Daredevil (1964 series) #233

The mad government agent Nuke, ordered to start a firefight in Hell’s Kitchen, disobeys the command to abort the mission and leaps from the helicopter into the heart of the inferno he created. The villain with his huge gun and the backup from the copter are too much for Daredevil, yet the hero keeps fighting. The Kingpin, relishing the action from his penthouse many blocks away, ignores Wesley’s pleas to call it off. Daredevil tries hand-to-hand combat to stop his foe but Nuke’s overdeveloped muscles easily ward off the blows. DD finally manages to flip his enemy off the roof and onto electric wires. Nuke plunges onto a car roof yet keeps firing his oversized gun. To stop the carnage, DD leaps down and seizes the weapon as the car’s gas tank ignites. The copter pilot strafes the hero but wounds news photographer Glori O’Breen; Daredevil turns the gun on the copter and, with a prayer for forgiveness, blasts it from the sky. The Avengers appear on the scene: Captain America rescues the wounded, Thor brings rain to douse the fires, and Iron Man takes Nuke, a gibbering wreck without his drugs, into custody. Later, at a meeting, one of the Kingpin’s associates questions the wisdom of his vendetta and is rewarded with a broken neck.

The next morning at a makeshift medical center in the church, Matt Murdock and Foggy Nelson arrive. Foggy is concerned for Glori while Matt discovers that Karen Page is safe. Suddenly Matt hears a familiar figure run by outside and pursues, catching up to Captain America on a roof. Cap asks for an explanation of the matter; he is interested in Nuke, a man who wears the flag on his face. Matt gives him his lead and leaves.

The story breaks in the Daily Bugle, thanks to Ben Urich’s reporting and Glori’s pictures. The Kingpin contacts the rogue general about containing the scandal but Cap arrives to demand answers. When the General denies knowing anything, Cap heads down to the building’s vault, where he taps into the base computers and learns that Nuke is the sole survivor of an attempt to create a super-soldier. Elsewhere in the building, Nuke is shown the newspaper and, seeing himself portrayed as a bad guy, he goes berserk and escapes, swallowing an overdose of red pills, which drives him mad. Cap hears the alarm and intercepts the huge killer, knocking him through a wall into the building next door. Meanwhile, Daredevil, on a mission to recover cash from one of Kingpin’s rackets for an elderly couple who lost their business in the fire, answers a phone call and learns about Nuke’s escape—and Kingpin’s orders to kill the rogue assassin. Elsewhere, Cap picks up the unconscious Nuke and carries him to the roof to meet newly arrived helicopters. Daredevil arrives to push the hero to safety as the copters open fire to erase the problem of Nuke. As Cap hold off the soldiers, DD commandeers a cab to rush the wounded Nuke to the hospital but the villain dies on the way. DD then carries his body to the offices of the Daily Bugle and dumps it on Ben Urich’s desk. With the exposure of Nuke, the Kingpin’s scheme becomes public knowledge, as his one-time associates and henchmen rush to cooperate with the authorities. The Kingpin is left a bitter man, able to comfort himself only in the fact that he was successful in destroying Matt Murdock.

Matt, however, is strolling contentedly down the street with Karen….