Daredevil (Vol. 2) #16-19:

Script: Brian Michael Bendis
Pencils/Painted Art: David Mack
Inks: Mark Morales/Pond Scum
Colors: Richard Isanove

Daredevil #16: "Wake Up Part 1"
24 pages + cover • May 2001

Ben Urich meets a young boy named Timmy who has withdrawn into a shell, babbling comic-book talk about Daredevil while staring off into the distance. His motherexplains that ever since his father went missing one night and he's been this way ever since, and she can't get any help from the cops totrack her husband down. While Ben Urich is getting heat from Daily Bugle publisher J. Jonah Jameson to cover the Kingpin trial, he is irresistibly drawn to trying to help this little boy. But JJJ won't permit him to follow a story on the missing super-villain named Leap-Frog and his withdrawn little boy.

He has nightmare dreams in which he meets Matt Murdock and asks him to discuss his role in the boy's trauma, but Murdock is murdered infront of him. The next day, he visits the boy at the hospital where his nurse has been watching him draw all kinds of pictures with crayons on paper; pictures depicting a fierce battle between good and evil.

Daredevil #17: "Wake Up Part 2"
22 pages + cover • June 2003

He tries to get the boy to talk once again, asking him pointed questions about Daredevil and his involvement in the altercation he witnessedwhere his father disappeared. They get nowhere, and the nurse recommends they take some time off. Urich heads to the discuss the crime scenewith the police officer assigned to the case of Leap Frog's disappearance, but the detective says nobody cares because Leap Frog was a psycho goof ball that must have gotten what was coming to him. After getting nowhere with the detective, he heads to Murdock's office to talkto him, but is told he's at trial and unavailable.

Ben visits with some of Timmy's schoolmates, and picks up insinuations that perhaps Timmy was abused. His meeting with a teacher confirmsthose suspicions; she had witnessed bruises on the boy's body. He goes back to Timmy's hospital room and finds bruises on his body.

Daredevil #18: "Wake Up Part 3"
23 pages + cover • July 2003

Ben Urich splits time between his assignment to cover the Kingpin trial and his urge to do something on behalf of Timmy, whoseems to have nobody in the world to help him solve his problem. He ducks out of the trial and heads to Timmy's room, where hesees typical childhood furnishings, as well as dozens of super-hero toys and posters. Ben reflects back on his own troubled childhoodand wonders what it must have been like for Timmy to receive punishment from a father who bounded around in a frog suit. Back atthe clinic, Timmy has been drawing cartoons depicting Daredevil beating up a giant frog. Ben tries to draw the story out of him as to what happened the night his father disappeared, and if it was Daredevil that made him go away. After his rapport with the boydries up, Ben determines he has to get the full story from Daredevil if he's to get anywhere at all.

After much trying and failing, Ben and DD finally meet in a public park. Ben puts the question to him: "What do you know about Leap Frog?"

Daredevil #19: "Wake Up Part 4"
23 pages + cover • August 2004

Daredevil tells Ben that he was doing a routine patrol when he spotted Leap Frog trying to burgle an antique store, part of a seriesof thefts in the neighborhood in recent weeks. They fought, but Leap Frog managed to hop away in escape. He followed him to theroof of a building, where he was desperately trying to get inside the door. DD continues the fight, and just then, the door opens fromthe inside, and it's a little boy. DD looks up and in that moment, Leap Frog grabs a lead pipe. He starts beating on Daredevil, all the whilescreaming at the kid to go back inside. While the boy stands in shock, watching his father beat up Daredevil, he warns him to go backinside or he'll get a beating just like Daredevil.

Daredevil passed out for a few moments, and when he came to, only the boy was still on the rooftop. Leap Frog was gone, and theboy wasn't saying anything. He evacuated the scene when he heard cop cars coming. Ben Urich informs Daredevil the kid was LeapFrog's son.

The next day, Daredevil visits Timmy in full costume. The kid is astonished. As Ben and the boy's nurse look on, Daredevil takes the kid andgoes swinging through the sky, bounding across to the Brooklyn Bridge. For the first time in a long time, the kid begins to remember exactlywhat happened that night. The reflections pass before him- he wandered out to the rooftop, saw his demonic father beating on one ofhis beloved super-heroes. The father started threatening him, too. The boy saw an electrical cable on the ground, which had been severedby the fight between Leap Frog and Daredevil. Unthinkingly, he picked up the cable and touched it to his father. He screamed and fell overoff the rooftop, falling all the way down to the street where he fell into the back of a garbage truck. The truck continued on down the street, oblivious to the fact that it had a new piece of garbage thrown inside.

As this all sinks in to Timmy, he opens up again, and hugs Daredevil, crying. After reading Ben's full story for the paper, Jameson decidesto run it after all. Later, Ben takes Timmy home to stay with him and his wife for a short time, while his mother can get her act together.