The world dissolved into a concussive boom and a seizure of light. One moment, I was swinging in, ready with a witty quip about noise complaints. The next, the floor of the arena met me with the force of a wrecking ball.
Now, gravity was a lead weight. Every muscle fiber screamed in protest, a chorus of agony thrumming in time with the phantom beat still rattling my skull. My vision was a kaleidoscope of retinal ghosts—purple and green spotlights swimming in a soupy haze. Forcing my arms beneath me, I pushed. The groan that escaped my lips was lost in the roar of the arena.
Through the swimming spots in my eyes, the scene sharpened into a nightmare. A sea of bodies, thousands of them, moved as one organism, their arms raised, their heads tilted back. And the sound they made… it wasn't the wild, chaotic cheer of a concert. It was a single, resonant chant, a drone that crawled under my skin.
"HUS-TLER! HUS-TLER! HUS-TLER!"
My eyes frantically scanned the front rows, my heart a frantic, panicked drum against my ribs. There. Elaine. Her face, usually so full of life and gentle skepticism, was slack, beatific. Her eyes were unfocused, fixed on the figure commanding the stage. Her voice, the voice that had whispered secrets to me just hours ago, was just one more drop in that terrifying ocean of sound.
"Come on, Parker…" I muttered, the words a rough scrape in my throat. My head felt like it was full of angry bees. "You've taken hits from Vulcan harder than this. You've had Supercharger literally rattle your fillings out. Don't let a walking disco take you down."
The thought was just absurd enough to give me strength. Planting my feet, I swayed, but stood. The stage was an altar of light and sound, and upon it stood the high priest of this sonic religion. Hustler.
His voice, amplified by the belt, boomed through the arena, smooth as velvet and hard as steel. "Look at them, Spider-Man! Look how alive they are!" He gestured to the mesmerized crowd with a grand sweep of his arm. "I give them rhythm. I give them ecstasy. I give them a perfect, blissful escape from their traffic jams, their deadlines, their boring little lives. I'm not hurting anyone—I'm setting them free."
I took a staggering step forward, my senses slowly coming back online. The ringing in my ears subsided into a dull throb. "Free?" I called out, my voice feeling small and thin in the cavernous space. I took a breath, trying to project. "You've ripped away their choice. They're not cheering because they want to… you're making them. That's not freedom, Hustler. It's slavery with a soundtrack."
A condescending laugh echoed from the stage. "Semantics from a man in a onesie." He raised the mic to his lips, but not to speak. He tapped it once, a sharp thump that sent a focused sonic burst rocketing toward me.
It hit my chest like a phantom fist. I stumbled back, air knocked from my lungs. Instinct took over. My web-shooter fired, a thick strand connecting to a towering amplifier stack to my left. I yanked, pulling the heavy black box in front of me just as he sent another pulse. The sound wave crashed against the amp, which shuddered and emitted a screech of feedback, but it held.
He fired again, this time at my feet. I leaped, twisting in mid-air, and shot a web at a lighting rig dangling from the rafters. Using it as an anchor, I swung across the stage, a pendulum of red and blue. The fight found its rhythm. It was his rhythm, a driving four-four beat that pounded from the speakers, and he was a master of it. He'd strike on the downbeat, a focused sonic punch. He'd sweep his arm on the upbeat, a wider wave of force. It was choreographed, precise.
My only chance was to break it.
While he moved like a dancer, I moved like a bug caught in a jar—erratic, unpredictable. I dodged off-beat, deliberately a half-second too late or too early for his tempo. I swung in arcs that defied his linear attacks. He struck left, and I'd drop to the floor. He aimed low, and I'd be clinging to the scaffolding above. I was jazz; he was a metronome.
I landed on a platform behind him, webbing a pair of massive speakers and yanking them into the air. "This is some light show," I grunted, swinging one like a wrecking ball.
He sidestepped with effortless grace, sending a tight sonic beam that sliced my web line. The speaker crashed to the stage, splintering the floorboards. "What do you give people, Spider-Man?" he taunted, circling me, his movements fluid and hypnotic. "Fear? Panic? Headlines of terror in the streets? Your appearances cause more chaos than they stop. I give them joy. They love me. They want to be here."
"No, they don't!" I shot back, landing and rolling to avoid another blast. I came up on one knee, my head still swimming. "You're not letting them choose to walk away. Love doesn't mean anything if you steal it." I pushed myself to my feet, my voice rising with righteous anger. "You're just lying to yourself—because deep down, you're afraid they wouldn't cheer without the belt."
For a single, glorious moment, I saw it. The smirk faltered. A flicker of uncertainty, of raw insecurity, crossed his perfectly sculpted features. I'd hit a nerve. The persona cracked.
And then it was gone, replaced by a mask of cold fury.
"You know nothing," he snarled. The beat from the speakers doubled, a frantic, heart-pounding tempo that made my teeth ache. He didn't just attack harder; he attacked faster, a flurry of sonic jabs that forced me back, giving me no time to think, no time to plan. I was purely on the defensive, webbing monitors and stage props, anything I could find, to use as makeshift shields. Each impact sent a jarring vibration up my arms. My body felt like one giant tuning fork, and he was relentless in striking it.
Then, he stopped. He stood mid-stage, bathed in a crimson light, and with a deliberateness that chilled me, he twisted a dial on his belt. The change was immediate and sickening. The pounding bass didn't vanish, but it was joined by something else, something insidious. A low, gut-churning thrum, a frequency that seemed to bypass my ears and drill directly into my brainstem.
The world tilted. It felt like standing on the deck of a ship in a violent storm. My equilibrium was gone. The stage beneath my feet seemed to lurch and sway. My spider-sense, my ultimate lifeline, went haywire. It was no longer a precise warning of incoming danger, but a constant, deafening scream of static, a psychic air-raid siren that offered no useful information, only overwhelming panic. Every direction felt like the wrong one. Every surface felt unstable.
The crowd responded instantly. Their unified chanting broke, but not into freedom. It became a frenzied, ecstatic roar. They weren't just swaying anymore; they were pressing forward, a tide of humanity surging toward the stage. Their movements were faster, jerkier, their eyes wider. The wave pushed Elaine closer, her small frame jostled by the crush. She was barely ten feet from the stage now, her face a mask of mindless adoration.
Hustler's voice cut through my disorientation, a calm anchor in the storm he'd created. "You see? It's not about force. It's about harmony. True connection." He began to walk toward the edge of the stage, his arms outstretched as if to embrace his flock. "You fight to maintain the broken status quo. The loner in his apartment, the bored housewife, the kid who feels invisible. I bind them together. I make them part of something bigger, something beautiful."
I tried to web his feet, but my aim was off. The web-line went wide, sticking to a speaker with a wet thwip. My head swam. I gripped the stage railing, my knuckles white, panting for breath that wouldn't come. The disorienting thrum was getting worse, making my thoughts feel syrupy and slow.
"You call it control—I call it harmony," Hustler declared, his voice a messianic boom over the frenzied pulse. "This is the future, Spider-Man. A world where everyone dances together, and I'm the one holding the mic."
He was at the very edge of the stage now, looming over the front row like a conquering king. My gaze locked onto Elaine. The faint, ambient light of the stage caught her eyes, and I saw they were glowing with a soft, unnatural blue light, the same color as the crystals on Hustler's belt. Her hand, trembling slightly, reached out toward him, an offering from a devoted subject to her monarch.
Her lips parted, and over the din, I could just barely hear her voice, a breathy, worshipful whisper.
"Hustler…"
The sound of my own girlfriend, a woman I loved, murmuring the name of the man who had stolen her mind, was a blow more devastating than any sonic blast. It shattered something deep inside me. All the strength, all the resolve, drained away, replaced by a cold, hollowing dread.
My own words were a choked whisper, lost to the beat, lost to the roar, lost to everything but my own failure.
"Elaine… no."