DAMAGED - ISSUE #1

The city was always loud at night. The hum of traffic, distant sirens, and the occasional burst of laughter from some bar down the street. But inside John Harkin’s childhood home, there was only silence—until his father came home.

John was ten the first time he realized the beatings weren’t hurting like they used to. He stood in the dim light of their crumbling living room, staring up at the broad shadow of his father. The smell of liquor clung to the man’s breath as he staggered forward, bottle still in hand.

“You think you’re tough, boy?” his father slurred, raising his fist.

John didn’t flinch.

The punch landed hard against his cheek. He felt the impact, the snap of his father’s knuckles against his skin. But it wasn’t the same. The pain dulled quicker than before. He touched his face, staring at his father’s confused expression.

The beatings continued, but something changed. At first, John thought he was just getting used to it. But by eleven, he noticed something else—every time he took the same kind of hit in the same place, it hurt a little less. By twelve, the bruises weren’t as deep, and by thirteen, the cuts didn’t bleed as much. He wasn’t healing faster—his body just wasn’t breaking as easily in places it had already been broken.

By fourteen, he started to experiment. He’d press on bruises that lingered, comparing them to the places where past injuries had already left scars. He realized that once something healed completely, the next time it happened, it hurt less. If a wound left a scar, the area around it toughened. It didn’t make him invincible—new injuries were just as painful as ever—but his body was learning. He tested his theory in schoolyard fights and by deliberately scraping his knuckles on rough brick walls, watching how much less they hurt after a while.

By fifteen, he started pushing back. His father’s beatings became harder, more frantic, but John never crumbled. He could tell the old bastard was getting frustrated, drinking more, hitting faster. The man wanted to see him break, to hear him cry. John just stared back at him, silent.

One night, after a particularly bad fight, he sat on his bed, flexing his fingers, running them over his bruises. His father had thrown a glass bottle at him, catching him on the shoulder. The pain still throbbed, the wound would still take weeks to heal. But he knew that next time, if it happened again, it wouldn’t hurt as much.

By sixteen, his father stopped altogether. John had won.

John left as soon as he could. By eighteen, he was gone, scraping by on whatever jobs he could find. Construction, bouncing at bars and underground fights when the money ran low. The city was a different kind of battlefield, one where people took what they could and left nothing behind.

He learned quickly. If you wanted to survive, you had to be harder than the people trying to take you down. And John was harder than most. The beatings, the fights, the broken bones—his body adapted. Each scar made him stronger. Made him colder. But he still healed at a normal rate. He could still bleed, still break, still suffer. He just wouldn’t suffer the same way twice.

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On the streets, people started calling him Damaged. It fit. He didn’t stop crime for gratitude—most of the people he helped didn’t even say thank you, but they knew him. Whispers of the man who could take a beating and keep standing spread through the alleys and backstreets. He wasn’t a hero, but he was there when no one else was.

In this world, powers weren’t special. Some people could glow in the dark, others could stop a moving train. The strongest among them, the ones with world-ending strength, worked for the government. They saved cities, saved nations.

They never saved people like him.

John Harkin had no interest in the Paragons—the world’s premier superhero team. He had watched them fight monsters and tear the sky open with their powers. They weren’t here, in the parts of the city where people went missing and never came back. They weren’t in the alleys where a man could be stabbed over a cigarette.

Now present day he stood in the rain outside a pawn shop, watching the flickering television screens in the window. The news played a clip of the Paragons in action—flashes of power, buildings crumbling, people running. The same as always.

“Fucking Paragons, the governments bitches." John muttered to himself. He then heard something in the alleyway across the street.

The alley was dark, but John could hear the sounds of struggle as he got closer. A group of men were kicking the hell out of someone against a dumpster. A woman’s voice cut through the night, pleading for them to stop.

John stepped out of the shadows.

The gang turned, sizing him up. His stance was loose, casual. His arms were wrapped in bandages, his jacket damp from the rain.

One of them had a fist that glowed orange, waves of heat distorting the air around it. John immediately knew—this was something new.

The first thug swung a bat. John let it hit his back, barely registering the impact. He grabbed the bat mid-air, yanking it forward and pulling the man off balance before driving his knee into his ribs.

Another came at him, throwing wild punches. John let them land. Normal fists didn’t mean much anymore.

Then one with the burning fist lunged forward, his burning knuckles catching John across the ribs.

Pain. Real pain. A flash of white-hot agony unlike anything he’d felt in a long time. He gritted his teeth, staggering back.

The gang saw it. Saw him react.

John’s glare darkened. They thought that meant something.

He surged forward, ducking under another flaming punch, and slammed his forehead into the man’s nose. Blood spattered, and the fire-handed thug stumbled back. John didn’t give him a chance to recover. He grabbed his wrist and twisted until the man howled, the heat fading from his fist as John drove an elbow into his jaw, knocking him out cold.

The rest scattered.

John nodded towards the couple he saved and walked on through the alley.

John returned to his apartment, peeling his shirt off and looking down at his side. The burn was raw, blistering, unlike the old scars covering his body.

He grabbed a roll of bandages, wrapping the wound tight. New scars.

“At least next time,” he muttered to himself, “it won’t hurt as much.”

A small television in the corner flickered on. The news anchor’s polished voice filled the room.

“And now, a statement from Cerberus, leader of the Paragons, following today’s battle in the city’s financial district.”

John’s eyes narrowed as the screen cut to a towering man in a red suit, cape draped over his shoulders. Three heads, but only the central one spoke. The others remained still, hidden behind metallic coverings.

“Our duty is to protect this world from threats beyond comprehension,” Cerberus declared, voice smooth and commanding. “Today was another victory for order. We will always stand above the chaos.”

John scoffed. “Arrogant prick.”

The Paragons saved the world. But Damaged saved the people in it and tomorrow, he’d be back out there. 

Because someone had to.