Now You See Me

A New York State of Mind.

Part of heroism is being able to see the future and still remain standing. If you don't believe in God or Fate you must still believe in narrative.
HEATHER HAVRILESKY

          Juliet Young is not a hero, but it's understandable if you were to mistake her for one. With her inconvenient habit of standing up for those who can't stand up for themselves, her superhuman mastery of various forms of combat, her lack of a consistent love interest and—don't forget!—her gritty, depressing personal backstory, she checks all the boxes. She even has the powers: a skilled telepath, she possesses the ability to warp anyone's perception of reality—to get inside their mind, to twist it, to break it.

          But she's not a hero. Not anymore.

          Once, she was Phantasma, part of the up-and-coming superhero team the Saviours. Now, Juliet is known as the Illusionist, a mutant-for-hire who will do anything you want for the right price—whether it's to fulfil your deepest, darkest fantasies within the safety of your own subconscious, or wage psychological trauma so violently visceral it can reduce you to a hollowed-out husk of a human being. Either way, you'll be paying handsomely; a high-end mercenary with contractual loyalty to whoever has enough to afford the exorbitant price for her services, the Illusionist is the one you call when you want to send a message. And it's a message the recently-incarcerated Wilson Fisk wants to send to his beloved New York City, to remind them that he's not gone, not permanently. That he'll be back, once his legal team get him out of the web of a court case Spider-Man has trapped him in, and that his city should be waiting patiently for his return.

          Juliet signs her name on that dotted line assuming that her job is to hold the line while Fisk is gone. Then, she learns of her real role: to take care of a new threat surfacing in New York City, one that the Kingpin can't crush from his prison cell. A market for mutants has set up shop in the criminal underworld, where anyone who's willing can put themselves through an experimental drug trial and go from zero-to-hero (or as the advertisements, suspicious in nature and vague in origin, say.) Itching to stake a claim on the city while Fisk is otherwise engaged, his rivals have capitalised on the trials, sending their men into the narcotic unknown in the hopes that what returns will be weapons strong enough to destroy his criminal empire.

          But Kingpin has a weapon of his own—the Illusionist, who sets her sights on Spider-Man after he, surprise surprise!, takes issue with the mental trauma she's inflicting on her boss' enemies. Peter Parker blames himself, in all honesty; after Fisk's arrest, New York City has been holding its breath, and to be frank, so has he. Sure, he took down the big bad, but his (well, Spider-Man's) actions have left a gaping void in the hierarchy of New York's underbelly and too many people who want to fill it.

          So, yeah, he sees the power vacuum coming.

          But not the insanely-OP mutant enforcer who hates superheroes and all they stand for. Deeply unimpressed with the self-inflated sense of importance she believes Spider-Man possesses, the Illusionist wants nothing to do with the guy (and technically, as per her contract, he's a threat to Kingpin's empire and thus must be dealt with.)

          Peter isn't the Illusionist's biggest fan either, not by far: her methods break too many laws and too many bones for his liking. But despite their differences, he can recognise some shred of goodness in her—some scrap of the hero she was before the Saviours chewed her up and spat her out. (And Juliet can acknowledge, albeit reluctantly, that her goals of cleaning up the city in her own way align more with Spider-Man than they do with Kingpin.) So, mercenary and hero form an alliance to get to the bottom of the mutant mess.