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It started with a sound so loud that Eddie had to grab his ears in hope of blocking it out. It hurts so much that he swear that his face was trying to melt away. He can feel his skin ripping apart from him, screaming louder than him. Its as if his organs were going to implode the longer he stayed here. He wants to run but he can't open his eyes to see where to go. He was on the verge of collapse as the sound got to a higher pitch when suddenly he was grabbed by a familiar hand and pulled away from the screeching of the MRI and sees the doors shut in front of him as he fell to the floor. His body still shaking from the nonexistent pain.
“ That was trying to kill him?!” he heard Anne ask from behind him. But his focus was on the black slime like creature that was slowly crawling to the door with a weak attempt to jump up at the glass to get back to Eddie before falling back on the tiles and melting into the cracks as of it wasn't there at all. He felt sad when it disappeared, though, he couldn't figure out why. A pain in his chest, like it was missing something. Missing the slime perhaps? Why was he so attached to that slime creature? There was a sigh.
“It's a shame that you killed it before it could kill you.”
Another voice said behind him. Eddie quickly put his back to the glass doors and looked up to see Carlton Drake glaring down at him with a huge smile. “ I mean it was killing two bird with one stone. You'll stop interfering with my research and I'll have the symbiote back at last.” Carlton walked closer as he spoke. “But I guess that I have to get my hands dirty after all, right Riot?” He stopped in front of Eddie as he grew taller with the silver symbiote swiftly closing him inside.
“ Have a nice life, Brock .” they said as they kneel down and put their claws around his throat, cutting off his airways with an explosion.
Yes, an explosion is why he can't breathe at the moment. Eddie turns and coughed up the rest of the water that was stuck in his lungs. He was hot and soaking wet from falling into the ocean. Sitting in the sand, he looks back over the water at the rest of the falling debris and flames that finally killed Riot and his insufferable host. He was safe and sound on the beach and he was extremely depressed about it. Eddie feels like he was forgetting something important. Something that saved him. Something that died for him. His chest still aches. He puts his hands over his face trying to remember what was missing from his life. The missing memory came back with a vengeance that was consuming him like a parasite.
A tear runs down his face.
“ Eddie .” a familiar voice called out in front of him. “ Eddie .” Eddie dropped his hands to see Venom standing in front of him. All around them was a pure white room that made the black symbiote stand out but Eddie is just overjoyed that Venom was alive and well. He came back to him! He tried to raise his hand to it and ask it to bond with him again only to find it really hard to move a broken arm. In fact, a lot of him was broken it seemed. Both legs are showing bone, it was hard to breathe so he must have his ribs broken and he can see his fingers twisted in an unnatural way. Car accident, his brain has put together the memory of an epic car and drone chase and its conclusion; his broken body. It was a bit of a shock but he knew Venom could help put him back together.
“ Eddie, we're hungry.”
“Okay buddy. Just come over here and we'll go find some bad guys to eat. Maybe afterwards, we'll go get some chocolate.” Eddie smiles at him, still attempting to raise his hand as Venom slowly walks closer.
“ No, Eddie. We're hungry.”
His hand finally started to move when it hits him that Venom said we’re hungry and not I'm hungry. Confusion must have been written on his face since Venom started to chuckle.
“I've found myself a better host, stronger, with less moral rules.” He was now in front of Eddie, with a wide toothy grin. His arm stretched from his body and wrapped around Eddie in a tight grip and lifted him up in the air. Eddie gasped at the pressure his broken bones are now getting. “Because you were such a good host, We'll eat you first. I promise it'll be practically painless.”
Venom opened his mouth, ready to swallow Eddie whole. “I…” he started which made Venom stop and look at him, curious of what he's about to say. Eddie looks into the swirling eyes in front of him. “ I thought we were Venom…”
“Oh Eddie,” Venom says as he rises the sweaty man above his head “You never were.” and he let go of his hold while his mouth opened as wide as it could.
Time seems to move slower as he fell into that dark abyss of teeth. Of course Venom never meant to stay with him. No one ever stays with him for too long. Everything he does is a mistake because he's a loser. Anne couldn't stand to be with a loser who lost them both their jobs, no one wants to hire a loser who has a tainted record , hell even his father knew how much of a loser he was by the time he could walk and he never let him forget it. “ You came in second place, that makes you a loser, Edward!”
But it seems to hurt more then Riot's spike into his heart,hurts more than Anne's calm demeanor when she gave him back the engagement ring, to hear that Venom only thought of him as lower than dirt. He thought that they'd build something together, a strange friendship of sorts.
He opened his eyes that he hasn't realized closed, tears rolling down-or up in this case- his face. He felt Venoms’ teeth starting to close around his waist. Well at least he'll die helping his friend, no matter what they think.
With his last breath in the inky darkness, he whispered: “Mask.”
Copy
Eddie woke up taking deep breaths, his nightmare fading away into reality. He slowly sits up and looks around his apartment, everything is in place but something seems wrong. He moves to get out of bed when he realizes that he was covered in a moving black liquid. He was Venom.
“Um Ve-” he started but Venom already was being to retreat back under his skin. With a sigh he lays back in bed. “What's wrong bud?” he felt Venom move around his body, almost as if he was pacing back and forth.
I...would never eat you or replace you. You're mine .
It took him a second to understand what he was talking about. “I know.”
The movement within him stopped and a blob of a head appeared on his chest looking at him. Staring at him. A quite angry stare. He pets it. Venom eyes turn to slits and purrs. It's surprising relaxing. “ You're mine. ” he mumbles again. Eddie hums his response.
Venom stays unusually quiet as Eddie falls back to sleep. The last thing he heard before his unconscious try to take him was a whisper.
“ We’ll always be Venom, Eddie.”