His world is one of eternal darkness, but oh how the darkness is filled! Images ,
more vivid then any eyesight, supplied by a unique "Radar sense", as well as
hyper acute senses make his world a unique and astonishing place. By day he is a well
known and respected lawyer, by night a different kind of defender, one who is known by his
enemies as a "Man without fear". Years of training along with his amazing senses
have made him a man who instills fear instead. Armed with his multi purpose "Billy
Club" he swings through the Manhattan skyline , battling evil and injustice wherever
it rears its ugly face. He is....
What has gone before dept: Daredevil was attacked two issues ago by Sabertooth, after a
quick and brutal battle, DD defeated the feral assassin , but not before suffering a
scratch to his unprotected face, a scratch with poisoned claws! As DD passed out , Elektra
ran to his aid, only to be attacked by Natasha Romanoff, the Black Widow! The two women
fought savagely, and in a brutal last ditch effort, the Widow shot Elektra at point blank
range with her widows bite ! Elektra, on the edge of unconsciousness , explained the
situation to the Widow. DD later woke up in Avengers mansion, where Natasha told him he
was cured by Dr. Kincaid of the poisons effects. After leaving the Mansion, he encountered
a woman called Nina, who was , unknown to him the same Nina who was Elektra' friend . The
same Nina who died at the Hands of the behemoth named " ". That same monstrous
evil blind sided Daredevil, and he mercifully passed out. Which brings us up to
now.........
"Wake up!"
WAK!
The wooden staff slapped Daredevils ribs, hard! Through a fog of pain DD shook his head
as his radar sense distinguished a hazy image his sightless eyes would never see.
"Get up ya bum, we ain't got time for this!"
The staff fell again, this time to be caught in DD's gloved hand!
"Enough of that "Stick" , or whoever you really are. I want some answers
Hand assassin, and I want them NOW! Stick's been dead for years, so you're not him."
"Idiot," The wizened old man spat out,"Death, life, it's all the same
once ya know the right equations. It's me Murdock, fer real. I been back across that void
more times then I know how ta count . And I'm back again stupid, this time ta save yer
butt as well as the babes."
"Babe? You mean Elektra?"
"Who else ya idiot? The Hands got her. You got the evidence right in yer
palm."
DD glanced at his hand with sightless eyes, as his radar sense played over the sash
that he held without realizing it. His super acute sense of smell confirmed Elektra' scent
on it. There was no doubt, it was her crimson sash.
"How?......"
"Boy, you are thick today. They placed it there, Nina and her pet ape. It's an
invitation. They want you ta come after her."
"Well "Stick", that's a given. So why don't you tell me where your
friends have taken her, so I can get on with this without having to take you apart along
the way."
"Listen you stupid brat, I saved yer sorry behind years ago after yer accident
with that truck. I taught ya about another world out there, one ya don't need eyes for. I
ran the Chaste fer years, the enemy o' the hand, and made the world a safer place. But
this is goin' to far, if you ain't gonna get yer head outta yer butt, I'm just gonna go
find Logan and have him save the world. Yer probably not tough enough ta do the job
anyway, wimp."
He raps DD across the head with the stick , catching him on the side of the head, above
the ear.
Crack!
"That's it! "Bellows Daredevil, as he throws a left cross at the old man, who
miraculously ducks beneath it, and jabs the sightless adventurer in the ribs!
"Uggh" Growls Daredevil through grit teeth.
DD slashes out a round house kick to sticks legs, but the old man uses his staff, and
pole-vaults over the lightning fast move to kick DD full in the face with both feet!
Pow!
DD goes down , and rolls over backwards to an immediate ready crouching position. Both
men circle each other warily, like tigers. DD feints left, a bit to strongly, and Stick
goes for the right, as if he knows what Daredevil is going to do, but Daredevil hesitates
momentarily, and continues the left move, his left roundhouse catches the old man full in
the jaw knocking him to the ground.
Ka-Pow!
Stick slides across the rooftop a few feet before standing again hands at the ready,
but DD merely drops his own hands.
"Hold on Stick, I know it's you, relax."
"Yeah? What made ya finally wake up? It was the damn feint again wasn't it? "
"When you were teaching me how to fight, you always fell for that feint. It was
the only way I could get to you. Some things never change."
"Yeah, ain't that the truth punk. "
"Okay Stick, where do we go from here?"
"WE don't go anywhere, I take ya to a mutual friend , who gets ya ta where they
got legs trussed up. On the way I tell ya a story, and after that, yer on yer own."
"So I gather you're not joining me any further in this adventure?"
"I'll be right beside ya all the way kid, but I can't go ta where yer going, it's
tainted now, and in my current state, I'd fall victim to it to easily. "
DD rubs his chin thoughtfully. "Okay then "Yoda", where am I
going?"
The old man retrieves his stick from across the rooftop , which he dropped in battle,
before answering. "Yer goin' ta see a mutual friend , which I already told ya, then
yer goin' inta the Lions den. The Chastes mountain."
Cut to.....A nondescript bank in Manhattan, where a familiar figure walks through the
door, nervously fingering a key to a safe deposit box. Foggy Nelson has come to receive
his inheritance from the mother he hardly knew.
"I wonder what this is all about ?" He thinks, "Mom was a
strange lady to say the least, and I had a lot of issues with her, some that I'll never be
able to resolve now. But maybe this is her way of saying she's sorry for treating me like
a second class son."
Moments pass, and after Foggy is led into the safe deposit room by a guard, he begins
to open the box. And when he does his eyes go wide!
"I don't believe it....." Is all he murmurs.
DD swings and leaps across building after building, to the jaded and not so jaded New
Yorker far below, it seems that Daredevil has finally gone insane, for he seems to be
carrying on a conversation with thin air! No one sees the old man running and leaping
alongside the Man without Fear, save Daredevil himself!
"Where are we going Stick?"
"What are you an idiot? I told ya to see a buddy. His names Doc Strange."
"Okay." Sighs DD heavily as he fires his billy clubs line out at a far away
flag pole, to swing effortlessly around it in an almost horizontal arc towards another
roof. Where he lands lightly, Stick already there.
"Ya got good moves yet kid, that's for sure."
Stick walks across the roof, and sits on an Air conditioning unit.
"Here's the deal: The Hand finally caught the Chaste unawares. They stormed the
Chastes home and killed everybody within. Now that don't really mean all that much to guys
like me. We got this life and death stuff down to a science. But what they did was taint
the Chaste with their evil. That's why Elektra wasn't invited onto the mountain top when
she brought her pal there. The war was already over, and she handed lil' Nina over to the
bad guys. They completed her training in the dark ways, and made her one o' them."
"Alright then, we have to get there and free Elektra, if they haven't killed her
already."
"They haven't kid. They want you both out of the way, not just her. She's the bait
to the trap. This is the final gambit as far as they're concerned. They wanna put their
worst enemies outta commission, permanently. That's you and legs. "
"What about you Stick? Why aren't they after you?"
"I'm dead Kid, I'm no real physical threat to them, and my hold here gets weaker
all the time. It may be another hundred years before I can't come back at all, but fer
now, my grasp on the physical is not as strong as it used ta be."
"Then we go to Stranges'."
Without another word Daredevil presses the stud on his Billy club, and with an almost
inaudible "Whish" the line fires out , and Daredevil the fearless swings across
Manhattan, towards the Greenwich village home of Dr Strange, Sorcerer Supreme!
Moments later he lands outside the front door of Stranges Sanctum Sanctorum , and when
he does, he immediately drops into a ready fighting stance, his super sensitive hearing
alerting him to the presence of a half dozen silent warriors. Silent for any normal sensed
person, but Not for Daredevil!
Wordlessly they converge from the shadows towards him, leaping with swords drawn to the
attack!
DD slips under the first slash , from the bravest , or most glory seeking of the hands
Ninjas. Who, for his efforts receives a rear thrust kick from Daredevil, to the throat. In
a puff of brimstone smoke, he dissipates! Two more attack, one with a head level sword
stroke, aimed at DD's neck, the other, trying to cut the man without fears legs out from
under him!
DD leaps and tucks all in one motion, making himself like unto a ball , he avoids both
slashing cuts, to roll out of the way, to a fighting stance once more, where he instantly
hurls his billy Club behind him to his left, where it contacts like lightning to another
assassins nose, shattering it! DD stretches out his right hand, catching the returning
club, as a front tai kick shatters another killers sternum. Smoke billows as the man fades
from sight.
With a quick one-two motion, DD delivers a left -right combination , that drops another
Hand assassin where he stands, his face a bloody pulp under his mask. The powerful blows
knocking him unconscious immediately. Again, another puff of smoke heralds his
destruction.
Three assassins remain, and circle Daredevil warily. One bleeds from the broken nose he
received via DD's billy club. The other two are unscathed. When suddenly a powerful and
commanding voice rings out from nowhere and everywhere, all at once!
"Hold! You dare profane the house of the Master of the Mystic Arts with your vile
presence? Begone evil ones! To a realm more to your liking!"
They disappear, screaming!
The door to the mansion opens, and Daredevil enters. In the Foyer, Wong, Strange'
trusted friend and manservant greets him.
"Dr Strange awaits you in the Library Daredevil, to your left please."
DD nods and follows Wong, to find the Master of the Mystic Arts floating in a lotus
position , before his mystic Orb of Agomotto .
"Greetings Daredevil, how are you my friend?"
The two men shake hands.
"I'm fine Dr, considering the circumstances."
"Hhmm, yes, Stick here informed me of your plight."
DD's senses play over a corner of the library , where Stick is sitting in a chair
sipping tea.
"I see you made it here before me . It was so nice of you to help with the
Ninjas."
Stick puts his cup down and walks over, joining the three men.
"Ya didn't need the help. Ya know that already."
"Gentlemen," Dr Strange interjects,"Relax. Let's get down to cases,
shall we? Daredevil, I will join you in this mission to the Chastes mountain. Together we
will free Elektra, and ascertain the amount of other dimensional evil being filtered in to
our home dimension by the Hand."
"Other dimensional evil? What are you talking about Dr? All I knew was that the
Hand had Elektra and had somehow beaten the Chaste."
Strange stares momentarily at Stick, who merely shrugs his shoulders and smiles.
Dr Strange then turns towards Daredevil, "Daredevil, There's been another force
empowering the Hand recently. One of rather ...demonic status. It's how they assume they
can further their own evil agenda."
DD shakes his head, "Stick, your mind games have always annoyed me, but I know you
mean well. Dr., I'd rather go this alone. If I fail , I need you to be my anchor here. To
be the back up I may need incase things go sour."
Strange stares at Daredevil grimly, before sipping on his just arrived tea. Wong hands
a cup of the steamy liquid to DD who nods thankfully with a slight smile, before
re-focusing his attention on the matter at hand.
"I'll abide by your wishes Daredevil, since this is your battle." Strange
agrees, before taking another mouthful of the fragrant tea. "Though I must say, it is
rather brave of you to try to enter the den of the beast and to beard it there as
well."
DD places the empty cup on a the tray Wong had laid down on the coffee table, which
immediately springs to life and scurries away towards the kitchen, cup, tray and all.
Bemused. DD continues the conversation
"Well Dr. Strange, they do call me the Man Without Fear."
"And they are correct. I assume you are ready then?"
"Yes." DD answers, grimly.
"So be it my friend. If I do not here from you via this mystic crystal." He
hands Daredevil a golden , glowing stone, "Then I will assume the worst, and prepare
accordingly."
With a wave of his hands, Dr. Strange sets the air to glowing around Daredevil, who
promptly disappears from sight....
To reappear simultaneously half a world away! And as he does in a dark , dank cavern
within the Chastes former home, his ears filled with the sounds of chittering things, all
demonically murmuring his name, he wonders if the statement he just made to Strange was
indeed as truthful as he would like to think............
Next : Into the heart of darkness!
Dare-ing to be different
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