Living with a murderous alien in your body had its challenges, as Eddie soon found out.
For one, you were never really alone, no matter what you did. Every mundane thing you did during the day was now the subject of intense scrutiny. He had honestly never thought he would be discussing his bowel movements with an alien, or explaining to said alien why he preferred to shave his face from left to right.
It was simultaneously hilarious and exhausting.
Another thing was that Venom needed to eat. A lot. This translated into a chronic feeling of hunger, only ever really sated right after Venom ate a person, and then only for a short time. The upside to this was that Eddie never had to worry about gaining weight ever again because Venom blew through every calorie they consumed at an alarming rate.
Eddie let Venom decide when and where to eat people, as long as they were bad guys and as long as they didn't get caught. Eddie knew very well that he had inexplicably turned into a serial killer. Not something he had ever aspired to be, but life was funny that way.
Trouble started when Venom decided to play with his food instead of clean his plate.
Eddie looked at the headline on his phone screen. 'HEADLESS BODY FOUND NEAR GOLDEN GATE BRIDGE.'
"V, why didn't you just eat the whole fucking guy?" Eddie asked.
Venom poked his head out of Eddie's chest and swirled around to look at him. "I just ate my favourite part."
"Yeah, I get that, buddy, but now the police are looking for a murderer."
"The police are no threat to us, Eddie," Venom assured him with a deep rumble that Eddie thought was meant to sound comforting.
"That's not the point," Eddie said. He put his phone down and rubbed a hand across his face. "When you eat people whole they just disappear and there is no evidence a crime even took place." He gestured at his phone. "But when you leave behind the parts you don't like then everybody will be looking for a killer and that will make it more difficult for you to eat people in the future."
"I had not considered that, Eddie," Venom said with a tilt of his head. "There are so many bad guys to eat that I thought I could just eat my favourite part."
Eddie snorted with laughter. "You know what you remind me of, V? A bear."
"A bear?" Venom demanded. "What is a bear?"
"It's a big furry beast that eats salmon. When there is an abundance of salmon the bears only eat their favourite parts of the fish, the brains and the eggs, and leave the rest to rot." Eddie had spent a lot of time watching random nature shows to pass the time after Drake got him fired from his job.
"They like to eat like me." Venom shot out a tendril and dragged Eddie's laptop closer. "Show me." Ever since Eddie had introduced Venom to Youtube, he demanded that Eddie show him videos about every little thing they discussed.
Sighing, Eddie typed in a search command and soon they were watching a couple of huge grizzly bears standing in a river, swinging their paws at the nearby fish.
"Can we eat them, Eddie?"
"Salmon? Sure, we'll get some from the store tomorrow."
Venom shook his head vigorously. "No, the bears. Can we hunt the bears? They look tasty."
Eddie stared at Venom in disbelief. "You want to hunt and eat a bear."
"Yes, Eddie. Can we?"
Eddie wanted to deny on principle, because what the fuck even, but then he got an idea. "There are black bears in California so I guess we can go and hunt some, but only if from now on you clean your plate."
Venom gave him a deeply suspicious look. "What does that mean?"
Leaning back in his chair, Eddie gave his alien pal a satisfied smile. "It means you eat the whole guy and you leave nothing behind. Do that, and you can hunt a bear."
"The whole person? Always?" Venom brought his face up to Eddie's to look him in the eyes.
"Yes, always. Here on earth we have to eat all of our dinner before we get dessert."
Venom sulked for a minute or so, before nodding his head. "Fine. We will eat the whole person, always. Can we now hunt a bear?"
Snickering, Eddie gestured at the window to show the darkness beyond it. "Too late now, buddy, but tomorrow we'll take the bike out to the hills and you can hunt your bear."
"Very good, Eddie. Now show us more of them." Venom pushed the laptop a little closer to Eddie, who, with a sigh, clicked on the next video.
Potential law enforcement crisis averted with minimal fuss. He was really getting the hang of this symbiote wrangling thing.