Chapter 7: Breaking Even

Authors Note: Hey how is everyone doing? I know it has been well over a year since the last time I updated this story. Yeah I'm sorry. Well here it is I hope you like it and please review.

I've been backed into a corner by my choices. What can I do but admit I'm in over my head. At the mercy of its desires. Help is trivial. If I could let go of this nightmare then I could finally be free. I can't win if I indulge this monster.

The rain was relentless. The sky was dark but the wind held back on this dreary site. People had gathered around holding up their umbrellas from the deluge above. They stood in an orderly fashion in front of a coffin draped with an American flag. Before it was Col. Fury trying to deliver words of comfort to those grieved of the lost.

"I know how fruitless these words must be. I cannot comfort you with the memory of the loved and lost with my words alone. I pray that the sacrifices laid by him will not go unseen. We all owe him much more than anyone could ever repay. He took it all without question. He did it gratefully and without remorse. May we all follow his example."

The call came in at about 0200 hours. Col Fury said that it was over. It was not hard to detect the frustration in his voice. Efforts at capturing and subduing Venom were becoming fruitless. The order was given to kill the target with any means necessary. It happened to be me, which was the "any means necessary." The stairs leading up to the rooftop were dark and dreary. It seemed like an endless winding tunnel that could never be overcome, but suddenly it just ended. The door made an elongated creak as it opened up to the rooftop over looking Time Square. On a normal day this sight would be pleasant, but just below Venom was wrecking havoc in the streets. I saw many men being tossed around the streets as they tried to take him down. Tendrils snaked out in every direction. Some SHIELD agents were impaled by the tendrils and some were being constricted and choked until there was no more life in them. Just seconds later his nemesis, Spiderman, arrived and the usual death match began which only created more chaos.

The smooth sound of the barrel sliding into the stock assembly instilled confidence. The sight was adjusted as best as it could given that the target was constantly changing position. Three rounds pushed into the clip and slid up into the firing chamber. The fight below showed evidence of a winner. Venom stood up, one foot digging into the back of Spiderman the other followed the rest of his body turning right down my sights. It almost seemed like Venom turned to look right at me. I hesitated for a second and refocused my thoughts. That is when the first shot discharged from the chamber. Several seconds later Venom was dead. I swear he was dead.

Jackson quickly snapped out of his daze. He remembered the night he fired those shots. How did this happen? The collapse due to the explosion left the entire square block in a near-collapse state. They had arrived had the ground level. Spiderman was checking the staircase leading underground for any survivors. The sprinkler systems had been engaged to the fire burning several hundred feet below them.

"Jackson it looks like there is still someone trapped in the west elevator." Parker reported as he continued to search for anyone in the area,

"Col, this is Jackson we got a survivor in the west elevator shaft. Spiderman is helping the rest the people evacuate the ground floor. I need to know how I can get to the elevator compartment. It looks like it is only three stories from my location."

"I read you Jackson. Head down the west hall and you'll find a maintenance room with a crawl space access to the elevator shaft. It should be just around the corner from the elevator doors." Fury replied.

"Copy. Spidey get the rest of these people out I'm goin to take care of the elevator!"

Jackson blitzed around the corner sprinting for the maintenance room. The door cracked along the hinges and gave way as Jackson slammed into it.

"I'm coming! Don't move I'll be down there in a minute okay?" Jackson called to the woman trapped inside the elevator just below him. The emergency exit hatch had been halfway opened as he looked down at her.

"Hey, what's your name?" Jackson asked.

"Erin… my name is Erin. I can't stand up. Please help me out of here." Her voice shook and her lips quivered as she spoke. Jackson quickly ran to the access ladder and slid down to the roof of the elevator. As he opened the hatch he could see the woman had clearly broken her leg and would be unable to climb up to him. Cuts from what could only have been close contact with glass covered her face. Her face was shrouded with fatigue as she could barley muster enough strength to call for help.

"All right can you move right cause I'm coming down to get you?" Jackson asked.

"Yes." she slid out of the way as Jackson lowered himself down. He could see that her leg had been fractured just below the knee.

"don't move. Are you hurt anywhere else?"

"I don't think so." She replied.

"Okay I'm going to fasten this harness around you and pull you up," Jackson quickly secured the harness around her and attached the other end to the access ladder above the elevator.

"Now this is going to hurt like a bitch, but I have to get you standing up in order to get you through that hatch. Okay?" She simply nodded. With her arm around his neck and shoulder they both stood up and the inevitable "pop" of her leg came with them.

"HOLY SHIT!" she screamed.

"Don't put your weight on it!" Jackson ordered.

As he turned with her to face the emergency hatch above they both noticed several thick streams of salvia dribbling onto the elevator floor. Before she could scream Jackson quickly covered her mouth and put one finger in front of his as he looked at her. They both quickly looked back at the hatch. The saliva had stopped. Shit Jackson thought, and before he could yell Venom came crashing down into the elevator. The impact rattled both of them against the opposite wall. Venom slowly stood to his feet, tendrils snaking and slithering, and looked right at Jackson. The huge beast had to hunch over as he causally made his way towards Jackson inside the elevator. Jackson pushed the woman to the opposite side and motioned her to slowly move around Venom to the hatch. It took her a second but she began to creep over towards the exit. Venom cocked his head towards her, but then refocused on Jackson. Every possible outcome he could think of rushed through his brain as Venom approached him. Jackson's mind was racing, he remembered everything that happened in the last forty-eight hours, and finally all of that stopped as he looked up and now finds himself staring right into those lifeless white eyes.

Something happened. Venom's head torqued strangely to the side, his body twitched. Inside Venom something ignited and Edward Brock took his first breathe again. During the last two days or ever since the events of that night the symbiote had been hard at work trying to repair and revive its host. This process had just been completed.

Eddie Brock snapped into consciousness. In front of him again he saw Jackson and he looked to side and saw the woman frightened and whimpering just underneath the emergency hatch. Brocks gaze switched to his own hands. And suddenly a flood of memories rushed his mind. He experienced all of those murders and killings all over again. Brock saw her again. Gwen's smile lifted his spirit, but Brock soon remembered how this began. He felt a rage rise inside him and he knew that the symbiote was about to take over again. Eddie struggled to suppress the symbiote. It took a moment but Eddie was able to think clearly again. Venom refocused at Jackson who had already primed an incendiary grenade.

Jackson stood on unsteady legs. He took one-step back and in-turn Venom followed and pressed his head against Jackson's. Tense does not describe the situation accurately enough. Venom's jaw's cracked opened and his tongue danced in the air between Jackson and his own head.

"Kill us." Venom whispered.

Jackson was caught off guard. He half-expected Venom to bite his head off right there, but this was different. How do you respond to that?

"KILL US! Kill us before I change my mind!" Venom growled.

Jackson snapped out of his state of shock, looked behind Venom at the woman, and then back at Venom.

"You ready?" Jackson asked the woman.

Jackson lifted his sidearm and without a seconds hesitation pulled the trigger destroying the support cable to the elevator. The cable screeched under the immense strain and snapped. The elevator car began to plummet deeper into the earth. Jackson smiled briefly as the woman screamed; she remained strapped to the harness in safety, while he and Venom started their final descent. The acceleration was quick. The emergency lights that scaled the elevator shaft's interior raced by creating a strobe effect. It was quiet, though all the commotion of the car scraping by and the wind blowing all around them it was still peaceful. They both took a deep exhale and looked at one another.

"Today is a good day." Jackson stated.

Venom smirked and then nodded in agreement.


"It has been three weeks. You are just going to have to accept it the way it is. There is nothing more I can do," Nick Fury tried to inform Spiderman but he wasn't having it "Listen, all right I want to believe you, but I can't. This whole thing was a disaster and we are just now getting back on our feet again. I will deal with this when I have time to."

"What did you find?" Spiderman asked.

"We looked all up and down that elevator shaft and hell almost all of Manhattan by now and found no signs of him; I have taken this as far as it can go. We discovered Jackson's body but nothing of Venom. If you want to pursue this you must take upon yourself, in fact I want you to but I don't have the man power to do that right now. You find that bastard and you make sure that he is never coming back."

Authors Note: Okay so there it is. No this is the not the end. Just the 1st event of the story. The next chapters will throw the gears in reverse and you will see some very brutal shit, but not the way you would expect it would happen.