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There was a reason that Venom wore gloves. They were a layer of separation, a border between control and chaos. Reliable, replaceable, and removable. Not that he ever actually took them off.
There was a time where you could catch a glimpse of Venom’s bare hands, just after he was taken on by the Guild. When he was still openly defiant and openly disposable. When he was still a child. When Zato wasn’t there.
Venom never really got used to killing. He just got past it. Every job, every mission, he would move past his doubt and fears and disgust, sliding above it all with the help of his pure devotion to the man who had saved him. The violence was worth it to him, worth the way his skin would crawl for hours after blows were exchanged, worth the way his feet seemed to stick to the ground despite willing himself to move.
So he kept the gloves on. Business became life, and killing became simply part of the job. His hands stayed clean, even as the rest of him rotted away. As long as he could still hold a cue, he could carry on.
But now, for some inexplicable reason, Venom found his gloves off, hands bare except for the cuffs of his jacket and a thick layer of blood. And it took Venom a moment to realize that the blood was not his. It would have been better if it was.
He looked down. He could not recognize the body below him. But he screamed.
Hardly becoming of an assassin, to be rattled by his very trade, but Venom never tended to feel anything this… viscerally. But despite this knowledge of what he should be feeling, how he should be acting, panic still rose in Venom’s brain.
The scariest part was that he didn’t know. He didn’t know what he had done. He couldn’t remember receiving this job, no preparation or travel present in his mind. He did know that he had finished it. Venom knew he had killed the person below him, without a doubt.
As he gasped for air, he looked at his hands once more. Still red, still bloody. He instinctively moved to wipe them off on his pants, staining the white half near irreparably. He couldn’t bring himself to care at the moment. His only desire was to get the blood off.
The blood didn’t care. The blood crawled up Venom’s hands and onto his wrists, growing and spreading as he tried desperately to rid himself of it. It wormed its way under his sleeves, up his arms, infesting his body slowly but surely. It kept climbing, disregarding any contact with other surfaces, small transfers doing nothing to slow its growth.
Venom found himself dropping to his knees, staring at the blood on his arms and hands as his jacket began to soak with it, drips falling onto the already messy ground. He couldn’t stand it. The feeling was too much, all at once too warm and too cold, too soft and too piercing.
There was a distinct prickling in Venom’s skin. Maybe the foreign blood was making its way into him. Maybe it was staining his veins, his heart, his soul. Maybe he would never be clean again. Maybe he would always look at his hands and see red, and maybe he would always panic when something touched his bare skin, and maybe he would never breathe without his lungs heaving again, and maybe—
He jolted awake.
Venom sat up quickly, hands in fists around the sheets beneath him. The room was quiet, save for his own labored breathing and a very soft mechanical whirring. As he pushed his hair out of his face, he glanced to the other side of the bed, confirming that Robo-Ky was still asleep. He was fine. They were both fine.
And yet Venom found himself standing in the bathroom in front of the mirror, washing his hands as the adrenaline flooding his body refused to retreat. The feeling of blood was still there, faintly, even as he ran steady streams of water over his skin.
Venom’s hands were exposed a lot more often lately. Granted, he still wore gloves, but it was more to protect others than himself. Foodborne illness was no joke, and he and his pastries weren’t going to be the reason some poor soul got sick anytime soon. But outside of work hours, he found no real reason to wear gloves anymore, so he just… didn’t. The choice was freeing.
Robo-Ky said he liked Venom’s hands. He often watched Venom work, given that was really one of the only things he could do before they’d saved up enough to get him a new body. He said there was something delicate about how Venom looked when he was baking—yes, thorough and methodical, but still soft. Fond.
Venom looked at his hands now, and didn’t understand how there could ever be anything fond about him, when every passing day he felt a bit more like he ruined everything he had ever touched, bloodstains left on hands and shoulders and arms and hearts of every person who came across him. Even now, he could see the marks on every person he’d cared for—or tried to, at least.
Turning off the faucet and shaking some of the water off his hands, Venom gripped the sink, staring into the mirror in front of him. Though his hair was tied back for sleep, some strands of hair had slipped out, as they always did. One eye was covered, replaced by white and blue, a segment of an eye that Venom had not used in quite a while. An unblinking stare.
He still couldn’t bring himself to cut off his bangs. They’d been part of him for so long, now an integral piece of his identity. If he couldn’t cover his face, become imperceptible as a human being, then what was he?
Venom hooked a finger into the elastic band holding his hair together, brushing the rest over his ears and onto his face. The relative darkness was a cold comfort, even in the dim lighting of the bathroom. He closed his eyes, moving his arms down to his sides and digging his nails into his palms.
God, he was pathetic. Still finding relief in the same things he used to, even when he wasn’t being made to murder. Why had he even left the Guild? Was there any point in taking the knife out if the scars would never truly heal?
Since he’d been given the bakery, these thoughts had played through Venom’s head, like a ticker on a newscast—hidden, but never truly gone. So often there seemed to be no point to any action Venom would take to sever himself from his past, because it would always come creeping back, inevitably. He should be fine now. He was free, and safe, and loved, and that should have been all he needed. But still his brain would not abandon the Guild, the violence of it all.
Silently, Venom walked out of the bathroom. With the utmost caution, he opened the closet door, lifting it ever so slightly to avoid the loud squeak its hinges made. Without thinking, he picked out a vaguely presentable outfit, though not caring if things fit well. More important was the item he knelt down to find, shuffling about the fallen clothing on the floor until his knuckles brushed up against cold metal.
Venom grabbed the handle of the case, placing it lightly on his side of the bed and flicking open the latches. Inside laid his pool cue, broken down for travel and nested into lined cutouts made to hold this very item. But he ignored the cue for now, in favor of a small zipper near the top of one side of the case. He rooted inside it for a moment, before pulling out two identical scraps of fabric—gloves.
He snapped the case shut a bit too quickly, wincing at the noise. His eyes landed on Robo-Ky, ears straining to pick out the soft hum of his sleeping form. When, after a few moments, he didn’t stir, Venom let out a breath he didn’t realize he was holding. More quietly now, he grabbed the backpack he’d been keeping unused on the floor near his side, shoving the metal case inside it—a backpack was a bit less conspicuous than a metal briefcase, after all.
After changing into his street clothes, he took a few more items before leaving—his wallet, sturdy shoes, and… his hand hovered over the small printed picture of him and Robo-Ky he kept on his nightstand. He brought it back to his side for a moment, before darting his arm out to grab it, stuffing it in his pocket.
Venom slung the backpack over his shoulder, opening the bedroom door with a bit less care than he had the closet and continuing out into the rest of their apartment. He didn’t look at anything he didn’t absolutely have to. The hair made that easier.
He stopped near the front door, glancing at the side table and its small basket of stationary. After a moment of pause, he grabbed a pad of sticky notes from the precarious stacks of small paper goods, and a stray pen.
I have decided to leave. It seems my mind cannot escape the Guild, and I fear it never will, so there’s no reason for the rest of me to escape it either. If this is what I’m built for, there’s no reason to pretend I’m anything other than a man born to kill. I don’t know what will happen, but I will miss you.
Don’t look for me.
- Venom
Backtracking into the small kitchen in the center of the space, Venom placed the sticky note in the center of one of the cabinets, right at eye level. He stood still for one more moment, turning and brushing his bangs out of his eyes to look through the open bedroom door. Robo-Ky continued to lay still and unmoving.
Venom placed his bangs in front of his eyes one more time. Rooting around in his pockets, he pulled out the two scraps of fabric he’d found prior.
He put on his gloves, and walked out the door.
It was never entirely dark outside, not here. With street lights and house lights and such, there were always bits of brightness around to ensure you could make out your surroundings at least passably. Venom found himself lingering slightly around the edges of the light around him, hesitating just a moment before returning to darkness. He cursed as he slipped out of the reaches of a streetlamp, resenting his reluctance to return to secrecy.
Still, he walked onwards. Unfortunately for him, the train station was on the other side of town from the bakery, which meant a much longer trek than he’d rather deal with, especially as his legs began to tire. It wasn’t as though he’d gotten unused to being on his feet for hours on end, but in his defense, he had spent a shift in the kitchen the day before. He’d have to work on that. He had a lot he had to work on.
For now, he walked a bit past where his half hour of travel had gotten him until he came upon a bench, where he dropped his items and his weight onto the seat. Venom winced as his side clipped the bar in the center of the bench—stupid hostile architecture. Whose business was it but his if he wanted to sleep on a public bench? Scratch that, if he had to? He should really talk to someone about that.
He stopped dead. No. No more of that. Get rid of the attachment. Breathe it out of your lungs, choke on it like smoke until you’re clean. Until you can pass their tests, get that job back, get back to doing what you’ve been made for.
Venom slumped back onto the bench. His hands fell to the seat, then behind his head, then into his pockets, and —shit.
Venom pulled a bulky key ring out of one of his pants pockets. He’d taken his keys with him. He must have nabbed them on the way out of the bakery, still operating on a recently-developed habit. He scowled at the thing, gripping the metal bundle hard in his fist. Points and ridges dug into his palm and fingers, even through his gloves.
He couldn’t go back. And anyways, Robo-Ky had another set of keys. He could just toss these out once he was far enough away. The last thing he wanted to do was leave the other man with more problems than he already was.
He stopped short. Breathed out again.
Venom shifted again, slipping the keys back into his pocket, when his hand caught on yet another surface. Damn, how many things had he fucked up this time? Unsurprising.
He pulled out—Venom sucked in a large breath as he looked at the scrap of paper he only just remembered taking with him on a whim.
This might have been the only record of Venom’s face that had existed for a very, very long time. He was in…terrible quality, truly, but he wore his coat and hat that Robo-Ky had bought him just before the opening of the bakery. His hair was up, and he stood right in front of the entrance. His partner stood right beside him.
The two most important parts of the photo were the two that Venom remembered last. He wore no gloves, hands bare to what the world might bring. And he was smiling. Eyes closed, nose scrunched smile.
Fuck.
No, no no no. Breathe out. Rid yourself of all emotion and just get the job done. You don’t need him and he doesn’t need you. He’s better off without an assassin. And you’re nothing but an assassin. It doesn’t matter if you aren’t happy. It’s what you’re made for.
An epiphany.
He was made for this. Made for this. By who?
Certainly not himself. Because over the past months, he had made himself into something better for him, for the world. He’d made himself into a baker. A citizen. A lover. A kind person.
Maybe he wasn’t any good at any. But damn if it didn’t take time for him to get good at killing. And yet he did it. For someone.
Venom wanted so bad to become a person. He realized now he just needed a reason.
And he looked down into the picture in his hands and found it.
Venom huffed as he opened the door, quickly depositing his keyring back onto the small table next to the front door of the apartment above the bakery. He breathed in deeply, taking in the lingering smells of yeast and metal, letting it all take root.
As he padded back towards the bedroom he’d left not too long ago, he stopped momentarily in the kitchen, spying the sticky note he’d left. Without thinking much, he took off a glove and crumpled both items up in his still-covered hand, before taking off the second glove around it all. He threw the bundle into the trash. No hesitating. Maybe he’d regret it in the morning. Right now he couldn’t bring himself to care.
Into the bedroom for real now, fully opening the cracked door, seeing Robo-Ky still laying on his side of the bed. Venom sighed, standing to look at him, until the whir of circuits and motors picked up a bit. Venom froze as Robo-Ky sat up, opening his eyes.
“Venom?” His partner asked, clearly still rebooting from the sound of his bleary, sliding voice.
“Hey,” he whispered, never more glad to be found sneaking in somewhere.
“What’s with the backpack?” Robo-Ky asked. “What time is it? Where are you going?”
“Don’t worry about it. It’s late.” Venom told him, walking over to his own side of the room and dropping the aforementioned backpack. He slipped off his shoes before slipping back under the covers, not even bothering to change, shivering slightly at the now-cold sheets.
“And nowhere,” he said, answering the last question and taking Robo-Ky’s hand, laying a kiss on the back. “I’m not going anywhere.”