Rain: And I am back with a brand new chapter. This chapter will deal with the guilt Garfield is feeling after killing a villain so sit back, relax and enjoy!

Mario: Here we go!

A Symbiotic Bond: A Venomous Titan Reborn
Chapter Seven

Champion City
Champion City Hotel

With a streak of lightning, Garfield's body rose up sharply from the bed, sweat falling down his face as he panted heavily. "Again?" Garfield muttered softly as he brushed both hands through his hair before he lowered his head.

It had been three weeks since Garfield's battle with Oblivion and Garfield had been plagued with nightmares.

Nightmares of Oblivion's screams as molten steel poured over his body. Nightmares of the entire affair. Despite the symbiote's countless talks with him, Garfield still couldn't shake it off. He had murdered someone in cold blood.

It only made it worse when the news continued to play the news

Garfield rose out of the bed and walked towards the window and watched as the rain fell down the window pane.

He needed to clear his head.

"Hey...You awake?" Garfield spoke out.

"Mhmm," The voice responded tiredly.

"Go back to sleep. I'm going to go swing for awhile," Garfield said sweetly.

The voice hummed in thought before Garfield closed his eyes and summoned the suit onto his body, where the large white eyes opened. During the three weeks of hiding, the symbiote had trained Garfield to use his suit when she was resting.

His abilities were limited during her rest but he could still use the suit, which was all that mattered to him.

But there were many other abilities that he had learned but those were more battle abilities than ease of life abilities.

Garfield opened the windows and shot a strand of web and swung out into the air. Unlike his first few outings as a hero, Garfield's swings wasn't flashy. It was just a slow, leisurely swing.

Garfield released his hold and fell to the ground where he then shot up another web and zip lined himself to another building where there was gargoyle and landed on top of it before he walked to the narrow platform and sat down on it.

Garfield shut his eyes and lowered his head as the raindrops splashed against him. Ever since he was a child, rain soothed him. He couldn't explain how but it bought his soul to rest and after the last few weeks, he needed to feel the rain against him.

Was he hoping that the rain would clean his soul of what he had done?

No.

Garfield felt that nothing could clean his soul for what he had done.

As evil as Oblivion was, he should have been taken down another way...

There should have been another way...

Garfield was so deep in thought that he didn't realize that someone was floating in front of him until a female voice said "You must be the Spider-man everyone is talking about. Well I want to talk to you"

Garfield looked up and blinked in surprise.

Champion City – Champion City General Hospital
Rocket

"This is not a good idea, Rocket," Dr. Strange stated as Rocket slipped on her shirt with a wince. It had been three weeks since she had been in the hospital after her severe injuries against Oblivion and she couldn't stand sitting in the bed anymore.

During her time, she had been seeing the news of this "Spider-man" over every channel in her city and it made her curious. The only time she had seen him was when her battered body had collide against his at the end of her fight against Oblivion.

But from what she saw, it looked as if he had taken over her role as the main hero of the city. Admittedly, she was glad for another hero on the scene while she was wounded like this but what she needed to know how he defeated Oblivion.

She knew from her last memory that he took over the battle and from the news reports, the two fought their way to the steel mill and moments later, the mill exploded but not before the "Spider-man" managed to escape and no trace of Oblivion had been found.

How could he have defeated Oblivion when she couldn't?

She just had to find out. So when she saw him swing past her hospital window, she knew this was the chance to find out.

"I know Doctor," Rocket responded as she slide on some pants and placed her belt around her waist. "I know that I am going to regret it but I need to speak to him. I promise I will be back as soon as I can."

With a reluctant nod from the good doctor, Rocket opened the window and flew out from it, forming an orb around her to keep herself from getting wet. She didn't have to fly far however because after five minutes, she found him sitting on a platform with rain falling down on top of him.

She floated before him but he didn't say a word to her which was fine, she was the one who needed the first word. "You must be the Spider-man everyone is talking about. Well I want to talk to you."

She watched his head wipe up and for a moment, she saw the eyes on the mask widen but she thought she was seeing things. "You're Rocket..." the hero said softly.

Rocket nodded and flew close to him before she landed on the platform around him and said "That's me. I'm honestly glad I get to finally see the one who saved my life along with those in the city from Oblivion."

She noticed that he flinched at that name before he nodded and said "Yeah...Well no autographs. I was just doing the right thing. He was a killer who would have killed you and many others had I not stepped in."

"That I know," Rocket responded. "He bragged about all of the lives he took and wanted to add me on that list before he found my mentor, Icon...He was horrifyingly tough...How did you do it? How did you take him down?"

"It wasn't easy..." The hero answered. "It wasn't easy at all...No matter what I did, he recovered almost immediately due to the nanomachines he had on him...The only way I could have defeated him was to overload those machines."

Rocket nodded and looked up at the sky and asked "So how did you get passed it?"

It then grew quiet between the two, the only sound being heard was the thunder rumbling in the sky above them.

Before Rocket opened her mouth to ask again, The hero said "Molten Steel...I forced gallons of molten steel on his body. So much that it caused the steel mill to explode...I killed him..."

Ah...So he had to murder the villain in order to full stop him.

"I...I knew he killed thousands of innocent beings throughout the world and universe...He would have continued had I didn't...I knew that but I...But I should have found a better way to stop him...I shouldn't have had to resort to that..."

Rocket stayed quiet.

She could hear the pain in his voice as he spoke to her about what he had done but she understood. She truly did...

Oblivion relished the fact that he could kill anyone and anything and made it painfully clear to her that was going to kill again. That monster had to be put down before he caused more senseless death.

But to hear the pain in this hero's voice, his choice to kill Oblivion was haunting him greatly but she couldn't help herself and said "But what could you have done? You said it yourself, he healed from any injuries that you had given him and hell, he healed from injuries that I had given him...He would have killed again...And as guilty as you feel, there was no other way."

"I know..." The hero responded sadly. "I just wish I could erase what I did from my mind..."

The hero then looked up at the sky and said "When I was with the Teen Titans, Robin, the leader, always touted that killing was wrong and that no matter how tough the villain was, that they could always be defeated...It just feels like I took the easy way out in killing him..."

Rocket was surprised.

This hero was a Teen Titan?

She had never seen him in the lineup before.

But that was beside the point.

Robin was the well known apprentice of the famed Batman, who she knew that had one key rule and that was to never kill and it sounds like Robin followed that rule.

But she knew that the rule of no killing was a hard one to follow, especially when it came to bad guys who were very strong and while not killing was very noble, it only allowed all of the villains to grow more powerful and get that harder to defeat the next time around.

"I just feel...Like I'm less than a hero...That I'm corrupted...And I'm scared that I may have to kill again and I can't take that..." The hero finished before he lowered his head.

"Killing is never easy," Rocket told him softly. "It is one of the hardest choices that you can make...You have to make the choice to say "This person is far too powerful and far to vicious to be left alive." and then carry it out. For heroes like us, we try to never reach that point but when we do...We have to go through with it. We have to carry that burden of killing forever. We have to look ourselves in the mirror every single day and wonder if we did the right thing."

Rocket then reached out and placed a hand on his shoulder and said "Killing someone is never easy for heroes like us so its not an easy way out unless we aren't as good as we think we are...The fact that it hurts like this... the fact that I can hear the pain you are going through tells me that you aren't some unclean monster that will kill again. You show remorse for your actions, actions that I feel were justified. And now that you have done it, you know that you will do everything you can to avoid having to make that choice."

Rocket stood up and said "I have to get back to the hospital. Once I fully heal, I would like to talk to you again...And maybe take you out to dinner as payback for saving my life."

The hero looked up and said "I-I would like that..."

Rocket smiled and said "I hope so. I didn't want to be turned down." Rocket floated off the platform and said "You aren't weak for killing him...You made a difficult choice and now you have to carry that weight for the rest of you life but despite that, I know from the news articles that you continue to be a hero, despite the problems that you are facing. To me, that only shows how strong you are...Don't forget that Spider-man. Later."

And with that Rocket flew off, hoping that her words broke through to him.

Rain: And that is the end of this chapter. So I decided to make this chapter because Beastboy seems to be the type to put himself through mental torture after making such a heavy choice like that so I wanted someone to snap him out of it and Rocket was that person so until the next chapter...

Mario: See you next time!