manwithoutfear | [for Steve] sticks and stones

I don't like hospitals. They're an assault on the senses. The monitors beeping. The astringent smell of anesthetic. The coughing and the crying and the hurried footsteps and the sirens and the oppressive presence of death and all that that entails around every corner. I appreciate the work of hospital personnel (despite Foggy's adoptive mother's accusations that her son is the only member of Nelson & Murdock to find injury, my life has been in someone else's hands more times than I have fingers) but the environment in which they do that work is hostile. It's my understanding that the room I'm in now is just a simple clinic, an off-shoot of the local laboratory, but the trappings are more or less the same.

I'm not here for myself; I probably should be, with the amount of minor injuries I've racked up over the past month, but I've lived through worse. I'm not recovering from surgery. I haven't been shot. Not like the man I intend to visit. The tap tap tap of my cane gives me an idea of the room's layout (that it's relatively small and that it's not empty). It hits the edge of something to my side (something with give, most likely a bed), and I stop to listen.

"Captain Rogers?"

His real name. I trust him to take the hint and use mine in turn.

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It's a hell of a thing. My first thought is that the Hand was somehow involved, but I don't give it voice. There's more than way to bring someone back from the dead. I don't press for more information. His tone's loud and clear: an interrogation isn't welcome here.

"You must be glad."

"I am... deeply grateful," I say, because it's true, although of course the truth is complicated.

"This island may be misleadingly quiet, but I owe it a thing or two, regardless."

"That makes one of us," I say. There's no jealousy; I've never been bitter about my lot in life. Not in terms of my sight, at least. I ought to be grateful for the vacation, but the sentiment is soured by the fact that it'll never end.

"Though I'll confess it's nice to be out of the public eye."

"Agreed." It is- as ready as I was to take what the trial and the fallout dealt, I certainly wasn't looking forward to it.

"I've never been forced to this much inactivity, maybe, at least not while I was conscious- but I do have to agree with you on that point."

"You'll be out soon enough," I say, nothing less than convicted. A man like Steve Rogers can't be kept bedridden for long; in our work, you either heal fast or you get buried. Regardless of the severity of his injuries (and I admittedly don't yet know their extent), I believe this, fundamentally.

"Of course, you're already a hot topic."

I don't bother to hide my look of confusion. Aside from the handful of people I'm already acquainted with from home who stopped by, I can't imagine my arrival having much of an impact on anyone. I have a brief mental image of news reports, which is still an old-fashioned association for a world that has twitter, which I still don't understand the purpose of. I haven't seen the makeup of the island, though, I don't know what gets information around, here.

"How so?"

"It's my understanding that not many people show up here in your condition. In terms of gossip, it trumps talking about the jukebox's lack of taste," I say frankly. Then again, I've already come across a few people who'd heard about the blind man walking Tabula Rasa's shores, so maybe I shouldn't talk.

"Right," I murmur, "it must have been... fairly dramatic. Apparently I appeared on the compound steps?"

There's probably still a stain.

"So the story goes," I say. "You got lucky, in that regard. Showing up so close to medical supplies, personnel... This island isn't very large, but you wouldn't have been easy to carry."

My own arrival was much less traumatic, if still exhausting. A long night stretched into a long day of explanations and introductions. Nearly two months later, and I'm still not as settled in as I would like.

"Like I said, Matt," I tell him with a slight, solemn nod.

"Whatever circumstances may be, I have to be grateful for a thing or two. How long have you been here, now?"

"Coming up fast on two months," I reply, sounding a little more tired by the prospect than I like. "It's been... a learning process."

[for Steve] sticks and stones

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