Happy Tuesday, everyone! So, as I'm writing this, it is December 2nd, just as a timestamp. I suspect that this wave of chapters will be out around Christmas week so again, we'll see how right I was!
Creativity: Because your last guess was on the ball. I think you were two weeks late.
Author: Don't be a pessimist. Anyway, as you all might have guessed, this set of chapters is focused more on Ana's first steps in becoming the next Spider hero. As for what Garter's doing, well… It more or less comes back to some stuff in the original. You'll see. Now, on to reviews:
Joeclone: Like I said via PM, I'll be going into more detail on what's going on in Venom's mind later.
And that's all for reviews!
Anyway, Ima cut this short because you all want to read the story, and I need to get back to studying for exams! Without further ado, here's chapter 7 of Venom: Resurgence!
Ana couldn't help but grin as she hurried to an old crumbling warehouse. It was scheduled for demolition to clear space, but it was still structurally sound. She'd finished assembling the webshooters and had put together a pair of gloves that were made to allow her to keep clinging to walls or floors. She'd also brought an extra bottle of the web-dissolving agent after a little… incident when she was finishing the webshooters at home and the firing mechanism went off by accident. Thankfully, she'd managed to dispose of all the webbing before her parents came home. That would have been really difficult to explain.
Still, now that she'd fine-tuned her current design, it was time to take them for a test run. She pulled the gloves on and snapped the webshooters onto her wrists before checking the trigger by firing a web ball into one of the support beams. Spurred on by her success, she leapt into the air and fired a line onto the ceiling and swinging over a pile of rusting machinery and barrels before releasing it and firing another line. Every pendulum-esq swing gave her a rush, followed immediately by the rush of weightlessness when she released a line before firing another one.
Ana had to constantly resist the urge to whoop with delight from the thrill of swinging around on weblines. She could only imagine what it would be like to actually swinging through the city. As soon as she had a working costume, she was definitely going to go out on a joyride. She'd done a fair bit of research on where she could acquire some more circuit-weave mesh and a few other bits and pieces for her costume and had found a relatively cheap but durable version of the mesh, since she'd acquired some for testing and familiarizing herself with its intricacies. She managed to pin down an address and was going to go pick some up tomorrow, so she could finish work on the costume. In the meantime, she'd picked up the sleeve-material that went over the mesh to conceal and protect the circuitry beneath. Plus, provided she could figure out a few little tricks, she could make the webshooters just another part of the costume! But that would have to wait. For now, they'd simply attached as they were to her wrists.
After half an hour of practice, she decided to head home so she could get some work in on her costume. All she wanted right now was something that could cover her face and not get in the way of swinging through the city. She could work out the completed costume later.
One thing that somewhat surprised her was how easy it was to pick up web swinging. She thought there was going to be more of a learning curve for learning how to swing, but it came to her much more naturally than she initially thought. Maybe she was just born for this!
Once she got home, she grabbed the new mask she had managed to whip up. It was reminiscent of the traditional Spider Man mask, except it didn't cover her hair. She'd managed to replicate the technology in the lenses from the suit designed by Tony Stark, though it had been a bit… finicky so far when it came to programming the lenses to shrink and grow in response to her own eyes. As it was, she was having trouble striking that right level of sensitivity with the lenses. So far, they'd only been too responsive or not enough. Additionally, she'd made a utility belt of sorts for the purpose of storing spare web cartridges and other gadgets she would start working on once she had the essentials down.
After plugging the mask into the computer, she began tweaking the program a bit more until she managed to finally hit that sweet spot. Afterwards, she grabbed a skin-tight long-sleeve shirt she'd made with the circuit-weave mesh and attached the webshooters to it before opening the interface on her computer. She'd structured a simple HUD for the mask and was currently synchronizing it with the webshooters, allowing her to see what mode of fire was selected, how much web fluid and cartridges were left and possible malfunctions and damage that the webshooters suffered. After making sure everything was set up correctly and the right pathways through the mesh were established, she pulled the shirt on and attached the webshooters before pulling on the mask.
"Alright, first full system test. Let's start with cartridge status." Ana muttered to herself, her voice muffled through the mask. That gave her the thought of maybe adding a voice modulator to the mask, but that would have to wait. For now, she removed a few cartridges from each webshooter, causing the HUD to display the same number of cartridges were missing. Then she swapped in an empty cartridge on each which registered as in place, but empty. After that, she added a cartridge that had been partially spent by her practice session earlier that day, which registered as partially full. Satisfied with the cartridge test, she cycled through the modes of fire, which registered as changing through the specified modes, as indicated by the small images she had made to indicate different modes of fire. Spurred on by her success, she did a final check of the programming as well as a few more in-depth tests before packing everything into a box and hiding it under her bed, but not before refilling the web cartridges. She intended to make tomorrow night the first day her new gear was ready by going on a 'maiden voyage'. Right now, her costume consisted of the mask, shirt and gloves and skin-tight leggings, but they weren't really a proper 'costume' yet. Except for the mask, which she had colored blue (She was still working out if and how she wanted to lay the web pattern on it) they were just the default gray of the thin, waterproof covering for the circuit-weave mesh. To make the costume a little bit more exciting, she bought a thin blue jacket with a hood and painted a black spider logo across the front of it. Hopefully she'd be able to complete her 'official' costume soon enough, but this would do for now.
Soon the all new Spider-Woman would be making her debut.
Garter let out a contented sigh as he walked back to his camp-site. Today had been a VERY successful day of trading. He'd traded away his grappling hook for a large amount of food preservation supplies, exchanged a small amount of those supplies for more rations, a fishing net and picked up a new set of clothes to replace is increasingly ratty, tattered set. Plus, there were only so many times that the bloodstains could be washed out.
Now he was going to go to a nearby stream to see if he could get his hands on some fish for his lunch and/or dinner, as well as a possible trading item. The last couple of years he'd been here, he'd been able to catch some decent sized carp in the stream, and a few crayfish when the sun was going down. Not that he ever got enough crayfish to trade or make a proper meal out of. He'd need a really big net to carry that many. But enough to add a small bit of variation to his diet. Salt-dried meat, flat bread and whatever greens he could scrounge could only be prepared in so many ways before you got tired of them.
Settling down at the water's edge, he suddenly had an idea. After making sure that there was no one around, he started to draw on his symbiote-granted abilities. His senses sharpened to the point where he could pick out the fish. After making sure his net was laid out, he reared his hand back and lunged forward, grabbing the fish with his bare hands! He yanked it out of the water and deposited it in the net before going for yet another. Half an hour later, he had a net stuffed with fifteen to twenty fish! He had moved up and down the stream a few times, as well as waded out to catch them, but he was overall really satisfied with the results, soggy clothes aside.
Once he had the fish cleaned out and preserved, they would definitely make for some good trade the next day, so he set about putting his new supplies to good use. He gutted and filleted the fish before preserving what he intended to sell, then set about preparing his midday meal of fresh fish and a few greens he had in his pack. After getting everything prepared and leaving it over the fire to cook, he took a look around. The sky was turning gray, which would lead to a few cooler days, but that wasn't anything he wasn't prepared for. He'd be more concerned if there was a storm coming, though that wasn't outside the realm of possibility. Despite the dreary skies, it was feeling pretty warm. Hopefully it would just pass them by, assuming there was one.
After smelling that the food was done, Garter immediately began eating. Ever since the symbiote had attached to him, he'd had a boost in metabolism, which somewhat irked him. He'd spent most of his life on a strict meal schedule designed for his lifestyle, but the presence of his passenger had thrown that into disarray. Now he was stuck trying to rebalance his diet to account for availability of food, minimum distance he needed to cover in a day, and how much he needed per meal, and this entire process could take months for him to figure out again.
Well, at least he didn't have to worry about food supply for a little while. With the abundance of fish in the stream and his newfound skill at catching them barehanded, he could probably get some real good trading if he could find more fish in that stream. He'd probably have to change locations since he'd cleared out most of the fish in that area.
On second thought, maybe he shouldn't go back and do more fishing. He wanted to use that river in future, after all.
As the day wore on, he conversed with other Travelers, did a bit more trading and eventually came to the end of the day. The sun was dipping low in the sky and he could feel his stomach grumbling. He was suddenly glad he'd preserved the bulk of the fish he'd caught. He'd traded some of it away, but the rest he'd kept for reserves, and for if better trade items arrived.
After preparing yet more fish for dinner, he took a short vigil, using his symbiote enhanced senses, plus a few new ones to make sure that there was no danger. So far, it seemed they were in the clear. After settling down under his shelter, he let himself drift off to sleep.
A few hours later…
"WAKE UP! TROUBLE!"
Garter's eyes snapped open and he rolled out of the shelter and to his feet. He could hear shrieking and shouting, the occasional twang of bowstrings and the whipping sound of slings. The shrieking was characteristic of Rippers.
"Damn it all…" He resisted the urge to shout as he grabbed his knife and charged into the fray!
"Um, don't you think I should help?! I think enhanced strength, reflexes and webs would be helpful right about now!" The symbiote exclaimed in his head.
"If we reveal ourselves, they'll ignite the rings of fire, which I don't think I need to remind you is a very bad thing! Just watch my back and keep an eye out for anyone who might want to put a knife in it!" Garter responded as he dragged his knife across the body of a Ripper before ducking under a different Ripper before kicking them in the stomach! He whirled around and started frantically looking around. Luckily, the other Travelers were holding their nerve and the line. Likely, they were surrounded, and this initial rush was meant to spook them into running into the waiting arms and knives of the other Rippers that were hiding behind the treeline. They may have been incredibly savage, but they were still cunning. Unfortunately for the Rippers, Travelers were smart too, and this trick wasn't a particularly new one. As long as they could hold the line until the Rippers gave up, and provided that nothing worse showed up, they'd make it through the night with minimal casualties. The fact that they had ranged weaponry meant that the Travelers held an immense advantage.
Unfortunately, something worse did happen, though not what Garter was expecting.
A blinding light suddenly pierced the night, causing everyone to suddenly cover their eyes. The Rippers all shrieked before turning tail and bolting back into the woods. As Garter's eyes adjusted, he could make out what looked to be a giant floating box with wings that appeared to be the light source. The box lowered to the ground and swung open, allowing roughly a dozen people wearing impractically bulky clothing to jump to the ground! In their hands were long, metal slabs which they started pointing at the Travelers! Immediately, the slabs flashed, and several Travelers dropped to the ground!
"Not good! Very not good! We gotta go! Forget your supplies, we can come back for them! We gotta get outta here!" the symbiote shouted in a panicked tone! As Garter turned to bolt however, their escape was cut off when one of the Travelers ignited the rings of fire in an effort to discourage these strange people from continuing their attack! Unfortunately, Garter was standing rather close to one of those rings when the fire suddenly erupted into existence, causing him to leap back in shock and pain as the sudden flash caused the symbiote to violently recoil! Which had the unfortunate consequence of revealing to absolutely everyone present that there was a symbiote among them.
All hell broke loose. The strangers started aiming their weapons at him and every Traveler started running as far away from him as they could! Thankfully,the symbiote shielded him from the strangers' weapons, leaving the projectiles they apparently launched falling to the ground harmlessly. However, due to the fire, he was still trapped. Plus, he could feel the symbiote's panicked thoughts assaulting his mind. It was practically having a panic attack! Then he noticed something. The strangers were collecting the bodies of the Travelers that had apparently killed! Then he noticed through his enhanced vision that they were still breathing! Why were they taking Travelers alive?
Unfortunately, he wasn't going to get an opportunity to find out, since they were all retreating into the box that they had arrived in and were lifting into the air! Garter looked around and he realized that most of the Travelers had ran off, so he wouldn't have to worry about that.
When he looked back to the box, he could see that it was accelerating away from him! He could see a trail left behind it. He started turning to go collect his supplies, but then turned back to look at the trail. Why had they abducted Travelers?
"We should help them." The symbiote said, catching Garter by surprise.
"Uh, why? Also, how did you know we should run?" Garter asked.
"I'm… not sure. I think I knew something about them from before the amnesia thing? Either way, helping the other Travelers is the right thing to do." The symbiote replied.
"The right thing to do?! The right thing to do is survive to see the next day! And the one after that! I mean, there are some implicit things like don't cannibalize, but I don't see how helping them after they've been captured by an unknown party with weapons that easily outstrip ours to be the right thing to do!" Garter retorted. The symbiote held firm.
"We need to help them. Besides, I can read your mind, remember? I know you want to go after them too." The symbiote argued. Garter tried to find another retort, but the symbiote had him beaten there.
"Fine. Let me grab my gear and we'll get moving. Assuming they don't change course, it shouldn't take too long to find them." Garter relented before making his way through the dying flames to his campsite, which had thankfully been spared a torching. After collecting his pack, he started following the trail left behind by the flying box.
Hopefully the rescue mission would be nice and simple. If only.
And that's where we'll leave it for today! And oh, man has it been a while. At the beginning, we said that this was start on December 2nd, 2018.
Creativity: It is now February 21, 2019. Yeah, bit quiet on the writing front over here.
Author: Well, this is the stress story. Three more before this all starts being released.
Part of why it's taken so long is because we've been really concerned about getting the final stretch of A Very Bad Idea finished up, which it practically is. We're just about to start the final two-chapter fireworks display as of this writing.
Plus, we have Limit Breaker doing pretty well for itself. Still trying to figure out why it took off like it did, though.
Alright, so next time, we have Ana going out on patrol for the first time and Garter tracking down where his fellow Travelers were abducted to.
See ya tomorrow!