Ultimate One Universe: Year One Application
// PEAK PHYSICAL CONDITION| Having undergone several kinds of rigorous training across his lifetime, Matthew has achieved a human body at peak physical performance, with his strength, speed, stamina, endurance, agility, and reflexes all at the absolute upper limits of human capability.
// PEAK MENTAL ABILITY | Matthew is incredibly gifted, having studied hard and achieved great academic success in his civilian life, and honed that intellect into some more practical talents for his vigilantism. Skilled in detection and problem-solving, Matthew also has a fantastic working knowledge of criminology and psychology. Furthermore, Matthew is able to detach himself from emotional response when necessary, able to turn to logic and rationality and focus entirely on his goals, suppressing emotion completely.
// SUPERHUMAN SENSORY SYSTEM After the accident that caused Matthew's blindness, his other senses began to compensate far past what was expected of them, and with Stick's later training, Matthew has honed these remaining senses into the superhuman, unlocking extraordinary abilities.
◼ SUPERHUMAN TOUCH | Matthew's sense of touch is so acute that his finger can feel the faint impressions of ink on a printed page, allowing him to read by touch. The rest of his skin is equally sensitive, enabling him to feel minute temperature and pressure changes in the atmosphere around him. Even with his senses of smell and hearing blocked, he can feel the presence of a person standing five feet away from him simply by his or her body heat and disturbance of air, which he can use to predict the movement of people nearby.
◼ SUPERHUMAN HEARING | Murdock's sense of hearing enables him to detect an acoustic pressure change of one decibel at a pressure level of seven decibels. He can hear a person's heartbeat at a distance of over twenty feet, or people whispering on the other side of a standard soundproofed wall. He is also able to focus on a particular sound, however quiet, and block all others out. Matthew's hearing also allows him to use incoming acoustic information to map out his environment in 360 degrees.
◼ SUPERHUMAN SMELL | Matthew's sense of smell is so acute that he can distinguish between identical twins at twenty feet by minute differences in smell. He can detect odors from even the smallest concentrations in the atmosphere. Furthermore, his ability to remember smells enables him to identify nearly any person by their natural odor alone, and he can use this to track a mark across a large distance, even through a crowd.
◼ SUPERHUMAN TASTE | Matthew's ability to identify and remember tastes in incredibly tiny quantities enables him to determine every ingredient of a food or drink he tastes, and even taste particular vapors in the air.
Born to a nameless mother, Matthew grew up with his father, Jack Murdoch, a semi-pro underground boxer for Hell's Kitchen and its underbelly. Jack had a penchant for getting back up off the mat despite however many broken bones he'd picked up, and this trait seemed to pass to Matthew, who would treasure it in later years; for most of his childhood, however, Jack tried to keep his only family hidden from the violence that plagued the downtrodden Manhattan neighborhood and instead directed Matthew's attentions to his studies, making sure he kept up in school until Matthew started to excel by himself. Jack was proud that such a bright child could be called his, and he foresaw an escape from Hell's Kitchen for his son - an escape that would not find Matthew; at nine years old, Hell's Kitchen put in its claim to the child. A traffic accident and a courageous, reckless act, caused a truck hauling chemical waste and toxic run-off to crash and overturn, spilling its cargo across the road and onto several bystanders - including Matthew. Caught in the spill, the chemicals burnt his eyes irrevocably. Jack and Matthew's lives changed forever - Matthew bound to the abilities that would reveal themselves over the next few months and years, and Jack bound to dealing with a disabled son who displayed abnormal reflexes and sensory overload.
Matthew spent his formative years learning his new place in the world, refining the senses he had left and continuing his studies. Jack continued boxing, losing and winning when the local mob told him to, until eventually - as he realized Matthew's abilities and intelligence were beginning to pull him to greater things - he took a final stand, winning an against-all-odds boxing match in Round 9 against 'Crusher' Creel, despite being instructed to stay down in the fourth. Jack Murdock never made it home. Matthew fled Hell's Kitchen the same night, cursing the criminals that had shaped his life and ended his father's. He found refuge in an nun's orphanage for a time, until his abilities took the notice of a blind man who called himself 'Stick'; Matthew left with Stick to train his mind, senses, and body, and he never (figuratively) looked back.
Many years later, Matthew returned to Manhattan to pick up where he had left off in his education; securing a place at Columbia, where he met Foggy Nelson, and going on to secure a Summa Cum Laude Law Degree from Harvard Law, with Foggy attaining a Cum Laude Law Degree alongside him. Taking a cue from Harvey Dent, an admired peer Murdock had met at university, Murdock moved back to Hell's Kitchen with Foggy to become New York's newest ADA, a high profile judiciary positions that gave Murdock quick access to the information he needed to start cleaning up his home. However, Matthew soon found that courtroom law was far from the 'justice' he sought for the people of Hell's Kitchen. At first, it was those in his immediate vicinity; a blindfold and dark clothes for the domestic abuser in the next building over, the cop taking bribes from the local dealer to keep him operating on student corners. Beyond that, Matthew moved his scope to the broader picture, donning padded athletic wear and a more stylized 'mask' to take on gambling rings and amateur human trafficking. Soon enough, Matthew saw too much in court to stand by without action any longer. It was time for the suit, to combat the massive crime organisation that underpinned the criminal everyday of Hell's Kitchen.
It was time for Kingpin. It was time for Daredevil.
▼ SUPPORTING CHARACTERS :
// ALLIES◼ FRANKLIN 'FOGGY' NELSON | Matthew's partner in law as Assistant District Attorney and lifetime best friend, the two met at Columbia Law and have been inseparable ever since. Foggy is Matthew's walking conscience and moral compass, always there to guide Murdock back towards the light when the Devil strays too far into the dark.
◼ KAREN PAGE | A beautiful blonde hired by Foggy to be his and Matthew's assistant, Karen is tenacious, intelligent, and a little too morally upstanding to be safe in Hell's Kitchen. She enjoys a fiery chemistry with Murdock, although he refuses to let anything come of it.
◼ STICK | A martial arts master with supersensory abilities even more advanced than Murdock's, he recognized Matthew's condition at the orphanage and took him away for training. He is mysterious, stoic, and guarded, but nonetheless a strong ally of Matthew.
◼ JACK MURDOCK | Matthew's father, a semi-pro boxer in Hell's Kitchen who raised Matthew as a single father. He did well, teaching Matthew to be a kinder and better person than Jack was, and after Matthew's accident, still encouraged him to pursue his studies. Tragically, he eventually crossed the mob of Hell's Kitchen while Matthew was still young, and Matthew has been trying to do his father proud ever since.
// FRIENDS◼ HARVEY DENT| The zealous and enthusiastic ADA of Gotham City, Murdock met Dent at Columbia Law and the two immediately formed a strong respect for each other. They rarely talk anymore, but Murdock keeps tabs - Gotham is a difficult city, and allies there are hard to come by.
// ENEMIES◼ THE KINGPIN | The unquestioned head of nearly all organised crime in New York, with an iron grip on Murdock's neighborhood of Hell's Kitchen, and an intellect to match his physicality. Ruthless, violent, intelligent - there is no criminal in New York who would cross the Kingpin. But there is a Devil waiting to face him.
Matthew followed the clacking of the metal heels deep into Hell's Kitchen, every step rippling out across the street and down the curb, lighting up the asphalt. The ripples mixed with the rain, every individual drop giving him constant flashes of the city - every sidewalk tile, every trashcan, every streetlight. A whole city as one surface, pulsing and radiating soundwaves and heat. Matthew himself spread noise, the low wet thud of his boots against rooftops feeding him information that he accepted, analysed, and discarded. Above all that was Matthew's mark, and now, despite the rain, he was picking up smells as well - wet leather, musky cologne...and the slight tinge of salt, mixed with oil and the unmistakable scent of gunpowder. The salt carried the sea with it, but Matthew already knew they were headed to the docks by their direction - but the oil and gunpowder was from the pistols Daredevil's mark carried, holstered beneath his coat around his torso. They'd been fired recently, but the man didn't carry the smell of blood with him, so Matthew assumed it was target practice or goods testing. They were drawing closer to the docks and he was learning more about his mark every step - testing pistols. Flashy fashion sense. Bald, wearing sunglasses, thin vest top. Something in his left pocket - the coat swung heavier on that side. He leaped another rooftop, putting a hand to his batons in mid-air. Something told him he'd need them.
Matthew kept on the mark's trail. They went a couple more blocks and then buildings gave way to warehouses and Matthew had to hit the ground if he wanted to follow. Warehouses were noisy and involved a lot of glass - in the rain, he didn't want to slip. Or put his foot through a pane. The guy carried guns, and bulletproof armour was hard to move in. Instead, he dropped carefully, leaping from the rooftop to the indent of a window a few stories down on the opposite building, landing with the balls of his feet on the outcropping and springing back, flipping backwards from the window and reaching out to grab a steel cable that was strung between the buildings another few stories down. His orientation didn't matter; he kept track of himself through proprioception and the buildings through sound, air pressure, the smell of brick and concrete. The cable flexed as it took his weight and he dropped the last few metres, rolling as he hit the ground and unsheathing his batons. He spun them in his hand and tested the retracting cable that strung them together, and then, satisfied, re-centered his hearing. The footsteps were still there, still his mark's. They'd been alone for a while now, and he hadn't changed his gait. Matthew slunk across walls and behind shipping containers, still in pursuit. They were by the sea's edge now, and the docks had turned into massive corridors of corrogated metal, walled off by cargo.
He whistled. A simple four-note tune, but it was clear in its purpose. A woman appeared from behind one of the containers. Matthew had heard her heartbeat as they'd approached - it remained calm. His mark's did not. He cleared his throat, and spoke:
"The guns are good. I'll take more pistols, and I want to add the assaults and the sniper. It'll all be useful." His heart rate was rapid, but his breathing and words remained steady. He was about to do something stupid.
"You sound like you're takin' a crew. He doesn't like supplying crews. They might get stupid and think they're competition." She replied, voice calm, heartbeat to match. She seemed to anticipate it.
"No crew. Just what's needed for the target. High-risk."
"If you're going after who I think you're going after you're going to need a crew. Not like you'd lose much on the split."
"I don't need the money." It wasn't a boast - his heartrate hadn't faltered, so he believed it. Either he was well-off or didn't care. "I'm not doing it because someone paid me to do it." Still telling his truth. "I'm doing it because it can be done. And everyone's going to know my name when I do it." He seemed proud in himself, puffed up on his own stupid ego. The woman just shrugged.
"Whatever. Just make sure you keep whatever trouble you stir up to yourself. He doesn't need egos bringing trouble back to him. You know what he wants for the goods. You can wire it direct."
"I know what he wants." Muttered the man, voice low - trying to be threatening. Matthew primed himself, every muscle wound tight, ready to spring. His fist clenched around his batons. The man unholstered his pistols, arm stretching out to hold it in front of him. "But only I get what I want."
The woman would have begun to laugh, had Matthew not loosened his body and launched from the corner, already raising his arm to strike with the baton - but the woman had seen his fast movement and the man had noticed her, throwing his arm out behind him to the left without looking and pulling the trigger. Matthew felt the arm's movement through the air, the heat from the muzzle and the sound of the gun telling him the exact path of the bullet and he was able to throw himself backwards to the ground immediately, feeling the air ripple and vibrate above him as the bullet slammed into a shipping container and ricocheted away. Matt barely had time to register the good shot before he flicked the top of his baton as he fell, releasing the cable that tied the two together and whipping his arm out as he hit the floor, hitting the man's inside wrist, nearly breaking it with the force of the throw and forcing him to drop the pistol. He slid in the rain, pitching forward and pushing up on his feet as the mark drew his other pistol in his remaining hand. He barely had to time to wrap his finger around the trigger before Matt brought his stick straight down on the arm, cleanly breaking the ulna as the shooter yelled out in pain, silenced by a boot to the chest as the other pistol clattered to the ground. The woman was pissed - at the mark.
"You brought the fucking Devil with you? You let him follow you? You're a fuck-up and a nobody! After threatening me? He'll come see you soon, don't you worry about that. Then, people are going to know who you are."
She was gone before Matt could stop her - not that it would have been useful to do so. He took a deep breath through his nose, analysing all the scents he could find before isolating one that would be easy to follow up on - fish, variety of, from the nearby market she obviously frequented - before he delivered a sharp heel-kick to the skull of his mark. Extorting an arms-dealer to get weapons so he could go after the very same vigilante that had already surreptitiously followed him to said dealer. He probably wasn't doing much damage that hadn't been done already.
It didn't take long to deliver the no-name to the PD, and Matt wondered if he'd see him later in court. Probably not - he didn't see much of his handiwork. He usually got them on the streets before he needed to defend their victims in the courtroom. He spent the rest of the night on more patrol, thinking over his new lead through the arms dealer and listening to his city. Matt had his own problems; but Hell's Kitchen wouldn't see anymore trouble tonight.
▼ WHAT MAKES DAREDEVIL 'ULTIMATE'?:
This is a Matthew Murdock who, instead of helping bleeding hearts and the unfortunate, still has dreams of being a big city lawyer. He's high profile and works high class cases, directly taking on the mob on both his civilian guise and during the night when he dons the horns to become Daredevil. It is more important than ever to keep his dual life secret, as he becomes a bright target to the underworld on both sides of the law.
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