CHAPTER THREE

It brandished it's weapon, so they brandished theirs. They didn't have as much morphing ability as Carnage, but they could still kill it with their tendrils and claws. They licked their teeth.

After turning a circle for a few moments, they leapt at their prey. It sidestepped them and kicked them in the ribs. A weak attempt, but it still hurt them. They hadn't fought anything this strong. It wasn't what they had smelled, but it was good enough for a fight. They growled at it and swung their arm to cut it apart. When it dodged again, they extended sharp tendrils from their hand to stab it. But it pulled a small disc from a holster on it's side and sliced their tendrils off. That hurt! They retracted the remaining bits of themself and roared at it.


The creature wasn't very clever. But he had figured out that it was a Symbiote. He replaced his disc and staff, and pulled his whip out. He ran at it as he slashed back and forth. He cut it several times across the chest before it leapt up onto one of the buildings surrounding their battleground.

It screamed in pain, but never bled. This Symbiote must be solidly entwined with it's host. He threw his bladed disc at the Symbiote. It caught it and tore it apart. He accessed the memory bank in his helmet and looked at the Symbiote language. He spoke it:

"I do not want to fight."

It roared back at him and leapt on top of him, punching him.

It was strong. As his head lay on it's side, he looked up at the buildings in horror.


Interesting. This creature knew the language of the Symbiotes. This infuriated them.

"We are not a Symbiote anymore! We are VENOM!"

They bent down to bite the creature, but were stopped by it's spear. They bit the spear; it tasted like blood. And the blood smelled like the scent they had found earlier.

It flipped them over itself and repeated back to him in it's broken English:

"Venom!"

As they got up from the throw, they saw it running at them with it's spear drawn. Apparently it wasn't sincere about not wanting to fight. Too bad. It jabbed at them with it's spear, but they sidestepped it and grabbed the end of it. They grabbed the creature's helmet and forced it to look at them.

"This is our territory, and you cannot hunt without our permission!"

It extended claws out of it's left arm and slashed them across the face. They roared and raised their claws to slash it to pieces, but noticed it pointing up.

They followed it's finger/claw, and noticed what it was staring at. Now they knew what they had been smelling. Xenomorphs. They were everywhere. There must have been at least a dozen. They had surrounded them and were closing in. They were climbing down from the buildings.

They released their captor and stood back-to-back with it. One of the Xenomorphs leaped at them and they extended a tendril to knock it away. They didn't notice the other coming at them.


At last! This Venom had realized what he was saying. He couldn't find the word for Xenomorph in the Symbiote language in time.

He fired a net at one of the Xenomorphs attacking Venom. He knew they would have to work together to defeat all of these in their weakened states. His net stuck the Xenomorph to a wall, but that wouldn't contain it for long. He didn't start it's contraction process, because he knew it's blood would rip through the wires.

As he was looking at the trapped specimen, he didn't notice the Xenomorph attacking him. Venom extended it's claws, slashing it, and threw the Xenomorph into two of it's brothers. It screamed in pain at it noticed the acidic blood, and wiped it off on the ground, where it sizzled and smoked. The Xenomorphs made their high-pitched screeching sounds and attacked in unison. He threw his spear at one and pinned it to the ground. He used his whip next, slashing at two more that approached, removing their heads.


Curse theses wretched Xenomorphs! They had forgotten these creatures had acidic blood. It had been a long time since they had seen one. Their "friend" was holding his own well, so they decided to have some fun.

The one they had thrown had gotten back up and extended it's tail toward them. They extended a tendril toward it and wrapped around it's tail, swinging it around, until finally slamming it on their friend's spear in the ground. Another leapt at them, but they grabbed it by the head and neck; decapitating it, carefully avoiding the blood. They noticed their friend extend his claws again and slice another Xenomorph across the chest. That gave them an idea. They tore the tail off of the dead Xenomorph at their feet, and use it to slice another attacking one in half.

One attacked them from the side, tackling them to the ground. It extended it's inner mouth and dug into their chest. They roared in pain once again.

"Nuh uh uh! Bad table manners!"

They webbed the beast's mouth shut and kicked it into the air, and web-jerked it into the side of a building, where it's body was crushed by the brick.


He was swinging away, having found no other problems after encountering Daredevil. Surprisingly quiet for a night like this.

Then he heard a roar from behind him. He turned around and stuck to a building. He heard strange screeches coming from the same direction. Unless there was a giant bat in town, he had no idea what it was.

"I'd better check that out."

He hears another roar.

"Oh no! That sounds like Venom!"

He ran along the side of the building before leaping off and swinging toward the disturbance. He saw people running and screaming below. What had Eddy done now? He prepared for the worst.

He swung low and stopped a citizen.

"What's going on?"

The panicked man yelled

"Monsters! Tons of 'em! Down an alley. I'm getting' the hell outta here!"

He pushed passed Spider-Man and kept running. Well, now he had his answer. He took off swinging again.


He had used his disc to kill the last two Xenomorphs. Both he and Venom were bleeding and breathing heavily. His spear was destroyed, Venom had destroyed his bladed disc, and his blades were worn down. His whip was still functional, having quickly rid itself of the blood after each swipe. He had saved his cannons and bomb for the greater threats, which he knew would come soon.

Venom approached him with it's hand out and spoke in Symbiote.

"No hard feelings, friend?"

After staring for a moment, he approached with his own hand extended. He looked past Venom at the Xenomorph in the cage. It was gone! There was blood on the melted wire. He pulled his whip out again just before Venom was grabbed by his ankles by the Xenomorph's tail and dragged away. It had gone down into an underground aqueduct system. The lid was off. He ran as fast as he could. He had actually gained a comrade on this planet, and he would not lose his only backup!

He jumped down into the hole, not falling far before landing in the liquid below. He activated one of his cannons and night vision. He looked around quickly, whip in hand and cannon at the ready. He saw a life form lying on the walkway against the wall. He approached it slowly, but his readings said it was neither Symbiote or Xenomorph.

He tried to turn around but was quickly slammed against the wall. He tried to pull himself away, but he was held up by some kind of sticky secretion. It was slimy, yet stringy. A tail sliced the cannon off of his shoulder, and he stared into the face of a new monster.


He had finally found the alley.

"Oh… my… God!"

The sight before him was horrific. Black reptile creatures were scattered everywhere! And bits and pieces of them, too. Green slime was everywhere, apparently blood.

He lifted up his mask and ran out of the alley just in time to throw up in a trashcan. He felt a hand on his shoulder and turned around quickly. He looked up at Ben Grimm: the Thing from the Fantastic Four.

"Whoa, sorry kid. I was in da neighborhood and saw ya swing by."

Peter wiped the last bits of his dinner off of his chin.

"Sorry Ben."

They walk back into the alley. Ben has the same horrified expression.

"Sweet Christ on a cracka!"

Peter sees the open manhole and runs up to it.

"EDDIE?"

He couldn't see anything in the darkness.

"I'm going down, Ben. Can you wait for me up here?"

"Sure. Just don' take too long."

Peter jumped down the hole and turned his belt light on.

"Eddie?"

He looked around and heard something behind him. It was like a chirping, screeching sound, but it was barely audible. His spider-sense tingled mildly.

"Whoa. You are NOT Eddie."

He jumped to the opposite wall to look at the creature.

"Holy shit!"

It was Venom! But it was strange; it looked like one of the dead monsters in the alley, but it had Venom's eyes and spider symbol. He dodged just in time to avoid it's huge tail, which knocked a hole in the wall. The long tongue he had known stuck out toward him, but it had a mouth on the end. He grabbed it just in time to keep from being eaten, and threw it aside. The monster shot a web blob at him and caught his foot as he tried to jump away. The monster crawled right up to him, making it's terrible screeching noise. It raised it's tail to strike.

Peter's life passed before his eyes. A whip appeared out of nowhere and sliced the tail off. The monster screeched in pain before it was kicked aside. He had been saved by Indiana Jones? He looked up at what was definitely nothing George Lucas could come up with. A large, bleeding, man-like creature. It had a circular blade in it's hand, which it used to cut him out of the web blob. They looked and saw that the Venom monster had disappeared. The creature went down the tunnel after it, but seized up and fell over in the water. It didn't get up.

Ben's voice was music to Peter's ears.

"Hey Spidey? What's goin' on down dere?"

"Hold on, Ben. Package coming up."

He grabbed his savior by the arm and lifted him up. He was unconscious. He moved him to the ladder that led to the surface, and noticed a naked man lying on the walkway.

"Eddie!"

Within minutes they were all on the surface. Ben talked into his wristwatch communicator.

"Hey, Reed?"

Reed Richards replied.

"Hey Ben. What's up?"

"I need an evac over here right now."

"How many?"

He looked at Spider-Man.

"Can you swing?"

"Yeah, I'm fine."

"Uh, myself and two passengers."

"On my way, Ben."

"Oh, and uh, bring some uh yer test tubes and stuff. Yer gonna want a sample of this

stuff. And call a clean-up crew while your at it. We got a real nasty mess down here."