Kyle Richmond (Earth-61712)

Men are still good... We fight, we kill, we betray one another... But we can rebuild... We can do better... We will... We have to...

— Nighthawk

Early Years

When Kyle Richmond was a when child his parents, Titus and Rosalie, were killed before his eyes, viciously gunned down in a drive-by shooting. He turned his father's investments into a thriving corporation, becoming a billionaire industrialist and creating his notorious playboy persona, and used his wealth to create a bulletproof costume and an arsenal of weapons that he would use to fight and apprehend on those who preyed on the innocent, especially those who preyed on African-Americans and other social supremacists, a honor to Kyle's mother and the rest of his maternal lineage, who were African-Americans. Richmond eventually named his costumed vigilante identity Nighthawk, as a nod to the bird that flew overhead the night of his parents' murder.

Richmond's tactics to oppose crime as a vigilante at night proved successful leading him to becoming a frequent urban legend in the cities of New Troy, Cosmopolis, and the rest of Squadron City. He revealed himself at a dinner of the most influential and corrupt figures in New Troy and promised them all that their reigns on the city would eventually end. Most of the Squadron City Police Department was sent in force to capture him. He gained his most powerful ally when he met police lieutenant Jacob Arredondo, one of the few honest cops on the force. The two developed a working relationship operating outside of the law when they needed to.

Nighthawks's presence in Squadron City has generated a new breed of criminals, no longer the simple thugs and gangsters involved in the Squadron Organized Crime, but more dynamic personalities. Later on during his first years, he would meet his greatest nemesis when the man known as Whiteface first appeared, a brilliant serial killer dressing like a clown and murdering people uncontrollably. He had been exposed to chemicals in an accident that drove him completely insane, and he swore revenge on Squadron City for creating him. Whiteface's identity remained a mystery to everyone else, including Nighthawk himself, however it all changed, after Whiteface himself revealed his tragic past and origin as Steven Binst, a former leader of a white supremacist gang that the latter once have consistently led a long ago before he became Whiteface. As Nighthawk's legend grew, so did his Rogues' Gallery, and in these days, Nighthawk has many countless adventures he had gone through, not even his fellow heroes and villains would have figure on counting.

The Havoc of Hyperion

His strongest characteristic was initially thought to be a strong moral code to never kill, until he became considerably more extreme in his approach to fighting crime in the city of Cosmopolis and the rest of New Troy, after witnessing the almost-destruction of the city that was unintentionally cause by a fellow superhero named Hyperion, who was fighting off a highly-enhanced Scoundrel whom he later killed out of fear and desperation, in order to prevent the city's state from ever worsening, many lives were gone and was loss from that disastrous, traumatic event. The combination of emotional and physical pain, loss, exhaustion, and potential disillusionment he’s experienced during his time protecting the streets of Squadron City and New Troy, as well as his growing skepticism, pessimistic, and world-weary personality, causing for Nighthawk to decide that he was better off letting his enemies die than allowing them to return and cause more harm.

The Last Laugh

Whiteface 61712 — Nighthawk would eventually have to face his demented and sadistic archnemesis Whiteface, one last time

Nighthawk met the newly-elected Deputy Mayor of New Troy, who told him that people were no longer reporting crimes in the south and west sides of the city because they wanted Nighthawk to take care of crime his way. Meanwhile, Steven Binst, Nighthawk's known long time arch-nemesis who was an imprisoned and catatonic serial killer, formerly known by his alias, "Whiteface," suddenly woke up after several years and walked out of his minimum security correctional facility, made up as a clown, and drove to New Troy, returning into his life of crime once more, though nobody else would knew, this would be his one last straw.

Five weeks later, after saving a baby from death and taking him to Kyle's long-time love interest and close friend, a woman he once knew, named Doctor Beatrice Arredondo (who was also the daughter of loyal and righteous police commissioner, Jacob Arredondo), Nighthawk encountered an epidemic of drug addict deaths all over New Troy. As the death count rose to thirty-eight hundred over three days, the governor was helpless to stop the circulation of poisoned drugs. Nighthawk interrogated a federal judge to try to find the supplier, to no avail. Later Binst, made up as a clown, went to a birthday party for the mayor's 6 year-old son, killing the mayor's son and wife using balloons filled with poison gas. The mayor, grief-stricken, committed suicide during a press conference, but not before calling on Nighthawk to kill Binst on his behalf, knowing that Nighthawk would go to extreme measures to those permanently punish those who would commit the worst of crimes.

A manhunt for the killer began in Grant Park, where the mayor's wife first met Binst. Nighthawk tracked Binst down to an abandoned warehouse, but was knocked out by Binst with sleeping gas. After escaping Binst, Nighthawk was exposed to the poison. Nighthawk, out-of-costume, went to see Dr. Arredondo. After uncomfortably and forcibly kissing her, he asked about the baby he saved named "Baby Doe". After Kyle leaves, Dr. Arredondo went to the nursery to look in on Baby Doe. Unknown to Dr. Arredondo and Nighthawk, Binst takes down Nighthawk, shoots down Dr. Arredondo through her spine, devastatingly paralyzing her, and then takes Baby Doe.

After finding Dr. Arredondo painfully paralyzed, Nighthawk carried her and immediately brought her into the nearest hospital throughout New Troy, before he continued his search, grudgingly looking for Binst. The Deputy Mayor of New Troy then gives a press conference and says that "Whiteface is dead". Nighthawk tracks Whiteface to a chemical treatment plant with Baby Doe in hand. Face to face with Nighthawk, Whiteface said how the two men are "opposite sides of the same coin". Before the final duel between the two concludes, Whiteface even taunted Nighthawk that since Nighthawk couldn't even kill him before, he could never do it, ever. After a fight and saving Baby Doe from the hands of Binst, Nighthawk fires a grappling hook gun through the Whiteface's midriff, then snaps the killer's neck and drowns him in untreated sewage, the same sewage where Binst first became the psychotic and insane Whiteface. And afterwards, just like that, Nighthawk has finally done the very thing he once pledged into never doing, ending his own worst enemy by literally reluctantly ending his life, once and for all.

Observing the infant for a second, Nighthawk and the child vanish into the night. Having no one else he could have given the child to besides the now-paralyzed but miraculously-surviving Dr. Arredondo, Kyle decided to put the baby into a high-quality private orphanage located in New Troy, so that maybe one day, Kyle may be able to finally raise the orphaned infant by himself, once he is finally in his right age as growing and developing child. Following the aftermath of Whiteface's downfall, Kyle decided to visit Beatrice while she still lies on her hospital bed as Nighthawk, paralyzed. Due to the irreversible recklessness caused by Whiteface and Nighthawk, Kyle finally unmasks himself in front of Beatrice, asking for her deepest of forgiveness.

Beatrice was undoubtedly surprised by the unexpected revelation of Kyle as the Nighthawk, however, it became more surprising for Kyle after Beatrice tearfully accepted his sincere apology, believing that Kyle did all he could in order to protect the very woman that he has always loved since the beginning. Despite the fact that Beatrice had finally forgiven him both as Kyle Richmond and the Nighthawk, Beatrice's father, police commissioner Jacob Arredondo suddenly changes his mind on Nighthawk, after seeing he was truly triggered and traumatized after his own daughter was affected during the final crossfire between Nighthawk and Whiteface, with Jacob now believing that Nighthawk was nothing more than a masked menace, saying that would only bring more threats and dangers to the city.

Supreme Journey

The government team project known as the Squadron Supreme, formerly led by Nighthawk and Hyperion, has already been scrapped and the first secret incarnation of the team was disbanded by the current president of the United States of America, believing that each and every superhero would be better on their own without them having to be involved with the government's classified agendas, but due to the unexpected arrival of the Null, the "Living Darkness," the authorities had no other choice but to reassemble the superhero team for the sake of defending the world and preventing the planet from the most dangerous of threats, no single hero could ever handle in defeating.

While the entire creature itself was still outside the Earth's orbit, the Null asexually reproduced and spawned a countless swarm of its offsprings and biological vessels, known as the Nullifiers. As a result, the Squadron Supreme was immediately alerted by their swift arrival towards the Earth's atmosphere, causing for the heroes to charge off against the hostile creatures in order to prevent them from ever reaching the planet's surface, especially the most populated cities such as Squadron City and New Troy City.

Expecting the arrival of the Nullifier swarm up ahead the skies, the Squadron rallied in defense of New Troy, but quickly concluded they would be overwhelmed as wave after wave of Nullifiers have descended. The rest of the Squadron Supreme kept their ground to hold off the invasion and evacuated civilians while Hyperion and Doctor Spectrum themselves pursued Null while it was still in orbit. Hyperion tried to beat it into submission, however, Spectrum finds another alternative in order to stop the invasion of the Living Darkness from ever commencing on Earth.

Though Hyperion's beatings on the creature manages to ultimately stop the Nullifiers' attack on Earth with the help of the Squadron Supreme, it only made the state of the Null itself even worse than before. Sensing the energy from the White Outburst's effects, it was revealed that the most powerful source of energy was located at Emil Burbank's headquarters, where his secret laboratory was also located, safely containing the last amount of the White Outburst's mysterious energy. After sensing the Outburst's energy, the last surviving Nullifier immediately escapes from the clutches of the Squadron as it swiftly flew towards the Burbank International headquarters.

The heroic speedster Blur, followed by the rest of the Squadron, manages to catch up with the Nullifier on time after reaching the top floor of the building, however, the Nullifier was too alerted about their presence, it manages to knock all the heroes down, including the Blur, one by one, before proceeding to enter Burbank's secret lab. Unbeknownst to the Squadron who have just recently arrived the headquarters, Burbank himself was already inside his laboratory at the time. Burbank was already aware about the arrival of Null on the planet's orbit, and yet, even he was surprised about the unexpected infiltration of the Nullifier on his lab where it carelessly and rapidly destroys the entire laboratory in the process, searching for the mysterious white energy source.

Burbank tried to get the safe container inside the lab that currently stored the powerful energy, but it was to late for him, as the last Nullifier finally grasps the container, ruthlessly breaking it, releasing the white energy in the process. Unfortunately, the Nullifier itself was immediately disintegrated as the energy transforms into a massive beam of light that ascended into the heavens, reaching the planet's orbit. Now that Null itself was able to reach the beam of light, the large, weakened entity heads directly straight towards it in order to absorb the energy being released by the beam. As Null kept on absorbing the white energy, it makes it even more stronger, however, the longer it absorbs the energy from the beam, it only dragged the creature more and more further towards the light, like a black hole. Unaware of what the creature has been up to, both Hyperion and Spectrum tried to stop from speeding towards the light, and despite all their best efforts of escaping, Null was too fast and too powerful.

Prime Reality

As a result, Null, along with on it who were Hyperion and Spectrum, vanishes into space as they enter the white beam of light. Meanwhile on the surface of the Earth, the rest of the Squadron to see that the beam itself began to slowly increase in size and diameter. The Blur tried to reverse the effects of the light by running around the light beyond the speed of light, in reverse in order to unravel it. As he run so fast, his teammates tried to get back, just in case, but it was too late. The Blur's unmeasured powerful speed had unexpectedly taken himself and his entire team towards the beam of light, and similar to Null, Hyperion, and Doctor Spectrum, they also vanished into nothingness, although this time, the light finally fades into thin air, thanks to the Blur's counteracting actions, which unbeknownst to him, actually worked afterwards.

Due to the mysterious effects caused by the White Outburst's beam of light, Null the Living Darkness and the Squadron Supreme were suddenly transported to another location across the vast multiverse, so seemingly familiar, and yet so different at the same time. As the heroes have finally awoken from their unconscious state, Null was nowhere to be found anywhere, along with finding themselves lying on the roof of a skyscraper. As they awoken, the heroes were so confused to see how much the environment of "New Troy" they're currently around, felt like they were during the "19th century," instead of being in the 21st century.

The Avengers

Arriving in the mysterious reality they find either really unfamiliar or ancient, Nighthawk and the rest of the Squadron tries to explore the city of New York after leaving the skyscraper, only to be surrounded and confronted by a group of armored vans ridden by people in suits led by a man named Phil Coulson, with Nighthawk immediately figuring out they were secret members of a militaristic, peacekeeping organization in which Nighthawk seemed to be more interested in but still distrusted at the same time, as he truly craves to have his most puzzling questions answered by the time they've arrive in this reality as soon as possible.

Powers and Abilities

Powers

Power Grid ^[1]

Intelligence*

6

5

Strength*

5

4

Speed*

5

3

Durability*

5

3

Energy Projection*

4

1

Fighting Skills

7

* Once empowered into greater levels by certain temporary enhancements.

Abilities

Indomitable Will
Intimidation
Interrogation
Peak Human Conditioning
- Peak Human Strength
- Peak Human Reflexes
- Peak Human Speed
- Peak Human Endurance
- Peak Human Agility
Acrobatics
Martial Arts
Weaponry
Stealth
Marksmanship
Genius Level Intellect
- Aviation
- Business Management
- Disguise
- Driving
- Investigation
- Martial Arts
- Stealth
- Tactical Analysis
- Throwing
- Tracking

Strength level

Class 10+

Weaknesses

Human Vulnerabilities
Single-Mindedness

Paraphernalia

Equipment:

Hawksuit
Utility Belt

Transportation:

Hawkmobile
Hawkcycle
Hawkwing (also known as the Hawkjet)

Weapons:

Throwing Knives
Talons

Notes

No special notes.

↑ Modern Comics: Squadron Journey Vol 1 2

Trivia

Nighthawk was created as an analogue/pastiche of DC Comics' Batman.

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Links and References

None.

[1] Modern Comics: Squadron Journey Vol 1 2

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