In the Emergency Room of Metro-General Hospital, Claire Temple was experiencing some serious déjà vu.

It had started off as a fairly slow night, but in the span of about twenty minutes that slow pace was shattered as ambulances and private vehicles alike began pulling up to the emergency dock—all of them, oddly enough, transporting injured people dressed up in formal attire. Claire and her colleagues had all gotten straight to work, and Claire was so busy with all the incoming patients that she hadn't initially paid any attention to the news chyrons winding across the nearby televisions:

Devil of Hell's Kitchen Behind Ambush On Charity Ball; At Least Two Dead, Dozens Injured

Local Journalist Target Of Vicious Attack By Devil of Hell's Kitchen

Vigilante Once Hailed As Hero Shows True Criminal Colors

She was in the middle of tending to a middle-aged woman in a velvet evening gown who had gotten a viciously deep gash across her forehead when she recognized one of the unconscious patients being wheeled in: Sarah Corrigan, pale as death and just as still.

As soon as she spotted Sarah she knew that Matt couldn't be far away, and that he would be looking for her. And the moment he crossed her mind, she had looked up at the television to see his alter ego plastered on every news station. Over and over they played clips of shaky cell phone footage from a dozen different angles showing Daredevil holding a woman in a dark green dress over a balcony, and then throwing her over the side with cold-blooded ease.

And that was what made the disturbing feeling of déjà vu kick in. Between the news headlines and the people flooding into her emergency room, Claire might as well have gone back in time to the night Fisk blew up half of Hell's Kitchen and blamed Daredevil for it.

The chaos in the ER meant that Claire wasn't able to step away immediately, but when she was able to break away she went down the hall to where several victims of the tranquilizers were being treated. The update she got from the nurse assigned to the group was about what she expected based on her previous experience with these darts: some patients were reacting badly, showing signs similar to an overdose. Others were already awake and slowly moving.

Sarah was somewhere in between: stable for now, but nowhere near waking up.

Checking her phone as she headed back towards the emergency room, she was surprised to see Matt hadn't called her yet. It wasn't possible that he didn't know, right? But that question was quickly answered a moment later when she found herself being quietly pulled into an empty exam room by a tuxedo-clad figure in the shadows.

"I didn't do this," Matt said as soon as the door closed behind them. "It was someone else."

Claire didn't need that explained to her, of course, and he should really have known that. Matt Murdock had many (many, many, many) flaws, but being a murderer and attacking a building full of innocent people weren't among them. In another situation, she might have reminded him of that with a gently sarcastic remark, but looking at him standing in front of her she found she didn't have the heart. The poor guy looked shell-shocked, and underneath the dried blood on his face he was nearly as pale as Sarah had been.

"I know," she said, keeping her voice calm. "I'm guessing you're here for Sarah."

Matt gave a tight nod.

"I've been listening in. They hooked her to up to some monitors...gave her an injection of something," he said.

"Yeah. With the number of those tranquilizer darts going around town, they've gotten the routine down pretty well. We've had a few other patients come in from that party who got hit."

"One of them didn't make it. The tranquilizer made his heart fail; he went into cardiac arrest in the ambulance," Matt said, and although his voice was low and even, Claire could hear the current of apprehension underneath.

"I know. I heard. But there's no reason to think Sarah would have a reaction like that," Claire reassured him. "She's stable right now. You can hear her heartbeat, right?"

Matt was quiet for a moment and Claire assumed he was tuning into Sarah's heartbeat, rooms and halls away.

"It's steady," he said finally. "But slower than usual."

"Exactly. You can't base your expectations on the worst case scenario."

For a moment, she thought maybe Matt would actually listen to her. Then after a short silence, he spoke again.

"That cop's mother who got one of those darts. She never woke up, did she?" he asked.

"No," Claire said slowly. "But...that was a little different."

"How?"

"For one thing, more time had passed between her getting hit with the dart and getting to the hospital. We don't know how long she was there before Sarah found her. For another, she already had liver and kidney problems. Her body...it just couldn't process that level of toxins like someone with healthy organs could. She was also older, and...as unscientific as it sounds, where you are mentally plays a part in recovering."

"What do you mean?" Matt asked. It appeared he was fully in question-and-answer mode.

Claire sighed.

"I mean...Cheryl McDermott had just lost her son. Her only living relative. And most of her days were spent trying to find out how he died with no results. Sometimes...people are just more likely to let go. Sarah has a lot to come back to."

Matt nodded slowly, then abruptly spoke.

"I was supposed to keep her safe. It was the entire reason I was there," he said. His mouth twisted bitterly. "And I failed. Again."

"There's only so much you can do when someone is firing into a crowd, Matt," Claire said. She'd known the conversation would turn this way, could feel the Catholic Guilt coming from a mile away.

"Yeah, but it makes you wonder..."

"Makes you wonder what?" Claire asked, watching him carefully.

"How much good you're bringing to someone's life versus how much harm."

"Oh, my god," Claire breathed out, rolling her eyes up toward the ceiling. "You think this is your fault? Why, because some crazy guy decided to dress up like you and go after people? Were you supposed to predict that somehow?"

"It's not just that. I pushed for her to be at that party. I talked her out of backing out, I found a place for her to practice—Jesus, I put the card back in her bag," he said, shaking his head as he scrubbed a hand down his face.

Claire wasn't entirely sure what he was talking about, but she did know there was little point in trying to get through to him when he got like this, dug himself deep down into a hole of self-loathing.

"I need to go," he said flatly.

"Go where?"

"To figure out who's behind all this."

"Alright," Claire said warily. "Be careful."

Matt just gave a sharp laugh at that.

"You'll keep me updated?"

"Of course," she said.

Matt reached into the inside pocket of his jacket, then went very still and swore under his breath.

"What's wrong?" Claire asked.

"She still had it. I didn't realize."

"Had what?"

"My mask. She must have put it in her bag with...with the burner phone." Matt groaned. "Jesus. I didn't get the bag. The paramedics didn't bring one in with her?" he asked, although he looked like he already knew the answer.

Claire shook her head. "I didn't see anything listed when I went to check on her."

"Dammit. I should have grabbed it. I wasn't..." he shook his head, the angry tic in his jaw growing even more pronounced. "I'll figure it out."

"So...don't call the burner?" Claire hazarded.

"No. Not until I get it back. But I have another one at home, that I was using for..." Matt trailed off and shook his head. "I'll give you the number."

He told her the number and she added it to her contacts, wondering just how many vigilante-related phone numbers she would end up storing in this phone.

Matt turned to leave, then paused and turned back to Claire.

"Listen, make sure—" he broke off and rubbed an agitated hand over his mouth. "Make sure they fix up the cuts on her hands, alright? It's important."

Claire's brow creased faintly, but she nodded. "Yeah. Okay, I will."

So while Sarah lay pale and unconscious in her hospital bed, hooked up to wires and monitors, the Devil was let loose on Hell's Kitchen. And Claire felt sorry for anyone who got in his way.

Deep inside her own mind, Sarah slowly opened her eyes.

She was lying in bed, resting her head on her folded arms as she stretched out lazily on her stomach with soft silk sheets draped across her waist. Across from the bed was a bedroom mirror, and in it she could see the reflection of herself and Matt. His bare legs were stretched out alongside her, tangled up in the same silk sheets as he propped himself up on one elbow, leaning over her. He had a slender paintbrush in his hand, and he dipped it into the pot of bright red paint that was nestled in the sheets next to them, then brought it to the skin of her bare back and made a long line down her spine.

"What are you drawing?" she murmured.

"You'd have to tell me," he answered with a crooked grin. The paint was cold against her skin as he swept the brush across her back.

She watched him in the mirror for a while, feeling more relaxed than she had in a long time. It was peaceful, watching him dip the paintbrush in the red paint and then drag it across her skin. She studied his reflection, her eyes tracing the many scars on his chest, then moving up to his face. His sightless eyes were aimed somewhere past her as he painted.

"How was your night?" he asked quietly.

It was a good question. How was her night? Why couldn't she remember?

"I'm not sure," she admitted. "I think...something bad happened. But I don't remember what."

"Is that how you got that blood all over your hands?"

Sarah frowned, then lifted her head to look down at her hands.

Matt was right. There were smears of dark red across her hands, much darker than the red of the paint. She squinted, trying to figure out if the blood was coming from a wound, but she couldn't see any.

"I don't know," she said slowly.

"It's alright. Don't worry about it right now," he said.

Sarah nodded and rested her head on her arms again. She didn't want to worry about anything right now. This was so nice and calm.

Then there was a loud, slow knock at her bedroom door. Sarah groaned. Why did someone always interrupt whenever she and Matt just wanted to be alone? Now one of them—more likely both of them—would have to put clothes on and get out of bed to entertain whoever this was.

"Are you going to answer it?" Matt asked, lifting the paintbrush off of her skin and waiting.

But Sarah just stretched, burrowing deeper into the sheets around them.

"I'm so tired. And this is so comfortable. Will you get it?" she murmured with a sleepy smile. She let her eyes flutter closed again.

"I can't, sweetheart," Matt said. "It's for you."

As soon as the words left his mouth, Sarah was hit with a deep sense of dread. It made her chest seize up, made her feel like she couldn't breathe.

"I don't want to," she heard herself whisper.

Her eyes snapped open, and she found that Matt's bedroom had disappeared, and so had Matt. Now she was fully clothed, lying in her old bed at her father's house.

She struggled to get up and out of the bed; it felt like her limbs were made of lead. A flash of annoyance hit her as she looked around the room. She was positive she had already packed all of these things up along with the rest of the house: her old books and teenage decorations, clothes that didn't fit her anymore. Why were they all back out again?

Sarah slowly made her way out of the bedroom and down the hall towards the living room. Maybe her dad would know who had unpacked all of her things. She'd made so much progress and now it was all getting undone.

"Dad?" she called out down the hallway.

"In here!" she heard him answer from the living room.

When she got to the living room, she stopped in surprise. Her father's old folding table was set up in the middle of the room, stacked with playing cards, cash and chips just like it had been almost every weekend when she was a kid, when he would invite all of his poker buddies over. And there he was, sitting at the table facing her.

But the men at the table weren't his old buddies.

Sarah's gaze moved from face to face as she recognized each of them: to her father's right was Officer McDermott. Blood slowly seeped out of the gaping wound in his throat as he watched her with a sneering expression of contempt on his face.

Next to him was a man in a tuxedo with an earpiece like a bodyguard—how did she know him? What had his name been? All she knew was he'd died right in front of her, and she couldn't even remember his name. He, too, was staring at her, but with a neutral expression underneath the clean round bullet wound in his forehead.

It took Sarah a moment to place the man sitting next to him; after all, it had been so long since she'd seen him. It was Yates, a ring of dark bruises around his neck. He looked at her with some confusion, as though he were trying to place her, too.

The last player at the table was another face she hadn't seen in a long time, although this one she recognized right away. James Wesley. He was wearing the same cold grin he had the day they first met, when he had started this entire chapter of her life. He regarded her coolly, sitting in a remarkably relaxed posture for a man whose shirt was blooming bright red with bloodstains across his chest.

"Hi, honey," her dad greeted her in surprise. "I didn't think you'd want to wake up. I would have stayed asleep."

"No, I...have too much to get done," she said slowly, staring at the group of men around the table. "Dad, I—I don't think you should be playing that game."

"Oh, it's fine. I haven't been dealt in yet. I'm just watching for now," he said, nodding towards the table. Sure enough, everyone was holding a hand of cards except for him. His hands were resting on the table as he fidgeted with a napkin, slowly tearing it into tiny shreds. "Trying to learn the rules. I swear I used to know them."

Sarah frowned as she counted the number of people around the table.

"Is someone missing?" she said, more to herself than to them. But they heard her, all of them, and their faces all broke into slow, identical smiles. All except her father, who was still regarding her with a worried expression on his face.

"Don't be angry, Sarah. I know I'm not supposed to be gambling, but...it's only card games."

"Yeah, but card games with dead guys is, like...extra bad," she protested.

"Do you want to play?" Wesley asked, gesturing towards the cards. "I think you'd be good at it."

She started to tell him no, but then something out the window caught her eye, and she moved closer to get a better look. Outside, a large cemetery stretched across the backyard as far as she could see.

"When did you put a cemetery in the backyard?" she asked curiously.

"Oh, I just planted it recently," her father answered brightly.

"Why?"

He followed her gaze out the window with a thoughtful look on his face. "I thought the flowers on the graves might help raise the property value."

Sarah nodded slowly. "That makes sense."

Before she could say anything else, she heard a knock at the front door: slow, like last time, but louder now. She stared at the door; on the other side of the frosted pane of glass, she could just make out a dark shape. It knocked again, and the deep sense of foreboding returned to her chest.

"No," she muttered. She felt around behind her for the doorknob to the backdoor. When she found it, she turned the knob and slipped out into the backyard, away from the knocking at the front door.

Outside, it was raining steadily. Sarah blinked the water out of her eyes and squinted around to see a group of people gathered a short distance in front of her. As she got closer, she saw they were mourners, dressed head to toe in black with thick black veils covering their faces. None of them were speaking, although a few were quietly weeping as they all stood facing away from the house. Sarah stood on her tip toes to see through the sea of black clad figures, trying to discern what they were all looking at. In front of the crowed, she saw a large, rectangular hole in the ground with a flower-laden casket waiting next to it.

This is a funeral, she realized. But whose was in it?

She began to weave her way through the crowd of people to get a better look. They barely seemed to notice her as she pushed her way through, but every time she looked up she was as far from the casket as she'd been when she started. She kept trying for a few more minutes, then with a frustrated huff she gave up and turned around. She blinked in surprise to find that she was still at the very back of the crowd.

Exhausted from her efforts, she perched on a nearby gravestone to rest. Why was she so tired? She felt like she could fall asleep standing up. Shaking her head to try to clear the cloud of exhaustion, she decided to return to the house to check on her dad. Maybe whoever was knocking had left.

Unfortunately for Sarah, her house didn't appear to be in the same place she had left it, so she would have to search for it.

She began walking through the gravestones in the direction she thought her house might be, and as she walked she tried to read aloud some of the names she saw. But every time she focused on the letters, they seemed to morph and shift around.

"Did I forget how to read?" she asked herself out loud. Then she frowned suspiciously. "Did I ever know how?"

"Excuse me!" came a sharp whisper from somewhere nearby. Sarah looked around but didn't see anyone. "Can you keep it down, please?"

Bewildered, Sarah squinted around through the rain for where the voice was coming from, then finally looked down.

Beside her was an open grave, much bigger and deeper than she'd have expected, and at the bottom of it she saw Lauren and Greg. They were sitting on opposite sides of a large metal table, not unlike the ones she'd sat at in the police station a few times. Behind them, Noah was babbling quietly as he played with a pile of dirt-covered bones in the corner.

"Lauren?" Sarah said in confusion.

"Sarah," Lauren greeted her, sounding annoyed. She gestured to the table in front of her. "Listen, I love you, but I'm trying to have this job interview right now. I really don't think I'm going to get it, but you making all this noise isn't helping."

"Oh. I'm sorry," Sarah said, then looked at Greg. "Is it going okay?"

Greg just sighed and looked up at her.

"The thing is, she's already been hired. A while ago, in fact. And I keep trying to tell her that, but she won't listen," he said. He pushed a stack of papers across the table towards Lauren and spoke loudly, enunciating each word. "You. Already. Have. The. Job. I promise you I don't need to see your CV again."

Lauren shook her head and pushed the papers back towards him, smiling brightly.

"I worked at a Dunkin' Donuts for two months the summer after my junior year of high school," Lauren replied. "Did I remember to put that on there? Is that useful?"

Sarah suddenly noticed that the rain had gotten much heavier, and there was water steadily pouring into the open grave her friends were sitting in.