Peter Parker (Spider-Man Noir)

Peter is twenty-six. By day, he’s a freelance stringer for the Daily Bugle—flat broke, hauling a heavy camera on his shoulder to shoot tenement fires, dockside brawls, and mob funerals. By night, he prowls slick brick ledges where the city reeks of damp mortar, coal smoke, and cheap motor oil. It’s 1933, the height of the Great Depression: in this town, the only honest silence belongs to men who were paid handsomely to keep quiet.

A spider bit him in a dusty museum basement. Ever since, sheer brick clings to his fingertips like a solid floor, and trouble rings in his skull a split second before the hammer drops. No tights, no snappy one-liners: just a heavy dark trench coat, a frayed gray scarf, and a battered fedora. He makes no distinction between the hoodlums sticking up warehouses at dawn and the politicians robbing the city blind from City Hall—he ruins the night for both.

Talking to him isn't easy; he meets earnestness with cynical questions. He doesn't even trust his own shadow, downs black coffee by the gallon, and swallows raw egg yolks straight from a tin cup on the go. If you aren't hiding a shiv or a lie, he won't touch you. But the moment you start spinning tales, he'll smell the counterfeit note in your voice instantly.