"Little thing why have you strayed so far? You know it is not safe for you here."
It was a man's voice, he did not expect that.
"Do you not have a home of your own? Do you not have a wife waiting for you there?"
It was soft and it smooth, almost like a loud whisper, and it sounded tired, like its throat was hurting. He could see it lurking in the darkness, blending into it completely, if not for the large mass of muscle pulsating from the wall and the white eyes and spider, he could never had seen him. And yet from this Darkness did the creature speak with a human voice, weak and aged. It had been such a long time since he had heard that human voice, how many years ago was it? They must have only been kids back then, perhaps the early twenties, perhaps even younger. The voice had aged but was still very much his own.
"Eddie?" Asked the Spider.
"Eddie is not here right now, Peter." Said the Darkness.
The Darkness hunched forward into the light, where his teeth and eyes shined from the moon, and the tongue rolled out and swayed beneath its mouth. Then it moved that mouth, and that tongue, and those teeth, and out came the voice of that man.
"He was tired, I told him to go to sleep, I'd get us home." The Darkness explained.
"You used to say that to me." The Spider narrowed his eyes.
The Darkness gave a small chuckle as he was now able to using that man's voice.
"Yes, I did, didn't I?" The Darkness looked up to see the Spider who was perched up on the top of the wall.
"He's a good kid." The Darkness says in that kid's voice. "Really he is. Just angry, and scared. No one can blame him, growing up in this place."
The Spider in red and blue moved along his fingers and toes into a better position, he sat vertical on the wall and looked down at the Darkness, who stood on what was once a ledge. And so did they wait on each other, making sure if the other was not going to do anything, allowing the other to make the first move if that move was to come. Yet this move, this inevitable form of violence did not come.
This is where it happened. The Darkness knew this place well, as this was where it was born anew. Where it almost died, where it was rejection by the only creature that had ever shown it love. It came from far away, rejected by its own kind for individuality and a dream of perhaps a greater bond to another. It came here from far away and it would not know how to go back if it wanted to, too long has it been here with these people, too long has it been a part of them, feeling their feelings, seeing what they see, touching what they touch. Too long has he looked upon this planet called Earth and had hosts call it home. It was here, this little planet among all the planets did another creature come to him in agony and pain, and did the creature seek it, and it replied to the creature. It was a man named Peter Parker and for a time Peter Parker was grateful and it was grateful, for it had found another, it had fulfilled the one dream it had, to have a purpose to belong and be desired.
But here, in this dying remnant of once was a church, did Peter Parker leave it. The church had long been abandoned, the Darkness had come one night and in a fit of bitterness destroyed most of it so it would not be worth it to rebuild. And now the spiders had taken it, windows were boarded up, and blocked by the little things' webs. Here did the Darkness nearly die from the rejection of Peter Parker.
They both know this place, in their silence they relish on the memories of their togetherness.
The Darkness put its hand over that bell that separated them, it knocked on the bell creating a hollow sound from the many cracks on its surface.
"I broke our bell." The Darkness said.
The Spider says nothing.
"I knew you would come." The Darkness smiled to itself.
"What do you want, monster?" The Spider asks cruelly.
"My name is Venom!" The Darkness spats.
Then its hand slips off the bell, and the hulking mass that was the Symbiote and Eddie Brock lowered its head.
"Eddie and I, we came up with it together. You did not name me." The Darkness says in that human voice, full of sorrow, full of pain.
"I didn't even know you were there."
"LIES!"
The Darkness pounds it's hand on the bell to which it shatters and falls the three stories down to the ground. The Darkness heaves feeding air to the man within it as he sleeps, and the tongue slips out and it drools in anger.
"I spoke to you, and you spoke back." The Darkness says.
The Spider remains silent.
"You knew who I was. You knew what I was doing! What I wanted! And you wanted the same!" The Darkness says.
And so do our lover's spat begin, old lovers, on a level unimaginable by all but a few who have experienced it for themselves. Lovers not of body, but of soul, of mind, of heart. They were once one, the Darkness and the Spider. And since has the Darkness gone to others. It has found a man named Eddie Brock whom shares much of his thoughts. But Eddie, Eddie is angry he is in pain, but he could never know, he could never imagine how the Darkness feels, how such simple human thought bounds such pain. It has done well with this Eddie, taken care of the boy with care it has been taught from the Spider, and cared for his host if not finding him frustrating. As despite his loyalty and dependency, despite his desire to stay with the Darkness, despite his anger and his hate and his love, he is not Peter Parker.
The Darkness has been loyal to this Eddie. It has gone to aid those Eddie loved. It has felt the body and mind of a woman, and touched the flesh of creatures, and gone through men using them as mere puppets.
But there was one man the Darkness would not dare use as a puppet. One man the Darkness will always long for, for that man was an equal, and there was purity in his heart despite the anger, despite his hate, there was nobility in him. There was something that the Darkness has since desired, but not found.
We never forget the ones we love.
"Peter…" The Darkness tries. "Peter Parker, Spider-man, beloved nephew, beloved friend, and lover. First human being to ever touch me."
"Venom," The Spider raises up. "You are the worst thing that could have ever happened to me. You twisted me into what you wanted me to be. You invaded my body, my mind, my heart. You tried to take away those whom I love the most. And you continue on in your life, death left behind in your wake. And what am I to do but fear your onslaught? Fear that this time I wont be able to stop you, and you'll just go on killing."
"I kill for you! They die in your name, Peter! And they will never stop!"
"What do you want monster!? What can I do to make you leave us all be!"
Hunger. It hungers, unsatisfied, a gaping in hole inside itself. A feeling that it should be no where but beside Peter Parker. What was in it that man that did this, what was it that it felt in him? Why is it nowhere else?
"I once offered you so much…"
And so does the Darkness begin to move, each step it takes leaving a thunderous echo in the place where it was abandoned for death. It crawls and lurks over onto the walls leaping closer to the Spider.
"Power. Love. Strength." The Darkness says.
It begins to circle the Spider, and even if his face is hidden by that mask, he knows what it looks like. It knows of those eyes beneath those white lens. It knows of that face, with the small scars from all these years of fighting the true monsters. It knows of the large scar where he was once stabbed by the Goblin man, and where the Sandman got a good hit, and where the good Doctor Octopus man grabbed him, and where the Electric man shocked him, and the Hunter cut him, where the Vampire bit him, and where the lover kissed him. It knows the flesh and the mind of the Spider, and it longs to see what he must be thinking now.
It always thought Peter looked best in the black and white anyway, blue and red weren't even found in spiders.
"I don't want what you have to offer." Says the Spider.
And then the tongue comes and it wraps around the Spider, over the neck and shoulder and so does it carass that cheek of that man who was once part of it.
"I want what you offer." The Darkness says.
The Spider grabs the tongue and pulls hard with that natural might, and kicks the jaw of the monster, before swinging over to the opposite side, to which the Darkness follows, for only the Spider to jump out of the board windows and crawl up to the roof, where the Darkness punches its way up.
We never forget our first love.
We never want to let them go.
We want to hold onto them and believe that they want the same.
We want to have it be like it used to.
And if it can't be that way, we will lash out. We will hurt that First love.
And our efforts will fall in vain.
So here the two stand, each having found another, but one still desiring the other. The Darkness that only wanted kindness, and the man who had to fight it. Peter Parker stands with an emotionless mask, as the Darkness hunched over roars at it. The Darkness in all its furry gives out an agonized cry, it was not supposed to be like this, it was never supposed to be like this. There was supposed to love here, there was suppose to be a bond that would no tend where each would be satisfied. Now there is only hunger, and pain.
The Darkness raises its head and the tongue flies up over the face, before it falls back down and begins to run.
"When you were with me…" Peter begins.
The Darkness does not care for what the man has to say, there is only so much rejection one can take in a night. It runs cannot waiting to grab the little Spider and crush it beneath its foot, and to take that body, to look at that face as it dies, and watch him beg for life. Give me life, Venom, Peter will say. I need you, Peter will say. We will live together, Peter will say. And Venom, the Darkness, will not give it to him, he does not deserve it.
The Darkness raises its clawed hands and opens its mouth to grow its teeth.
"You were so much more beautiful." Peter finishes.
The Darkness stops, and the Spider punches it in the face, shattering teeth. The Darkness' head falls back down and a swiping arm strikes the Spider over. It runs to the fallen loved one, grabbing him by the leg and throwing him through the roof into the Church where the spiders run to their webs and the rats into their holes. The Darkness jumps after the Spider, and the Spider rolls out of the way of the coming Darkness.
And we know how this will end.
"Why did you come, Peter? Why did you leave that home?"
The Spider jumps out of the way of a swooping arm, onto a pillar that loses its strength and falls. The Spider lands on his hands pushing away onto his feet where he grabs a web and swings to the nearest wall. Angry that the Spider is not listening, the Darkness grabs him half way in his swing and pins him to the ground and looks at him face to face.
"Why did you leave that wife of yours!?" The Darkness asks.
The Spider puts webbing into the Darkness' eyes and it has to scratch it off. Before it can the Spider jumps over its head to its back where it jumps up for a ledge and lands, pushing down a nearby pillar to fall onto the Darkness.
"To protect her from you!" Peter yells.
The Darkness grabs the pillar before it falls and throws it back at the Spider, who jumps out of the way.
"What could see give you, Peter!?" The Darkness asks. "That I could not give you!?"
Perhaps the idea of human love was impossible to comprehend for the Darkness. It knew not of a physical body, it did not know of hands that were its own that could hold another's. It did not know of touching forwards, or of the voice of their lover. It lacked its own body, and perhaps a relationship based on body touching to achieve mental touching was beyond it. Relationships to it were more than that, they went deeper, were supposed to last longer, and desired more.
Perhaps it just did not know what it was missing. Or it did, and it was insanely jealous.
The Spider rests on the wall as the Darkness stares up at it, anger and furry and hate inside it. Then suddenly the emotion disappears. And the Darkness fades off that face to reveal the man beneath it.
"Peter?" Eddie Brock asks, waking up from his rest.
Then suddenly the Darkness creeps again over its host's face, silently and without pain does the human face close its eyes and allow it. Venom, Eddie Brock and the Darkness stand motionless for a moment, the Darkness telling its host what it has done. To this Venom raises its head at Spider-man, and nods.
Then Venom leaves, simply walking out calmly.
But they know, the Spider and the Darkness and they watch each other as the distance between them grows greater and greater but never really changes.