The ache was a familiar friend.
I could walk without looking like a ninety-year-old man navigating an ice rink, which was progress. My left arm, however, was still a mummified mess of gauze and medical tape under my suit, a constant, itchy reminder of a fight that had come dangerously close to breaking more than just my bones.
And now, here I was, voluntarily walking into a different kind of arena.
The television studio was an assault on the senses. The lights were hot enough to bake bread, the air thick with the scent of hairspray and nervous energy. A dozen crew members swarmed around me like ants, adjusting cameras, checking microphones, and occasionally giving me a wide-eyed stare that screamed, "Holy crap, it's him."
To be fair, I was thinking the same thing about myself. What was I doing here?
Whitney Chang, a storm of professional calm in the center of the chaos, was conferring with her producer. She was all sharp angles and sharper intellect, her blazer a severe navy blue that meant business. She caught my eye and gave me a tight, brief nod. The translation was clear: Don't be an idiot, Parker.
My nerves were doing a tap dance on my spine. So, I did what I always do. I deflected with noise.
"Hey, quick question," I called out to a sound guy fiddling with my mic pack. "If I accidentally get some web fluid on the boom mic, is that covered under warranty? I'm asking for a friend."
The guy blinked, his mouth half-open. A nearby camera operator snorted into her fist.
Whitney strode over, an iPad in her hand and a look of practiced patience on her face. "Spider-Man. Please try not to break any of my equipment before we go live. It's a rental."
"You say that like I have a reputation," I said, placing a hand over my chest emblem in mock offense. "I am a responsible, property-respecting superhero." I gestured to my bandaged arm. "Mostly."
She rolled her eyes, but the corner of her mouth twitched into a smile. It was the Whitney Chang special: 90% exasperation, 10% genuine amusement. In the six months we'd been doing these clandestine interviews and off-the-record tip-offs, she'd learned to decode my particular brand of anxiety-fueled humor.
"Two minutes," she said, her voice dropping to a confidential tone. "We're going to cover the fight, the aftermath… the public reaction. Just be honest. Be you."
"Be me?" I chuckled, the sound slightly tinny through my mask's vocalizer. "Which one? The guy who stops muggings or the guy who still isn't sure how to separate his laundry properly?"
"Let's stick to the first one for now," she advised, before turning and taking her seat opposite me. The chairs were plush leather, but they felt like an electric chair. The countdown began, a disembodied voice from the ceiling marking the seconds. Five… four…
I took a deep breath, the filtered air of the suit tasting sterile. Showtime.
"Good evening, New York." Whitney's voice was a smooth, polished instrument, cutting through the silence as the 'ON AIR' light glowed a bloody red. "Two weeks ago, our city held its breath as Spider-Man faced off against the mercenary known as Taskmaster. The battle ended in victory, but left a scar on our skyline and a question in the minds of many."
The screen behind her filled with images: me, silhouetted against an explosion; the shattered glass of the tower's upper floors raining down; a street-level shot of citizens cheering as I finally fell a battered Taskmaster to a chunk of debris.
"Hero or menace?" Whitney continued, her gaze fixed on me. "A savior who stopped a terrorist, or a vigilante whose methods result in millions of dollars in damages? Spider-Man, thank you for being here. In your own words, what happened up there?"
The question hung in the air, heavy with expectation. I shifted in my seat, the bandage on my arm pulling tight. "Thanks for having me, Whitney. First off… I'm just glad no one was seriously hurt. What happened up there… it wasn't a choice. Taskmaster forced my hand. He was going to continue hunting other heroes and many I call friend. Hell he might have changed his target towards civilians." I leaned forward, trying to project a sincerity I deeply felt. "I didn't enjoy it. None of it. Taking someone down like that, hitting them that hard… it's the worst part of the job. I think real strength isn't about how hard you can hit. It's about knowing when to stop yourself."
Whitney nodded, her expression unreadable. She was good. She let my words settle before pressing forward, her journalistic instincts zeroing in on the emotional core. "You say it's about knowing when to stop. But watching the footage, seeing the sheer ferocity of that final confrontation, some are saying you came very close to crossing a line you couldn't come back from. How close did you get?"
My breath hitched. My mind flashed back to the moment—the roar of the wind, the metallic tang of my own blood in my mouth, Taskmaster's smug, helmeted face laughing as he mimicked my every move. The adrenaline had been a white-hot nova inside my chest, screaming at me to just… end it. To stop him, permanently. The memory made my skin crawl.
I forced a light, airy tone into my voice, a quip to build a wall around the darkness. "Wow, that's a heavy one. Look, if I ever start sounding like Taskmaster, going on about strength and domination and all that jazz, please remind me to take a vacation. Maybe Fiji. I hear it's nice this time of year."
It was a clean dodge. Whitney let me have it, but her eyes told me she knew exactly what I'd done. She filed it away for later. Then, her approach softened, the shift in tone so subtle it was almost imperceptible.
"The mask," she said quietly, gesturing to my face. "It protects you. It protects your loved ones. But does it ever get… lonely?"
The studio suddenly felt a hundred degrees colder. The hot lights, the crew, the millions of people watching—they all melted away. It was just me and her question, a question no one had ever dared ask. My usual arsenal of jokes felt useless, like trying to stop a bullet with a paper shield.
I hesitated. The silence stretched, thick and uncomfortable.
"It's… a different kind of lonely," I finally admitted, the words feeling rough and foreign in my mouth. "It's funny, you know? You swing out there, and you save people, you high-five kids, the whole city knows your name. But at the end of the day…" I trailed off, searching for the right phrase. "At the end of the day, you're everyone's hero… and nobody's person."
The confession hung in the air between us. I could feel the weight of it, the raw, unvarnished truth of a life lived in secret. I saw a flicker of something in Whitney's expression—not pity, but a profound, startling understanding. It was a look that saw past the suit and, for a terrifying second, I felt completely exposed.
Sensing she had pushed as far as she could, she skillfully lightened the mood. "Well, 'everyone's hero' seems to be winning the day online. My producer just told me you're trending again. Hashtag 'Web Warrior Supreme' is everywhere."
The tension broke. I let out a genuine laugh, the relief washing over me. "Really? 'Web Warrior Supreme'? That's terrible. I much preferred 'Menace of Midtown.' It had personality. A certain flair, you know?"
"I'm sure J. Jonah Jameson would agree," she deadpanned, and the easy rhythm of our banter returned. We spent the last segment trading playful remarks, her professional poise sparring with my wisecracks. It was a glimpse into the strange, symbiotic relationship we'd built: she got the exclusive, front-page story, and I got a platform, a way to speak directly to the city without my words being twisted. She was the press, and I was the source, but somewhere along the way, we'd found a weird pocket of mutual respect.
"And we're clear!" the producer's voice boomed.
Instantly, the blinding lights dimmed to a functional glow. The spell was broken. The crew began to disband, their chatter filling the cavernous space. I let out a breath I didn't realize I'd been holding, my shoulders slumping.
Whitney unclipped her microphone and walked over to me, her formal anchor persona replaced by something more genuine. "Thank you, Spider-Man. For trusting me with that."
"Hey, any time you want to psychoanalyze me on live television, you know who to call," I joked, my voice back to its usual jaunty cadence.
"I'm serious," she said, her eyes holding mine. "I know this interview will be great for my ratings, I'm not going to pretend it won't. But I meant what I said. I want to use this to show New York who you really are. The man, not just the mask."
The sincerity in her voice was disarming. "Well," I said, pushing myself out of the chair, "if you ever do figure out who the man is, you owe me royalties for the tell-all biography."
She actually laughed, a real, unguarded sound. "It's a deal."
I gave her a two-fingered salute and walked toward the studio's massive loading bay doors, which a stagehand had opened for me. The cool night air of the city beckoned, a welcome balm after the stuffy studio.
"Be safe out there," she called after me.
I paused at the edge of the doorway, looking back at her standing under the dim work lights. "Always."
With a running start, I leaped into the night. The familiar thrill of the fall, the satisfying thwip of a web-line finding its purchase, the G-force pulling at me as I swung into the concrete canyon—it was freedom. For a brief moment, as I soared past the glittering skyscrapers, I glanced back. Through the massive window of the broadcast studio, I could just make out her silhouette, still standing there, watching me disappear into the urban jungle. The look on her face, even from that distance, felt curious. Maybe a bit too curious.
Later, perched on the fire escape of my tiny Queens apartment, the sirens of the city a distant lullaby, I watched the fallout on my phone.
The interview was everywhere. Clips of it were spliced into reaction videos, debated on cable news panels, and dissected in endless comment threads. The internet was a raging bonfire of opinions.
A tweet from a verified account: "Spider-Man's words on strength are what this city needs. He's more than a hero; he's a role model. #WebWarriorSupreme"
A reply underneath it: "A role model who caused 50 million in damages?? He's a reckless vigilante who got lucky. #ArrestSpiderMan"
Another post, with a screenshot of my slightly slumped posture during the 'loneliness' question: "Did anyone else feel that? For a second he wasn't a superhero, he was just… some guy having a really bad day. #MoreThanAMask"
They were celebrating me, accusing me, defending me, dissecting me. The city was talking, arguing, and buzzing about Spider-Man again, louder than ever. I watched the numbers climb, the hashtags trend, the digital storm raging on in the palm of my hand.
I closed the phone and looked out at the familiar, comforting skyline of my borough. The bandage on my arm itched. The dull ache in my ribs was a quiet, steady rhythm. I was just a blip on the radar, a anonymous face in a city of millions. But for a few hours tonight, my voice had been the loudest in town.
A faint smile touched my lips.
"Guess I'm still trending," I murmured to the empty night. "Not bad for a kid from Queens."