At LaGuardia Airport, Jack Garrett is on the run, escaping arrest for selling information from the SHIELD Witness Protection Program to the new Scourge of the Underworld. Suddenly he is confronted by Captain America; he opens fire and runs through the airport; cornered he takes a child hostage. Cap whips his shield into action…and takes out two Hydra agents who were sent to assassinate Garrett to keep him from talking to the authorities. Cap seizes him and demands to know what information he gave Henry Peter Gyrich….
At their hideout, the Scourge—Dennis Dunphy, the former Cap-ally known as D-Man, confronts Gyrich his handler demanding to know what they did to his brain to bring him under control. He hurls Gyrich across the room…and the ex-agent activates a small device and suddenly Dunphy is docile and obedient once more. Gyrich tells him to rest up for tomorrow’s mission….
Jack Barrett calls Gyrich to a late night meeting in a Washington park. Suddenly Gyrich realizes it’s a trap and he tries to flee but he is captured by Sharon Carter and Dum Dum Dugan. As he is taken away, the brainwashed ex-agent insists he is the hero fighting back against a corrupt system…
In sick bay, injured Diamondback comes out of her coma and tells Dugan that the new Scourge is D-Man, insisting Cap must be told immediately….
At the Baltimore shipyards, a worker named Roger Manning—formerly the second Porcupine—is leaving when Captain America appears and carries him out of the way of sniper fire. On a nearby rooftop, Scourge has second thought about harming his old pal Cap but Gyrich’s conditioning is too strong, the voice in his head to loud and he finds himself lining up his next shot at Captain America ….