SpideyDevil

Sneaky Sneaky

Peter frowned. He actually frowned at the news there weren't any criminals in the building.
Not because he was upset he wasn't going to fight anyone or anything remotely like that, in fact, it was actually somewhat of a refreshing break from the usual procedure of kicks and punches. However, he couldn't shake the strange nagging feeling. There was something so odd about the Russian gang's shady over-the-top security practices, yet they didn't bother to have any actual cameras inside their building. What kind of lair didn't have cameras?
Peter pressed his lips together.
Maybe the kind where highly important people didn't want to be tied to visiting?
"Huh. Seems too good to be true. If my spider senses weren't so quiet I'd think it was a trap. But, I won't look a gift horse in the mouth." He placed his hands on the dips of his hips as his sly partner was finishing up with picking the last lock and making his way towards the double doors.
Humming his understanding on his part of the mission, he said,
"As much as I love a date with the performing arts, I hope it doesn't come to that." A small grin traversed his lips for a moment before he went back to the serious, time-sensitive matter on their hands
"But, I'll catch you in a few." Sliding his phone from the tight pocket of his spandex , "And by few, I mean 3 minutes and 50 seconds."
As the door swung closed behind the red vigilante, Peter tried the first door, which led to the tech room.
Shuffling around the gray-carpeted room, Peter started with opening desk drawers and digging through the brown cardboard boxes for any clues.
He had hoped to find maybe a disk or USB, or even a password to get into the computers, but as he continued to search the room, he had to give the goons credit this one time; they weren't stupid to leave those sorts of things laying around. At least not in obvious places.
With only packs of industrial wires and batteries to show for his scouring, Peter was forced to consider this room a bust, and he quickly moved on to the next office across the hall.
Making a beeline to the metallic tower of file cabinets, Peter started from the top and worked his way down the compartments, quickly skimming through the different manila folders and their contents.
At first, nothing really stood out to him. Just bills and papers that came along with the building.
However, as he moved on to the next compartment, he was a little taken aback to find papers for a completely different property.
Sliding the cabinet below that one, Peter swiped the first paper and saw that it too was for another totally different plot of land.
"Okay.. What do we have here.. Playing Monopoly?"
Aware he didn't exactly have enough time to read through all the fine, times new roman print, using his free hand, Peter slipped out his phone and took snapshots of his findings, before neatly sliding the papers back into their folders, and closing the cabinets, leaving them as undisturbed as he found them.
Although he didn't have much time left, he figured he could at least give the sleek managerial type room at the end of the hall a quick rundown.
Yanking the clear glass doors open, Peter slipped behind the polished mahogany desk and bent down to rummage around in the drawers.
However, aside from a few fountain pens, they were all empty except for the bottom compartment, which had a few sheets of paper. Upon examination, he saw they were receipts for cargo shipments. The first pages were nothing out of the usual, the typical industrial equipment and machinery that would assist a large textile supply operation. But glancing at the last bill, the items were all coming from the Caterpillar company, which Peter was pretty sure was solely used for construction purposes.
Taking pictures of that, too, Peter slid the drawer shut before rising to a stand. On very hurried feet, he made his way out of the room and back towards the vent they had originally come through.
They had about 30 seconds left before the sensors rebooted and switched back on.
If Matt wasn't back in the next 20, then the spider would be forced to make a start of the exit and meet him outside as agreed.
-
The Daredevils boots were nearly silent as he jumped over the rail and dropped to the bottom of the small stairwell, landing in a crouch as he surveyed his surroundings again.
However, he didn't have the time to waste on precautionary sweeps. Moving quickly through the next set of doors he found himself in a more open warehouse space, but as he moved between the large crates, stacked high by forklifts parked to the side in wait for the next day's work.
Matt frowned, tapping and knocking at crates to find their interiors usually filled with quite mundane and normal items.
His frown deepened with every rock overturned to find nothing, jogging the empty perimeter with every step more sure he was going to return empty-handed, more confused as to why they would guard something like this. More confused as to why he had wasted his time.
Just as he was going to turn around to make his way back to Peter he clocked a side door, tucked into the back of the warehouse that led to another set of stairs, it echoed showing Matt its depth.
His brow crashed hard over his sightless eyes and he hesitated for a moment, but Peter would understand- he wouldn't want Matt to miss an opportunity for information and this was exactly the reason that they had a rendezvous.
So without another moments notice, he pulled open the stairwell door and moved to make the same leap over the rails to the bottom, expecting it to only be a level or two.
It was only as his feet flew over the bars he realized it went down at least four floors and he was forced to catch himself halfway down on a passing railing before completing the fall, immediately taking his clubs from their holsters on his hip as he rose into a crouch, surveying the small cramped column of concrete he found himself in.
There was only one door, which he was facing down with an etched frown.
He still picked up nobody on the other side, but the concrete was thick and the door was a heavier metal than the ones before it, bolted closed and locked tight, but not to keep him out. Indeed, as he holstered one club and reached forward, he found he could easily slide the rusted bolt from its reciever, and slowly, his gloved hand fell to the other locks, hesitating tentatively
Was this what they were looking for? Some underground cache of people or weapons?
Matt felt his heartbeat quicked with anticipation as he went to work on the padlock that held the secrets closed. He thought about calling Peter, but there wasn't the time, he may not have been particularly worried about getting caught but he didn't want to draw out this reconnaissance mission if it was unnecessary, and he didn't want anyone to know they had been here if they could help it, it left coming back on the table if they felt it necessary.
So he focused on opening the lock, pushing the door inwards in slow careful centimeters, trying to judge what was on the other side of the insulting door.
But as the crack grew to a gap, he heard nothing on the but a vast expanse.
As he stepped through the threshold his boots hit metal grating that vibrated lowly to show him another set of stairs, ending in what seemed to be a brick and cobble room, or perhaps passage because Matt didn't have time to perceive the end to the room or its relative depth.
Behind him, there was a whispering kiss of metal, crossing a threshold. Matt didn't have time to process how he had failed so completely in sensing the oncoming attack. He had to defend against it.
Side stepping the blade, he felt the hiss of air as it crossed his cheek. It took his breath away.
Breathing in quickly through his nose to power his blows and attempt to gather data, he finds that he couldn't smell soap or detergent or shampoo. There were no obvious markers of this attacker in his reality but the hiss of his blade, which Matt entirely lost when it halted its ark through the air to retreat back to its owner.
He didn't have time to be confused. He threw a blind kick, hitting two arms which protected the attacker from the force of the Devil's boot. As Matt's leg came down, so too did the sword, and despite a quick shift in stance, Matt felt the lick of hot fire light up his thigh.
A sharp gasp escaped him but he used the relative advantage of knowing where the sword was, slick with the copper tinge of his own blood, to land a blow in the attackers face, his other booth stomping the descending blade from the hands of the attacking ghost, sending the blade clattering to the grating.
But Matt's punishment for his hubris did not end there. The man was quick, quicker than anyone Matt had fought in a long time.
His blows came fast and quiet from out of the darkness and Matt was only able to deflect so many, quite a few landed as he was wrestled back, nearly bowling over backwards from the stair railing to the dusty ground below.
Pushing the attacker back, he managed to get a leg up, putting his boot into the quiet hearted chest - the man emitting the first real groan Matt had noted.
But as he flew through the doorway he rolled backwards to his feet without missing a beat, and Matt only had time to lift his fists to his face and take a step forward before he was forced back again, dodging the crystalline cry of metal...stars? Flying past his head, *one, two, three* of them.
Matt stepped forward again, his teeth gritted, and snatched a fourth star out of the air, launching it back the way it came before he caught a fifth star in his shoulder for all his effort.
It was his turn to let out a disgruntled groan and he yanked out the star to return it to its owner, though this like the last missed its mark- the flipping and twisting that prevented its landing helping to land a foot in Matt's stomach, sending him sprawling back into the doorway he'd only just made it through.
-
As the seconds ticked down, Peter anxiously bounced up and down on the tips of toes, expecting to see Daredevil burst through the double doors at any given moment. But as he waited and their time gradually ticked down dangerously close to their final 10 seconds, Peter was forced to come to the unpleasant conclusion that Matt wouldn't be making it back in time.
Gritting his teeth against his lower lip, the spider's calculating gaze flicked up to the vent.
8 seconds... 7... 6....
Even though they had both agreed to a meeting point in the event something like this happened, Peter just felt... wrong about leaving without Matt.
But ignoring their game plan also felt wrong to the hero..
On the rare occasions Spiderman had teamed up with other supers for an operation, he always stuck to their agreements and never deviated from what the other hero wanted, because things went ... sour if they weren't on the same page.
But with Matt.. It was different. He couldn't easily ignore his personal feelings for the sake of a mission.
5 seconds... 4... 3...
Sucking in a sigh, Peter closed his eyes and forced himself to make his decision.
2... 1...
Taking a long stride forward, Peter ran for the double doors, flinging them wide open in his haste to find the missing Daredevil.
He wasn't sure where he was going as he hopped down into the main warehouse floor. He only knew he had to search around.
For a moment, he almost considered calling out for the vigilante but quickly decided against it as soon as the thought entered his head, wanting to avoid inviting any unwanted attention onto himself, just in case any guards had entered the facility to give it a sweep.
Hopping onto the stacks of boxes and crates, Peter was puzzled as to where his partner could have possibly gone, because despite the building being so large, it was quite spacious and as far as he could see from his elevated vantage point, there was no sign of the masked man or what had led him astray.
With nothing else to go on, Peter jumped down and headed towards the inconspicuous door in the corner of the room. But as he approached, his brows knitted together.
It was very faint, but he could hear distinct low grunts and the silvery clang of metal.
"Ah, fudge," he hissed into the fabric of his mask. His stomach tightened into a knot, dreading what he'd find on the other side.
Yanking the door open to a flight of stairs, Peter jumped onto the banister with effortless balance and crouched to stare down the center of the stairwell.
Although his dread had been proven true, it could not have quite prepared him for the sight below; his partner being kicked flat onto his back by a ninja menacingly towering over him slinging around pointy blades, sleeked in dripping blood.
No time to be surprised, Peter leaped onto the opposite wall, sticking his hands and feet against the chipped paint. He quickly and quietly slid down until he was just a few yards above them.
Before the ninja could even register what was about to happen to him, the stealthy spider jumped down on top of him, swinging his knees around the man's back and slamming his elbows against the side of his neck, right into his pressure point, knocking him out like a light.
As the ninja collapsed underneath him, Peter hopped.. off, his heart thundering his chest as he offered a hand to help Matt up.
"Are you okay?"
Hoisting him onto his feet, Peter wrapped an arm around his back so he could lean into him.
"Not sure what our ninja friend is all about, but I think we've overstayed our welcome."
-
Peter's heartbeat was like a tomtom breaking into the silence of the stairwell, Matt had never heard a sweeter sound. But he kept his teeth gritted and lips sealed, not wanting to tip off his assailant before Peter had the opportunity to aid his horned cohort.
If Matt had a hard time holding the fight, then a less well trained Peter would have to rely solely on his strength, might as well give him the advantage of surprise. So he kept his mouth shut as the man before him moved again towards the Daredevil with silent footfall which left the Devil clueless to his whereabouts until the Spider dropped from the ceiling and wrapped the ghost up, taking him to the ground with relative ease before he threw his hand out to Matt to help him back to his feet, an act he was already in the process of but took the gloved hand anyway- taking comfort in the solid grounding weight of Peter.
"I'm alive...." There was a grit to his words, tinted with vitriol and pain, a self served disappointment in another fight not going his way.
"*ninja*" he said the word with all the disbelief and confusion it deserved. "Makes some sort of sense... I couldn't hear his heart."
Though he hesitated to lean into Peter, favoring his left leg he moved from the other hero to pick up the sword on the grate, turning it so the blade faced out and sliding it through the crook of his arm so that his crimson red blood was slicked off the thin metal.
As he moved back into the stairwell, his limp becoming more noticeable with each gush of blood that pooled in his boots, he grunted slightly picking up the star that had struck him, pocketing it and pulling out a small item that looked similar to pepper spray.
Before he moved back towards Peter, he gave each splatter of his blood a healthy spray of something that smelled like a cleaning solution before he motioned his head towards the door.
"You are right. We should go. I won't know if more are coming if they are like him.." he sort of motioned towards the unconscious man on the ground before he started for the steps and winced on the first one he took.
"Damn it..." he hissed, more angry than hurt,
hesitating and turning back towards Peter and pointing at the gash, about two inches along his outer thigh, just above his knee; and he tried to smile through the pain, which came off looking a little unconvincing as he tried to call back to a less painful moment.
"Web me?" Just to slow the bleeding, it would maybe sting, but Matt would prefer that to continuing to bleed everywhere.
-
Spiderman's large white eyes carefully assessed the wounded Daredevil as he painfully got his bearings.
Although Matt was the perfect picture of stoic strength, Peter could tell the barbed encounter with the ninja had roughed him up a bit.
Underneath the webbed mask, a small frown etched over his features as he figured his fellow hero must be feeling quite the sting. Both to his person and his ego.
Pete's gaze flickered over to the man splayed out on the floor. There was no doubt that he was truly unconscious considering Peter could throw a punch at the force of an oncoming freight train and in his rush to get to Matt he could have probably held his jab a little more. "Yeaaah, not the strangest thing I've come across, but it's definitely not the usual foe. Especially in a Russian base."
As Matt limped around and picked up the blood-stained weapons, Peter was curious as to what exactly the spray he had on hand was used for. However, he reserved his questions to himself until they were in a more secure location. Because even though he had managed to take down one ninja with relative ease, he might not have the same luck warding off a hoard, nor was his partner. As resilient and stubborn as Matt Murdock was, he was in no good form to fight them off either; which was made pretty evident when he had only managed one foot up the staircase before he turned towards the spider with a smiling veneer that thinly veiled his discomfort.
Pete's brows rose with concern at the sight of the deep laceration in his slashed suit. It almost blended right into the rich red color of the vigilante's fabric.
Dipping down, Peter's gloved hand cupped the back of his leg and held him still as his webbing shot over the torn skin, and he wrapped it up firmly in a temporary makeshift compression bandage.
"It looks like we're gonna have to stitch that up, but this will do until we get back," he said, straightening up.
Wanting Matt to set the pace in his injured state, Peter let him go first as they moved through the facility, all the while he kept checking over his shoulder, just in case any silent but deadly ninjas decided to come out of the woodworks after them.
But as they got to the top floor with the hallway of offices, he had not seen a single sign of anyone behind them.
Getting to the vent they had first hopped down from, Peter bent down on one knee so Matt could use him as a boost to hoist himself up into the high opening.
Peter followed right after him and placed the panel back in its place - although it was a little pointless since they had already been discovered - but Peter couldn't help but fix it anyway.
Their journey across the rooftops was a bit longer than their flight across the city, but luckily for Matt, they weren't too far from Hell's Kitchen to begin with.
Along the way, Peter would try to lend assistance with longer, shakier jumps, but for the most part, he very well knew Matt was fairing well on his own.
But as soon as they made it inside Matt's apartment, Peter swung his lithe legs over the railing and hopped down his set of stairs, making a straight beeline for the medkit he knew Matt kept in his kitchen. It wasn't the first, nor was it the last they would dig into it.
"Sooo, tonight didn't go exactly to plan, but hey, it wasn't a complete bust." Peter said, tugging off his mask and setting it down on the kitchen counter. His voice inflection was light as he tried to bring some levity. "We did find out some things."
Carrying the kit over to the coffee table, he flipped the lid open and began searching for the suture needle. "Like... Matt Murdock can take a sword to the knee like it's nothing!"

-

The Daredevil was incredibly strong willed, one could say it was his true superpower; he employed it from the moment the Spider lay his webbed bandage.

Testing the relative pain of his steps by tentatively putting pressure on the leg once, sure the tension of the bandage was enough to keep him from gushing too much more blood, he began up the stairs. Or, in a return to form, he took the railing, preferring to climb up the bars than the labor of stairs.

Despite his limp, he moved at a brisk pace back through the warehouse, sure to shut and lock the doors behind them.

As they made it into the offices and Peter gave Matt a leg up, the Devil reinforced Peter's gut choice of cleaning up behind themselves.

As they crawled back towards the entrance, he took the moment to pause and whisper back towards Peter.

"They may know we got in, but if we cover our tracks well enough they won't know how, I can make the jump to the ledge from the vent, but you should shut this one behind you as well. I'm sure I don't have to tell you not to touch the ground. The floor is lava."

And with a slight hitch in his breath at the effort he was off, pulling himself out of the vent and using the edge of the roof to pull himself to a relative crouch, using the wall and his good leg to kick himself off, landing on his toes on the thin parapet. Crouching as best he could until Peter closed up the vent with the aid of Matt's pocket knife and swung them back out of the compound, a task easier than getting Matt over a fence in his state.

Though he did take back up his own means to get home he was slower than usual, his leg growing stiff and cramping from the strain. Despite this he pushed at a low jog, partly not to let Peter on to how much it was affecting him, but mostly so he could ride out any remaining adrenaline. It would really start to hurt if he slowed down.

So he didn't until he was crossing the threshold of his apartment, only then did he let his mind come back from the low grade dissociation.

The warm air was enveloping, and he only just realized how sticky with sweat he had already become, chilled to the touch despite his internal fire.

He made it down to the second landing in slow, heavy footed steps, taking the hood off and setting the only genuinely protective item on the newel post, hesitating for a moment with an elbow on the good knee before he began to pull at the laces of the combat boots.

It should say something about Matthew Michael Murdock, who only cared to have the hard cast helmet, only cared to protect his most important asset. The 'suit' was really not much to look at up close. Matt had basically outfitted motorcycle gear- something that was not terribly noticeable considering he had stripped it down to the padding and replaced the fabric with his trademark red, it had minor padding mostly around his knees, elbows and shoulders. Kevlar had been added around his chest, the inside of his thighs (to protect the femoral artery), and small panels along his arms, broken at the joints to allow free movement.

Matt sacrificed a lot of safety for mobility, and tonight it had cost him.

"Can't outrun what you can't see." He murmured to himself before he realized he had not said anything to Peter since walking in, and what was more than that it had been a bit too long since he had made the kindly joke to try and make the devil feel better.

He offered an unconvincing tight lipped smile, he hadn't bothered to fix his unruly head of flames and his brown eyes looked glassier than usual with discomfort.

"Um..." he tried to make himself focus on a cheeky response but he was not quite used to this part of their new relationship.

He was used to being alone after a bad night, he was used to fighting through pain alone. This felt foreign and uncomfortable in a way he hadn't the focus for.

"Um yeah. Like it's nothing. Except... I should have heard it coming. I still don't know how he was masking his *heartbeat*."

He shook his head and pulled his boot off, sucking through his teeth as his blood began to drip into the floor from his soaked through socks.

"Shh...hmmm fuu...can you bring a towel with you too Pete?" He motioned to where one was hung on a doorknob.