(This story first appeared in today’s USA TODAY.)

Ben Fodor doesn’t dwell much on his six professional MMA fights or the dozen or so he had as an amateur, but his mind often returns to the night he watched a woman die on the streets of Seattle.

This was three years ago, and he wasn’t acting as Ben Fodor at the time, but rather as his superhero alter ego “Phoenix Jones,” the masked crimefighter who’s been patrolling Seattle since 2010, courting controversy and danger.

“We were in Pioneer Square, and we heard gunshots,” Fodor, 26, tells USA TODAY Sports. “I started pursuit, and saw what looked like a man with a cellphone pressed to his ear.”

As Fodor later learned, what he saw was actually a 21-year-old woman clasping her hand over a gunshot wound as a gunman ran from the scene. As Phoenix Jones, clad in a mask and rubber superhero suit, Fodor gave chase.

Still, as he constantly reminds himself now, “There was a moment of hesitation.” He was scared to chase a gunman around a corner, for obvious reasons, and he hesitated further when police arrived and ordered him to wait as they called for backup. As he spoke with officers, the gunman escaped. The victim, meanwhile, lay bleeding on the ground.

“We were right there, and we just watched her die in the road,” Fodor says. “It was one of those experiences where I told myself, ‘It’s not your fault that she got shot, but it’s your fault that we didn’t catch the guy who shot her.’ It’s one of those things that I think about a lot. When I hear gunshots go off, I remember that I can’t let fear keep me from moving forward.”

If his self-reported record of wounds suffered on the job is any indication, there hasn’t been much hesitation on the part of Phoenix Jones since then. He’s been stabbed, shot – twice, though the second time was “no big deal,” thanks to an improvement in his body armor – hit with baseball bats, and threatened with all manner of violence by everyone from local drug dealers to inebriated bar patrons.

He’s been credited with stopping car thefts and bus hijackings, breaking up street fights, even recently disarming a knife-wielding attacker while in Connecticut to give a talk about his superhero exploits.

According to Seattle Police Department Public Affairs Director Sgt. Sean Whitcomb, who describes Fodor’s relationship with police officers as “mixed at best,” he’s also a positive force in the community.

“We do think he’s accurately reporting what he’s doing out there,” Whitcomb says. “He’s a person with the best intentions.”

He’s also recently taken steps toward getting serious about his career as an MMA fighter, inking a contract with WSOF, for whom he makes his debut on Friday at WSOF 20 (NBCSN, 9 p.m. ET) against welterweight Emmanuel Walo (7-2-1).

It’s a big step for Fodor (5-0-1), who’s competed mostly for smaller fight promotions. He recently began training alongside his adopted brother, Caros Fodor, 31, who’s been a professional since 2009. The elder Fodor sees promise in his superhero sibling.

“Ben’s going to be really good,” Fodor says. “He’s always had massive power, and he’s always been tough. Mentally, he won’t quit. He gets his fights into the later rounds, and he makes it a battle of attrition. He’s gotten where he has just on that, because his technical skills are not that great yet. But after two years of training with us, he’s going to be nasty to deal with.”

That is, if he commits to his MMA training and leaves the superhero schtick, which Caros calls “pretty ridiculous,” behind.

But retiring Phoenix Jones isn’t something the younger Fodor seems interested in doing. He signed with WSOF in part because it was the only contract offer he got that didn’t place any limits on his freedom to patrol the streets in his spare time, Fodor says.

“A lot of the other contracts said stuff like I couldn’t fight crime six weeks before a fight, or like they would own the Phoenix Jones rights and they could produce dolls and action figures,” Fodor says. “The WSOF only asked me questions about fighting. It was very strange.”

And while other fighters might be after fame and glory and titles, he insists he’s “not built the same way they are.” Part of that, according to Fodor, is that he’s not seeking the same form of validation they are. For him, it’s less about titles and fame and money (though, between body armor and flashy suits, “fighting crime isn’t cheap,” he notes) and more about gaining useful experience.

“I put on a suit and I go after real gunmen in a situation where I could really die,” Fodor says. “I do this because I believe in it, and when I get in the cage with you, I believe that I’m going to stop you. My only goal in fighting is to improve and gain skills that I will use on the street, where there are real consequences.”

Fans and opponents alike might not understand that, Fodor realizes, or they make think his crimefighting persona is all a publicity stunt – even a risky, ridiculous one, as his brother calls it.

“Seattle’s not the safest place,” Caros says of the streets his younger brother patrols. “To me, it’s stupid for him to be doing that stuff. Because, especially now that he’s training with us, he really has the potential to make a good career out of this.”

But for Fodor, the superhero thing feels like something that he can’t not do, he says. He’s tried to cut back before, only to find himself at home watching reports of the latest stabbing or shooting on the local news.

“I get this overwhelming urge to do something,” Fodor says. “There’s this frustration sometimes, like you just can’t believe the world is this way.”

The next thing he knows, he’s back out on the streets, looking for trouble.

Fighting crime remains, he insists, his first priority. Though training for Friday’s bout has limited his time for patrols, he still thinks of being an MMA fighter as his side gig – not the other way around. If there’s an upside to that, it’s that after the situations he’s found himself in as Phoenix Jones, there isn’t much that can happen inside a cage that truly worries him.

“People don’t think I can fight,” Fodor says. “But they need to realize that I have no hesitation because I’ve been there. I’ve seen death. I’ve seen the real thing. So you’re not scary to me. If you’re not ready for that, you’re going to get beaten up.”

For more on WSOF 20, check out the MMA Rumors section of the site.