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o.
Hot, red, burning. Venom knows they’re about to die, the flames lick along their skin, burning it away to ash on the wind. But they don’t both have to die. Venom can save Eddie. It will cost them their life, but this… this is worth it. Eddie showed them the best of humanity and he can live on and save the earth another day.
Goodbye Eddie.
They spread themself thin, catching as much air as possible, slowing Eddie’s descent to a speed he’ll survive the entry into the water.
“Venom! No!”
The fire rips through their whisper-thin form, scattering their essence into dust. The last thing they know is the sound of Eddie hitting the water, and then black, dark, and quiet.
i.
Cold, dark, time passes… warmth? Venom stretches their consciousness toward the warmth, and comes into contact with something living. They slide into its skin, consuming it nearly utterly in an instant. It was some kind of lower life form, similar to the “lobster” Eddie had consumed during their first encounter together.
Eddie. Venom had to get back to Eddie. They didn’t know how long they had been drifting in the cold depths of the Bay, but even an instant was too long. But they were so… weak. They didn’t want to admit it, but even the act of bonding with the thing they had just eaten had been nearly impossible.
Another sliver of warmth flitted above them, and Venom lanced toward it. The fish was bigger and more mobile than the crustacean, and Venom barely made contact with it before it darted out of reach. They were pulled along behind it as they struggled to enter through scales, and they had only managed to get a few tendrils in before a much larger animal came up behind and grabbed the fish in its mouth. It consumed it and Venom both in one gulp. This animal was not only bigger, it was warmer, a mammal.
Venom digested what they could from the fish before expanding past the mammal’s stomach. They were tired, and although they didn’t truly sleep as life on Earth would, there was a sort of hibernation state that they could enter, to regenerate faster. It wasn’t what Venom wanted, but their energy reserves were nearly depleted, and it would take time to digest what they had already consumed. They curled up just below the mammal’s spine and their consciousness drifted back into a mindless drift.
ii.
The mammal proves to be a good source of the chemicals they need, at least temporarily. Venom nearly exhausts its body, but leave it just short of death, something it can recover from in time. It hauls itself up onto a pier, and Venom surfaces from its skin to peer around with their own head. It’s daytime now, but Venom doesn’t know if it’s been one night or a hundred. Time had very little meaning in the cold depths, and they don’t know how long they were in the sea mammal.
It flops against the deck boards, and Venom vaults out of its body, into another of its kind. They have enough energy and control now to force the mammal to move around. Venom has a vague grasp of the geography of this city, but that’s all from the tops of buildings and a bit of street level around Eddie’s dwelling. If they’re going to have any chance, they have to get into a human who can get them into the city. But this mammal won’t approach a human, and try as they might, Venom can’t force it to.
They hop from mammal to mammal, skimming resources off the top of each, just to top up the energy it takes to do this, until they land on something different. This is smaller than the sea mammals, and it has feet. A land mammal, excellent.
This appears to be a “dog”, at least from what Venom had seen in Eddie’s memories. It was much bigger than the dog that had hosted them in the hospital had been. This dog was following a pair of humans, connected by a strap from one of their hands to a collar on the dog’s neck. The collar made Venom itchy, but they had expended far more energy than they had originally intended to, and it would take too much to leave the dog now. They took care not to pull too much energy from the dog, it needed to live long enough to support them so they could get further into the city.
While they nibbled delicately on its pancreas, they also rode in its brain, looking out of its eyes. Its vision was different from both Venom’s own eyes and a human’s sight, but the wealth of information inundating Venom through the dog’s nose more than made up for it. They knew that this was nowhere near the neighborhood they needed, but there weren’t enough landmarks for Venom to figure out exactly where they were. The humans took the dog inside a building, presumably their dwelling, and released it from the leash. The dog scratched at its ear, and the primitive emotions Venom read on its brain told them that it was trying to dislodge the symbiote.
Venom was sorely tempted to make the jump to one of the humans when they petted the dog, but there still wasn’t enough energy. Once again they would have to wait in this body until their own was strong enough.
As it turned out over the next few hours, the dog was a highly incompatible host, and it was all Venom could do to not pull all the phenethylamine they could find out of the dog and leave it a husk. But no, they could not, they would not, the dog, by some stretch, was capable of reason, and Venom remembered Eddie shrinking in horror at the idea of Venom eating a dog. So Venom would not eat the dog.
But the dog… the dog could eat meat.
It was the middle of the night, and Venom had regained enough strength to pilot the dog to the kitchen, and into the cold box. There they directed it to eat every scrap of meat it could find. It was dead food, but it was still better than the pebbles the humans had provided it in its bowl.
iii.
Venom was restless again, they were ready to try one of the humans, but the humans were sleeping, and the dog couldn’t manage the doorknob. Venom didn’t have quite enough mass to extend themself from the dog and open it with their own form, so all they could do was wait, and try not to kill the dog.
The shorter of the humans emerges first, and Venom allows the dog to follow its normal morning routine. It follows the human around until the human fills its bowl with the pebbles again. Unfortunately for Venom, the human doesn’t make contact with the dog, and instead goes off to the kitchen to obtain sustenance. A loud shout comes from the kitchen, and the dog goes to investigate.
The human is standing in front of the cold box, and the dog comes up behind, bumping into the human’s thigh. Venom seizes the opportunity, and surges into the human through thin cloth pants.
The human is too angry with the dog to notice their entry, and it… he begins scolding the dog. Venom almost feels bad for the animal, but in the meantime, they begin work on consuming the human’s neurotransmitters.
The human goes through his morning routine after evicting the dog to the backyard, and Venom notices a definite uptick in the human’s temperature as the hours progress. He’s proving to be an even worse host than the dog, and Venom needs to get out before they cause irreparable damage.
The taller human finally puts in an appearance, and as soon as he sees his partner, he rushes over.
“Babe, you look terrible,” he says, pressing a hand to the other’s head.
“I feel like I’m a thousand degrees,” Venom’s host says. “I’m gonna call off work today. Plus Buddy somehow got in the fridge last night and ate like all the meat.”
Venom gathers their mass and passes through the hand to the taller human, who jumps at the contact.
“The fuck was that?” he says, looking at his palm.
“Dunno,” the short human says.
“Go back to bed, hun,” the tall human says. “I’ll make you some breakfast.”
The short human disappears back up into the upper floors of the house. The tall human bustles about his task, making food for himself and his partner, and Venom manages to gently prod him into dumping most of a bottle of chocolate sauce into his cereal.
This task done, Venom retreats to the man’s abdomen to lurk until he is somewhere that Venom can find a new host. He eventually leaves, and out on the street again, Venom is seeking any host that could support them. Unfortunately for them, this man works outside the city and takes them farther away than they were even to start with.
iv.
Venom remains in the tall human for the better part of three days before they have a chance to escape. It’s into a series of mammals and birds that bring them deeper into the city. They use the birds to make short hops across the city. Squirrels and pigeons can’t support their form for more than a few minutes and they kill more than one of them before making a desperate hop across open air into another. They make it to a bigger animal, something close to a dog, but with sharper claws and a more flexible spine.
This animal (a human calls it a “cat”) is the best host they have found since the sea mammal, and they grasp the opportunity to recuperate in a host they won’t kill, if only for a few hours. It’s been at least two days since they left the last human, and animal hosts just aren’t as productive as human ones. If they had bones, they would be bone weary by this point, but they’re so close.
(They keep telling themself that. They have to be close.)
(If they can’t find Eddie, Venom doesn’t know what they’re going to do, so they have to find Eddie.)
(Eddie is good. Eddie is home. )
The cat has a daily patrol that brings it around to multiple houses where it gorges itself on the offerings of the humans within. It’s fairly smug with itself, and Venom doesn’t blame it. Eventually, night falls, and the cat wanders down an alley that Venom is sure they recognize. They stretch themself up and up, out of the cat’s back, trying to find the right window. But they’re all dark, and Venom’s own eyes are unreliable as weak as Venom is.
The cat hops up a fire escape and settles into a box for the night. Venom is forced to retreat into its body, and strongly resists the urge to consume the cat whole.
v .
The next morning finds the cat making its rounds again, and Venom can’t convince it to stay in the alley, which they’re sure is one that abuts Eddie’s apartment. The cat has a mind of its own, and Venom takes the chance when a man stops to pet it to move into him instead. They’re smaller now than they were even when they left the sea mammals, having started to consume their own essence in a desperate attempt not to kill their hosts. The man is far from an ideal host, but he will have to do.
Venom doesn’t have the wherewithal to control him, and they have to just ride along as he goes through his day, not noticing the symbiote simmering in his gut.
Venom gets a jolt of phenethylamine when the man consumes an entire chocolate bar in one bite. If they had the energy, they’d laugh at the cravings they’re giving him, but they don’t, so instead they just move up to wrap around his brain and look through his eyes. It’s late afternoon, and the man is in an office somewhere. Venom doesn’t know if this is anywhere near where they picked the man up, but he can only hope.
As the sun westers, the man leaves the office, puts on his jacket, and goes down to the street. He catches a bus, and it whisks him away. When he alights, Venom is relieved to see that it’s in the same neighborhood that they had left this morning. They don’t want to alert the man to their presence just yet, and it takes iron control not to override him and tear off through the night across rooftops. They would run out of fuel halfway through and it just wouldn’t be a good situation for anyone involved.
The man consumes his evening meal, a steak that’s so rare it looks like it’s never even seen a pan and a large pile of French fries. Not tater tots, but they’ll have to do.
He goes to his wardrobe and pulls out an outfit that reveals rather more of his skin than Venom had thought humans liked revealing. This activity didn’t seem to be leading to anything productive (at least for Venom) so they retreated to his chest. The man left the apartment and walked a few blocks to a building that reverberated with the bass of music and reeked of sweat and alcohol.
He waited in line to enter, and soon was gyrating on the dancefloor. The alcohol he was consuming made Venom nauseous, but they couldn’t burn it off without alerting him to something wrong with his body, so they avoided his stomach, forsaking his torso for his head again. They chanced a look through his eyes, and saw a mass of bodies and flashing lights.
The human’s body temperature was rising, and Venom had very little to do with it. The blood flow to his nether regions indicated arousal, and Venom was just along for the ride as he murmured in someone’s ear, “You wanna take this somewhere a little more private?”
The other person apparently agreed to it, and Venom was ready to abandon this host for another on the dancefloor when suddenly the man and his lust interest were outside, and the man had the other person backed against the wall of the alley, their lips locked together.
A jolt of sensation washed through Venom as the taste of the other person entered the man’s mouth.
They knew that taste.
Eddie.
+1
They almost surged up over the man’s face, and over Eddie’s hands, but suddenly the man was pushing Eddie away.
“You all right, man?” Eddie asked.
“Just not feelin it dude, sorry,” the man said.
Venom flowed down the man’s leg, and stretched themself across the ground, barely managing to grab the hem of Eddie’s jeans before the other man fled down the alley.
Eddie shoved his hands in his pants pocket, and huffed to himself. “Well fuck me, I guess,” he muttered.
Venom felt a wave of exhaustion wash over them at that moment, and it was all they could do do flow up Eddie’s pant leg and into the pocket of his hoodie. Bonding with him would take too much energy, they needed food first, and it wasn’t safe to show themself here.
Luckily for them, Eddie decided to head home then, and it took him a matter of minutes to get there. It was the same apartment that he had lived in before, although the damage was now patched, at least somewhat.
He entered the single room and kicked off his shoes before collapsing face down on the bed and groaning. Venom was ensconced between Eddie’s body and the bed, and they almost melted into a puddle at the warmth. It was, apparently, just this change in consistency that alerted Eddie to their presence.
He jumped up, skittering back from the bed. Venom was still in his kangaroo pocket, so they went with him, and sort of sloshed around in the fabric. Eddie’s back hit the wall, and he cautiously moved the fabric to peer into his pocket.
“Venom?” he asked cautiously, and Venom mustered just enough energy to extend a single tentacle.
Eddie plucked them out, and cradled them in his hands, their form so small they fit in the cup his palms made.
“V, I thought you were dead,” Eddie said, and Venom manages to form eyes just enough to see Eddie’s blurry face, and what they think are tears. “How… what... “ He can’t seem to form a coherent sentence, and Venom is trying to gather enough energy to respond when Eddie presses his face into Venom’s mass.
Somehow this is easier, and they seep into his body, relishing the feel of a compatible host, relishing the feel of Eddie again.
Hungry they manage to think.
“Oh shit, buddy, of course you are,” Eddie says, and jumps up. He raids his kitchen, shoving as much chocolate as he can find into his mouth. Venom soaks up the phenethylamine as soon as it hits Eddie’s system, and it’s like a shot of caffeine. It won’t last, but it’s enough for temporary energy. They’re going to need to hibernate again, but first, first, Eddie.
“How are you alive?” Eddie asks after finishing the last Snickers in the apartment.
Eddie Venom says, it’s all they have the capacity for, but they push the memories of the series of hosts between then-Eddie and now-Eddie at him.
“Jesus,” Eddie breathes. “If I had known…”
Venom wants nothing more than to form a head and have a conversation with Eddie, but they compromise by forming a hand that emerges from Eddie’s wrist to clasp his hand.
Found you anyway.
“Yeah, V, yeah you did.”
We are happy? It’s not supposed to be a question, but it is.
Eddie pulls his hand up to kiss the back of Venom’s hand. “I’d tell you you have no idea how happy, but you’re actually able to read my thoughts, so why don’t you look for yourself?”
It’s not quite right, Venom can’t actually read Eddie’s thoughts, but there’ll be time later correct that. For now, they can sense the flood of neurotransmitters that translate as “happy”. They skim just a little off the top, and glow with the feeling.
“Yeah, just like that,” Eddie says. “I missed you.”
Eddie. We like Eddie.
“I like you too, V,” Eddie says.
And just like that, Venom’s burned through their supply of chocolate energy.
Have to sleep, Eddie. Won’t leave again.
“And I’ll be here when you wake up,” Eddie said, his voice wavering.
Venom retreats to Eddie’s chest, taking up residence just over his heart. They snuggle in, moving just enough that Eddie knows where they are. He presses a hand over his chest, and they press a thin tentacle up to push against his palm.
And then
Warm, dark… together.