"Be afraid of the world, for it is big and strong; and fear the demons within, for they are many and brutal; but..." -Carl Jung
MAXIMUM CARNAGE! Part 4 - Cletus' Heart
What does it mean to be yourself?
To do what comes natural, without making a conscious effort?
As for me, when I'm...
Mary Jane woke up with a start.
She was pinned to the wall. Her arms were stretched out wide and her wrists were tied up by red cords. Those red cords covered every inch of the walls, floor and ceiling like out-of-control ivy. And they pulsated like the veins of a living creature.
A young man was sitting directly in front of Mary Jane. His body was the same dark red color of the tentacles lining the room. He looked like a demon from the neck down, but his head was a normal human's. A calm, young face with curly red hair.
"You're finally up," he said with a relaxed smile.
She regarded him carefully. "...Carnage?"
"No," he shook his head. "Not Carnage."
"Then, you're Cletus?" Mary Jane was confused. "You got control away from Carnage?"
"Not exactly. The truth is... There never was a 'Carnage'."
Cletus Kasady stood up and paced in front of her. A bundle of cords trailed on the floor behind him, connecting his back to the overgrowth on the walls. He was the nerve center of the entire building.
"What are you saying...? Cletus, what's going on?"
He looked at her kind of sadly, like he pitied her. "Really? I really need to spell it out for you? My act couldn't have been that good... I was faking, Mary Jane."
"Faking?"
"I'm saying I've never had a split personality. I was only pretending to."
"That can't be true!"
"Don't be naive. The fact that I'm here, as Cletus, and I'm still holding you captive is proof beyond anything else."
Cletus slowly walked around the room, smiling to himself. He was proud of himself - proud of what he'd done. "I thought, even if I was caught, I wouldn't be blamed if I claimed, 'oh, it wasn't me, it was that other person controlling my body.' Actually, I didn't really expect to fool anyone... But then I met Peter and Spidey. You guys already experienced the real thing, so you didn't even hesitate to believe me. I mean, why would the guy who really had D.I.D. suspect that there was no such thing? It was such an unbelievably lucky break!"
"I can't believe this," Mary Jane shot back. "You're just Carnage, pretending to be Cletus, aren't you?"
"You're not listening!" Cletus shouted. "There is no Carnage! There's no multiple personality disorder. It was all me, pretending to be two people. I was conscious of everything. Carnage isn't an Alter - just a role I played. You want to become an actress, so you should be able to understand that," he added with a smirk.
She was horrified. "Then... that robbery downtown, to lure out Spidey...?"
"That was me," he proudly replied.
"And stealing that suit from Oscorp's lab?"
"That was me."
"Trapping Gwen and the others on that rooftop... And then the break-in at Peter's house?!"
"Everything was me... I remember and was conscious of everything... You all fell for my act like the world's biggest suckers!"
Mary Jane narrowed her eyes.
After a moment she asked, "Why are you telling me this?"
"I got bored, so I'm dropping the act," he replied casually. "Like I said, I never planned for the split personality excuse to get me very far. I only kept it up because of Peter. I had a good laugh at his expense and now I'm moving on to the next thing."
"What's the next thing?"
Cletus smiled at her. "Think of it as the final boss of a video game. This school is the stage for a dramatic showdown with the resident superhero... Spider-Man is my final boss."
"Now I get it," Mary Jane said. "You want to fight Spidey. That's what this is all about. Is it supposed to be some kinda duel to the death?"
Cletus didn't respond. He just stared at her seriously.
"It is a fight to the death," she realized in horror.
He stepped very close to Mary Jane. "I honestly kind of like you guys. You, Peter, Gwen, even Spidey. I wasn't planning on killing any of you. I only wanted to have some fun. But you all know my secret identity. So you see..." Cletus locked eyes with her. There wasn't even a hint of a smile on his face anymore.
"I seem to have painted myself into a corner."
Scared as she was, Mary Jane wouldn't look away from him.
What does it mean to be someone else?
To force yourself to say things you don't honestly think?
As for me, when I'm...
Spidey and Gwen walked out into the main hallway of the ground floor. The red gunk was everywhere. The building didn't look even remotely like a school anymore. It was more like the hive of an alien monster.
But the sight of the people frightened Gwen much more than the scenery. Unconscious students and teachers were scattered all over the place. Some were slumped on the floor, some were pinned to the walls, but each one had a tendril stabbing them in the torso.
Gwen quickly ran up to one of them and checked his breathing. "They're alive... But..." She got out her cell phone and called Debra. "It's me. We got-"
She was interrupted by background voices on the other end. "Don't hog the phone! We wanna hear too!"
"Me first!"
"Stop grabbing!"
"Just put it on speaker!"
"What button is that?"
"Give it back! I'll handle it!"
This continued for a few moments. Gwen waited patiently, but not without some annoyance.
Debra's voice spoke again. "There, you're on speakerphone now. Could you please start over, Gwen?"
"...We got inside, but it looks a lot worse than I feared. The hostages are all unconscious, and each one has a tentacle attached. It looks like this red gunk is feeding off them."
"That makes a little sense," Debra's voice replied. "I imagine Carnage's suit would need some kind of sustenance before it could envelop an entire building."
"Try ripping the tentacles off!" Kong said.
"She can't just rip it off!" Flash countered. "What if that hurts them? Internal bleeding or whatever."
"Well, what is she supposed to do, just leave it? What does Spider-Man think?"
"Spidey? He's-" Gwen looked around, and saw Spidey walking off without her. "Hey, where are you going?!"
She ran up to him, but Spidey kept walking without looking back. "Carnage is this way. If I take care of the root of the problem, it'll solve everything else."
"How do you know he's this way?"
"Because of my Spider-Sense... It says this is the most dangerous direction."
They walked over the cords on the ground. One of the cords Spidey stepped on twitched.
A cord attached to Cletus' back twitched.
"He's here," Cletus announced. "I sense the bio-suit... But he didn't break the doors down. How did he get in...? No, that doesn't matter. If he's here, I should go greet him."
"Cletus, please stop this," Mary Jane pleaded. "There's no reason for you to fight!"
"There's plenty of reason."
"Not any good ones," she shot back. "When we first met, didn't you say that you wanted to know what kind of a person I was? Didn't you enjoy being with Peter and the rest of us, even a little bit? What was the point of all that if you're just going to end things like this?!"
"I did want to meet you," Cletus replied. "I wanted to know you better. All of you... But there's no more time."
Cletus calmly walked to the doorway, leaving Mary Jane mounted on the wall. At the last moment, he paused and looked back at her.
"One last thing," he said. "Peter and Spidey... Did they really believe me when I told him my story? Did they... trust me?"
Mary Jane stared at Cletus and answered, "I don't know about Spidey... But Peter trusted you from the bottom of his heart! He still wants to save you!"
Cletus was silent for a long time. Then he smiled and nodded.
"Then that's fine... That's more than enough."
He ran out of the room.
Mary Jane struggled against her restraints. She pulled with all her strength, but the cords around her wrists wouldn't budge.
I have to stop that fight, she thought desperately. I can't let him die!
What does it mean to be more than one person?
To not fully remember what you do sometimes?
But who uses your body and brain when you're not really you?
As for me... I'm... I'm...!
Spidey and Gwen ran up the stairs and through the halls. Then Spidey abruptly stopped and held out his arm to block Gwen. "He's here..."
Cletus calmly walked through an open doorway. The red costume still only came up to his neck. He stared coolly at the two of them.
Spidey scanned him with his Spider-Sense. To his confusion, he only sensed danger from the boy's suit, not Cletus himself.
"You're different from usual," he muttered.
"Different?" Gwen asked.
Now Cletus was confused, but he recovered quickly. "Oh, that's right. You're not Peter. You're Spidey. This is the first time you've seen me when I wasn't acting."
"Acting?"
"I just finished explaining to Ms. Watson," Cletus said. "It's a little annoying to have to do it all over again... I lied to you about my split mind. I've been lying to you since the moment we met. 'Cletus' and 'Carnage' are the same person. There's no multiple personality - Just me."
"That doesn't make any sense," Gwen blurted out.
"It makes perfect sense. Don't you remember, Gwen? You suggested turning me over to the police. But Peter and Mary Jane talked you out of it, because they wanted to save the 'good personality'. But there is no good version of me. It was all just an act."
"But then-"
"Hang on," Spidey interrupted her. "You explained it to MJ? She's awake?"
Cletus tilted his head to the doorway. "Yeah. She's back there. You should go wait with her, Gwen. Things are about to get pretty violent here. But don't worry, I promise not to harm either of you... until after I'm done with Spidey."
Gwen glanced at Spidey, who nodded. Then she cautiously walked towards Cletus. But as she passed the boy-faced monster, he rammed his claw into the wall behind her.
"AAHHH!"
"STACY!"
Gwen wasn't hurt, but there was a large crater where she stood a moment ago.
"Haven't you learned by now not to trust me?" Cletus quietly asked.
Gwen ran the rest of the way. A second later she was out of the room.
"You...!" Spidey growled at his enemy.
Cletus spoke with an easy smile, "You're angry. That's a good thing." He spread his arms wide and brandished his claws. "This fight wouldn't be exciting if you weren't revved up."
Spidey and Carnage launched themselves at each other.
Gwen quickly found the room where her friend was. "Mary! Are you okay?!"
"I'm fine." Aside from still being mounted on the wall like a preserved insect. "Did the fight start yet?"
She ran over. "Yeah... Spidey's fighting with Cletus right now."
"We gotta break them up! Get me out of here!"
Gwen tried ripping the bonds, but they wouldn't break.
"There's a Swiss army knife in my right pocket," Mary Jane said. "Maybe that can cut it."
"Right!" Gwen reached into her friend's pocket and pulled out the red knife. She looked through the different gadgets. "Toothpick... Nail file... Here it is!"
She touched the blade to the red cord... then she stopped and stared at the Swiss army knife in her hand. "Why did you bring a knife to school?" she asked sternly.
"Uh, well, I never actually used the knife part," Mary Jane replied defensively. "I only bring it to school in case I need to trim my nails... And, very rarely, to pick locks..."
"Do you have any idea how much trouble you could get-"
"Gwen, there's no time for that! We might be too late already!"
Gwen began cutting through her restraints. "Too late for what?" she asked as she worked.
"There's no time to explain, but Cletus... He's gonna do something horrible unless we stop him right now!"
What does it mean... to be...
...
No... I don't care anymore...
Spidey had gone into Rage Mode. He and his all-black costume tore across the battlefield. His punches left gaping holes in the walls.
Cletus, whose costume still didn't cover his head, deftly dodged each blow. He swiped with his scalpel-claws and kept Spidey away. It was a back-and-forth game of attack and evade.
"Are you even trying?" Cletus yelled.
The walls were crumbling down around them. There was hardly any distinction left between the hallway and adjacent rooms - it was all one large battleground. Thankfully, there were no other people in this part of the building to begin with. With his animal-like focus on the fight, Spidey couldn't have guaranteed their safety. Cletus moved his hostages to only the parts of the building he wanted them in. This area was for them - For their fight.
"Yaaahh!"
Spidey swung his arm. The black gel over it stretched out into a long pillar. Cletus didn't have enough distance to dodge the new type of attack. It slammed into his torso with the force of an elephant's trunk. Cletus was thrown against the far wall and made a large crater on impact.
An ordinary person would have been killed. But that suit - Protoform X - did not make Cletus ordinary.
He coughed up a little blood, but said, "Is that all you got...?"
"I just realized I don't know what to call you anymore. If you're not a split personality, why would you pretend to be one?"
Cletus peeled himself out of the crater and stood up straight. Except for the drops around his mouth, he seemed completely unharmed. "Sympathy. To earn your trust. After having fun as a villain, I could join your little meetings and learn how you were planning to fight back. You were playing in my hands the entire time."
"And how did you know Peter and I were split?"
"I didn't know. It was just a coincidence that you were the real version of what I was faking... A wonderful coincidence."
"You little brat... Do you have any idea how much this is gonna hurt Peter once he finds out? You totally betrayed him!"
Cletus was silent for a while. He kept his face perfectly composed, and then he said, "Hurting people is what I do... What I've always done... If you don't like it, then try and stop me!"
The cords on his back pulsated. The cords along the walls and ceiling pulsed with them. Suddenly, dozens of claws shot down from the ceiling and rained over Spidey.
Spidey jumped backwards. And he jumped backwards a few more times, twisting and squirming in between the claws and tentacles.
"You don't hate me enough!" Though he was calm, Cletus had to shout to be heard over the crunching floorboards. "That's why you're not fighting harder! Maybe I should start killing my hostages until you take this fight more seriously?"
The onslaught finished. There was a thick curtain of tentacles stretching from ceiling to floor. Cletus couldn't see his opponent - couldn't even tell if he was unharmed.
The claws retracted into the ceiling. With the battlefield clear, Cletus saw Spidey lying motionless on his back.
Cletus blinked. He was beaten just from that?
He took a few steps towards the fallen hero... Then a string of web suddenly shot from Spidey's wrist to Cletus' ankle.
Spidey got to his feet with a backwards somersault, in the process yanking the web-line and pulling Cletus off-balance. With his foot pulled out from under him, Cletus collapsed and landed awkwardly on the pile of cords growing from his back. The wind was knocked out of him for a brief moment.
In a battle like this, a brief moment meant everything.
Spidey leaped over, landing with a foot on either side of Cletus. He was directly above the other boy. And Cletus' head was still exposed and unprotected.
With all his strength - every ounce of his power - Spidey launched his fist towards Cletus' face.
Mary Jane ran into the room and shrieked, "Spidey, stop!"
His fist froze less than an inch from Cletus' eyes.
Spidey turned his head. He saw Mary Jane panting at the edge of the battlefield, with Gwen walking up behind her.
"Don't let Cletus fool you," Mary Jane pleaded. "You're fighting the wrong person... That's not really Carnage!"
He looked back at the other boy. Only in retrospect, Spidey realized Cletus made no move to protect himself in that last second. Cletus had shown no fear, but after what Mary Jane said, his lip was trembling.
"What..." Cletus said at last. "What are you talking about...? I already explained... over and over... There is no-"
"Cletus," Mary Jane interrupted. "I said Carnage broke into Peter's house and you took credit for it."
"Yes. Because I did it."
"There was no break-in!" Mary Jane countered. Cletus' eyes widened in shock. "You took credit for something I made up. You had to take credit for whatever I said, because... you don't really remember what you do when you're Carnage... do you?"
Cletus said nothing. He simply lowered his eyes.
Spidey looked down at him. "So... He wasn't pretending to have multiple personalities... He was pretending to not have it? I don't get it."
Gwen sighed. "I should have explained it before I rescued Mary. What was I thinking?"
"At least we got back here in time," Mary Jane added. "Though it's too bad Spidey couldn't figure it out on his own."
He blinked. "Huh? Wait... You mean I was the only one here who fell for it?!"
"Duh. Did you forget about the Alter-destroying device?" Gwen spoke to him derisively. "Why would Carnage force Osborn to make one if he didn't need it? The part I don't understand is..." She looked at Cletus. "You are Cletus right now, right? So why is the school still like this? And what was the point of this last-minute charade? Why did you want to fight Spidey?"
Mary Jane quietly said, "I think... I think Cletus wanted Spidey to kill him. Sort of like suicide by cop."
Spidey looked back to Cletus in shock. But Cletus still wouldn't make eye contact.
"That's what this is about...? That's what all of this is about...? You punk!"
Spidey reached down and grabbed Cletus by the collar of his costume. "If you got control of your body away from Carnage, then you should have turned the school back to normal! You should have released the hostages! But you... You took advantage of what Carnage started for the sake of stupid emo urge?!" He lifted the boy up into the air.
"Spidey!" Mary Jane cried out.
"Don't stop me, MJ! Carnage may have started this disaster, but he's just as responsible for not ending it when he had the chance! Not Carnage - Him! In the end, you're just as bad as Carnage! You sacrifice other people, and play us for saps, just to get what you want! How do you know draining all these people won't cause permanent damage? And you... You almost killed Stacy back there, just to taunt me! You... You...!"
Cletus looked at him with sad eyes. "Spidey... If you want to hit me... Hit me."
Spidey grit his teeth. Then he pulled his fist back. "You're asking for it!"
"Stop!" Mary Jane yelled.
"Don't!" Gwen yelled.
"I... I..." The costumed hero's hands trembled. "I... can't let that happen..." He lowered Cletus to the ground. "Cletus..." The costume changed from the black Rage Mode to the red and black default. Then the mask melted away.
"Cletus is my friend," Peter said as he looked into the other boy's face.
"Peter...?" Cletus said.
"Yes." Peter let go out Cletus and held his own head. He was still in his Spider-Man costume from the neck down. "I got control away from Spidey, somehow." He rubbed his temples. "Man... He really gets angry around you or Carnage..."
The two girls walked up to the boys. "Peter, how much do you remember?" Gwen asked.
He concentrated. "Most of it... I think... Seems like that's normal when we switch without losing consciousness."
Peter paled suddenly. He turned towards Gwen in a panic. "W-Wait! Did Spidey - Did he really tell Debra and the others?!"
"Did he?" Mary Jane asked with casual interest.
Gwen pinched the bridge of her nose. "I feel another headache coming..."
Peter sighed deeply. "One problem at a time..." He turned back to Cletus. "How long have you been in control?"
Cletus looked away. "I don't know exactly," he said quietly. "I just suddenly woke up, in this suit, and the whole building was like this. I'm not sure why Carnage allowed me to come out. But I realized that this was supposed to be our final stand... Spidey was right. I could have fixed this, but I chose not to."
After some hesitation, Peter asked, "Did you really want me to kill you?"
Cletus nodded slowly. "I thought... if you thought there wasn't a 'good' personality to save, you wouldn't hold back... Carnage wants to 'kill' me so he can live on by himself. I want to kill him too, I just... don't care if I go down with him."
"Why would you...?"
Cletus slowly sank to the ground. Still wearing that demonic outfit, he pulled his knees to his chest.
"I've been lying to you since the moment we met, Peter. You told me everything, but I kept secrets from you. I've always known what Carnage's Master Plan was - That was lie number one."
He reached up and tugged on his curly red hair. The hair slipped off of his head. It was a wig. Underneath was light red stubble, hair just recently growing back after being shaved completely. Clearly visible across his head were long scars - left by surgery.
"Ever since I moved to this city, Carnage has been sneaking to Oscorp's labs so they can do tests on my - our - brain. I was conscious for some of them - Carnage woke me up. Oscorp used the data as a blueprint to finish making Protoform X. This suit was literally built by our brain. That's why it's so advanced and why we can use it so well. Carnage also told them to use the data to find a way to erase me... He left messages telling me everything. He bragged about how soon he'd be rid of me, and how he'd be able to do his chaos full-time. And when he stole the suit from the lab, I knew that I didn't have much time left..."
Peter sat down in front of Cletus. He felt like he understood something important about Cletus, even though, looking back, it probably should have been obvious a while ago.
"Stopping Carnage," Peter said, "wasn't the most important thing... It was the only thing you cared about... You never really wanted to save yourself."
Cletus lowered his head onto his knees.
"I think Carnage first woke up inside me when I was seven years old, but I didn't know it at the time. I just noticed that the neighbors' pets were suddenly scared of me. They were injured too, like they had been fighting with other animals. But after a few weeks they were all killed. And it didn't stop with the pets. It seemed like I was always stumbling onto a dead bird or squirrel in the area. That's when I started to realize something was wrong with me.
"As I got older, I became aware that Carnage was living inside me. Around that time, he started hurting humans. He was subtle at first - they were just pranks, really - he didn't want to get caught. But it only got worse. The only reason he didn't murder people was so he could hold it over my head. He got more violent any time I tried to stop him... I didn't have a choice. I let him do whatever he wanted... But it only got worse...
"People around me are in danger. Growing up, that was an inescapable fact. The only thing I could do was to stay away from everyone. And it was easy to keep my distance. No one at school wanted anything to do with me anyway. My mom - I don't think she knows about Carnage, exactly, but she's still afraid of me. And my... my father... my... f-father..."
Cletus began trembling. Peter, Gwen, and Mary Jane could only watch in silence.
Eventually, Cletus looked up at the ceiling and said, "Carnage could have killed anyone in this building... No, he will kill them, next time..." He winced. "It's been so hard, living like this, waiting until he makes me a murderer... I can't stand it."
"So you tried to make Spidey kill you today," Peter said.
"Not just today... I tried to kill myself lots of times. I've done everything from eating poison to jumping off skyscrapers. But no matter what I did, Carnage would take over and save our body." He looked down at his wrists, covered in that demonic costume. "I can't even cut deep enough to leave scars. He always stops me. Every single time. My own body and sense of self are out of my control."
"Cletus, people are equal," Peter told him. "You shouldn't have to die to prevent someone else's death. That's just-"
"It's not just about protecting other people," Cletus snapped. "I can't stand living like this. And I don't want to hear any speeches about how there's always hope or tomorrow's a new day because it doesn't apply to me. To me, 'tomorrow' is like a monster I can't escape from. It always comes no matter what I do. It's just another day of feeling guilty... and lonely... and powerless... And I have to live with all that every single day for the rest of my life... All I've ever wanted was to escape this life a tiny bit sooner."
Gwen spoke up, "So that's why, when you woke up today, you didn't release the school. And you made up that ruse to make Spidey hate you... You wanted him to..."
"Spidey was never going to kill me," Cletus said with a shake of his head. "The fact that Carnage didn't come out during the fight is proof of that. Even if Spidey got mad and beat me up, I was never in any real danger... I can't do anything. I can't even die on my own terms..."
Peter stared sadly into his friend's face. Cletus began crying. He was probably holding back those tears for a long time. He lowered his face and cried.
"Peter... You said you wanted to save me... So please, Peter... Save me... I can't face any more tomorrows like this..."
Peter was silent for a long time. Finally, he looked at Cletus and answered. "Cletus... Even if you beg me, I can't kill you."
Cletus sniffed.
"I'll kill you."
Everyone turned towards the new voice. A short way down the hall, past the destruction of the battlefield, Harry Osborn stepped out through an open doorway. His hair was dyed black again, and his earrings and flashy clothes were gone. He wore a plain coat and jeans.
"Harry?!" Peter jumped to his feet.
"Yeah, sorry," he said, without really sounding sincere. "I wasn't trying to eavesdrop. It's just that there wasn't a good place to interrupt before now."
Harry's voice and expression were serious. Cold. Almost heartless. This was a new face to Harry the others hadn't seen before.
"How long have you been listening?" Gwen asked, eyes darting from Peter to Harry.
He thought for a second. "Um... I think I came in at 'no one at school wanted to be with me'."
Peter looked down at himself. He was still wearing his Spider-Man costume from the neck down. Even if Harry hadn't overheard everything, there was no denying it while he was dressed in that.
Peter groaned loudly. "So on top of everything else, now Harry knows my secret too... This is my worst day ever." When he looked back on it later, Peter felt selfish for being worried over his problems instead of Cletus, but it really was a big deal to him.
"Actually, Peter, I already knew you had a split personality."
Silence.
Peter lifted his head and stared at Harry deadpan. "Really?"
"Well, 'know' is a strong word, but I definitely suspected."
"How long?"
"First day of school."
"Dang. That long?"
"I met you - I mean, the other you - downtown on the same day I met Gwen. It was only for a few seconds but you were really different than when I saw you again in school. Add that to a few little things, and I figured it out more or less."
"How come you didn't say anything?"
"You didn't say anything. You clearly didn't want to talk about it. So I let you pretend it was still a secret... Although, I had no idea the other you was Spider-Man. That was a shock. You did an excellent job of keeping that part secret... Before today, I mean."
Peter grimaced.
"Did I explain everything? Good. Now let me kill Cletus." Harry spoke as casually as if he were talking about running an errand to the supermarket. He reached into his coat and pulled out a gun. It was the same kind of laser gun Peter saw Norman Osborn's assistant use at the construction site.
"Where did you get that?"
"'Borrowed' it from Oscorp. It's pretty scary how easy it is to break in there, even if you are the C.E.O.'s son. Now..." He aimed it at Cletus. "Please stand back, Peter."
Cletus calmly wiped his eyes. He didn't stand up. He didn't resist.
Peter resisted. He jumped in between Cletus and Harry.
"I won't let this happen," Peter said firmly.
"Cletus wants it to happen," Harry replied. "He is literally begging us to kill him. So for whose benefit are you keeping him alive?"
Peter hesitated. He looked at Cletus over his shoulder. Then he turned back to Harry and said, "Mine... I'll miss Cletus if he was gone."
Cletus stared at Peter.
"And it's for his sake too," Peter continued. "I still believe that there's a way to save him... Really save him, without putting him out of his misery. And it's for your sake too, Harry. Are you really willing to become a murderer, just to stop Carnage?!"
"Yes," he said, still aiming the gun through Peter. "That's my penance! My penance for not stopping him when I had the chance. I ran away and tried to forget about the problem, and a lot of innocent people got hurt because of it. A man died during the first hostage crisis! Even if Carnage didn't pull the trigger himself, he's a murderer already! And there might even be more victims none of us even know about! The monster inside Cletus can't be allowed to run rampant anymore! Now out of my way!"
"No. You're mad because Carnage killed an innocent person, but you're trying to kill an innocent person too. Cletus is innocent."
"That's debatable. Carnage was born from Cletus, after all."
"What about me, then? You'll have to kill me first to get him. Are you willing to shoot through your best friend?"
"Yes," Harry said without hesitation. "I'll hate myself in the morning, but I'll still do it. Unless you get out of my way."
Peter and Harry glared at each other. Harry's finger was on the trigger. Peter did not move.
Gwen suddenly ran in between them. "Harry, how much do you love me?"
Without missing a beat Harry said, "If you were a man, I'd turn gay for you."
"Do you love me enough to not kill my friends? I want to save Cletus too, you know. I'd never forgive you if you killed him now!" She looked fiercely right into his eyes.
Harry hesitated for just a moment. Then he placed the gun back inside his coat.
"Peter, thank your girlfriend... And by 'thank' I mean without any romance or touchy-feely-ness whatsoever." And just like that Harry returned to his joking, fool-in-love persona.
Gwen sighed. "You really know how to cause trouble, Harry. We don't have to go through Cletus to stop Carnage. We have this."
She pulled the "brain pedometer" out of her pocket and showed it to the group.
"That's right, now I remember," Peter said. "The guys from Oscorp told Spidey that device could erase one side of a split personality."
"Really?! Geez, Gwen, you should have told us about that sooner!" Mary Jane cried.
"I didn't exactly have a lot of chances," she replied.
Mary Jane turned to Cletus, who still hadn't moved from his spot on the floor. "You see, Cletus? With this, we can-"
"I can't accept it."
"Huh?"
Everyone turned to look down at Cletus. "I can't find happiness if it's by myself."
The group was confused, except for Peter. Peter understood Cletus.
"You don't want to erase your other self, because you know I can't erase mine."
"Mr. Osborn designed the procedure for Protoform X and my brain specifically. The Alter-Destroyer can't be used on anyone except me - this body. Even so..." Cletus looked up at Peter. "Even if you can't use it, Peter, it wouldn't be fair if I was cured and you weren't. I know how much you want to take your life back."
Peter kneeled down in front of Cletus. "Our situations are completely different."
He smiled weakly. "Yeah, I know. You don't have a monster inside you. But you still understand the fear of losing yourself. We're the only ones who understand each other... Dissociative Identity Disorder is incredibly rare. And among those cases, having only one other Alter instead of a group is even more rare. And on top of that, we both have 'super' Alters, even though yours is a superhero while mine is a supervillain... We're the same, Peter. You might be the only one in the entire world who's in the same boat as me.
"If I got out of that boat... even if you encouraged me to do so... if I left you behind, alone, and I started an ordinary, happy life for myself, I don't think we could stay friends..."
Peter wanted to say something like "We'll always be friends," but he didn't think he could say it with conviction, especially after his fights with Harry.
"We'd act like friends on the surface, but you might become jealous of my normal life, and I'd feel guilty for being the only one who got what he wanted. I'd pretty much be getting away with murder, too. We would lose our ability to emphasize with each other. And without wanting to, we might drift apart one day."
Cletus looked at him. "I'm fine with dying, Peter, but I don't think I could live without you. Not after waiting my whole life to meet you."
Peter thought carefully about his next words.
"Cletus... I don't think you understand me as well as you think."
He blinked. Peter continued. "I do want to get rid of Spidey sometimes. But even if I had the chance, I wouldn't take it. 'Spider-Man' does a lot of good things for this city. And Spidey's not a bitter half-person like Carnage, who does nothing but lash out. He has a wide range of emotions and is working hard to develop his own identity."
Peter looked down. "I... I don't know for sure if that's the right thing to do. A psychologist would probably say he needs to be reintegrated into my subconscious... But I didn't give Spidey his freedom because someone told me to. I decided, for myself, to treat him as a separate person. I've been working hard to make it work, so if I stop now..."
Peter lifted his head back up and smiled, self-depreciatingly. "Then there would have been no point in everything I've done up 'till now. At least, that's what I feel like."
He reached over and grabbed Cletus' hands. "You are not me, Cletus. So don't try to copy me. And don't worry about what other people think. Don't even worry about what's right or wrong, or what's possible or not. If you're you, then think carefully and decide for yourself... What do you want to do?"
Cletus was silent for some time. He lowered his head and thought carefully. All sorts of thoughts and emotions he couldn't define were swirling around in his head, but there was one clear thing was shone through them, like a light at the end of the tunnel.
"I..." For a second it looked like he would cry again. But Cletus put his wig back on, hiding his scars, and showed Peter a brave face. "I want to stay friends with you. And..." He stood up straight. "I want to get rid of Carnage! Before he gets rid of me or anyone else!"
Peter smiled decisively and stood up too. Harry smirked too, just a tiny bit.
"It's probably impossible," Cletus continued. "It might be better if I just died quietly after all. But if I could, then I'd want to rip all his evil feelings out of my heart!" He glanced at Mary Jane. "Some people might say it's like murder to erase an Alter." He glanced at Harry. "Some people might say it's just therapy. But I don't care either way. I want to fight back against Carnage! I'm sick of letting him have his way while I do nothing but feel sorry for myself!"
"As much as I - for once - like Cletus' way of thinking," Harry spoke up, "we're all forgetting one important point. We're still not sure if the Alter-Destroyer or whatever-it's-called will even work."
"It's still worth a shot," Mary Jane said.
"There's one more thing," Gwen said. "To erase Carnage, we need to attach the device while Carnage is awake. Even if we switch him with Cletus, how can we stop him from switching back? If our timing is off..."
"I think I know how to solve that," Peter said.
"Already?!" Mary Jane was impressed.
"That's Peter for you," Gwen said. "He's so much smarter than Spidey..."
"Peter, do you...?" Cletus trailed off.
"Yeah." He nodded and, once again, smiled decisively. "I have a plan."
To be continued...
Author's Notes: (12/5/2013) So I missed my once-a-month deadline. I was really hoping to keep up the pace until the end, but...
This chapter owes a lot of things to a lot of things. The two main sources of inspiration were from Hizumi's talk with Ayumu in the penultimate volume of Spiral: The Bonds of Reasoning; and Hermit's talk with Sakuya at the end of dot-hack/Quantum. Throughout this story, I made Cletus similar to Hizumi in a lot of ways.
Disclaimer: I do not own Spiral: The Bonds of Reasoning or dot-hack/Quantum.
Edit: (12/17/2017)
A few months ago, someone reviewed this story and asked to see more. And it was the first time someone asked for an update since I cancelled the story, so I wrote them a private message that summarized, more or less, how I planned to finish it.
Now that I'm getting some of my other stuff in order, I figured I might as well copy that message here. It's not a real chapter, but it'll give closure just in case anyone's still reading this and wondering.
"...but do not fear yourself, for that is your Self." -Carl Jung
The End of Double Life
Peter's big plan is actually pretty simple. In the past whenever Cletus tried to hurt himself, Carnage instinctively woke up to protect himself. Since Carnage comes out whenever his body is in danger, Spidey and company need to put him in constant danger so that Carnage can't switch again. Basically, a long dramatic battle scene I could never figure out how to choreograph. But in the end it works and they use the device to erase Carnage from Cletus' body.
The school returns to normal. Cletus still feels guilty about everything that happened, but the gang forgive him and hide the fact that he had anything to do with the attack on the school. The gang learns that Cletus' father was physically abusive, and when Cletus was small he killed his father in self-defense by pushing him down the stairs. It was sometime after that Carnage started coming out.
The battle is won, but the bio-suit has mysteriously gone missing.
Several days later the Venom Arc begins. It's revealed that Carnage had a secret accomplice since the beginning: Eddie Brock. (Way back in chapter 12 Carnage mentioned a "friend" who made the fake bomb. That would have been Eddie.) Eddie and Carnage met by chance a long time ago, recognized each other as kindred spirits, and planned the whole thing from there.
Because the bio-suit was made by copying Cletus/Carnage's neural pathways, instead of disappearing in the last battle, Carnage's consciousness was copied into the bio-suit itself. Now Eddie has the bio-suit and he and Carnage are working together as a single entity: Venom.
Carnage wanted to get away from his other self. Eddie was lonely and wanted someone close to him. The whole thing went exactly as they hoped.
Venom has a battle with Spidey. And Spidey points out that Carnage isn't any better off than he was - he's just a suit that can't do anything without sharing a body with someone else. Carnage retorts that he isn't "stuck" with Eddie. He can pick any body now, and is only sticking with Eddie because he kinda likes him. He doesn't need to kill Cletus anymore because it's not necessary.
Spidey's losing the battle, but Cletus shows up and makes an offer. He says he can't live with the guilt of the crimes he and Carnage committed, and wants to accept punishment by sacrificing himself and letting Carnage have full control of his body. Cletus says that's what Carnage really wants: his true body without Cletus fighting back. That's the real reason he never tried to kill Cletus after the separation.
Eddie laughs it off, thinking Carnage has a much more suitable partner in him. But Carnage ignores Eddie and abandons him. The bio-suit leaves Eddie's body and slowly squirms over to Cletus.
But Cletus never had any intention of sacrificing himself. It was just a trick to split Venom up. After the bio-suit/Carnage gets off Eddie, Spidey easily beats the both of them.
Eddie is arrested and the bio-suit is locked up at Oscorp, never to be used again. Cletus decides to turn himself in and tell the police everything about himself and Carnage. Peter doesn't want him to at first, but Cletus insists that he face the consequences for everything that happened, and he also wants to get professional help to make sure another Carnage never appears inside him.
So Cletus turns himself in - without revealing anything about Peter or Spidey, of course. His sentence is relatively short, there's very little news coverage, and he gets transferred to a good mental hospital. Peter and friends assume Norman Osborn pulled some strings as part of a cover-up.
In a few years Cletus' sentence is complete, and he leaves the hospital to meet up with Peter and friends.