Law Beyond Shadows

PTSD

We only had a couple of days to prepare, and it did not take me long to realize that there was something he was trying to hide, something taking his attention from our case. Besides, he was always hurt, and had a huge ass bruise on his face, I mean, I know he is blind, but it is too much. Karen tried to explain it to me

"You'll get used to it, Foggy said he has an alcohol problem, and he has another client as well." Though sincerely I didn't believe it, there was something else, and she knew it, she was trying to pretend there wasn't anything, and I decided to do just like her.

It sucked because Matt was the man for the opening statement and Foggy was afraid he would not do it, that he would have some sort of emergency. I discovered that Foggy didn't want to represent Castle, but Matt convinced him - but if Matt was the one interested in the case, why is he never here?

We wanted to go with PTSD, talked a lot about it but when Karen talked to Frank he said he didn't want to go with it, that that's not his case, but gave us someone to work with: Colonel Ray Schoonover, his old CO. At least he gave us something. I mean, talking about someone with a shitty load of evidence against, Castle is really hard to work with.

The next day we had the first day of trial, and guess what, Matt was not there. We were panicking, had no opening statement, nothing to say.

"Isa, what do we do?" Said Foggy,

"Where the fuck is Murdock? I said we should have some plan B in case he didn't show up, damn." I answered.

The Judge asked for our opening statement and all I wanted to do was to kill Matt, Foggy started to say something, but he was babbling really, so I took over.

"Okay, so... you're 19... standing in hot sand... sun burning down... noise... yelling, gunfire... The only thing that you know for sure is that you're surrounded by an enemy that wants you dead. But you do it. You endure it. Why? Because you have orders. And you have a duty. And also because your life doesn't end here. You have people you love waiting at home. Because... aside from being a decorated marine... the man before you is a good husband and an excellent father. Frank Castle returned from the hell of war wanting nothing more than to pick up his life. But his wife... young son and daughter were brutally murdered by criminals, and no one, not the police and certainly not the District Attorney stepped up to make it right. See, Frank Castle never came home. He just traded in one war zone for another. This trial isn't about vigilantes. It's about the failure of the justice system. And how one man, Frank Castle, is being used as a pawn to cover up that system's mistakes. The prosecution wants blood. But as the judge just said, to get it, they have to prove their case beyond a reasonable doubt. So, all I'm asking of you today: keep an open mind. That's all, Your Honour." Damn, I have no idea where that came from, but I'm on fire.

When I walked over our table I saw that Matt was there, he's fucked because I'm gonna kill him, I don't give a shit if he's blind, he's dead.

"Sorry, guys." He said.

"Where the hell have you been?" Asked Foggy.

"Look, I made a mistake, Fog, I feel terrible about it, but, Isa, I caught some of your opening statement. You did great. " He tried to ease our anger,

"She was amazing."

"Hey, hey, thanks for keeping us afloat."

"Yeah, well... hopefully Reyes didn't notice my buckets of flop sweat. And if the DA's office didn't suspect we had nothing before, they gotta be sure now." I said, angrily.

The rest of the trial day went kinda as according to plan, and at the moment it was over I went home, had no patience to deal with Matt, dough I heard Foggy and Karen talking - more like screaming - with him.