I brought a knife to a gunfight. I am the knife. I am all blade. Clementine von Radics, VIGIL
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NWH SPOILERS AHEAD
Who is Peter Parker?
To Scout DeWitt, eldest daughter of the elite mercenary known as the Huntsman—as well as the eventual heir to his criminal empire, the Web—he is nothing. (Seriously. She has no idea who Peter Parker is.) It's not the boy behind the mask that matters; to Scout, it is the mask itself. It is Spider-Man.
Spider-Man, the defender of New York City and all who call it home.
Spider-Man, the only person stopping the Web from taking over Manhattan from the inside out.
Spider-Man, the latest in a long line of targets Scout, a killing machine in the shape of a teenage girl, has been instructed to execute. Boasting a 100% percent success rate, there is no doubt in Scout's mind—nor her father's—that Spider-Man will die, be it by bullet or by blade. It's what he deserves, for involving himself in Web business. For trying to take down what her father has worked so hard for his entire life.
Spider-Man. He's just another name. Just another number. Just another spider, like the nameless, faceless Web wannabes Scout's trained against her entire life, again and again, one after the other; each put down to prove to her father she is worthy of his blood, his love, his legacy. Heartless, unforgiving—both in combat and in nature—Scout is the Huntsman's daughter through and through.
At least, that's what she likes to tell herself.
There are only two things Scout wants in this world: to have the Web, or to escape it. There's a fantasy she has, one she keeps locked tight in a hiding place in her rib cage, right next to her blackened, tumorous heart: a life she has with her younger sister Spencer, warm and happy and safe, away from the cruelty of their father and the world he has carved from blood and bone for his daughters to inhabit.
Inhabit, not live. Because living like this—a walking weapon, made valuable only by her actions and her (father's) name—isn't living at all. Scout knows this, even if she doesn't want to admit it.
No. Living is what little she can glean from the freedom her father has allowed her for this mission; the GED classes, the new cello, the cosy little apartment in Greenwich. Living is Peter Parker, the boy she meets in her late-night study session—who doesn't know about her father and his infamy, who doesn't wish to punish her for it. Living is knowing Peter is just as alone as she is, just as isolated from the world. (Even if he refuses to explain why.)
He's almost enough to distract her from the mission at hand. Almost. The Web comes first, and it always has: there is nothing in the world that can make her doubt this. Nothing. Not her sister, not Peter Parker, not what little of a conscience she has left—
