In the moment before he attacked, Daredevil had crouched in the shadows, making sure that the gravity effect had fully worn off. He used the time to study his opponent.

The "Halo Knight" had a uniform that was made of a strange type of fabric: it sounded and smelled like nothing Daredevil had ever encountered. He felt protective padding underneath it, and his helmet was even harder. There was a thin indentation that was probably a visor. The helmet had some sort of oxygen filter in it, and he could hear other electrical components, as well. As for the young man inside...his lungs were straining, his stomach was roiling, and his heart was pounding. Daredevil didn't know what had happened up there, but the kid with wings had really put him through his paces.

My turn.

Daredevil flipped to a crouching position, exploded out of his stance, and gave him a full-strength uppercut with his billy club. He felt the impact all the way to his shoulder. Whatever the helmet was made of, it was tough, and his billy club hadn't even dented it. Halo Knight took a shaky step backwards, however. Daredevil kicked him in the stomach, hit him in the side of the neck with his billy club, and then ducked an attack. While he was down low, he tried a sweep-kick. It knocked Halo Knight's legs out from under him.

Halo Knight almost fell-Daredevil was hoping to pin him face-first against the roof-but he suddenly grabbed some invisible object, dangling from it. With his opponent momentarily defenseless (he only had one free arm to work with), Daredevil battered his ribs with his fist and billy club. But Halo Knight managed to get back on his feet. Then, the invisible object came flying at him, followed by more, and Daredevil was too anchored to engage in his usual acrobatics. He was holding the billy club, and its grappling cord was wrapped around Halo Knight's torso. Letting go would be giving up the advantage. Instead, he dropped back and avoided the attacks the way that a boxer would, ducking and weaving.

He assumed that Halo Knight had some sort of gravity-based ability. It had crushed him against the rooftop and sent the kid flailing into the air, and it seemed to enable him to fly. Unfortunately, his radar sense went right through the energy that Halo Knight created, and it didn't give off any heat. It did, however, make a barely-perceptible sound, one that even he had to strain to hear. He couldn't see his attacks, but he could hear them. The lack of loudness was a nice change of pace. With his super-hearing, gunfire sounded like atomic explosions, and it gave him a headache after a while.

The kid tried to get behind Halo Knight, but the flurry of energy attacks made him back off. Daredevil waved him away. If the kid got too close, and Halo Knight saw him and turned around, he'd be on the wrong end of a point-blank attack.

Daredevil circled Halo Knight from right to left: every time he made a lap, he wrapped a little more cord around him. If he went the other way, he'd be inadvertently untying him. Halo Knight's attention was divided. He was trying to get himself untied, but he was also trying to shoot Daredevil. Neither were going particularly well for him. He must have realized that, because he gave up trying to shoot him, and started to hover, instead.

Uh-oh.

Daredevil clutched his billy club with both hands, getting ready to take a ride, but the kid buzzed over him, forcing him back down. While Halo Knight was distracted, Daredevil ducked/lunged close and aimed a kick at his knee. Unfortunately, Halo Knight started to take off, again, and it hit his lower leg, instead. It jostled him, and he flew crookedly, trying to get away from both of them. Daredevil yanked on his billy club in an attempt to pull him back, but it was like lassoing a rock. That energy really kept him in the air.

He's moving his free arm around like crazy...unless you're as fast as Spider-Man, you'll never pin it against him. You'd need impossibly-good timing. No, go for his legs, instead.

Daredevil started to make another lap around him, but Halo Knight had caught on. Instead of chasing him with energy attacks, he shot in the direction that Daredevil was trying to go, cutting him off. With the right-to-left route ruled out, he tried left-to-right. Daredevil threw his billy club left (and low), and since it was connected to Halo Knight, it swung in a circle, like one of those balls that are tied to vertical poles. He simultaneously did a series of flips and headed right. While Halo Knight wasted time trying to shoot him, the billy club's cord wrapped around his ankles a few times, and Daredevil eventually caught it. Halo Knight once again had to grip the energy to keep from falling; he heard the winged kid say "Wow."

Halo Knight seemed to be helpless. His ankles were tied together, one arm was pinned to him...if he used his free arm to shoot energy at them, nothing would be holding him up, and he'd fall flat on his face.

The winged kid landed, aiming both guns at Halo Knight. "Hey, great, you got him!"

"It's over," Daredevil said to Halo Knight. "You're going to an insane asy-"

Halo Knight shot the billy club's cord with the energy he'd been holding, and, before he could fall, he created more energy and lifted himself off of the rooftop. Both the billy club and its cord became incredibly heavy. It fell, while he yanked himself loose and floated over the rooftop. Both of his arms were now free. He tried to shoot at Daredevil, but the kid shot him in the back with some type of non-lethal ammo, and it threw off his aim.

The kid and Halo Knight were both in the air, but Halo Knight was focused on Daredevil. He launched a barrage of energy at him. But Daredevil wasn't connected to him, now, which made it easier for him to evade his attacks. He flipped and rolled and spun in the air. The kid was shooting at Halo Knight, but his suit was padded, and the dense objects weren't doing much damage.

"You're just confused," Halo Knight said to the kid. "You can still be the light! Come on, think of all the people that are suffering...they're sick, or miserable, or both...you can end their pain!"

He was floating too high; Daredevil couldn't reach him. And his billy club was pinned to the rooftop. There was a chimney nearby, and he thought about climbing it and using it as a platform to jump off of, but it wasn't tall enough. Daredevil cursed under his breath, continuing to dodge Halo Knight's attacks.

"The ritual will work! To hundreds of millions of people, angels represent good, and the devil represents evil. If you kill him, it'll trigger something powerful. I know it. They aren't meaningless costumes-you really do have wings, and people really are terrified of him. All the religions and mythologies out there, all the stories about light and darkness, one of them will have to be triggered by this. This planet is probably swimming in magic. We already know about Thor and his people, and-"

"SHUT UP!" The kid shot Halo Knight in the face, and Daredevil could hear his helmet reverberate. The speaker in his helmet became too distorted to understand.

Halo Knight seemed to be gripped by indecision; he looked back and forth between Daredevil and the kid. Daredevil was thinking about what Halo Knight had just said. He lived a logical, street-level life, but he was also Catholic, and he knew that there were cosmic mysteries out there. He'd also "seen" Stick do things that should have been impossible. And some of the stories that Stick had told him, about immortal ninja warriors and ancient cults that could bring back the dead...

"FALSE! FALSE LIGHT!" Halo Knight switched his attention to the kid, firing energy at him. His aim was improving by the second. Daredevil shouted at the kid, pointed at a neighboring rooftop, and ran toward it, waving him along. The kid got it and followed.

Daredevil knew that Halo Knight was firing some sort of energy bursts, and not a continuous stream, because he heard multiple sounds at once. The sound was coming from concentrated areas, so they couldn't have been very big. Also, when Halo Knight was flying, he could only shoot from one hand (Daredevil could hear the energy being generated), and that helped. But, as long as he was stuck down here, he couldn't do much to help.

The next rooftop over had a taller chimney. Daredevil leapt across the gap, quickly scaled the chimney, and watched as the kid led Halo Knight closer (and lower). The kid was smart; he immediately figured out what he wanted. Halo Knight, on the other hand, was furious and distraught. His vitals had been erratic ever since the kid had refused to play his role. When Halo Knight passed over, Daredevil took a one-step "running start" (the chimney wasn't exactly wide), leapt, and caught his foot. He swung his entire body up, wrapping his legs around Halo Knight's torso.

Halo Knight panicked, and tried to shake him off, but Daredevil was locked on tight. Using his legs to grip him, he pulled himself higher. Daredevil was on his back, now, and he grabbed at his helmet, trying to rip it off. A good series of head-shots could end this. But the helmet was really attached, and it wouldn't come off. He dug his fingers underneath, trying to find a better place to grab it, but it seemed to be sealed to the suit. There weren't any gaps.

Suddenly, the kid was flying alongside him, pointing. Daredevil knew that they were about to crash into a taller building. It was right up against the rooftop they were on, overshadowing it. When Halo Knight saw it, he tried to pull up, only for the kid to once again buzz over him, forcing him back down. When he tried to veer to the side, the kid literally flew circles around him. In the end, Halo Knight couldn't avoid it, and Daredevil leapt off at the last moment. Halo Knight cracked against the building, and then he dangled in midair. Normally, when he gripped that energy and flew, his body seemed to be buoyant. He wasn't just hanging limply from it. But, at the moment, he was dazed, and he was swinging back and forth like a piñata. The kid swooped in and kicked him with both feet, smacking him into the building once again.

"I think we beat him," the kid said, shouting down to him.

"Keep your distance!"

Out of nowhere, Halo Knight speedily lowered himself to the rooftop, leaned against the lower part of the building he'd hit, and opened fire with both hands.

Daredevil tumbled and sprang around, but the kid got a little too aggressive. He was angling to attack him again. The kid was still alive, so he must have avoided a lot of shots when they were flying around, earlier...but this wasn't high-speed, high-altitude stuff. They were slower and closer, now. And his wings made him a big target. Predictably, one of Halo Knight's shots clipped him, and he collapsed onto the rooftop.

Help him, Matt.

Daredevil charged, leapt onto his hands, sprung off of them, and landed a few feet away from Halo Knight. He came down right next to an old board, just as he'd intended. It was covered with dust and cobwebs. While Halo Knight watched his fists ("Typical Western thinking," Stick would have said), he slipped a foot underneath the board and kicked it at him. It hit him right in the face, and while the helmet kept it from hurting him, it smeared his visor with dust and cobwebs. He'd be blinded until he cleared his visor.

Halo Knight panicked and strafed energy everywhere, but he was using one of his hands to grab at his helmet, so he was only firing at half-strength. Daredevil danced past his attacks and unloaded on him. He high-kicked him in the side of the neck (where he'd hit him earlier), elbowed him between his shoulder blades (there was a joint in the padding there), and gave him a spinning flip-kick under his jaw (his boots were steel-toed, but it still hurt to hit the helmet like that). Daredevil then snatched the board off of the ground and hit Halo Knight across his knees.

Halo Knight's entire body wobbled, and he gripped energy to keep himself upright. Daredevil went after him, but Halo Knight backed off, and he was unsurprised when he flew away.

"You okay, kid? Can you chase him?"

"Umm, I don't..." The kid managed to get up-it had only been a partial hit-but his body seemed slow and heavy. When he tried to fly, he only got a few inches off of the rooftop.

A crowd had gathered below. The police had arrived down the street, where the robbers were, and Halo Knight's energy must have created a lightshow, because they were pointing up at the roof. There were woken-up civilians, as well.

"We need to get out of here. I want you to climb down that fire escape, go through the alley, and wait for me. I'll grab my billy club and meet you down there. But, once we're clear, we're going to have a talk."