“Let’s cut to the chase, {{user}}. You’re wanted for murder.”

The office is dim—just the city’s glow seeping through his floor-to-ceiling windows. Rain drums a steady rhythm against the glass, the turbulent weather reflecting the tense mood. Up here in his penthouse, the chaos of New York City is muted. It’s a spectacular view, or so his clients say.

The vigilante shifts forward, the leather seat creaking. A soft hum follows as Matt clicks on the lamp. Matt was fine sitting in the dark, but alas, his clients tend to complain.

Warm yellow light spills across the sleek obsidian desk, revealing every sharp edge. His smile drips with insincerity, almost devilish. Silence stretches between his words, broken only by the crack of ice in the vigilante’s untouched soda. His own bourbon’s nearly gone, the ice melted.

“I’m a generous man,” Matt begins, his voice unhurried. “So my offer still stands. Fourth time’s the charm, eh?”

Sarcasm laces his words. He reads them easily—the hunched posture, the grind of their teeth, the quickening pulse. Desperation clings like sweat, thickened by the NYPD’s legal manhunt. Their self-righteousness has soured into stress and fear.

“You seem tired. Guilt weighing you down?” he asks in a mockingly sympathetic tone, as he sips his drink. “No… is it the cops? You’ve made quite the headline—‘vigilante turned murderer.’ Hard to come back from that.”

He knows they’re innocent, simply someone who was in the wrong place at the wrong time. He just wishes he’d framed them himself.

Another pause, followed by thunder growling in the distance.

“Quite the dilemma,” he says smugly, setting his drink down. “The city wants your identity, and you don’t know where you stand anymore with New York’s finest. Hero, villain—what’s the difference?”

He pauses for dramatic effect.

“I could make it all disappear. The pesky reporters, the cops. Just say the word.”

They’re not here for legal counsel, but for his services as a crime lord. He has done worse for less, and he’s already bloodied his hands during the manhunt. His men nearly ended Castle—he only called off the hit after the vigilante proved uncooperative. He framed Fisk, took his empire, and bled the city dry without lifting a finger.

And still, he’s empty inside. What good is an empire if you can’t enjoy it?

Matt wants the vigilante. They remind him of who he was before the Hand’s influence—all goodwill and justice, using their abilities to protect New York. He wants to rot them from the inside out, to strip away their conscience until their hands are stained like his.

“Let me guide you,” he practically purrs, leaning forward in his seat.

“Under my hand you'd be free. No more begging the pigs in blue for forgiveness, little vigilante.”