to walk, though her eyes stayed focused on the precinct doors. At one point she bought a cup of coffee and used that as a reason to sit down,it and staring at those doors in a way that seemed more like somebody zoning out than a professional keeping watch. Her head was a mess of thoughts, and while some of them were related to Matt it wasn't about them potentially having sex. She'd thought about that before, but the job at hand had stakes high enough that she was mostly thinking about things related to that.

"Great, me too." Agitated, anyway. But that was basically her natural state of being, and having people fuck with her friends was a one way ticket to Stress Street. She kept a distance that she felt was appropriate and kept half an eye on the man and half an eye on Matt, trying to make sure that nothing went weird. Not that she thought that he was going to be the one who ended up doing something weird, he was just the only other gauge she had for how things were going. He was the one who could hear what was going on after all. If this was a trap he'd be the one who would probably know first. Jessica wasn't sure if the blind man was also expecting that to happen, but if he wasn't she wanted to be able to live in whatever world he was in because it wasn't reality.

When the man went into the Chinese restaurant, she glanced at Matt but didn't say anything. "High Golden Palace," she confirmed. Matt scowled and mentioned Gao and Jessica shot him a look. "I told you it was connected." And now he couldn't deny that she'd been correct. Should have known better than to question her when she'd said this was all one thing. A moment later she had a realization and frowned in irritation. "Oh great, more ninja." There was no way there wouldn't be more ninja in there. Which meant they were probably going to have to punch things. "If there's a door we'll find it." Even if she had to fight people while he touched every inch of the wall.

Plans were for people who didn't have things to do and could feel the slight warmth of alcohol leaving their veins to be replaced with the horror that was sobriety, and Jessica had her hand on the door before she paused. "You can't exactly go in and then get into a fight," she realized, "if they don't already know who you are that would probably give them an idea." And he couldn't just go in with the scarf on his face, that would be weird and ruin any chances of peaceful communication if there were civilians in there. "I don't have to fight ninja until I met you," she complained, like it was entirely Matt's fault. With a deeply reluctant sigh she peeled her scarf off and handed it to him. "If I go in, will you be able to hear everything from out here?" If not she could call him before she went in and leave her phone in her pocket. "I won't need backup," she might, "but it's better if you know what's going on inside. Code words are stupid, so you can assume that something went wrong if I throw something." It would be loud enough for Matt to hear and wouldn't require her yelling the word 'banana' or whatever. She'd rather be stabbed. "You can case the place from the outside or wait here, but I'm thinking all the things we want are going to be inside. If you go in with your face all hidden right away you''ll look like a robber or a crazy person." He might have been the second thing, but only as much as she or any of the others were.

Which was maybe not a comforting thing, Danny Rand said he'd punched a dragon.

((I'm thinking Jessica goes in, a fight starts, Matt helps her, and then they investigate and find the cop))
 
Matt was too busy kicking himself in his mind to answers Jessica's 'I told you so'. If instead of grieving for the loss for his murderous girlfriend he had been doing his job and followed through, that problem wouldn't be there, but instead he left the remains of the Hand to rest, festering like an ill treated injury. "I don't feel anything that weird there, but then again if they are ninja..." Matt frowned, focusing but getting nothing else. Jessica was keeping a cooler head than him, so Matt tried to listen for once and didn't barge in. The plan didn't include entering kicking ass from the get go, so it was better if he stayed outside.

As mean or grumpy as Jessica could sound when she talked about all things ninja, Matt felt a bit better when she handed him her scarf, a gesture that may be mostly practical on her, but still was welcome. "I could hear everything until they opened some kind of metallic door, heavy" Matt answered. "I don't know if it's a meat fridge and they are going to chop the cop or it's some kind of security door or safe room" he added, a bit surprised due to her claim. They didn't know what was in there, but in classic Jessica bravado she didn't need backup, of course. "You will have backup, even if you don't need it" Matt said, deciding that was the best way to sort it out, as he could be headstrong as well.

"I'll take a peek around while you do your private investigator magic in there" Matt said, wanting to take a look at other possible entrances to the place. "I'll hear if you get into trouble and will go in. Face covered of course" he added, a brief smile on his face as he held her scarf. Once Jessica moved in, Matt went around into the alleyway, a place way more discreet to make a break and enter. His hearing focused on Jessica's heartbeat, the steps of her boots, while his smell couldn't help but find refuge in her scarf once more, fleeing from the less appealing aromas of the street. It smelled of booze once more, of course, but that wasn't the only thing it smelled as, it never was.

Taking his mind away from where it shouldn't be, fearing for a moment if he didn't have a drink too many for his mind to wander into that territory in such a situation, Matt sharpened his focus into the situation itself. Jessica being his compass at that moment didn't help either.

(sounds perfectly fine!)
 
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