Work Text:
Frank Castle doesn’t believe in bad feelings.
Right now, the warehouse is feeling wrong.
He stands just outside the perimeter, crouched behind a stack of rusted shipping containers, gun steady against his shoulder. Across the lot, the building looms with cracked windows, a flickering security light, a door that’s been replaced too recently to belong in a place this abandoned.
Frank watches.
Counts.
One guard at the side entrance. Two more making a lazy circuit around the loading dock. There should be more. There’s always more. But that’s the thing—the absence feels louder than presence.
He exhales slowly through his nose. “Too clean,” he mutters, barely audible.
But clean jobs don’t exist for him. Haven’t in years.
Still, intel’s intel. Shipment coming in. Weapons. Heavy ones. He doesn’t have the luxury of waiting for perfect conditions.
Frank adjusts his grip on the gun and moves.
The first guard doesn’t even have time to turn.
Frank’s hand clamps over his mouth, knife sliding in under the ribs, angled up. Quick. Efficient. He lowers the body silently, easing it against the wall before it can hit the ground too hard. The second one goes down with a shot.
The third?
That’s where it starts to slip.
The man turns too fast. Not startled—expecting. His eyes lock onto Frank with a kind of sharp, focused awareness that doesn’t belong to a bored perimeter guard. “Hey!”
Frank fires, but the guy’s already moving, ducking behind a crate as the bullet sparks off metal.
Not good.
The warehouse lights snap on.
All of them.
Floodlights blaze to life, cutting through the darkness, washing the yard in harsh white. Shadows disappear. So does any illusion of stealth.
“Yeah,” Frank mutters, shifting his stance. “There it is.”
Voices erupt from inside. Doors slam open. Boots hit concrete—fast, coordinated.
Too coordinated.
Frank doesn’t retreat.
He moves low and fast, crossing the yard as bullets start chewing up the concrete around him. One grazes his shoulder—a hot, slicing burn—but he doesn’t slow. Doesn’t even flinch.
Inside, the warehouse is worse.
Not abandoned. Not even close.
Crates stacked high, marked with stenciled codes. Weapons, yeah—but not just guns. Heavy artillery. Military-grade. And men. A lot of them.
Too many.
Frank slides behind a pillar as gunfire erupts, splintering wood, punching holes through crates. He returns fire in controlled bursts, dropping two, then three, but they keep coming.
They’re not panicking.
That’s when he realizes—this isn’t a job.
It’s a trap.
“Son of a—”
A flashbang goes off before he can finish the thought.
White light.
For half a second, the world disappears.
That’s all they need.
He fights.
Of course he does.
Even disoriented, Frank Castle is still Frank Castle. He moves on instinct—grabbing, striking, shooting. Someone goes down with a broken neck. Another with a bullet through the chest.
But there are too many hands.
Too many bodies.
Something hits his ribs—hard enough to make something give with a dull, sickening crack.
He snarls, swinging blindly, connecting with someone’s jaw. There’s a shout, a curse, but then—
A needle.
Sharp, sudden, driving into his neck.
Frank’s hand clamps down on the arm holding it, crushing, but it's already too late.
Chemical burn floods his veins.
“Get...off...”
His words slur, muscles turning traitor as the drug hits fast and hard.
Figures.
They planned for this.
The last thing he sees before the world tilts and folds in on itself is a man stepping into view. “Finally,” the man says, voice smooth. “That was harder than expected.”
Frank tries to lunge.
His body doesn’t listen.
Darkness takes him.
Consciousness comes back in pieces.
Pain arrives first.
Not sharp—dull, heavy, layered. It sits in his bones, in his ribs, in the back of his skull. Every breath drags over something bruised or broken. His mouth tastes like iron and chemicals.
Frank inhales slowly.
Wrists—bound. Ankles too.
He listens.
Drip.
Drip.
Water somewhere nearby. Slow. Steady.
Footsteps? No.
“Awake already?”
The voice cuts through the quiet.
Frank’s eyes open.
Same man from before. Not a speck of dust or blood on him, despite the chaos earlier. He stands a few feet away, hands clasped behind his back. “Impressive,” the man continues, tilting his head slightly. “Most people take longer.”
Frank’s gaze is flat. Assessing. “Most people aren’t me,” he says, voice rough.
The man smiles. “Yes. That’s rather the point.”
He steps closer, shoes clicking softly against the concrete floor. The room is dim, lit by a single overhead bulb that casts harsh shadows. No windows. No obvious exits.
“Do you know how difficult it is to catch you, Mr. Castle?” the man says, almost conversational. “We’ve been trying for quite some time.”
Frank doesn’t answer.
Doesn’t need to.
The man doesn’t expect one. “You’re very… thorough in your work. Efficient. Predictable, in a way.” He gestures vaguely. “Patterns. You follow them. That’s how we set this up.”
Frank’s jaw tightens, just a fraction.
Yeah.
He figured as much.
“Don’t look so disappointed,” the man adds lightly. “Even the best hunters can be hunted.”
He stops directly in front of Frank now, studying him like a specimen. “Tell me,” he says, “does it ever get boring? The killing, I mean. The same cycle, over and over.”
Frank finally speaks. “No.”
The answer is immediate. Certain.
The man’s smile widens. “I thought as much.”
He nods to someone off to the side—someone Frank hadn’t noticed before. That’s on him. The drug’s still messing with his perception.
A second man steps into view. Bigger. Built like a wall. He’s holding something.
Tools.
Frank’s lips curl slightly.
There it is.
“Let’s see how long that certainty lasts,” the man in the suit says, stepping back.
Pain changes things.
Not for Frank—not in the way it does for most people. It doesn’t break him. Doesn’t make him beg or bargain or reconsider his life choices.
What it does is sharpen.
Focus.
Every hit, every cut—it strips away the noise, leaves only the essentials. Survival. Endurance. Timing.
They start simple.
Fists. Blunt force.
Testing.
Frank takes it. Counts the strikes.
Then they escalate.
Blade across the ribs. Not deep. Just enough to bleed. To sting. To remind.
A laugh escapes him—low, humorless. “Gonna have to do better,” he rasps, blood slipping between his teeth.
One of them hits him harder for that. Good.
The man in the suit watches from a distance, expression unchanged.
“Careful,” he says mildly. “We want him conscious.”
They switch tactics.
Electricity.
That one hurts.
Frank’s body jerks against the restraints as the current hits, muscles seizing, teeth clamping down hard enough to crack something. The world goes white again, but this time it’s pain, not light.
He rides it out.
Counts through it.
One.
Two.
Three.
It stops.
He sags slightly, breath coming in rough pulls.
“Still with us?” the man asks.
Frank spits blood onto the floor. “Yeah,” he says hoarsely. “You done warming up?”
A flicker of something crosses the man’s face. Interest. “Not even close.”
Time blurs.
Minutes. Hours. Maybe longer.
They don’t let him rest. Don’t let him slip fully into unconsciousness. Every time he starts to fade, something drags him back—another shock, another blow, another cut.
They want something.
Information? Maybe.
Or maybe it’s simpler than that.
Maybe they just want to see how far he can go.
Frank’s not giving them anything either way.
At some point, the man in the suit steps forward again. “Tell me,” he says, crouching slightly to meet Frank’s eye level. “Who would come for you?”
Frank lets out a dry, broken chuckle. “No one.”
It’s not self-pity but a fact.
The man studies him, searching for something—hesitation, doubt, a crack.
He doesn’t find one. “Really?” he says softly. “No allies? No friends?”
Frank’s silence is answer enough.
The man straightens, brushing invisible dust from his sleeve. “That’s unfortunate,” he says. “For you.”
He nods again.
Another round begins.
By the time they finally stop, Frank’s breathing is shallow, uneven. Blood runs in thin lines down his arms, his torso, dripping onto the concrete below. His vision swims, edges darkening.
But he’s still conscious.
Still aware.
Still there.
The man in the suit steps closer one last time, looking almost… disappointed. “I expected more,” he admits. “Not in terms of resistance—you’ve exceeded expectations there. But I thought you might… break, eventually.”
Frank forces his head up, meeting his gaze. “Not happening.”
The man sighs lightly. “No,” he agrees. “I suppose not.”
He turns to leave, pausing at the door. “Oh well,” he adds over his shoulder. “We have time.”
The door slams shut locks.
Silence settles again.
Drip.
Drip.
Frank lets his head fall back slightly, eyes half-lidded.
He takes a slow, careful breath. Then another. And another.
He’s not dead.
Not yet.
Matt hears him before he knows why it matters.
It starts as a disturbance—another rhythm in the city’s endless orchestra. New York never really sleeps; it always sounds like engines, exhales sirens, a thousand overlapping heartbeats.
Matt filters it without thinking.
A certain heartbeat.
Familiar.
Wrong.
He stills on the rooftop, head tilting just slightly, as if that might help him isolate it faster.
Rain threatens in the air—thick clouds, heavy with the promise of a storm—but it hasn’t broken yet.
Still, it's there.
Not fear. Frank Castle doesn’t do fear, not in the way civilians do. This is something else. Pain. A body under strain for too long.
Matt’s jaw tightens. “…Frank?”
He doesn’t realize he said it out loud.
He shouldn’t be able to pick him out this far.
But he can.
Because Frank’s heartbeat isn't like everyone else. It’s steady even when it shouldn’t be.
And right now, it’s being pushed.
Hard.
Matt’s grip tightens on his billy club. “No,” he mutters, already moving. “No, no, no—”
He launches off the rooftop before the thought fully forms.
Frank fades in and out.
Not unconscious. Just… slipping.
The body does that, sometimes. Tries to shut down when it’s taken too much. He doesn’t let it.
Breathing hurts.
Everything hurts.
But pain means he’s still here, still fighting.
Somewhere in the haze, he registers the door opening again. Footsteps. Different from before. Lighter. Measured.
Not the big guy.
Frank forces one eye open.
Blurred shapes. Shadows stretching under that same harsh bulb.
“Still alive,” someone says. Just… noting.
Frank lets out something that might be a laugh if it had more strength behind it. “Yeah,” he croaks. “You’re gonna have to try harder.”
A hand grips his jaw, forcing his head up. “Funny,” the voice replies. “We were just getting bored.”
Frank’s vision swims, but he catches the outline of a blade again. Smaller this time. Precise.
Great.
“Let’s fix that.”
The first cut lands shallow, deliberate. Designed to sting more than anything else.
Frank grits his teeth. “Seen worse,” he mutters.
The hand tightens. “We’ll see.”
Matt moves like the city belongs to him.
Rooftop to rooftop. Fire escape to fire escape. The world maps itself in sound and vibration.
Frank’s heartbeat is his compass.
He shouldn’t be this locked in. Shouldn’t be this...focused.
But he is.
And he’s not examining that too closely right now.
What matters is the distance.
Closing.
The pattern of the area sharpens as he approaches—industrial.
Perfect for something off the records.
Perfect for a trap.
Matt lands on the edge of a building across the street from the source and crouches low, listening.
There.
Inside.
Multiple heartbeats. A cluster. Controlled. Alert. And one strained.
Irregular, but still fighting to find its rhythm again.
Frank.
Matt’s chest tightens, just for a second. “Hold on,” he whispers, already moving again.
Frank doesn’t scream.
They’ve tried to make him. Different methods. Different pressures. Pain calibrated to push, to pry something loose.
But screaming is a release.
And Frank Castle doesn’t give them that.
He breathes through it instead. Short, controlled bursts when he can manage it. Ragged when he can’t.
The blade withdraws. Goes back in somewhere else.
He loses track of where.
Doesn’t matter.
Pain is just noise now, but through it, something else starts to creep in.
Footsteps.
Faint at first.
Frank frowns, just slightly.
That’s new.
It’s not theirs. Not any of the men in the room. He’s catalogued those already—learned their patterns.
This one was closer.
For a split second, something unfamiliar brushes the edge of his awareness.
Expectation.
He shuts it down immediately.
No one’s coming for him.
He already said it. Already knows it.
That’s not how his world works.
Still, it gets louder.
Matt doesn’t go in through the main door.
Instead, he circles the building once, twice, mapping entry points, counting people, tracking movement patterns. There’s a back entrance, lightly guarded.
He hears the shift inside. Voices. Movement.
And under it, a sharp spike in Frank’s heartbeat.
Pain.
Something in Matt snaps tight. “Okay,” he breathes. “We’re done.”
He moves.
The first guard goes down without a sound.
Matt drops behind him, Billy club striking the base of the skull with precise force. The body crumples before it can even process what happened.
The second turns too late.
A quick strike to the throat, a twist of the arm, and he’s out cold on the ground.
Matt doesn’t linger.
Frank hears it.
The impact.
One of the men pauses mid-motion. “…what was that?”
Frank’s head tilts, just a fraction.
Closer now.
Frank’s lips twitch, just barely. “About time,” he mutters, voice wrecked.
The guy in front of him frowns. “What?”
Frank doesn’t answer.
Because the lights go out.
Darkness floods the room.
Not total—there’s still the faint glow from somewhere down the hall—but enough to throw everything off balance.
Voices rise. Confused. Sharp.
“What the hell?”
“Check the breaker!”
Matt moves through them like something out of a nightmare.
They can’t see him.
He can see everything.
Every breath. Every shift of weight. Every heartbeat spiking in sudden panic.
He takes them down one by one.
Quick. Efficient. Controlled.
A strike to the temple. A sweep of the legs. A baton cracking against ribs with just enough force to drop, not kill.
One of them fires blindly.
The shot misses.
Matt is already behind him. “Sleep,” he murmurs, striking as the man collapses.
In the center of it all—Frank.
Matt feels him before he reaches him.
The strain in his muscles. The way his breathing stutters just slightly off rhythm. The blood—too much of it.
Matt’s control wavers for a fraction of a second.
It’s enough.
Someone lunges at him from the side.
Matt reacts on instinct—too hard, too fast. The crack of bone is louder than it needs to be.
The man drops.
Silence follows.
Heavy. Sudden.
Matt stands there for half a second, chest rising and falling.
Then he turns. “Frank.”
Frank squints into the dim.
He can’t see much. Just a shape. Red, maybe. Or that might be the blood in his eyes.
But he knows.
“Red?” he rasps.
Matt’s already at his side, hands moving fast but careful, checking restraints, injuries, everything at once.
“What the hell happened to you?” Matt demands, voice tight in a way Frank hasn’t heard before.
Frank huffs out something like a laugh. “Couple guys,” he says. “Got lucky.”
Matt’s jaw clenches. “Yeah,” he mutters. “That’s one way to put it.” He snaps one of the restraints and moves to the next. “You look like shit, by the way.”
“Feel worse,” Frank replies automatically. “Glad you could make it,” he adds, quieter.
Matt stills for just a second.
Just a second.
Then he finishes breaking the last restraint. “Yeah,” he says. “Don’t get used to it.”
Frank’s weight drops forward as the tension releases. Matt catches him before he can hit the ground fully, arm coming around him without hesitation.
It’s… new.
For both of them.
Frank notices.
Of course he does.
“Careful, Red,” he mutters, voice low. “You’re getting soft.”
Matt snorts, adjusting his grip to keep him steady. “Shut up,” he says. “You’re bleeding on my suit.”
“Yeah?” Frank’s head tips slightly toward him, a ghost of his usual edge slipping back in. “Looks better this way.”
Matt shakes his head, but there’s something there—relief, sharp and bright under everything else.
“Come on,” he says. “We’re getting you out of here.”
Behind them, somewhere deeper in the building, a door slams.
More footsteps.
More heartbeats.
Matt’s expression hardens. “Of course there’s more,” he mutters.
Frank huffs. “Wouldn’t be fun otherwise.”
Matt adjusts his hold, tightening his arm around him—not letting go. “Try not to die on me,” he says.
Frank’s answer is immediate. “No promises.”
By the time they make it out of the warehouse, the sky finally gives in.
Rain crashes down like it’s been waiting all night—heavy, relentless, soakinh through fabric in seconds and turns the city into something blurred.
Matt doesn’t slow.
Frank’s weight leans into him, uneven but stubbornly present, boots dragging, proving how bad it really is. Every step sends a new spike through his system—Matt can hear it, feel it in the hitch of his breath, the stutter of his pulse trying to keep up with everything his body’s lost.
“Still with me?” Matt asks, voice low, cutting through the downpour.
Frank lets out a rough exhale that might be a laugh. “Yeah,” he mutters. “You talk too much for me to pass out.”
“Good,” Matt replies. “Would hate to carry you the whole way.”
Frank shifts slightly, wincing despite himself. “Please. You’d enjoy it.”
Matt huffs under his breath, adjusting his grip—careful, but firm. “Keep telling yourself that.”
They move fast, cutting through alleys and fire escapes, Matt guiding them with instinct and sound while Frank does what he does best—endures. The rain helps. Covers noise. Washes away blood. Turns everything into chaos that only Matt can really navigate cleanly.
Frank notices that.
Of course he does.
“You always this dramatic?” he mutters after a minute, voice strained but steady enough.
“Only when you get kidnapped,” Matt shoots back.
“Kidnapped’s a strong word.”
Matt stops short on a rooftop, turning his head toward him, rain dripping off his jawline. “They had you tied up, bleeding out, and torturing you, Frank.”
Frank shrugs, or tries to. It comes out as more of a twitch. “Yeah,” he says. “Bad day.”
Matt stares at him—well, not stares, but close enough. “You’re unbelievable.”
Frank smirks faintly. “You came anyway.”
Matt exhales slowly, then starts moving again. “Yeah,” he says, quieter. “I did.”
Matt’s apartment is exactly how Frank expected it to be.
Matt gets the door open one-handed, guiding Frank inside before kicking it shut behind them.
Frank sways slightly as they step in.
Matt’s grip tightens automatically. “Easy,” he mutters.
“Relax,” Frank says. “I’m not gonna die.”
“You did try.”
That shuts him up for half a second.
Matt doesn’t wait. He steers Frank toward the couch, easing him down carefully despite the way Frank tries to resist the help.
“I can sit on my own, you know.”
“Could’ve fooled me.”
Frank exhales sharply as he lands, one hand bracing against the cushion. The movement pulls at something—Matt hears it before Frank fully reacts.
A sharp intake of breath.
There it is.
“Yeah,” Matt says under his breath. “That’s what I thought.”
Frank glares in his general direction. “You always this smug?”
“Only when I’m right.”
Matt moves quickly after that—grabbing a first aid kit, towels, anything he needs. His motions are efficient, practiced. This isn’t new for him.
Still, this is different.
Because it’s Frank.
He kneels in front of him, hands already moving toward the torn fabric of Frank’s shirt. “Don’t punch me,” he says.
Frank snorts. “No promises.”
The damage is worse up close.
Cuts layered over bruising, some shallow, some not. Blood still seeping from a few places that haven’t clotted properly. Burns. Restraint marks. And under all of it, the steady, stubborn rhythm of a body that refuses to shut down.
Matt’s jaw tightens. “Jesus, Frank. I'm gonna take off your shirt now.”
“Buy me dinner first,” he mutters.
Matt pauses.
“You’re bleeding all over my couch.” Matt pulls the shirt open anyway.
Frank tilts his head back against the couch, breathing through the sting as the cooler air hits exposed skin. “Romantic,” Frank replies.
Matt shakes his head, but there’s a faint edge of something almost amused in it. “Hold still.”
“I am still.”
“You’re not.”
“I’m injured, not dead.”
“Working on it, apparently.”
Frank huffs, but he doesn’t argue again. Not really. He lets Matt work.
The first touch is careful.
Matt presses a clean cloth against one of the deeper cuts, applying steady pressure. Frank’s muscles tense immediately, breath hitching just slightly before he forces it back under control.
“Yeah, that one’s bad,” Matt says.
“No shit.”
Matt works in silence for a moment, cleaning wounds, assessing damage. The rain starts tapping against the windows, softer now but constant, filling the apartment with a low, steady rhythm.
It’s… quieter here.
Frank notices that too. “Always this cozy?” he asks, voice a little lower now.
Matt snorts. “This? Cozy?”
“Yeah. Rain. Apartment. You playing nurse.”
“I am not playing nurse.”
“Could’ve fooled me.”
Matt presses a little harder than necessary against a wound.
Frank hisses. “Careful, Red.”
“Then stop talking.”
Frank smirks faintly, eyes half-lidded. “Make me.”
There’s a pause.
Matt’s hands still for just a second. Then he resumes, more controlled this time. “Keep this up and I just might,” he says quietly.
Frank doesn’t answer that.
But his pulse shifts—just a fraction.
Matt hears it.
Time passes differently like this.
Slower.
The urgency fades, replaced by something steadier. Matt moves from wound to wound, cleaning, stitching where he has to, wrapping what he can. Frank stays mostly still, the occasional sharp breath or muttered comment the only sign he’s not just a body going through the motions.
“You’re lucky,” Matt says at one point.
Frank hums. “Yeah?”
“Nothing vital hit. No major arteries. Whoever did this—” he trails off, jaw tightening again. “They wanted you alive.”
Frank’s expression hardens slightly. “Yeah,” he says. “Got that impression.”
Matt ties off a bandage, fingers brushing briefly against Frank’s skin. “You going back?” he asks.
It’s casual.
Frank opens one eye, looking in his direction. “You think I’m not?”
Matt exhales through his nose. “Thought maybe you’d take a night off. Try something new.”
Frank’s lips curl faintly. “Like what?”
Matt shrugs slightly, still focused on his work. “Not getting kidnapped.”
Frank actually laughs at that—low, rough, but real. “Yeah,” he says. “I’ll put it on the list.”
There's a moment of silence.
“Thanks,” Frank adds, quieter.
Matt stills again.
Just for a second.
Then he finishes securing the last bandage, sitting back slightly. “Yeah,” he says. “Don’t think about it too much.”
Frank tilts his head, studying him in that way he does. “Too late.”
Matt shakes his head, pushing himself up to his feet. “You’re staying here tonight.”
That’s not a suggestion.
Frank raises an eyebrow. “Didn’t I have a choice?”
“You don’t.”
Frank leans back into the couch, wincing slightly but settling anyway. “You're bossy.”
“And you're alive,” Matt adds.
Frank smirks faintly. “Yeah,” he says. “That too.”
Matt moves around the apartment, quieter now, but he doesn’t go far. Doesn’t leave the room.
Frank notices that.
Of course he does.
“You gonna keep hovering,” he mutters, eyes half-closed, “or you got somewhere to be?”
Matt leans against the wall, arms crossed loosely.
“I’m good here.”
Frank huffs softly. “Yeah,” he says. “Figured.”
There’s a pause.
Not uncomfortable.
Just… there.
“You came fast,” Frank adds, voice low.
Matt doesn’t answer right away.
The rain fills the space.
“I heard you,” he says finally.
Frank’s brow furrows slightly. “…what?”
Matt tilts his head, like he’s listening to something even now. “Your heartbeat,” he says. “I can pick it out. Anywhere.”
Frank goes still.
Really still.
For a moment, the only sound is the rain and the steady, stubborn rhythm in his chest. “Yeah?” he says after a beat.
Matt nods. “Yeah.”
Frank exhales slowly, something unreadable flickering across his face. “Huh.”
That’s all he says.
But it’s enough.
Later, when exhaustion finally starts to win, Frank shifts slightly on the couch, testing the limits of what his body will tolerate. “Hey, Red.”
Matt hums in response.
“Next time,” Frank says, voice already rough with sleep, “try getting there before they start the torture.”
Matt smirks faintly. “I’ll work on my timing.”
Frank’s lips twitch. “Yeah,” he murmurs. “Do that.”
His breathing evens out after that, finally slipping into something close to rest.
Matt stays where he is.
Listening.
Making sure that steady, relentless heartbeat doesn’t stop.
Not tonight.