#iteotm

The shocking news that there was a serial killer on the loose was enough to cause hysteria on its own, but it was the nature of the killings that had fear caressing the spines of New Yorkers like the first bitter chill of winter. According to the confidential memo, the NYPD believed the murders were done by a copycat trying to emulate one of New York City’s most prolific serial killers; Bastian Cooper. The biggest piece of evidence they had to support this theory was that the victims had been found with their eyes carved out.

Matt had been getting ready to go to a deposition when he’d heard the breaking news report coming from his tv. The mug he’d been holding had slipped right out of his hand, clattering on the floor and shattering into a dozen jagged pieces. He’d barely felt the scalding splatter of hot coffee that had soaked through the dual layers of his slacks and socks.

The disconcertment had come first. A serial killer. Three victims. And Matt had been completely unaware of the murders. While he’d been investigating arm’s dealings down at the docks and prepping for a corporate negligence lawsuit, people were being attacked and mutilated, and it hadn’t even been on his radar. The revelation had caused a needle of guilt to prick at his conscience. How could something so grisly escape his attention?

The newscaster’s voice had played on a loop in his head even after the broadcast ended, like a needle stuck in the final groove at the end of a record, spinning endlessly.

The NYPD believe these murders were the work of a copycat modeling themselves after the notorious serial killer known as Muse.

That part had caused a pit of dread to split open in his stomach, conjuring the recollection of his first encounter with Bastian. Even from the simple act of his mind crafting the evocation, his senses had instantly become overwhelmed from the memory, transporting him right back to that night he’d found Bastian’s lair underground in the subway tunnels. The damp air that had felt heavy on Matt’s heated skin. The acrid assault of lingering mildew intermingled with the harsh chemicals from paint and epoxy that had burned in his nose and throat. The sharp metallic tang of blood that had been so strong he could taste it in every single inhale. The fading rhythm of Angela’s heartbeat. 

Standing in his kitchen the day the Bulletin released that article, Matt had felt an uncomfortable sensation of déjà vu. By the time he and the public had been made aware of Muse, Bastian had already claimed upwards of sixty victims, and even with the DNA that had been found in the blood he’d used for his murals, a lot of the victims still had yet to be identified almost a year later. Matt had immediately felt compelled to track down the copycat, not just because there was a serial killer terrorizing his city, but because it was personal for him. He hadn’t been there to prevent the deaths of Bastian’s victims. He’d nearly been too late to save Angela. And letting Bastian get away that first time had given him the chance to go after Heather. He wanted to stop the copycat before they hurt anyone else.

But a month had gone by since that article had come out, Matt still didn’t have a single lead, and another victim had just been found, bringing the body count up to five. 

Matt threw his cowl forcefully at the living room wall with a frustrated yell, the loud echo of the collision setting his teeth on edge. He’d been out tonight, chasing yet another dead end, all while a fifth victim had already been found. Ripping off his gloves and tossing them to the ground, he squeezed his eyes shut and reached out to grip onto the back of the couch, letting his head drop between his shoulders with a heavy exhale.  

He’d been going out every single night for the past month, and he hadn’t found a goddamn thing. Matt was no closer to catching the copycat killer than he’d been the day the news broke, and now two more people were dead. He’d been following every update about the case, but the NYPD refused to share any details about the murders or the victims. They were still pissed about the chaos that the Bulletin article had stirred up amongst the public. 

Matt had to find a lead. He’d become so consumed by this case that everything else was starting to unravel. He’d barely slept more than four hours a night the last few weeks, he was falling behind on his cases, and Foggy had already chewed his ass out for being late to their last two court appearances. Matt had promised Foggy and Karen both that he wouldn’t let being Daredevil interfere with being Matt Murdock. A promise he’d failed to keep several times over. A promise that was starting to fray again. Karen was already giving him the cold shoulder, and her forgiveness was always harder to win back than Foggy’s. It seemed to get harder to earn again every time he let her down. 

He knew he was living on borrowed time when it came to being worthy of their loyalty. Sooner or later, that unwavering patience and understanding would run out, and Matt could hardly blame them. He wasn’t always the friend they deserved. But people were being viciously murdered in cold blood, he couldn’t just stand by and do nothing. Matt had already exhausted two resources and it had gotten him nowhere, but there was one more person who might be able to help him.

⠊⠞⠑⠕⠞⡉

“Mommy, I can’t find my bunny.”

Matt heard the exhausted intake of breath Jessica subtly took and turned his head to call out over his shoulder before she could respond.

“It’s under the couch, sweetie.”

Danielle knelt down by the couch, stretching her arm out under it, and Matt heard her excited gasp when her fingers brushed against the soft fur of the stuffed toy. She eagerly pulled it out with a grin, hugging it in her arms as she looked over at Matt. 

“Thanks Uncle Matty!”

Matt tilted his head to the side slightly and smiled softly in her direction. Jessica’s eyes tracked her daughter as Danielle sat on her knees by the coffee table, propping the stuffed bunny up on top of it to pour it an imaginary cup of tea. The tension in her shoulders deflated with the weight of a wild bunny search now off of them. She leaned her hip against the kitchen counter and turned her attention back to Matt.

“Thanks.”

“Yeah.”

Letting out a deep breath, she brushed a strand of her hair away from her face and lowered her voice.

“Why don’t you just put on the horns and talk to B.B.?”

“I did. It was an anonymous submission, and whoever sent it hasn’t sent anything else. She said there was no way to tell where it came from, and believe me, she tried.”

“What about your cop friend?”

“I already talked to Mahoney too. The NYPD is keeping everything locked down even more after that article. They’re trying to field out false tips and confessions, and they still haven’t figured out who leaked the memo and the crime scene photos to the press either.”

“Isn’t he the Chief of Detectives though? He’s done you favors before.”

“Comissioner Matthews called in the Feds. He’s padding his campaign for Mayor, and catching a copycat of one of the worst serial killers this city has ever seen will help him win by a landslide. Mahoney said the task force was hand selected by the Special Agent running it, and his team is watching everyone like a hawk. He can’t take the risk.”

Matt let out a deep breath and reached up to adjust his sunglasses on the bridge of his nose.

“And he doesn’t want me to, either. He told me to back off on this one with the F.B.I. and the NYPD both out on the streets.”

“But you’re not going to.”

Letting out a sigh, he angled his body closer towards her. He kept his voice low, but the desperation echoed between them. 

“I can’t, Jess.”

“Even though Daredevil’s chances of getting arrested and sent to prison are now doubled until the copycat is caught?”

“I think vigilantes are pretty low on their list of priorities right now.”

Jessica inhaled deeply through her nose and let it out slowly as she turned her head to watch her daughter play in the living room. Matt could practically feel her confliction as if it was a force inside his own chest, like the opposing ends of magnets.

“Look, I get why this is important to you, but I can’t get involved. I have to think about Dani. And I’m still…fucking…flickering.”

He could hear the frustration in her voice. Jessica had told him about how her abilities seemed to drop out and come back randomly since she’d had Danielle. 

“Hey, I get it, I do. Okay, and I’m not asking you to get involved. I’m here for private investigator Jessica Jones, not…Jewel.”

Jessica immediately turned her head to glare at him, pursing her lips at the sight of the devilish smirk stretching across his mouth. She hadn’t missed the mockery dripping from his tone. Jessica swiftly reached out to smack his shoulder.

“Oh, fuck you, devil boy.”

Matt’s lips spread into a wide grin, a deep chuckle thundering in his chest as he rubbed at the spot she’d hit before he held his hands up in a display of surrender.

“Ow, alright alright. Low blow. But I mean it, all I need is a lead. That’s it.”

Jessica rolled her eyes with a subtle shake of her head, placing her hand on her hip as she looked over at Danielle again.

“I might still have a contact I can reach out to, but I can’t make any promises, Matt.”

“I know. I appreciate you helping at all. I wouldn’t ask if it wasn’t important.” 

⠊⠞⠑⠕⠞⡉

Matt was sitting at his kitchen island with documents spread out in front of him, his finger tips running over the raised Braille bumps to read over a witness testimony for an upcoming trial. He had one earbud in, playing a voice note Foggy had sent him about finding a new piece of evidence that could help win their case. It was interrupted when his phone started to buzz on the counter, the voice assistance alerting him of an incoming call.

Jess. Jess. Jess.

Quickly removing the earbud, Matt picked up his phone and tapped his thumb on the screen, bringing it to his ear.

“Hey, did you find something?”

“Hello to you, too.”

“I said hey.”

Even on the other end of the line, he could practically hear her rolling her eyes. 

“Well?”

“Something is weird about this case.”

Matt’s forehead creased in confusion, and he sat up a little straighter hearing the suspicion in her voice.

“What do you mean?”

“My guy told me all he could get were the autopsy reports.”

“Why is that weird?”

“Because if he doesn’t have access to any of the case files, why the fuck would he have access to the autopsy reports?”

Matt pursed his lips slightly in thought. It was odd, but not an anomaly he could afford to waste time fixating on. There were more important things to investigate. 

“Mahoney said the Fed in charge of the task force is watching everyone in the department closely. Maybe he’s allowing people to only have access to specific pieces of the investigation to flush out who leaked the memo.”

“I don’t know, Matt. Something feels off.”

Matt got up from his chair, abandoning the court documents he’d been reading through, walking towards the living room with purpose even though he didn’t have one yet. After a month of nothing but dead ends, the prospect of finally having something to chase filled him with a sense of restlessness that was thrumming throughout his body.

“What did you find out from the autopsy reports?”

“That it seems like a stretch to call this killer a copycat.”

Matt hadn’t even realized he’d been pacing until her words stopped him right in his tracks.

“What do you mean?”

“Muse went after everyone, right? He didn’t discriminate with his victims. And he drained their blood for his fucked up little art project.”

“Yeah, that’s right.”

“Then the only thing similar between Muse and his alleged ‘copycat’ is the missing eyes thing.”

Matt was silent for a moment, feeling thunderstruck by Jessica’s assessment of her findings. He’d spent the past month burning the candle at both ends trying to hunt down a copycat killer that…may not even be one? Perplexity and irritation swirled all at once, causing him to feel rooted to a belief that had just been flipped upside down, leaving him dangling with nothing to grasp onto and right himself with.

“Wait, are you saying you don’t think this is a copycat?”

“I only got the reports of the first four victims, but they were all men, and they weren’t bled to death. They were beaten and strangled and carved up.”

He had a thousand more questions now than he did when the article first broke, and not a single answer. Each one appeared quicker than the last, droplets of inquisitions rapidly turning into a heavy downpour that had a headache beginning to throb dully at the base of his skull. He reached up to rub at his forehead, as if that would quell the mounting discomfort working its way up his brain, and let out a heavy exhale while closing his eyes.

“This doesn’t make any sense.”

“I told you, something is weird.”

Why would the NYPD suspect the killer was a copycat if there wasn’t substantial evidence to support that theory? Removing the eyes from the body was a signature of Muse, but with the evidence Jess had found, that seemed to be the only thing similar between the two killers. Was there something not in the autopsy reports that proved the killer was a copycat? Or had the NYPD jumped the gun with speculation, not expecting a press leak that would cause mass hysteria among the public?

“Was there…anything else? Do you have the victims names? Maybe I can start there, find a connection.”

“Asshole blacked them out before giving me the copies. Certain details are blacked out too.”

“Covering his own ass.”

“I did get one name, though. It looks like all the autopsies were done by the same forensic pathologist. Doctor Y/N Y/L/N.”

Matt perked up instantly, that restless energy returning full force to combat the frustrated tension building in his head.

“Do you have an address?”

“What am I, a fucking amaetur?”

⠊⠞⠑⠕⠞⡉

Matt had been standing on the rooftop of your building for two hours waiting for you to come home. He’d tried to go by the Medical Examiner’s office Jess said you worked at, but it was under heavy surveillance of both the F.B.I. and the NYPD. It was less of a risk to try and talk to you here, but the issue was he didn’t know your schedule. He didn’t know if you’d even be home tonight. Maybe you worked nights, or maybe a sixth body had been found and it hadn’t hit the news yet. He had no way of knowing. All he could do was wait.

When he finally heard a key slipping into a lock down on the fifth floor where he knew your apartment was, he leapt from the ledge of the rooftop down onto the fire escape platform right outside your living room window. He pressed his back against the brick wall, tilting his head to the side as he listened to you moving around inside. The jingle of your keys being hung up on the hook by the front door, your shoes hitting the hardwood with a soft thump, followed by an exhale of relief, and your bag being carelessly tossed onto your kitchen island.

He reached out to test if the window would budge, both delighted and concerned that it was unlocked. Matt pushed the pane up slowly, and his right foot hit the hardwood first as he swung his leg through the window, slipping inside silently. Just as delicately, he pushed the pane back down to close the window, keeping his ears trained on your movements in the kitchen. The hinges of a cabinet creaked as you opened one, and your nail faintly clinked against a wine glass that you reached for. He took a few soundless steps further inside your apartment, stopping once he was a few feet away.

“Doctor Y/L/N.”

The scream you let out made him wince, and the sharp sound of glass splintering against hard tile was just as painful to his sensitive ears. Your hand flew up to clutch at your chest as you whirled around and backed up against the counter, your heart pounding against your own palm like an erratic drumbeat.

“What the fuck?”

Matt quickly held his gloved hands up in a placating gesture of surrender, taking a half a step backwards.

“Relax, I’m not here to hurt you.”

He could feel your eyes fervently darting over him, assessing the threat of his presence, the fingers on your left hand twitching towards the knife block behind you on the counter. Matt didn’t move. He stood there patiently, keeping his hands where you could see them.

“Do you know who I am?”

Very, very slowly, your heart’s rhythm returned to a semi-normal tempo, but he could still sense the apprehension radiating off you in waves. 

“Well there’s a lot of you running around in masks and red underwear these days, it’s not easy to keep track.”

The edge of Matt’s lips twitched in amusement at the dry sarcasm in your tone. He gradually lowered his hands back down to his sides. 

“Kinda hard to mix up the devil with a spider.”

“Right. One of you is a friendly neighbor and the other is a fucking menace, I can tell which one you are now. Is this how you start every conversation? Breaking into someone’s place and scaring the shit out of them?”

Matt pursed his lips slightly in a faux expression of thought and then gave a faint shrug of his shoulders.

“Pretty much.”

He caught the subtle clench of your jaw, your heart rate ticking up again, but not out of fear this time. 

“I need to talk to you.”

“What could you possibly need to talk to me about?”

“The Muse copycat.”

The slight straightening of your spine and falter in your heartbeat caught his attention. Your hand fell from your chest as you cleared your throat, crossing your arms over your chest instead in a deliberate display of defensiveness.

“And why is that?”

“Because you did the autopsies.”

The joints of your knuckles cracking from the way you clenched your hands into fists sounded like balloons being popped right by his head in rapid succession. In the silence that stretched almost uncomfortably, Matt could feel you analyzing him again, and he assumed it was now in suspicion. Or maybe it was intrigue, based on the way your head tilted a little to the side.

“How do you know that?”

“A friend.”

Another beat of silence passed as you considered him carefully.

“What do you want?”

“Details. The NYPD aren’t releasing any-”

“Yeah, for a reason.”

“I know why they’re doing it, but I can’t help track down the killer without a lead. I’ve spent the past month chasing nothing but dead ends.”

“Why don’t you just let cops and the feds do their job? What can you possibly do that they can’t?”

“A lot.”

Your exasperation was clear as a bell in the way you rolled your eyes and loosely threw your hands up, your palms lightly smacking against the sides of your thighs when they came down. 

“What, like break the law? Beat the shit out of people for information? Break into places to find evidence?”

“Sometimes breaking the law saves lives.”

“Spoken like a true vigilante.”

Matt let out a deep exhale through his nose and took a cautious step forward, speaking in a low pleading tone.

“Look, I just need something, okay? Even if it’s small, just somewhere to start.”

“Why? Why do you care about this so much?”

“Because it’s personal.”

This time it was you that took a small step forward, eyeing him curiously.

“What do you mean?”

Matt hesitated for just a moment, weighing the scales of how honest to be. He had a feeling he would get more cooperation out of you if he gave you something in return for what he was asking for.

“I was there when he died. Bastian Cooper.”

A quiet scoff left your lips as you turned to walk towards your pantry, opening the door to reach inside for a broom.

“Yeah, no thanks to you.”

The accusation in your tone made Matt’s brows furrow beneath the cowl, and he cocked his head to the side.

“Excuse me?”

“You know, I read the files from the original case. You were there on two separate occasions when he attacked someone. They both almost died.”

The insinuation was sharp as a steel tipped blade, and it cut exactly where you’d aimed it. A muscle feathered in his jaw, the bones of his teeth grinding together as a defensive flicker of irritation ignited within him.

“I’m not a killer.”

The handle of the broom smacked against the counter you shoved it against before you turned to face him again.

“Well he was. And if he hadn’t been killed, who knows how many more victims he would’ve had.”

Matt stepped closer to you, his voice dropping to a lower octave that was laced with disbelief.

“You think he deserved to die?”

“I think you see the shit I do day in and day out, the kind of things humans are capable of doing to each other, and you get a little jaded.”

He could hear the hint of exhaustion in your voice, but he could hear the anger more clearly. Matt understood where you were coming from. The frustration. The appeal of a path that seemed easier and more effective. But it wasn’t a path he could go down, no matter how tempting it was during the bouts where his faith felt oppressive and hollow.

“He should’ve gone to prison.”

“Prison was never going to reform someone like Bastian Cooper. He wasn’t going to stop.”

“Fine, maybe that’s true, but he would’ve spent the rest of his life in a cage-”

“Like Benjamin Poindexter?”

The jab felt like a punch to the gut and a blade against his throat all at once. His silence had you advancing closer, any lingering trace of your initial trepidation completely absent.

“He was supposed to spend his life in prison, right? And he broke out, what, twice? How many more people have died since then?”

Matt’s hands clenched into fists at his slides, the leather of his gloves creaking faintly in protest under the strain.

“There’s a system-”

“No, there’s a pattern. Everyone you try to take down, Bullseye, The Punisher, Kingpin, Muse, low level criminals, they all get right back up, and they hurt more people. It’s an endless cycle, and it doesn’t make a goddamn difference in the long run, so forgive me if I don’t buy into your hero bullshit.”

The verbal daggers you threw at him landed harshly, piercing through the armor of his suit with their verity. He didn’t have a retort, because he knew you weren’t wrong. His conscience echoed those same thoughts when the weight of his own failure and self loathing weighed on his soul. His defensiveness fizzled out into reluctant resignation that filled his lungs like smoke.

“Sounds like you’re more than a little jaded, Doc. Sounds like a loss of faith.”

A dry laugh that was void of humor escaped your mouth as you gestured loosely at him with your hand.

“You’re gonna preach to me about faith in a devil costume?”

Matt titled his head to the side, offering a dim version of his signature charming smile.

“Would you believe me if I told you I was a Catholic?"

Your eyelashes fluttered like hummingbird wings as you blinked a few times in surprise, looking him up and down once again, one of your brows arching in skepticism.

“I would certainly be thoroughly fucking confused.”

“It's a long story.”

“I guess that explains the no kill rule.”

“I have been tempted. More than once.”

That quiet admission hung in the space between you, and he caught the way his confession had the tension in your shoulders uncoiling gradually. It confirmed his theory that you responded to his honesty. Letting out a heavy breath, he decided to lay his soul bare in a last ditch effort to persuade you to help him.

“Look, I get it. Okay, I do. You think it’s not frustrating for me to believe I've done some good just to see all that effort turn to shit? To think I've saved people by getting someone locked up, just for them to get right back out and do even more damage? To feel like…everything I do means nothing, and real justice doesn’t even exist?”

That was the thing that haunted him more than anything else. That none of it mattered. That nothing he did made a difference. That everything he’d sacrificed, his flesh and his blood and his sweat, it was all in vain for something that wasn’t even real. 

“You know, I've lost my own faith before, Doc. Several times, actually. I've even considered hanging up the suit for good more than once because of it.”

Turning to lean back against the counter, you stretched your arms out to rest your palms on the surface of the countertop on either side of you, voicing your inquisition with genuine curiosity.

“Why haven’t you?”

Matt mirrored your action, leaning back against the kitchen island across from you, folding his arms over his chest loosely with a sigh and letting his head drop slightly.

“Because I can’t ignore any of it. I can’t lay in bed at night and hear people begging for help, knowing I can do something, and try to block it out instead. I can’t hear a news report about people being brutally murdered and mutilated and just…go on about my day, hoping the police and the feds do their jobs. And maybe you’re right. Maybe if…if I had acted sooner or done something differently with Bastian, those two people wouldn’t have almost died. I don’t know. I can’t go back and change that. But if this really is a Muse copycat, I don’t want them getting anywhere near his body count. I found Bastian the first time before the cops did. I can find this guy too. I just need your help, please.”

The seconds seemed to pass like molasses cascading down bark, and if you said no, he didn’t know what he was going to do. Matt was already running out of steam. He couldn’t keep throwing everything at this and keep his promise to Foggy and Karen at the same time. He needed a Hail Mary. He needed you.

When he heard your subtle sigh of surrender, it instantly loosened the tightness in his chest, his body seeming to vibrate once again with impatient restlessness. Rubbing your hands down your face tiredly, you shook your head even though you’d already made your decision. 

“If I get caught working with you, I could lose my job. I could get sued-”

summary: bastian cooper is dead. matt was there when he died. so when a leaked report from the bulletin reveals that the recent string of violent murders in hell’s kitchen is the work of a copycat, he immediately gets involved. but this new killer isn’t paying homage to the original muse. they’re carving out their own bloody legacy along with their victim’s eyes. with the nypd refusing to release any details about the murders, matt reaches out to an old friend for help and tracks down someone close to the case, forging a reluctant partnership. when the mystery starts to unravel, matt is confronted with a reflection of his own failure under the mask.

a/n: massive massive massive shoutout to @quakeismyhero not just for helping me with the header (yes that is our lord and savior halsey shoutout to mother), but also for entertaining my plotting and playing dolls with me and helping shape what this series became. I suppose you could say...she was my muse 😏

if you know me, you know I love murder mysteries, and you know I love daredevil, so i'm giving you the best of both worlds. I hope y'all have as good of a time reading this as I had writing it, I hope it gabbers your flasters, and I hope it keeps you up at night (affectionately) 🖤

I didn't put together a taglist form bc honestly I just didn't feel like it lmao, but if you'd like to be notified when parts drop, just comment down below!

»— anything marked with an astrik contains explicit content. minors dni.

»— all work is my own. please do not repost anywhere else without my consent.

act one: rebirth

act two: ritual

act three: ruminate

act four: revelation

act five: retribution