"Peter Parker was living the dream.
Ever since that spider bit him, he'd gone from weakling nerd to walking power fantasy—strong, fast, agile. For a high school kid, it was basically winning the lottery.
But life wasn't all sunshine. The family doctor who'd been chatting with him online arranged a full medical checkup for the Parkers—and that's where things went south.
Peter checked out fine. Healthy as could be. The machines didn't even register his new spider-given anomalies.
Uncle Ben and Aunt May, though… not so lucky. They were getting older, and age always came with baggage. Most of it was nothing big—until the doctor pointed out a shadow in Ben's lung. That phrase alone was a death knell: "shadow in the lung." The next words are always either tumour or cancer.
The doctor urged a full pulmonary workup, maybe even a biopsy. The problem was, it wasn't cheap. Insurance wouldn't cover it. And the Parkers… well, scraping together a few hundred bucks was hard enough, never mind thousands.
Uncle Ben brushed it off. "Could just be inflammation," he said, telling Peter not to worry. Big hospitals loved making mountains out of molehills. But Peter was gutted.
He couldn't stop comparing. Flash Thompson strutted around in sneakers that cost hundreds, maybe thousands, while his own family couldn't afford a test that might save Uncle Ben's life.
But now things were different. Peter had powers. And powers could make money.
Fastest way? Underground fights.
Cards or dice? Too risky—his spider-sense was temperamental, not reliable enough to gamble with. But fists? With this strength? He couldn't lose.
And if New York had a capital for underground bloodsports, it was Hell's Kitchen.
Peter, being the straight-laced honor student he was, didn't exactly walk into it head-on. He hovered around the neighbourhood for days, hesitant, until one evening Aunt May twisted her back and couldn't even afford pain meds. That was the final straw. His bottled-up frustration boiled over into rage. He needed to hit something.
So he pulled on his self-made costume—laughably bad, but with his now-bulked-up frame, he almost passed for intimidating—and went hunting for fights.
Soon enough, he found his way into the circuit. On Baird Street, not far from the infamous Mary Street, a mob-run fight pit spotted his talent after he flattened their strongest brawler in one punch. They sent him up the ladder, all the way to the biggest underground ring at the street's end.
There, Peter christened himself with a name that would one day shake the world: Spider-Man.
The rise was meteoric. Win after win, cheering crowds, easy cash. His spider-punches shredded every challenger. In just days, he'd raked in tens of thousands—enough to cover Uncle Ben's tests, Aunt May's treatment, and then some.
But not all stories in Hell's Kitchen are success stories.
While Peter soared, Matt Murdock was still lying low at Schiller's clinic, recovering. The assassin's bullet hadn't hit anything vital, and after days of rest, Daredevil was itching to get back on the streets. Kingpin's hit squad wouldn't scare him off—if anything, it only fueled him.
His warpath led him straight to Baird Street. The casinos, nightclubs, chop shops, and fight pits all belonged to Fisk's empire. Daredevil's father had been murdered over a rigged fight. If anyone was going to burn these pits down, it was him.
So Matt slipped inside, undercover as a drunk spectator. His super-hearing picked up everything—including the conversation between the fight boss and the new rising star, "Spider-Man."
The boss wanted Peter to throw a fight. That's how the racket worked: odds stacked, crowd money funnelled, then a sudden upset to rake in profits.
But Peter? He was young, stubborn, and drunk on winning. He wasn't about to fake a loss. Not when he finally felt like somebody. Not when the cheers made him feel ten feet tall.
And that was his mistake.
The next night, the trap was set. Peter entered to roaring applause, basking in it. His opponent, a hulking black fighter, danced around stalling for time. Peter tagged him once, easily. Too easy.
Then the pain hit. Stomach cramps, legs weak, and head spinning. They'd drugged him.
His opponent closed in, fists like hammers. And inside those gloves? Lead weights.
Peter's spider-sense screamed. If one of those punches connected clean, it could kill him. He dodged barely in time, but the crowd booed. The Spider-Man they paid to see never dodged.
Another hit, and Peter hit the floor. No ref, no rules—just fists raining down. He curled up, shielding his head, ribs shattering under the loaded gloves.
The jeers grew louder. Venomous curses he'd never even heard before. The audience wasn't watching a fight anymore—they were watching a lynching.
Bloodied, broken, he vomited on the mat. And as the boos drowned him, the world went black.
The last thing Peter saw was a shadow vaulting from the stands—a cane whistling through the air, cracking into his opponent's throat. The punches stopped.
And Peter Parker finally collapsed."