"Bye Matt!" Karen hugged him and walked briskly toward the street, hailing a taxi. Matt listened to the taxi as it drove away with Karen inside. It had been a pretty typical Friday night. He, Karen, and Foggy had gone to the new Chinese restaurant near the office to celebrate an actual paying client. Matt's fortune cookie, which Foggy insisted on reading outloud, had said, "You will walk in the the shoes of your brother."
Matt had simply shrugged - he didn't have a brother, and fortune cookies were silly. They tasted awful as well. Foggy, having had a few beers, thought it was hilarious.
He walked home, smelling the ozone in the air from an approaching thunderstorm. It was a welcome distraction from the usual combination of garbage, car exhaust, and sewage. As he neared his building, Matt heard shouting from one of the upper floors, and the unmistakable thud of a fist striking another person, followed by muffled cries. There was a faint metallic taste to the air - blood. He hurried to his apartment and grabbed his old mask -no time to fully change- this should be quick, he thought, heading towards the commotion, a few floors above.
After taking care of what turned out to be a large, abusive boyfriend, he returned to his apartment and showered, massaging his sore jaw and noticing few new bruises along his ribcage, then lay naked on his bed. The storm had arrived, and the falling air pressure felt good on his skin tonight. He began his nightly meditation and drifted to sleep as the rain began to fall.
Matt woke with a start. His head was throbbing. As he opened his eyes, the light bombarded him, causing him to quickly shut them and turn away. Opening his eyes again, he squinted against the unexpected visual information, which had been absent for almost 20 years. There were shapes and colors. Everything was so bright, but the rest of his surroundings were so… dull. So quiet. He couldn't hear any conversations on the street, couldn't smell the neighbors' coffee brewing, and there was no metallic, bloody note to his saliva - something he had grown to regard as normal.
Something definitely wasn't right. His body felt very different. The constant aches and pains were absent, apart from the aching head. Matt sat on the edge of the bed. As his eyes adjusted to the light, the shapes came into focus. He began to recognize several of them - a window, a clock (although he didn't remember owning a clock, and had no idea what it said).
Matt stared ahead in disbelief. Was he dreaming? He looked down at his hands. Were those his hands? They had to be. The clock chimed to mark a quarter-hour. Matt recognized the sound - he was in Foggy's apartment, in Foggy's bed. He hadn't been drinking the night before, so why didn't he remember coming here? Had he taken a harder blow to the head than he thought?
"Foggy! Hey, I..." Matt called out, stopping mid-sentence. The voice was not his. It sounded familiar, but he couldn't place it. He stood up and felt dizzy. So much light. He closed his eyes tightly, disoriented by the deluge of visual input.
He knew the layout of Foggy's apartment well, and made his way-eyes still closed-to the bathroom, and shut the door behind him. Touching the mirror, he very slightly opened one eye, bracing himself for the light. There was none. Relieved, he tried to focus his hearing, but could only hear his own breathing. He began to see a faint glow near his feet - light filtering in from underneath the door - and remembered the bathroom light wasn't on. He hadn't actually used a light in 20 years.
Closing his eyes again and bracing himself, he flipped the light switch. His vision flooded with a color which he determined to be red, if he remembered correctly.
He slowly opened his eyes and let the visible world wash over him. They ached in protest. After a minute, they adjusted, and he turned his focus to the mirror and studied the image. He hadn't seen his own reflection since he was 9 years old, and really had no idea what he looked like.
He rested his hands on the counter, which seemed higher than he expected, and suddenly realized why he felt so different - because he was in a different, shorter, body - Foggy's body.
He stared at his reflection in shock. Light skin, light hair. Eyes a color he didn't know. So that's what Foggy looks like… He felt his - Foggy's - hair. It was much longer than his own. He knew Foggy liked to keep it long, but Matt never realized how long.
"Shit," Matt said outloud. If he was in Foggy's body, he wondered if Foggy would be waking up in his - Matt's… Daredevil's - body. Matt felt a twinge of panic. Was Foggy already awake? He had no idea what time it was, or how long he had been asleep, but it was daylight for sure. He needed to get over there as soon as possible.
He located Foggy's wallet, keys, and phone, silently thanking God that Foggy always put them together, and in the same place. He suspected at least one of his habits had rubbed off on Foggy.
Matt turned Foggy's phone in his hand, watching light reflect off the smooth glass screen. He managed to unlock the screen, and dozens of colorful shapes and words appeared. Matt's recollection of how to read with his eyes was limited, and Foggy didn't use voice commands.
Through trial and error, Matt activated the voice command prompt.
"Call Matt." The screen changed and he could hear the line ringing.