"No, I know. I wasn't insinuating any sort of transgenic origin story." Neither had he not been insinuating it, either, but Matt's response is enough make him think he's either on the wrong track or a conversation about that level of biological interference would be a non-starter. "But it's a learned adaptation too, right? There are humans who have taught themselves how to use it."
Lonán ought to have anticipated that the man would not entertain too much indirect speculation around this point or any other he's previously attempted to broach with the same circular logic. He swallows, weighing a direct response that may very well end the night and grant him no third chance with Matthew Murdock.
"You represented Luke Cage in court. You tried a case opposite Jennifer Walters. Both born human, both underwent an experience that altered their genetic chemistry. You've mentioned that chemicals were the cause of your own blindness. I'm just wondering if you noticed any other changes besides your vision."
"I'm surprised that someone in your position is questioning how adaptation works in the world. You know as well as I do that we learn the things to get by and there's nothing particularly special about that." Differently abled people have been doing that since the beginning and he thinks he can make a perfectly reasonable argument about his own. But that doesn't seem to be the question at hand. It's not how he moves through the world as a blind man. What he's being asked, under the layers of questioning, is first if he's blind at all and if he has something else that he's leveraging. The things that Stick called 'gifts' when they first met. He doesn't like that Lonán has gotten close on the power of research and observation and.
"I don't appreciate what you're implying." To say the least. It's a speculation that is right on the money and Matt is not interested in letting it get anywhere closer to the truth of the matter. These parts of his life are not up for disclosure for any number of reasons, not only because of whatever it might do to tie him to Daredevil, but another very specific one that comes from the occupation of the man in front of him. "I have no interest in being your science experiment. What happened to me and what effects it had on me are not the business of you or your employers." He recognizes as soon as he says it that he's overplayed in that because he's angry at the inference and bringing the agency into it does suggest that there's more to hide.
"What am I implying? I think I asked a pretty clear question..."
If Matthew wants to assume there's more to the query than what Lonán has actually asked, that's on him. What guilt he feels as the other man seems to fold in on himself has nothing to do with the way that he's approached the inquiry and everything to do with the fact that the other man now relates his own interest directly back to his job. "Science experiment?" He can't quite help the indignant laugh that burbles up completely unbidden in response to that. "Matt, I..." he starts, but the other man forges on and Lonán sits in self-imposed silence as the door slams shut on his curiosity. He swallows around a lump in his throat, not taking the self-inventory to know if it's annoyance or frustration or repressed shame and remembers to breathe before speaking.
When the words don't come, he takes another breath and finally speaks in the lingering pause that follows, lungs already in want of air. "I already told you I've got no int—" It's here he loses his breath and can't push the full word out. Lonán sucks in another lungful and tries to silently insist himself back to center. "Matt, I was serious about this conversation having nothing to do with the Bureau. I'm sorry. I know I can't erase the history of our first meeting and you've got every right to be wary of me, but please don't insinuate I see you as a test subject. I don't."
He stares at the other man, willing him to take it for the earnest fact it is, but Lonán's discomfort feels very nearly insurmountable. "I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I swear I didn't plan this to happen, but if you want to kick me out I need you to put my chair back."
In his experience, these aren't the questions that come from people who don't have a vested interest in trying to crack Matt Murdock like he's some kind of experiment or a case to be solved. It's not the kind of quaint conversation or even the moderately difficult ones that are occasionally had because that tends to get shut down with an explanation of complete blindness and the accident that caused it. That those facts aren't enough to still Lonán's imagination on the matter is unusual and, as a man who wants to keep his secrets, frustrating. Matt has walls built up around his abilities and his identity that have been transversed only a handful of times, often out of necessity, but rarely unwitting disclosure. He's not looking to change that now and admit to anything beyond the biographical facts that he has previously provided.
"Because those kinds of prying questions only lead to one place. Presuming that I had anything to offer up, and I don't," Lie. "Why would I admit it to you? Even if I did, that's the moment this would stop being a personal conversation because I have the assumption that you'd have to run and tell your employer if you were to encounter someone with gifts like that." It seems like a fair question. Lonán is generally a stranger to him and on top of that, associated with one of those three letter agencies that Matt is sure it would be a poor decision to ever disclose anything about himself to either directly or through the intermediary sitting in his living room. When Matt is angry, he doesn't lose breath or concentration and instead, locks in with a sharp chill in his tone and having that part poked and prodded elicits a reaction that he can't quite control, despite all of his usual power over himself.
Matt rises to his feet and in doing so, once again easily maneuvers the chair around and puts it where Lonán would be able to reach while he goes back to the kitchen with his glass in hand. He hasn't kicked Lonán out, but he's very clearly pissed and he chooses to handle that by going to grab a beer instead of the polite company of wine.
There is a sense of genuine fear in the other man that seems immediately quelled when the chair is back in reach. He's less aware of it than Matt might be, but the second Lonán's hand is back on his seat cushion his heart stops its violent knocking and the space around his lungs eases again. It's still a conscious effort on his part to remember that his lungs can either take in oxygen or expel words but not both simultaneously, but that doesn't seem as tough to manage when his unconscious mind isn't distracting itself with the unnamed terror of being genuinely trapped in a volatile situation with a man he's just openly provoked.
While Matt goes in search of a beverage better suited for the timbre of this conversation, Lonán transfers back into his chair. He's poised to leave if the other man sees fit to ask and since it's Matt's apartment they find themselves in tonight he won't express much stubbornness if asked, but the questions deserve an answer. He's not sure what would satisfy since honesty and his word are all he's got to offer and it feels like they've proven insufficient to this point.
"If this were a personal encounter with someone with gifts 'like that,' I still wouldn't be obligated to tell the Bureau, Matt. I know it's safer for the people you're protecting to think that way, but I promise you, I've pursued interviews with folks who told me to fuck off professionally and invited me out for a drink personally. I operate on informed consent, and in the absence of enthusiastic approval, nothing that's said gets shared."
Matt isn't unaccustomed to being feared, but it's an emotion that is only provoked when he's the Devil and usually at the expense of a criminal who is about to have his day ruined and his freedom threatened at the end of the kind of violent exchange. It does register for a moment that Lonán is, however briefly, afraid of him and what he might do because he's made the mental calculus that, if Matt were to turn violent, he holds every advantage even without knowing what he's truly capable of. Fortunately for Lonán, while his anger is peaked, his control over himself and the violence he can offer is strong and holds firm. There is nothing Lonán could do that would spark that kind of response from him, though obviously he has no way of knowing that.
"The satiation of your curiosity is not a good enough reason to dig into the lives of these people, particularly ones that you have expressed are no longer in the scope of your agency," Matt answers before flicking the cap off the beer into the trashcan. "For you, it's a thought experiment at minimum or a job if it comes to that but for people who actually have experience with these things, it's their lives." Matt can sell it under the guise of how he looks out for his clients who have abilities beyond the norm but of course, it's more personal than that. He's bothered now because his deflections and his statements to the contrary have still not satiated that curiosity, apparently, and while he knows that Lonán is telling the truth that he doesn't have to run to the agency if he were to discover something, that doesn't mean he won't if circumstances were to call for it.
It does occur to him that the lady doth protest too much and that he's only setting up confirmation of what Lonán suspects, but it's nothing he'll be able to prove. Especially not now.
"Just because you're not interested in my life doesn't mean I haven't presented it as an equitable trade." For all that's worth, at least. Still, to Lonán this remains absolutely true. He knows he's asked difficult questions, but they're nothing he's been unwilling to hold himself accountable for as well. Matthew has assumed without asking that this exists purely in the realm of theoretical for him, but how is he to know that?
Whether the man means to taunt him now or whether there's less at stake in revealing the full extent of his ability to map his environment without sight, Lonán doesn't know. Whichever it is, he watches the other man tilt the bottle and remove the cap with the kind of perfect accuracy that would demand a round of applause from fellow bar patrons even if he had his sight. There's a beat and a sudden flame of something self-righteous, but Lonán bites his tongue.
"What is it that you even think I do, Matt? Because if you think my job begins and ends at vigilantism and human mutates, that is a gross underestimation. And it's precisely because it's their lives that I do what I do. You've got me on the wrong side of this thing entirely."
"Alright. Tell me what gifts you have, then," he answers. That seems to be the line of questioning that Lonán is fishing toward if they're supposed to be on some kind of even footing here. The fact of the matter is that those things tend not to be overly relevant to Matt until such time as they become important to know, like in a city-threatening situation, or because he has to represent a client. If it's not disclosed, he thinks it's probably best to live and let live, which was what he was hoping for but hasn't exactly achieved here. He can recognize that he made an assumption in reckless anger, but he's offered to allow that situation to be rectified.
That Matt calls them gifts at all is a product of his raising and the influence of Stick on his life. Some would call them abilities or powers or some other similar word but he has been very particular in the language that he uses around what he can do. It attributes them for what they are and what he was taught to consider them to be.
There's always plausible deniability in everything he does, even a trick toss of a cap. It's his apartment and his trash can so of course he knows exactly where it is.
"Alright, explain then," he says, giving a sweep of his arm in invitation. He'll give Lonán the chance for that, though it's more for the sake of reading him than anything else at this stage. A recognition of truth and lies.
"Oh, fuck off," Lonán laughs at the other man's demand. There's no anger to it, but more of that self-righteous indignation that seems to be percolating just below the surface. Perhaps even more infuriatingly than the fact that he can't contain the sharp, mirthless laugh of surprise that had instantly greeted the goading demand is the fact that Lonán's leg has now seen fit to protest a long day of being seated in virtually one position. Back in the chair, his left knee is quivering and bucking with nearly twice the ferocity it had at the bar. It would be a hell of a tell, save for the fact that everything else in the man's physiology puts this as beyond his own control.
"Are you asking because you want to know, or because you want to feel like you've got something to hold over my head? If you were genuinely curious, maybe you'd have asked how I got into the profession, or what my personal views on disclosure are. But you haven't, until you started to think I've figured you out and now you're scrambling.
Mutates are a fact. It wasn't the Bureau that made that declaration, but we've certainly always known. Now imagine all of the tales from all of your stories. All of the creatures from every story across time and culture and place. How many of those do you think are a matter of fact? Because if you accept the fucking miracle of intelligent design — if you accept that mutates and monsters exist too — you must have left enough space in your mind for the possibility of it all, right?"
This is as close as Lonán feels he can come without confirming or denying what information remains locked behind a sensitivity level designation. There's not a word of a lie in what he says. More than that, he seems passionate about it; awestricken, even, in a way that talking about God never rendered him.
"You can say they want to be left alone. And some of them do, you're right. But not every one of them. Not all the time. Imagine knowing there's an entire world out there that you're not allowed to be a part of. Imagine being forced to hide for your own safety." He does not think that Matt needs to imagine very hard. "Is that the absolute best you can dream of for the future? Is that the legacy you want to leave behind? Existing in the margins, hiding in the shadows?"
"You told me you got scouted for it and they paid for a degree and you've already indicated that you're in favor of some kind of framework that would allow for broader legal disclosure and protections so let me know if I've misinterpreted that." The moments where he might have asked for additional details were lost when it became apparent that Matt had been initially targeted. It put a damper on what he might have considered to be professional curiosity for an occupation well beyond his usual grasp and left the talk of the government as one better left not spoken of. But apparently here they are. The question earns a shrug. "'There are more things in Heaven and Earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy.'" he quotes back. Matt has experienced enough in his life to know that there are things beyond knowing and that he would have never considered to be possible. He'd find himself unsurprised to learn that the tales told over time and passed to generations through words whispered around fires until they were told over televisions were all fictions. Somewhere in there with monsters and mutants are probably immortal ninjas and the resurrection of the dead by more than just God and he feels no particular need to question or doubt those things. "I'm hard to surprise with what's real these days." After everything, it's difficult to discount anything.
"That's one point of view. The idea of a world that someone is forever separated from. The other opposite side is that there are those who don't want to be seen and you talk about hiding in those shadows with derision," Matt counters as he moves to lean against the countertop. "Sometimes the shadows offer protection. More than the government could, at any rate." Anger has tempered out of his tone. He's still on edge, the way he would be if anyone was circling around his abilities and identity like a shark with blood in the water, but the moment has somewhat passed.
"Oh, well, then. It sounds like you already know everything about me that you could possibly need to." His voice would be stronger were the spasm in his leg not now making its way up his left side. Lonán grips his right hand in his left before the threat of feeling it taken by the same force can set in. He's less sure now about what he's managing to conceal from the other man's noticing, but he's trying not to give the man cause to think there's anything between himself and this conversation.
"What about anyone who can't hide? Do you consider them simple collateral damage? The shadows offer protection to those who are able to take advantage. Not everyone can. Not everyone was granted that privilege by their physiology. Do you only know how to argue for the interests of those who make it easy for you to do so, Mr. Murdock?"
"I might argue that you forfeited the right for indignation about that when the conversation we had about that got stymied by the whole lie of it all," he reasons. A tilt of his head follows. "Do you need something to help?" he asks. He can attribute it to the way that the tremor sounds against the chair and the soft clatter it makes that is heard over stern voices, but he asks it all the same and without venom in his tone. A genuine offer because something is obviously happening. Whatever else Matt Murdock might be, he is quick to set aside anything in the name of a concern.
The rest of it can wait if that's the case.
"I argue for my clients," he answers before taking another sip of his beer. "What are you proposing, then? You seem to have some semblance of an idea of how you think the world should work so how does that go in your ideal scenario that you and this agency of yours want to build? Because it seems like from either side of it, someone gets left behind."
"I never spoke a word of a lie. If you're so eager to count lies of omission, I'd remind you 'Let the one who is without sin be the first to throw a stone.'"
Lonán had alluded to exactly this earlier in their conversation: the recognition of the part of himself that exists beyond the realm of the physical. He'd experienced it for the first time more than twenty years ago. At that time he had not known the term out of body experience. Could not have conceived of it beyond that strange and disconnected feeling one gets when they've drunk too much, just before passing out on somebody's front lawn. It's the only thing that had ever before brought him close to the moment he was then to experience supine in a hospital bed with a tube down his throat.
Now, Lonán perceives it as an unfastening of his consciousness from his body. Not a full untethering; no, he simply floats above himself in pure, radiant, objective peace.
He witnesses it all from the ceiling of Matt's apartment. The moment where everything stalls and his body goes utterly still. When — in the pause between heartbeats — his own suddenly becomes perfectly even. His breath returns to a normal rate and even his skin stops perspiring. Lonán's leg goes blessedly still.
And he floats above himself, with no more awareness of how he managed this than any other time in those twenty-odd years he's found himself with the capacity to do the same, and no more certainty of how to return to that betraying body now stuck still in Matthew Murdock's apartment. Lonán watches, able to see everything now in stunning detail. Every gesture, every expression, every twitch of the other man's muscle. He watches and feels utter serenity with it all.
Matt is about to answer, to what will essentially be another lie about how he does not count himself among those he's talking about in this whole scenario but he doesn't get the chance. It's like a lightswitch flips and everything shifts. A skip of a heartbeat and then an immediate steadiness that is matched with breathing that is almost preternatural in how even it is. Matt is accustomed to shifts of speed and tempo but regulating like that is unusual, to say the least.
Matt feels something else, though he can't necessarily tell what it is, but something changes within the room. He feels it like a crackle of faint static electricity over his skin that is only noticed because of how sensitive he is, and it's not like anything he can recall feeling before. It's not the biggest problem at the moment.
The silence follows where he was expecting further argument.
"Lonán?" he says, putting down his beer.
No answer.
"Well, fuck."
He doesn't check pulse or breathing because he doesn't have to. He knows with certainty that even though something has happened, it's not immediately life threatening. He conceives that it might be a seizure of some kind, but it doesn't necessarily track either from the times that he's encountered people with such conditions. He says Lonán's name a couple of more times, louder at each interval as he approaches him in the chair. There's no hesitation in his movements and the way that his hands immediately seek and find, without a bit of groping at air, his shoulders to give him a shake in some attempt to wake him from whatever this is.
The man in the chair is not as easily moved or positioned as a rag doll may be. It's as though something still wants to keep him upright. There is, however, no indication of any other bodily change or reaction to Matt's insisting grasp. All of his physiology continues to function as though it were on automatic. Anything that the other man may see fit to check — heart rate, respiration, core temperature — present as perfectly average. Were Matthew to find a way to verify, Lonán's pupils would respond as expected to the presence or absence of a source of light. Even his bodily reflexes would react in the typical manner for him; he simply is non-responsive to voluntary external stimuli. Matt might pinch him or slap him across the face to absolutely no reaction. He could go as far as to treat him like a human pincushion and the man would not so much as flinch.
But Lonán sees every last thing that's happening to him. He exists in a moment of pure being, with no thought of the argument they've been having or concern about his position. Convincing the other man of his goodness seems equally as important as everything else — which is to say, not at all. Wherever the place is that he's been so suddenly pulled to, there is nothing in Heaven or on Earth that matters any more.
It is for that reason that Lonán feels no particular draw to go or to stay, and it is for that reason that Lonán always finds himself desperate for a way back here the moment he leaves it again. That is a thing that always happens too damn soon.
Though it may not feel that way for the man who's been left behind with a still body on his hands and the question of what there is to be done.
Time stretches past the point where inaction continues to be a reasonable course of action. Past the point where one ought to wonder what he might be held culpable for if this all goes sideways. But just before Matt can escalate to outside intervention, Lonán finds himself pulled back again. Back into a body that aches just for being. That feels itself wanting to splinter at the seams to contain what's suddenly too big for it. Back into a body that itches and tingles and a set of lungs that don't expand as far as they feel they need to and a mind that feels simultaneously too clouded with wine and far, far too sober for what it's about to face.
If Matt remains near enough, Lonán grasps the man's forearm before he manages the words that come. "Well, fuck," he repeats, in exactly the same tone of voice as the other man had minutes earlier. "That's not fair."
Matt shakes his shoulders a few more times but that doesn't seem to get him anywhere. The placid pace of heart and breath are something of a comfort because whatever is happening doesn't seem to be life-threatening in any kind of way. After the attempts, he considers what else to do and he crosses the room in order to retrieve his cell phone. He doesn't dial yet, and he wouldn't immediately call 911 because his first thought would go to Claire and what she would know or say to do. He'd be more easily able to explain to her how he felt the change in vitals without having to lie about what he can sense in the room.
He returns back to Lonán's side and that's when everything changes all over again. That same rush of energy over his skin, then a gasp and a pull on his arm when Lonán seems to come back to everything.
"I think you had a seizure or something," Matt tells him. That weird feeling of static had come over him and he ignores it for the moment. "Do you need water or…" He doesn't really know what to offer, exactly.
"No, it wasn't that." Lonán cannot rightly blame the honesty on being out of sorts. He knows that this may be a thing better kept to his chest, and if Matt wants to draw his own conclusions about what's just occurred it might be wiser to let those play out and go with the flow. But he'd promised the man — and himself, by extension — that he's not a liar on too many occasions. Lonán chooses not to make one of himself right now.
"I am... so sorry," he laughs and lets go of the other man's forearm. Far from amused, Lonán's laughter sounds almost disbelieving, like he can't quite accept that his body saw this moment as the most fitting to rescue him. It would be a shocking thing to know how Matt has perceived the fragmentation; that there is some kind of environmental impact on Lonán's soul splitting from his body. In truth, this is a thing he has rarely had reason or desire to explain to anyone else, and the mechanics of it remain a mystery to him.
The longer he goes without explanation the more difficult it feels to find a reasonable one. He knows he owes the other man some kind of assurance, despite Matt's reluctance to be quite so forthcoming with him. Lonán crosses his arms, feeling a cold shudder walk ghostly fingers down his back. He swallows and tips his head to gaze up at the other man's face. "What do you think is the most useless ability you've ever known someone to have? And before you say something like, 'tying a cherry stem with their tongue,' I mean an ability that defies average human capacity."
Whatever happened, apparently it has occurred enough that Lonán isn't startled by it. That's probably good, even if the laugh seems to be without real humor in it, given that it didn't feel like a particularly funny situation. Matt slips the phone into his back pocket since it seems like ringing up Claire is off the table, at least for now. He's not sure if Lonán is actually okay, but he does appear to be. Vitals seem back to normal and everything has seemingly settled for him.
There's still something strange lingering that he can't quite put his finger on. A remnant of that feeling of static and shrugs his shoulders and his arms in an attempt to remove the last of it, as if it's something to be shed. The energy in the room has returned to normal but it's more the feeling that he had that is difficult to shake off immediately.
The question confuses him, given that it seems to come out of nowhere but does seem to be leading to an explanation. "I haven't really thought about it," he answers honestly. Even the most pain in the ass parts of his own gifts have their uses and while he's understandably experienced the drawbacks of them or what others consider to be their own negatives, he hasn't thought much about useless abilities. "Are you sure you don't need water or something to eat?" He diverts the question to one of care because that's his base instinct to offer aid, even if it might not be necessary.
Matt is truly giving him every opportunity for a way out. Lonán wishes there was a clearer sign of whether the other man truly expects nothing, or whether he's demonstrating the level of grace that Lonán himself was unwilling to show. He knows there is a certain level of plausible deniability wrapped into the way he presents in the world, and what must've appeared from the other man's perspective to just have occurred. That he is already disabled and appears, for all intents and purposes, to have just experienced a mild medical event rarely makes anyone feel a need to look any further.
"Do you think," he starts after a lengthy pause. There's a hint of amusement back in his voice, but it's rougher around the edges. The smile of a man who senses the irony in what he's about to say, and likes it absolutely no more than what he expects the other man will. "Do you think," he starts again, "if someone were able to leave their body but they couldn't control when it happened, and their consciousness couldn't travel out of the room their body was already in... Do you think that would rank somewhere?"
Matt had Stick. Lonán, of course, knows nothing about the man who served as Daredevil's mentor. Who took an overwhelmed young boy and taught him to channel and to sharpen his abilities. Lonán has no concept of any of that, and thus no concept of how a given talent can be stretched and developed like a muscle. Maybe even expanded on over time. He's got no conceit of any sort of potential he may have; he just knows this as an infrequent and disruptive burden.
It does initially seem to be like a medical event of some kind and Matt isn't going to press on what caused it or what happened, except to try to offer some kind of care in the aftermath of it, like the suggestion of food or water to help with whatever after effects that Lonán is feeling right now. It feels like something private and his own curiosity isn't quite enough to push against the boundaries of that proactively so he offers maybe a little more grace than he was offered when it came to probing questions about himself.
The question is…strange. And there's no lie contained within it so it becomes a confession of sorts that, apparently, that's what happened. "It, uh, doesn't seem particularly useful, no," he answers. He can take a lot in stride. And out of body experiences aren't something that is entirely unknown to him as a concept, though it tends to be associated with near death instead of just sitting in someone's living room sharing an admittedly heated conversation over a bottle of wine.
"Does that happen a lot?" It seems to be a prudent question.
"Aw now, Mr. Murdock." There's a grin on Lonán's face that reaches into his voice and tinges his words with gentle amusement. "Are you asking if you managed to make me feel something?" What might seem like an effort at deflection at first blush is intended instead to mask some of the creeping shame Lonán feels at what's just happened, totally unbidden. He shifts his weight to adjust his posture and clasps his hands on his knees.
How much he'd like to give away is still something the man feels unsure of. He's operating completely without a playbook and has no clear idea how Matt might take what's happened or what it might prompt from the other man. "Not a lot," he finds himself admitting. "Sometimes when I get myself into dangerous situations, which is really fucking inconvenient." This has fortunately only happened a small number of times, but Lonán closes his eyes against the memory of floating above himself as he watched with perfect, stoic detachment as a firefight broke out around him. "Or when I'm about to say something I really shouldn't. I think it ought to be more useful than that, though. You know? Astral projection means traveling to other places, but I just stay stuck right here.
Maybe my spirit doesn't know how to get anywhere else without the chair."
This is a joke, of course, but Lonán just spreads his hands and shrugs. He hasn't mentioned how the detachment allows him to observe his surroundings in perfect detail, or how going blank in front of others means they often forget to modulate their behaviors or what they say when he's out. He doesn't think he needs to remind Matt of his own suspicions about the way the man senses the world well beyond the average.
Matt is far less amused by the remark and the suggestion than Lonán apparently is. If he was somehow the trigger for something that was unwanted, like whatever this 'event' might be called, he feels badly about that. His intention in argument is not to cause pain or something that has apparently manifested in an anomalous physical response. He can't imagine that there's anything enjoyable about losing control of one's body in such a way.
"So which of those was it? Did you feel particularly in danger or that you were going to give something away?" he asks as he moves into the kitchen to retrieve a glass of water because even if it's not a medical event, it seems strange enough that it probably wouldn't do any harm in hydrating after in a way that isn't wine or beer. Lonán has no way of really knowing that he is with someone who is the least likely to be violent against someone who neither starts a fight or is on equal footing to defend himself but he can understand that there might have been some concern.
He also retrieves his beer before he returns hands Lonán the glass of water and then sits down on the couch once again. "Seems like an ability that hasn't been properly controlled," he points out. Maybe that's giving something away but he has enough deniability that he could easily argue his way out of it if necessary. While Lonán was under, or gone, or whatever he wants to call it, Matt hadn't bothered to try to hide anything and had moved with all of the ease of someone with sight, beyond just the memorization of his apartment's layout. He'd found his phone without groping at the general area, he'd known exactly where Lonán's shoulders were and every movement had been easy. There was a lot to see.
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no subject
Lonán ought to have anticipated that the man would not entertain too much indirect speculation around this point or any other he's previously attempted to broach with the same circular logic. He swallows, weighing a direct response that may very well end the night and grant him no third chance with Matthew Murdock.
"You represented Luke Cage in court. You tried a case opposite Jennifer Walters. Both born human, both underwent an experience that altered their genetic chemistry. You've mentioned that chemicals were the cause of your own blindness. I'm just wondering if you noticed any other changes besides your vision."
no subject
"I don't appreciate what you're implying." To say the least. It's a speculation that is right on the money and Matt is not interested in letting it get anywhere closer to the truth of the matter. These parts of his life are not up for disclosure for any number of reasons, not only because of whatever it might do to tie him to Daredevil, but another very specific one that comes from the occupation of the man in front of him. "I have no interest in being your science experiment. What happened to me and what effects it had on me are not the business of you or your employers." He recognizes as soon as he says it that he's overplayed in that because he's angry at the inference and bringing the agency into it does suggest that there's more to hide.
no subject
If Matthew wants to assume there's more to the query than what Lonán has actually asked, that's on him. What guilt he feels as the other man seems to fold in on himself has nothing to do with the way that he's approached the inquiry and everything to do with the fact that the other man now relates his own interest directly back to his job. "Science experiment?" He can't quite help the indignant laugh that burbles up completely unbidden in response to that. "Matt, I..." he starts, but the other man forges on and Lonán sits in self-imposed silence as the door slams shut on his curiosity. He swallows around a lump in his throat, not taking the self-inventory to know if it's annoyance or frustration or repressed shame and remembers to breathe before speaking.
When the words don't come, he takes another breath and finally speaks in the lingering pause that follows, lungs already in want of air. "I already told you I've got no int—" It's here he loses his breath and can't push the full word out. Lonán sucks in another lungful and tries to silently insist himself back to center. "Matt, I was serious about this conversation having nothing to do with the Bureau. I'm sorry. I know I can't erase the history of our first meeting and you've got every right to be wary of me, but please don't insinuate I see you as a test subject. I don't."
He stares at the other man, willing him to take it for the earnest fact it is, but Lonán's discomfort feels very nearly insurmountable. "I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I swear I didn't plan this to happen, but if you want to kick me out I need you to put my chair back."
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"Because those kinds of prying questions only lead to one place. Presuming that I had anything to offer up, and I don't," Lie. "Why would I admit it to you? Even if I did, that's the moment this would stop being a personal conversation because I have the assumption that you'd have to run and tell your employer if you were to encounter someone with gifts like that." It seems like a fair question. Lonán is generally a stranger to him and on top of that, associated with one of those three letter agencies that Matt is sure it would be a poor decision to ever disclose anything about himself to either directly or through the intermediary sitting in his living room. When Matt is angry, he doesn't lose breath or concentration and instead, locks in with a sharp chill in his tone and having that part poked and prodded elicits a reaction that he can't quite control, despite all of his usual power over himself.
Matt rises to his feet and in doing so, once again easily maneuvers the chair around and puts it where Lonán would be able to reach while he goes back to the kitchen with his glass in hand. He hasn't kicked Lonán out, but he's very clearly pissed and he chooses to handle that by going to grab a beer instead of the polite company of wine.
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While Matt goes in search of a beverage better suited for the timbre of this conversation, Lonán transfers back into his chair. He's poised to leave if the other man sees fit to ask and since it's Matt's apartment they find themselves in tonight he won't express much stubbornness if asked, but the questions deserve an answer. He's not sure what would satisfy since honesty and his word are all he's got to offer and it feels like they've proven insufficient to this point.
"If this were a personal encounter with someone with gifts 'like that,' I still wouldn't be obligated to tell the Bureau, Matt. I know it's safer for the people you're protecting to think that way, but I promise you, I've pursued interviews with folks who told me to fuck off professionally and invited me out for a drink personally. I operate on informed consent, and in the absence of enthusiastic approval, nothing that's said gets shared."
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"The satiation of your curiosity is not a good enough reason to dig into the lives of these people, particularly ones that you have expressed are no longer in the scope of your agency," Matt answers before flicking the cap off the beer into the trashcan. "For you, it's a thought experiment at minimum or a job if it comes to that but for people who actually have experience with these things, it's their lives." Matt can sell it under the guise of how he looks out for his clients who have abilities beyond the norm but of course, it's more personal than that. He's bothered now because his deflections and his statements to the contrary have still not satiated that curiosity, apparently, and while he knows that Lonán is telling the truth that he doesn't have to run to the agency if he were to discover something, that doesn't mean he won't if circumstances were to call for it.
It does occur to him that the lady doth protest too much and that he's only setting up confirmation of what Lonán suspects, but it's nothing he'll be able to prove. Especially not now.
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Whether the man means to taunt him now or whether there's less at stake in revealing the full extent of his ability to map his environment without sight, Lonán doesn't know. Whichever it is, he watches the other man tilt the bottle and remove the cap with the kind of perfect accuracy that would demand a round of applause from fellow bar patrons even if he had his sight. There's a beat and a sudden flame of something self-righteous, but Lonán bites his tongue.
"What is it that you even think I do, Matt? Because if you think my job begins and ends at vigilantism and human mutates, that is a gross underestimation. And it's precisely because it's their lives that I do what I do. You've got me on the wrong side of this thing entirely."
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That Matt calls them gifts at all is a product of his raising and the influence of Stick on his life. Some would call them abilities or powers or some other similar word but he has been very particular in the language that he uses around what he can do. It attributes them for what they are and what he was taught to consider them to be.
There's always plausible deniability in everything he does, even a trick toss of a cap. It's his apartment and his trash can so of course he knows exactly where it is.
"Alright, explain then," he says, giving a sweep of his arm in invitation. He'll give Lonán the chance for that, though it's more for the sake of reading him than anything else at this stage. A recognition of truth and lies.
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"Are you asking because you want to know, or because you want to feel like you've got something to hold over my head? If you were genuinely curious, maybe you'd have asked how I got into the profession, or what my personal views on disclosure are. But you haven't, until you started to think I've figured you out and now you're scrambling.
Mutates are a fact. It wasn't the Bureau that made that declaration, but we've certainly always known. Now imagine all of the tales from all of your stories. All of the creatures from every story across time and culture and place. How many of those do you think are a matter of fact? Because if you accept the fucking miracle of intelligent design — if you accept that mutates and monsters exist too — you must have left enough space in your mind for the possibility of it all, right?"
This is as close as Lonán feels he can come without confirming or denying what information remains locked behind a sensitivity level designation. There's not a word of a lie in what he says. More than that, he seems passionate about it; awestricken, even, in a way that talking about God never rendered him.
"You can say they want to be left alone. And some of them do, you're right. But not every one of them. Not all the time. Imagine knowing there's an entire world out there that you're not allowed to be a part of. Imagine being forced to hide for your own safety." He does not think that Matt needs to imagine very hard. "Is that the absolute best you can dream of for the future? Is that the legacy you want to leave behind? Existing in the margins, hiding in the shadows?"
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The question earns a shrug. "'There are more things in Heaven and Earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy.'" he quotes back. Matt has experienced enough in his life to know that there are things beyond knowing and that he would have never considered to be possible. He'd find himself unsurprised to learn that the tales told over time and passed to generations through words whispered around fires until they were told over televisions were all fictions. Somewhere in there with monsters and mutants are probably immortal ninjas and the resurrection of the dead by more than just God and he feels no particular need to question or doubt those things. "I'm hard to surprise with what's real these days." After everything, it's difficult to discount anything.
"That's one point of view. The idea of a world that someone is forever separated from. The other opposite side is that there are those who don't want to be seen and you talk about hiding in those shadows with derision," Matt counters as he moves to lean against the countertop. "Sometimes the shadows offer protection. More than the government could, at any rate." Anger has tempered out of his tone. He's still on edge, the way he would be if anyone was circling around his abilities and identity like a shark with blood in the water, but the moment has somewhat passed.
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"What about anyone who can't hide? Do you consider them simple collateral damage? The shadows offer protection to those who are able to take advantage. Not everyone can. Not everyone was granted that privilege by their physiology. Do you only know how to argue for the interests of those who make it easy for you to do so, Mr. Murdock?"
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The rest of it can wait if that's the case.
"I argue for my clients," he answers before taking another sip of his beer. "What are you proposing, then? You seem to have some semblance of an idea of how you think the world should work so how does that go in your ideal scenario that you and this agency of yours want to build? Because it seems like from either side of it, someone gets left behind."
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Lonán had alluded to exactly this earlier in their conversation: the recognition of the part of himself that exists beyond the realm of the physical. He'd experienced it for the first time more than twenty years ago. At that time he had not known the term out of body experience. Could not have conceived of it beyond that strange and disconnected feeling one gets when they've drunk too much, just before passing out on somebody's front lawn. It's the only thing that had ever before brought him close to the moment he was then to experience supine in a hospital bed with a tube down his throat.
Now, Lonán perceives it as an unfastening of his consciousness from his body. Not a full untethering; no, he simply floats above himself in pure, radiant, objective peace.
He witnesses it all from the ceiling of Matt's apartment. The moment where everything stalls and his body goes utterly still. When — in the pause between heartbeats — his own suddenly becomes perfectly even. His breath returns to a normal rate and even his skin stops perspiring. Lonán's leg goes blessedly still.
And he floats above himself, with no more awareness of how he managed this than any other time in those twenty-odd years he's found himself with the capacity to do the same, and no more certainty of how to return to that betraying body now stuck still in Matthew Murdock's apartment. Lonán watches, able to see everything now in stunning detail. Every gesture, every expression, every twitch of the other man's muscle. He watches and feels utter serenity with it all.
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Matt feels something else, though he can't necessarily tell what it is, but something changes within the room. He feels it like a crackle of faint static electricity over his skin that is only noticed because of how sensitive he is, and it's not like anything he can recall feeling before. It's not the biggest problem at the moment.
The silence follows where he was expecting further argument.
"Lonán?" he says, putting down his beer.
No answer.
"Well, fuck."
He doesn't check pulse or breathing because he doesn't have to. He knows with certainty that even though something has happened, it's not immediately life threatening. He conceives that it might be a seizure of some kind, but it doesn't necessarily track either from the times that he's encountered people with such conditions. He says Lonán's name a couple of more times, louder at each interval as he approaches him in the chair. There's no hesitation in his movements and the way that his hands immediately seek and find, without a bit of groping at air, his shoulders to give him a shake in some attempt to wake him from whatever this is.
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But Lonán sees every last thing that's happening to him. He exists in a moment of pure being, with no thought of the argument they've been having or concern about his position. Convincing the other man of his goodness seems equally as important as everything else — which is to say, not at all. Wherever the place is that he's been so suddenly pulled to, there is nothing in Heaven or on Earth that matters any more.
It is for that reason that Lonán feels no particular draw to go or to stay, and it is for that reason that Lonán always finds himself desperate for a way back here the moment he leaves it again. That is a thing that always happens too damn soon.
Though it may not feel that way for the man who's been left behind with a still body on his hands and the question of what there is to be done.
Time stretches past the point where inaction continues to be a reasonable course of action. Past the point where one ought to wonder what he might be held culpable for if this all goes sideways. But just before Matt can escalate to outside intervention, Lonán finds himself pulled back again. Back into a body that aches just for being. That feels itself wanting to splinter at the seams to contain what's suddenly too big for it. Back into a body that itches and tingles and a set of lungs that don't expand as far as they feel they need to and a mind that feels simultaneously too clouded with wine and far, far too sober for what it's about to face.
If Matt remains near enough, Lonán grasps the man's forearm before he manages the words that come. "Well, fuck," he repeats, in exactly the same tone of voice as the other man had minutes earlier. "That's not fair."
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He returns back to Lonán's side and that's when everything changes all over again. That same rush of energy over his skin, then a gasp and a pull on his arm when Lonán seems to come back to everything.
"I think you had a seizure or something," Matt tells him. That weird feeling of static had come over him and he ignores it for the moment. "Do you need water or…" He doesn't really know what to offer, exactly.
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"I am... so sorry," he laughs and lets go of the other man's forearm. Far from amused, Lonán's laughter sounds almost disbelieving, like he can't quite accept that his body saw this moment as the most fitting to rescue him. It would be a shocking thing to know how Matt has perceived the fragmentation; that there is some kind of environmental impact on Lonán's soul splitting from his body. In truth, this is a thing he has rarely had reason or desire to explain to anyone else, and the mechanics of it remain a mystery to him.
The longer he goes without explanation the more difficult it feels to find a reasonable one. He knows he owes the other man some kind of assurance, despite Matt's reluctance to be quite so forthcoming with him. Lonán crosses his arms, feeling a cold shudder walk ghostly fingers down his back. He swallows and tips his head to gaze up at the other man's face. "What do you think is the most useless ability you've ever known someone to have? And before you say something like, 'tying a cherry stem with their tongue,' I mean an ability that defies average human capacity."
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There's still something strange lingering that he can't quite put his finger on. A remnant of that feeling of static and shrugs his shoulders and his arms in an attempt to remove the last of it, as if it's something to be shed. The energy in the room has returned to normal but it's more the feeling that he had that is difficult to shake off immediately.
The question confuses him, given that it seems to come out of nowhere but does seem to be leading to an explanation. "I haven't really thought about it," he answers honestly. Even the most pain in the ass parts of his own gifts have their uses and while he's understandably experienced the drawbacks of them or what others consider to be their own negatives, he hasn't thought much about useless abilities. "Are you sure you don't need water or something to eat?" He diverts the question to one of care because that's his base instinct to offer aid, even if it might not be necessary.
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"Do you think," he starts after a lengthy pause. There's a hint of amusement back in his voice, but it's rougher around the edges. The smile of a man who senses the irony in what he's about to say, and likes it absolutely no more than what he expects the other man will. "Do you think," he starts again, "if someone were able to leave their body but they couldn't control when it happened, and their consciousness couldn't travel out of the room their body was already in... Do you think that would rank somewhere?"
Matt had Stick. Lonán, of course, knows nothing about the man who served as Daredevil's mentor. Who took an overwhelmed young boy and taught him to channel and to sharpen his abilities. Lonán has no concept of any of that, and thus no concept of how a given talent can be stretched and developed like a muscle. Maybe even expanded on over time. He's got no conceit of any sort of potential he may have; he just knows this as an infrequent and disruptive burden.
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The question is…strange. And there's no lie contained within it so it becomes a confession of sorts that, apparently, that's what happened. "It, uh, doesn't seem particularly useful, no," he answers. He can take a lot in stride. And out of body experiences aren't something that is entirely unknown to him as a concept, though it tends to be associated with near death instead of just sitting in someone's living room sharing an admittedly heated conversation over a bottle of wine.
"Does that happen a lot?" It seems to be a prudent question.
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How much he'd like to give away is still something the man feels unsure of. He's operating completely without a playbook and has no clear idea how Matt might take what's happened or what it might prompt from the other man. "Not a lot," he finds himself admitting. "Sometimes when I get myself into dangerous situations, which is really fucking inconvenient." This has fortunately only happened a small number of times, but Lonán closes his eyes against the memory of floating above himself as he watched with perfect, stoic detachment as a firefight broke out around him. "Or when I'm about to say something I really shouldn't. I think it ought to be more useful than that, though. You know? Astral projection means traveling to other places, but I just stay stuck right here.
Maybe my spirit doesn't know how to get anywhere else without the chair."
This is a joke, of course, but Lonán just spreads his hands and shrugs. He hasn't mentioned how the detachment allows him to observe his surroundings in perfect detail, or how going blank in front of others means they often forget to modulate their behaviors or what they say when he's out. He doesn't think he needs to remind Matt of his own suspicions about the way the man senses the world well beyond the average.
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"So which of those was it? Did you feel particularly in danger or that you were going to give something away?" he asks as he moves into the kitchen to retrieve a glass of water because even if it's not a medical event, it seems strange enough that it probably wouldn't do any harm in hydrating after in a way that isn't wine or beer. Lonán has no way of really knowing that he is with someone who is the least likely to be violent against someone who neither starts a fight or is on equal footing to defend himself but he can understand that there might have been some concern.
He also retrieves his beer before he returns hands Lonán the glass of water and then sits down on the couch once again. "Seems like an ability that hasn't been properly controlled," he points out. Maybe that's giving something away but he has enough deniability that he could easily argue his way out of it if necessary. While Lonán was under, or gone, or whatever he wants to call it, Matt hadn't bothered to try to hide anything and had moved with all of the ease of someone with sight, beyond just the memorization of his apartment's layout. He'd found his phone without groping at the general area, he'd known exactly where Lonán's shoulders were and every movement had been easy. There was a lot to see.