Nighthawk II
Kyle Richmond

Powers

None

Equipment

Talents

Martial Arts A E, Acrobatics, Business, Aerial Combat, Leadership

Contacts

Defenders

History

Kyle Richmond was the son of Arthur end Penelope Richmond, a wealthy industrialist and his wife. Upon his mothers' death when he was still a child, Richmond was sent to a private school to be raised. His father was too busy with his business to take charge of him. By his teens, Richmond was known as a spoiled, irresponsible troublemaker. Despite his poor academic record. he was accepted into a private college, Grayburn University, entirely due to his father's generous endowment to the school. Kyle Richmond still largely ignored his studies, and most of his time with his girlfriend, Mindy Williams. One night, while driving his car under the influence of alcohol, Richmond lost control and drove off the road. The accident left Mindy almost dead but he walked away unscathed. Richmond was expelled from college.

Shaken by the tragic consequences of his irresponsibility, Richmond was glad when he was drafted into the army, and hoped that he would die in action. However, during his physical examination, a heart murmur was detected and he was rejected from service. 0n the same day, his father died in an airplane crash and Kyle found himself in charge of Richrnond Enterprises. Wisely believing himself to be incapable of handling the business, Richmond turned over the management of the firm to the company chairman of the board. J.C. Pennyworth. He then divided his time between the life of leisure of the idle rich and a search for a chemical cure for his heart ailment. Richmond soon discovered a mysterious book which contained alchemical formulae, among with was a formula to increase physical strength. Concocting the formula in a makeshift laboratory in his mansion, Richmond drank it, and learned that it did confer upon him heightened strength, but only at night. Richmond was then contacted by the Grandmaster, the cosmic gamesman, who had arranged for him to find the book. The Grandmaster wished to use superhuman pawns against his opponent, the time-travelling villain Kang. Hence, the Grandmaster made Richmond and two other human beings into counterparts of members of the Squadron Supreme, a team of homes of an alternate Earth. The Grandmaster also transformed nonliving matter into a duplicate of Squadron Supreme member Hyperion. Richmond took the name of Nighthawk, the costumed identity of the Kyle Richmond of this alternate Earth. The Grandmaster's new team was known as the Squadron Sinister.

As Nighthawk, the Squadron Sinister's Richmond was pitted against the hero Captain America in a battle over the Statue of Liberty. Nighthawk lost, but escaped imprisonment when Captain America was teleported away for yet another contest. Nighthawk decided to use his powers for "kicks" and tried to make a quick reputation for himself by battling the hero Daredevil. When this ploy failed, Richmond retired his Nighthawk identity for awhile. Some time later, Richmond was. unwillingly reunited with the Squadron when Hyperion volunteered the group to assist the alien Nebulon in his plan to melt Earth's icecaps. Acting responsibly for the first time in his life, Richmond fled to try to warn the hero team Avengers of what was happening. Unable to reach them, he instead contacted the Defenders. Assisting the Defenders, Nighthawk was struck by radiation from Nebulon's 'laser cannon" and was on the brink of death. The sorcerer Doctor Stephen Strange performed an elaborate spell to mystically resuscitate Richmond's life force by drawing upon the collective life force of the Defenders. When Nighthawk revived, he asked to join the Defenders, but was told the group was not an official team. Nevertheless, he began to associate with members of the loose-knit group on a regular basis. Richmond reveled in the sense of life and purpose that his affiliation with the Defenders afforded him, and converted his private riding academy into their acting headquarters. He later used his financial resources to develop for himself powered jetpack and apparatus to enable him to fly. With the increasingly long absences of Doctor Strange, Nighthawk became de facto leader of the group.

He remained active with the team until agents of the Internal Revenue Service, investigating tax fraud, brought forth an injunction to prevent him from donning his costume until the charges were cleared. Richmond eventually beat the charges. Months later, when the Defenders were under siege by the demonic Six-Fingered Hand, the mystic link that Doctor Strange created to save Nighthawks life after the Nebulon encounter was severed. This left Kyle Richmond paralyzed except at night when he regained full mobility. He accepted his infirmity and reduced his involvement in Defenders activities accordingly. Returning to the college he he once attended, Richmond discovered that his former girlfriend Mindy Williams had not died in the car crash he caused, but was severely crippled. Insane with bitterness and possessing certain psionic powers, Mindy tried to kill the man she blamed for her condition. Nighthawk managed to survive the attack with the help of the hero Spider-Man. This encounter led Nighthawk to a secret project in Colorado run by a super-patriot named August Masters who planned to launch a psychic assault on the Soviet Union, employing the minds of unwilling telepaths as weapons: Mindy Williams was one of these telepaths.

With the Defenders taken captive, Richmond established a mental link with his former girlfriend and contacted Dr. Strange to bring reinforcements. When the resources of the reinforcements were also taxed to the limit, the subconscious minds the six psychics took control of Kyle Richmond's mind, conferring upon it their collective power. Through Richmond they activated the destruct sequence on the main computer/power system of the whole secret complex. Apparently under his own free will, Richmond ordered Doctor Strange to evacuate the other Defenders from the installation, while he remained behind as a physical focal point for the minds of the psychics. When the secret complex exploded, Kyle Richmond, the six telepaths, August Masters, and his private army were all inside. Possessed as he was by the six psychics, it is not clear if Kyle Richmond purposely sacrificed himself so that a nation could live or if he was a pawn of the six psychics. Richmond was responsible for bringing Dr. Strange, Hulk, Namor, and the Silver Surfer back together. He is now aiding the team, that can't seem to disband itself.