The story starts with Luke Cage in a phone booth, checking his answering service to see if he has any new clients waiting for him as a Hero for Hire. Seeing him, two of Willis Stryker’s goons try to attack Cage. After being shot by one of them, Cage quickly deals with the two and goes on his way. However, a passer-by named Clair Temple wants to help Cage tend to his bullet wounds (They are mere bruises) and she brings him to her clinic. Upon arrival, they see that the place has been attacked by more of Willis’s goons and that her co-worker is under a filing cabinet. Cage lifts the cabinet to see that it is in fact Doctor Noah Burstein, the man whose experiment granted Cage his incredible abilities.