This story is set immediately after the events of "Last Rites: Part I of IV" 

(Daredevil #297, 1991), at a time in the character's history when his secret 

identity was still -- for the most part -- a secret. Bendis is a great writer, but 

I miss the good ol' days...

HONOR

Saab Lofton

I have to admit I've been a bit careless with my secret over the years. I'd 

always assumed there was no way anyone in their right mind would EVER think 

that A BLIND MAN could possibly hop from rooftop to rooftop. Our culture is 

so visual and the public's pity of the blind runs so deep...

And the few people who DO know that attorney-at-law Matt Murdock is also the 

masked vigilante Daredevil? They all have their own reasons to keep my 

nightlife to themselves. Wilson "the Kingpin" Fisk would rather have 

something rare and precious he can continually deny the world than share 

some knowledge that could possibly get me killed -- before having a chance to 

kill me himself, that is. Heather won't because she'll always love me. Karen 

Page slipped once (and that's how the Kingpin knows in the first place), but 

she won't do it again. She just can't.

Henri DuBois HAS to know, because it's his motorcycling business in France 

that custom makes my padded leather outfits (the brass studs on the gloves' 

knuckles were his idea). Kind of hard for him NOT to know with me buck-naked 

in that vat of cold goo he used to sculpt the costume with. And yes, my 

superhuman sense of touch can tell exactly what shade of red it is. I saved 

Henri's life during those early days when Daredevil looked like a cross 

between a ninja and "Shaft." He took one look at what I was wearing, took me 

by the arm and snorted, "Come with me." The rest is history.

Fortunately, my realtor DOESN'T know. It seems that at one time, New York 

architects got the bright idea of designing upstairs gymnasiums. The 

thinking was if double-decker buses were all the rage in England, then the 

same would be the case for gyms. It wasn't, and when one of them failed 

miserably, I bought it under the same false name I use to pick up that 

French leather, "Michael" (after my twin brother who drove my mother to the 

church by dying at birth -- dad never had the heart to lose his birth 

certificate). My "sensory deprivation tank" was once a tub, which soothed 

many an athlete's joints, and the hidden wall was originally installed to 

provide an extra space for indoor tennis, etc.

(Hey, you want a car, a plane and a computer in a cave? Find a 

multi-billionaire, OK? Like I'm always telling Foggy, I'm not going to sell 

out in order to afford more in life.)

I imagine someone in S.H.I.E.L.D. knows by now, after all the attention I've 

brought Hell's Kitchen, but spies are good at keeping secrets. Besides, I'm 

sure they wouldn't want the world to know HOW they come about such 

knowledge. Which brings me to Natasha, "the Black Widow," my partner and 

lover.

While I was out protecting someone the courts can't touch (for now) from the 

Punisher, it seems that Typhoid Mary had escaped from whichever asylum she 

was locked up in. Mary went straight for my place -- which is to say Matt 

Murdock's -- looking for payback. Imagine her rage when the only person home at 

the time was Natasha...

* * * *

Hal Burton was as spoiled as Texas oilmen get. How spoiled, you ask? He 

discovered oil on an island no country had any legitimate claim to and hired 

a bunch of mercenaries to "defend" the island from its "savages." Problem 

was, THE HUMAN BEINGS there have successfully warded off invaders 

masquerading as explorers for ages, and a couple of the mercs Burton led 

into a trap happened to be Marines who were buddies of Frank "the Punisher" 

Castle.

Poor Castle. A veteran of the first Gulf War who became the FBI's top man in 

the 1990s, he watched his whole family blown away by the mob just for being 

in the wrong place at the wrong time. Next thing you know, he goes 

underground for a year and comes back as an anti-hero who makes the rest of 

us REAL heroes look bad by engaging in cold blooded murder. The Fantastic 

Four and the Avengers patrol my planet; Captain America and S.H.I.E.L.D. 

patrol my country; Spider-Man patrols my CITY and I patrol a NEIGHBORHOOD -- so 

I'm not what one would call egotistical. I know my place in the grand scheme 

of things. But in the case of the Punisher, I don't mind getting on a high 

horse and judging him. He's wrong. Period. Killing criminals (whilst there's 

the means to reform them) is a step away from burning books and witches. 

It's demonstrates a lack of imagination and a lack of civilization. And 

aren't superheroes supposed to DEFEND civilization?

I don't go looking for the Punisher, but whenever he comes to my neck of the 

woods, I respond. When Hal Burton was on trial for misleading the 

mercenaries, Matt Murdock represented one of the widows (pro-bono, of 

course). During the trial, my superhuman nose smelled the kind of paste an 

actor would use to apply a facial disguise. The first chance I got, I 

scanned the courtroom more closely... and sure enough... there Castle was. He must 

have looked like a PIRATE, the poor thing!

'Course, it fooled everybody else, though. And when Castle saw Matt Murdock 

lose the trial (Hey, I can't tell the judge I HEARD Burton's heartbeat 

change when he lied about the defensive capability of the oil-rich island's 

natives!) and stormed out of the courtroom, I knew he'd make a move on 

Burton that night, under the cover of darkness, and Daredevil would be 

waiting for him.

So here I was, bodyguarding a man who led men to die in the name of greed 

from a man who -- to his credit -- never accidentally killed an innocent in his 

five-year-long "war on crime." Usually, Castle steers clear of "white-collar 

crime" (a specialty of mine), but then, one of the mercenaries involved in 

Burton's bloody debacle saved Castle's life in Kuwait, so I suppose it's 

PERSONAL for him this time around. Which, of course, will make him all the 

harder to deal with.

I can't wear the costume underneath my civvies because it's too thick, so I 

rush home to change and find my apartment in shambles. Fortunately, I'm on 

the top floor and below me is a mess of plumbing, so no one's hearing 

anything short of an explosion. But from the "looks" of things, SOMETHING 

exploded.

Daredevil costumes and masks were scattered all across the living room. A 

couple of my billyclubs were lodged into the wall while another swung from 

the ceiling fan it had gotten caught up in. And in the corner was Natasha, 

hurriedly packing a small bag.

"What the hell is this?" I demanded while quickly closing the front door 

behind me.

"'Typhoid' told me everything," Natasha said amidst sobs and that thick 

Russian accent of hers. She had her Black Widow jumpsuit on but it had 

clearly been scratched a bit, and wherever it was, Natasha was bleeding. 

"How you seduced her and had 'the nut house' pick her up while she was 

asleep. That's LOW, Matthew. That's really, REALLY low."

How could I make her understand I didn't enjoy doing that to Mary (much); 

that it's part of an ongoing plan of mine to bring down Fisk once and for 

all? "Natasha, let me explain --"

"I don't want to hear it!"

"I'm sorry I was in court. I could've been here --" She really didn't want to 

hear it, because before I could finish the sentence, Natasha had disappeared 

as we creatures of the night often do. She must have stuck around just long 

enough to let me know SHE knew I had done wrong.

Then the pit of my stomach went South the same way it used to every day 

after school, when I knew the bullies would be waiting for me: Both Mary and 

Natasha know who I really am... what if they decided to appear on one of those 

trashy talk show Foggy's always watching and "out" me?

No, no. Put it out of your head. Castle's out there right now, about to make 

his move, and I've got to beat him to the punch.

* * * *

I don't believe this. Every time I've ever fought this so-called Punisher, 

he had a black T-shirt with a white skull on it. There was Kevlar underneath 

(similar to mine), but it was still a cloth of some kind. Now I smell 

Castle's body and recognize his heart beating inside of what seems to be a 

very half-assed version of Iron Man's armor. The only conclusion I can draw 

from this is Castle has resorted to stealing in the name of his war on crime 

and ripped off Tony Stark, the defense-contracting, alcoholic playboy that 

Iron Man from the Avengers bodyguards (sorry, I never met the man, but if 

you were raised in the ghetto like I was, a resentment for the elite becomes 

second nature).

As he stepped out of his van in an alley on Fifth Avenue, next to the fancy 

restaurant Burton was dining at, I could smell the paint Castle must have 

recently laid on the chest of his armor (a skull, I'm sure) and all the ammo 

this walking tin can is outfitted with. This has always been a problem with 

my work: No one can sneak up on me and I can tell what's going on a mile 

away, but every once in a while, some superpowerful whatchamacallit breezes 

through my neighborhood and I get smeared on the street like peanut butter 

trying to stop it (the Hulk and the Sub-Mariner come to mind). So as Castle 

is stomping his way toward Burton, I'm left with the same choice I'm always 

left with. Flight or fight.

This is why they call me the man without fear. "CASTLE! STAND DOWN!" I 

figured using military slang might jar something deep within him and make a 

difference. I was wrong.

Ducking bullets isn't that hard for me. Since I can hear them coming before 

they're fired (AND can smell how many are in the chamber to begin with... not 

to mention the hormones of the shooter in question and whether they feel 

"lucky" enough to try something), it's almost as if they're coming at me in 

slow motion, or at the very least, "telegraphing" their moves. It's when 

they're coming and I'm already in mid-air, that's the problem!

Nethertheless, I barely managed to keep from getting shot while flipping in 

such a way that I caught Castle's new armor dead-in-the-chest with a 

dropkick. But before I could flip back far enough away to follow up with a 

swipe across the knees to take him off his feet, I learn the hard way 

Castle's armor also amplifies his strength. He catches me by the heel and 

treats the rest of my body like a fly swatter. It's the Incredible Hulk all 

over again. I can hear Burton actually having the gall to complain from 

across the street about "those rainbow-colored freaks of nature" and all the 

"incalculable property damage" we do, but I recycle what he says and use the 

rage it brings me as a kind of fuel. Call it a second wind, but I somehow 

kicked that helmet off of Castle's head. Before my other size-13 boot could 

find its way to his skull, however, he caught me. I sensed it coming, but my 

merely human reflexes just couldn't get out of the way in time.

I'm dipping in an out of consciousness as my radar/sonar detects Castle's 

hand reaching for my aching head, presumably to take my mask off in the 

middle of Fifth Avenue. I can already hear cameras in the distance waiting 

to capture the big moment when Natasha of all people starts yelling at 

Castle.

"He's a mess but he's MY mess!" I hear her say amidst delirium. "Let him go! 

I don't care WHO you came to kill, so go ahead and kill them! Obviously, the 

devil can't stop you! So go! NOW!"

Castle must have ignored her initially, because I felt his hand on my head 

and then heard a gun click. "I swear... Take it off and I'll blow your head 

clean off. No helmet, nice shot."

Instead of ruining my crime-fighting career and my life in general in that 

moment, I imagine Frank "the Punisher" Castle remembered something he 

learned during his time in the Marines' honor. The same honor he felt the 

need to avenge when his buddies from the Corps died for nothing working for 

Burton. Something similar happened when I drove the Hulk away from downtown 

Manhattan. I was bleeding to death with crushed ribs and-I-forget-what-else, 

and right before I passed out, I heard two cops arguing over me. The younger 

one wanted to go by the book and bust me for vigilantism (only the Fantastic 

Four and Avengers are government approved; everybody else is freelance, and 

therefore, technically illegal).

But the older cop said no, and barked at the paramedics who were carrying me 

away not to take off my mask unless they wanted "something stuck in and 

broken off." Nice mouth, but it got the job done. Somehow, that cop kept the 

entire hospital from unmasking me those two months I was in traction. 

Amazing. I never even found out his name either.

I've been a very lucky superhero over the years. Castle handed my beaten 

carcass over to Natasha, who spirited me off to a doctor in the underground 

who specializes in secret surgeries for characters like yours truly. And 

while Castle escaped, at least the cops who came in response to my fight 

with him ran "the Punisher" off before he could murder Hal Burton. I'd also 

like to delude myself into thinking I did his jury-rigged armor enough 

damage so that he'd never use it again. Oh, well. Such is the life I lead.