The city lights are bright as Valerie exit Hayden's car with Felicia.
"I'm going to try to find a place to park. In the meantime, good luck Valerie, you'll be great." he tells her, smiling.
She smiles back, and gives a small wave before he drives off. Felicia leads her to the backstage entrance, where two tall bodyguards block the entrance. Felicia shows them their pass and they allow them in.
"Will there be a pre-interview?" Valerie asks, remembering the several times she accompanied Hayden to an interview, but seldom participated.
"No, Betty likes to do honest interviews, that's why her show is so popular."
"Oh..." pre-interviews are when the interviewee and the interviewer discuss what the interview will be about before the cameras start rolling. Valerie will be completely unprepared.
In the small backstage waiting room, she and Felicia wait for the call, Valerie occasionally helping herself to a jelly bean from the bowl put out on the table. Felicia's phone rings, and she picks it up,
"Yes Normie? ...oh..." she looks over at Valerie, "No, I think she might be busy right now."
In between eating a few jelly beans, Valerie turns around and cocks her head, "Busy doing what?"
She smiles widely, "Uhm...never mind, here she is."
She hands her the phone, and the voice of Mr. Osborn comes in loud and clear, "Valerie, I just want to wish you luck on your interview. I know you’re probably nervous right now, but don’t be. Betty’s a wonderful interviewer.”
“Thank you Norman.” she formally replies, twirling a lock of her hair.
“Also, can Felicia hear us right now?” he asks, his tone lowering slightly.
She glances Felicia out of the corner of her eye, and sees that she’s glaring at her impatiently, her arms crossed.
“Yes, she’s in the room with me.”
“Go somewhere private. I need this to be between us.”
Valerie gets up, and leaves the backstage room. Not sure if she’s allowed to talk in the backstage hallway, she finds a bathroom and slips in.
“I’m alone.” she tells him.
“Good. So, I see you’ve been making good use of the suit.” he begins, “The press hasn’t decided on a name for you yet, but personally, I’m pushing for Tarantula, much more original than Spider-Woman.”
“Yeah, I was kind of thinking the same.” she agrees.
“Speaking of, I see you’ve partnered up with that Spider-Man.” he mentions, his tone shaky.
“Yes, we sort of...ran into each other. It sort of just...happened.”
“Well, thing is, Oscorp has had Spider-Man under surveillance ever since he stole his powers from us.” Mr. Osborn confesses.
“Why’s that?”
“We think he snuck into our nn facilities and stole our research on our radioactive spiders. And now he’s using the technology for himself.” he explains, “The spiders’ venom is mapped to its creator’s genes, so its properties wouldn’t work on me. That’s why we were trying to alter them with the radioactive lasers, but ever since you got hurt the safety department’s been breathing down our necks. I mean, imagined if you’d sued!”
She chuckles, “Sue you for giving me superhuman powers? I’d consider it a gift.”
He sighs, “Valerie...my life’s goal has always been to perform miracles, to leave behind a legacy. And...and with you, I think I’ve accomplished that goal. You’re only just starting out, but you’ve already done so much, and there’s so much more you can do. And me...let’s face it, surgeries or no surgeries, I’m fading fast. I’m in so much pain, all the time...I can’t handle it anymore. I’ve cancelled my further operations, don’t tell Felicia. I’m still got about a year left, but it doesn’t feel that long befo-”
His voice cuts off, although the line is still on. Valerie hears a crashing sound, like something falling, “Norman...Norman?! Mr. Osborn, are you there?!”
She runs out of the bathroom, nearly knocking over someone carrying coffee. The cup flies out of her hand, but Valerie catches it mid-air and hands it back to her in a split second before dashing to the backstage room,
“Felicia, I think there might be something wrong with Mr. Osborn, who’s with him?!”
“His nurse should be with him, I’ll call her.” she assures her, as Valerie passes back her phone.
Just then, a man enters the room, “Showtime Dr. Polina.”
“Okay.” she responds, “Felicia, make sure he’s alright, okay?”
“Of course I will.” she promises.
Valerie nervously follows the man to the edge of the stage. From there, she can see a well-lit stage, as well as a full house audience. In one chair is a well dressed woman with short brown hair,
“And now, for my guest tonight, I have not just an up-and-coming figure in the world of science medicine, but also a child genius. Please welcome: Dr. Valerie Polina!”
There’s applause in the audience as one of the stage hands pushes her on. Valerie slowly walks up the stage, trying to anticipate her every move. She shakes hands with Ms. Brant before taking a seat in the chair opposite her.
“So doctor, I know we seen plenty of your business partner Hayden Gull, that many of us thought he was the one running the company, but it’s actually you. How do you feel about that?”
Valerie pauses for a moment. She doesn’t really have an opinion on that either way, “Well, I mean, Mr. Gull enjoys the spotlight, while I prefer a much more private lifestyle. He’s much better at interviews anyway.”
“Well, in my humble opinion, I think you’re doing a wonderful job. I’ve been trying to get an interview with you since you came to New York, I think the world should know about your work. Could you tell us about what your company is doing at Oscorp?”
This is the easy question, “Well, most of what we’re doing with Oscorp is still under wraps. I can tell you that we’re making improvements to the AutoRevive system, and looking into supplying them to more developing countries.”
Ms. Brant’s face lights up, “Oh, aren’t you the philanthropist! Speaking of philanthropy, you’re often compared to Tony Stark of Stark Enterprises. Do you possibly also have a flying mechanical suit?”
She can’t help but chuckle, “Oh, no mechanical suit, I promise. I’ve never met Mr. Stark personally, but I’m certainly not as rich or as charismatic as I hear he is.”
“Wouldn’t it be amazing to have one of those things though?” she asks, going slightly off-topic.
Valerie nods, “It would, looks a little heavy though.”
“Moving on.” she continues, collecting herself, “You’re so young for a CEO, how did that come to be?”
“Well, for one, I was very lucky.” she explains, “My first grade teacher saw that I was much more advanced than the other kids...and that the other kids were beating on me constantly. So, she applied me to skip to the next grade, so I’d be in a more advanced class and away from those kids. But...second grade wasn’t any more advanced than first, and now the kids were even bigger, so it was a lot easier for them to beat on me too. So I kept asking to skip to the next grade, and that pattern continued all the way through high school.”
“And you graduated high school at...eleven?” Ms. Brant asks.
“Yep, and I was valedictorian.” she reminisces, “I remember giving my speech during graduation and spotting some guy snoring in the third row.”
“Did you call out on him?”
She shakes her head, “No, I was nervous enough as it was. And I wasn’t going to end my final year of high school getting beaten by kids seven years older than me.”
There’s a gasp from the audience. Even Ms. Brant looks surprised,
“So...I see you’ve had your fair share of bullying while at school. Care to share a little more?” she asks carefully.
“Well, I think it happens to everyone in one way or another. You kind of just have to learn to deal with it. Personally, I don’t think I handled it too well when I was in school. I talked back a lot, and then when they’d run out of words, they’d use physical force.”
“So would you say that bully victims just have to ‘suck it up and deal with it’?”
“No, no, no, I didn’t mean it like that. I’m saying that you should try to do something about it, whatever that may be. But at the same time, you don’t want to stoop to their level, although I’ll admit to doing that a couple of times. My solution was to try to skip to the next grade, hoping the next one would be better. And when I was forced to complete an entire year of high school to properly apply for college, I felt trapped.”
A buzzing noise comes from the studio and Betty rubs her eyes, “Oh...doctor, I’m afraid we’re out of time. That...that was...thank you for sharing that with us today.” she gets up and gives Valerie a tight hug, Valerie, caught off-guard by the gesture, doesn’t quite know how to react.
She waves goodbye to Ms. Brant as a stagehand leads her offstage. Felicia runs up and hugs her,
“Oh my gosh, that was amazing! You really put on a show there!”
“A...a show?” Valerie mumbles, recovering, it was all honest.
“Yes, did you see the audience? They were eating it up!” she exclaims, dancing over to the backstage room to collect her stuff.
Valerie spots a clock hanging on the backstage wall. She could still squeeze in an hour or two of superhero time if she skipped dinner. She wasn’t that hungry anyway, she just needed to get away, have some time to her thoughts.
“What are you waiting for? The audience is already filling out outside, they all want to meet you.” Felicia grabs her arm and pulls her to the backstage exit. The moment she opens the door, there’s a crowd of people surrounding the roped-off path that’s been set up for them. Valerie winces as camera flashes pop out at her.
They make their way through the path leading to the street, where Hayden’s car is waiting for them,
“Sorry it’s not a limo ladies.” Hayden smirks as they file into his BMW.
“It’s still a really nice car.” Valerie says, dizzily landing into her seat.
Hayden turns around to look at Valerie, “...was that a compliment? Wow...that interview must have really been freaking you out.”
“It was just...a lot happening at once.” she confesses, holding her head from the headache given to her by the bright lights of both the stage lights and camera flashes. Then she remembers, “Felicia, did you ever get ahold of Mr. Osborn?”
“Yeah, I called his nurse. He passed out from loss of blood sugar. It’s been happening more frequently lately, I think he’s getting worse.”
She knows she can’t tell her about Mr. Osborn, but would she find out anyway? She doesn’t want to deal with this right now.
“So...are we going home?” Valerie asks, as Hayden starts the car.
From the back view mirror, she can see Hayden twist his lips, “Sorry, I know you’re tired, but there’s still the interview after-party we have to go to.”
“After-party?” she dreads.
They pull up to a posh restaurant in downtown Manhattan. Hayden lets Valerie and Felicia off,
“I might join you two later, you know, if I ever find parking.”
Felicia laughs, “You are so funny.”
Hayden drives off while Valerie and Felicia walk into the restaurant. Valerie looks around at the small crowd in the restaurant. They’re all in fancy attire, even more so than her. They give a polite applause when she enters, and she sees their eyes trained on her. More reporters and cameras pop out and envelop her, all of them talking at once so loud that Valerie can’t make out a singular voice.
She spots an opening in the circle of paparazzi, “Uhm...excuse me.” taking this opportunity, she slips out of the ring of reporters and makes a break for the restaurant tables.
Maneuvering through the tables at lightning speed, she spots a staircase leading upstairs to the next floor. She takes it, her dress coat tailing behind her. She collapses on a small windowsill halfway up the staircase. Catching her breath from all the excitement, she looks out the window and sees the beautiful New York skyline. Even though she’s not that far up, she can still see the neon lights of the Manhattan streets. She notices the Oscorp building only a few blocks away. If Oscorp is that close, than her apartment shouldn’t be much farther. She could escape from here...she looks over her shoulder and sees the photographers haven’t spotted her yet. She pulls out her phone and texts Hayden,
“Left party early, not feeling well. Walking home, not too far.”
She puts her phone away and pulls up the window, a sudden breeze whipping her hair. With her heels still on, she ducks under the window and looks out over the city street. She stretches herself out, with both hands clinging to the outside arch of the window. And with both hands, she lets go, and falls to the ground.