Luke Cage is in the interrogation room at the police department, being questioned by Captain Chris Keating, Sergeant Tyrone King, and DA Blake Tower. They intend to put him away for good. During a break, King, the only sympathetic face in the room, asks Cage to repeat the whole story to him….
Three days ago at the Meadowlands Sport Complex, Power Man and Iron Fist were playing a charity game against the Chicago Bears, while their boss, Maxine Walter, is dodging personal questions by the press. The two Heroes for Hire win the game 73-13, delighting the underprivileged kids who were in the stands. But a sinister figure watches from the sidelines, John Lumus, who blames the two heroes for the death of his brother Stanley and has just escaped from prison to take revenge….
While the heroes are celebrating with the kids after the game, Lumus, wearing his brother’s high-tech armor, destroys the restaurant with a rocket. After the heroes rescues the victims of the explosion, Lumus continues to fire upon Power Man as he dashes through the streets but it gives Iron Fist time to reach the rooftop where the villain is standing. The two fight, with Iron Fist taking damage from the suit’s weaponry. Finally, Iron Fist concentrates, powering his signature move, which he uses to knock his enemy over the edge of the roof to land in the street below. Then he notices that his normally green costume has turned red, indicating impurity in his mystic forces….
Later, Danny Rand explains to Maxine he has been publicly shamed. She confesses that Iron Fist’s encounter with the assassin (last issue) was a set-up created by her and Luke to overcome his obsession. When Luke enters the room, Danny denounces the two of them for misinterpreting his problem and interfering in his life that way. Maxine is shocked at her colossal blunder, while Luke angrily storms out of the room past waiting reports, announcing that Heroes for Hire is finished….
Danny then gets a call from the Falcon summoning him to the hospital. Arriving there, he is met by several of the Avengers. Twelve-year-old Bobby Wright, who transforms into Captain Hero, is dying and since he tried to join Heroes for Hire, they thought Iron Fist would want to know. Reed Richards and Hank Pym tell him the boy’s condition is hopeless but Iron Fist refuses to believe that; he rushes to Bobby’s bedside and comforts the boy but while he is there Bobby passes away. The hero seizes the boy’s hand and wills his chi into Bobby’s body until he starts breathing again. In the waiting room, the Avengers speculate that the Nega-Bands of the original Captain Marvel may stabilize Bobby’s condition and Hank Pym heads back to his lab for his notes….
Meanwhile, as Power Man sits in his office over the Gem Theater, John Lumus is on a rooftop across the street, plotting to fire a rocket at him. He decides to get a little closer, unaware that he is being watched by a police SWAT team working with Cage. A gun battle erupts in the street and Cage takes on the killer hand-to-hand but it is Cage’s pal Gordy (of S.M.I.L.E.) who takes down the villain by hurling his special phone to short out Lumus’ armor. Cage then beats the villain through the ground and into the subway. Lumus regains his power and the two engage in a violent slugfest in the tunnels. The villain, his armor badly damaged by Cage’s blows, falls immobile into the path of an oncoming train. As Lumus pleads for his life, Cage calmly ignores him—it turns out that Cage has flipped the switch so that the train will miss Lumus, though the bad guy didn’t know that….
Luke Cage heads to the hospital and stops by Bobby’s room; he finds the Fist performing his healing maneuver on the boy. As Cage sits with his friends from the Avengers, Iron Fist continues to pour his chi into the dying boy’s body, and at his lab Hank Pym races to recreate the Nega-Bands. After twelve hours Pym arrives with the completed devices and they are placed on Bobby’s wrists. Immediately the child rests easier, on his way to recovery. Late that night, the exhausted Fist is deep asleep by Bobby’s bedside when the boy wakes up with severe pain. He calls for help but there is no answer. He switches to Captain Hero but the pain only increases so the superbeing removes the bands and nearly goes out of his mind with pain. Desperate and near insane he tries to wake up Iron Fist, shaking him—then hitting him—until he has beaten the sleeping hero to death. Cage returns from getting a snack in time to see Captain Hero disintegrating into tiny particles, and blowing away. Then he finds his partner’s body….
Now in the police station, Cage is the sole suspect in the murder of Iron Fist: the killer had super-strength, Cage and Iron Fist had an argument earlier, Danny left all his fortune to Luke, Cage is a notorious hothead. Unable to stand this, Cage punches a hole through the wall and runs. Tyrone King resigns rather than stop him and Gordy tells Keating he also believes Cage is innocent.
The next day, Danny’s funeral is held with many heroes and civilians attending. Colleen Wing confronts Maxine Walter, blaming her for Danny’s death. As Maxine drives off, a bomb placed in her car earlier by Lumus explodes, killing her. Later, Tyrone King mounts his bike and rides away and a similar bomb detonates—but King merely brushes the flames off his body like so much dust and heads home….
Much later, Misty Knight finds Luke Cage seated on the edge of a cliff, staring out to sea, and comforts him as he mourns his best friend.