Snuggles The Symbiote
"So, they're not usually that busy," I said as Klara and I left the rec room. "Like, once they even let me take a pool cue to use as a pointer when I was giving a lecture to earn my consultation pay." Klara and I had a short conversation after I'd gotten back from doing a Q&A Livestream and ended up heading to the rec room because she heard about the video games, but the rec room was unusually busy today.
Now I needed to find something else to distract myself from the fact that my friends and teammates were off fighting monsters that were after me specifically.
"I'm sure it's fine, we can try again later," Klara replied. She didn't seem to let too much phase her.
We were almost to the stairs when I heard someone singing off in the distance. I stopped. "You hear that?" I asked.
"Yeah," Klara said. Then she shrugged. "Is that normal?"
I shook my head and pointed down the side hall where it was coming from. "Wanna check it out?"
Klara shrugged again and we went. At the far end of the hall were a couple of vending machines and a man in front of them. Or, at least, I thought it was a man. He sounded like a man, singing, but his back was to us so all I could make out was that he was in a suit and that he had long shiny black hair that seemed pushed back.
" ...The record shows, I took the blows, and did it... M~y way! " He finished just as we got to him. Then he grabbed the drink he'd gotten out from the little slip at the bottom of the machine, and turned around.
"Oh, hello there," he said while I got a good look at him. Yeah, he was a man. A handsome man. A pretty man, but a man... Unless he was trans? Should I be calling him they?
"This one continues to be baffled by the human race's obsession with pronouns."
Anyway, I got a good look at... Him. He looked like a pretty man, long black hair pushed back, green eyes, white skin. There was something familiar about him but I couldn't place it.
"You must be Cuddlebug," he said while gesturing to me with the hand that held his soda can. Looked like some kind of fruit drink with a label I didn't recognize. His other hand had a bag of chips that I assumed were something spicy and cheesy because I could make out a jalapeno and a wedge of cheese on it. He gestured to Klara with that one. "And the healer that transferred in today. Rose Red, right?"
"Yes," Klara confirmed with a nod.
"I'm not blocking you, am I?" The man said with a warm smile.
"No," Klara shook her head. "We just heard you singing and got curious."
"I'm sorry," I said. "But you look really familiar and I can't quite place you. Have we met before? Who are you?"
"Oh, how rude of me," he said apologetically, "I'm Luke Lafayette, esquire. I'm a contract lawyer in the legal department. I don't think you and I have ever properly met," he began, "but I like to take walks on my breaks since all the machines have different selections and I'm not the kind of man who can just eat the same snack two days in a row. You've probably seen me in the halls."
"No, I don't think that's it," I said with my face scrunched together. This was gonna bug me all day.
"Well, I handled the PRT's side of negotiations for your, and Weaver's, custom contracts, little miss," He said politely. "And what a lovely opportunity that was."
"I don't...?" I was just more confused than ever now.
"You didn't hear this from me, but our esteemed director... Well, she has a stick up her ass that's bigger than she is." Klara gasped. "She means well, but... She places a lot of value in making sure her authority is known and respected. She also cares more about her agenda, parahumans being made to... fit in, to normal society, more than she cares about us doing out actual jobs. When your lawyer came in with a list of demands that very much emphasized your, and your friend's, desire to remain independent and an offer of services that the PRT could never afford to pay for in cash... I just had to talk the deputy-director into letting me offer some reasonable concessions and extra privileges to reduce the amount you were asking for..." Luke began giggling like a schoolgirl. "A wonderful opportunity to teach our esteemed director that she can't control everything and that not everyone can be beaten down and made to fit in. Either she learns her lesson, gains some humility, and becomes better at her job... Or she gets frustrated, quits, and someone else gets the job."
"...Couldn't you get in trouble for that?" I asked, incredulously.
"Nope!" He said. "Every perk and privileged you and your friend were given was evaluated, given a monetary value, and compared against that of the information you could provide and the value of Weaver's silk... Which has actually gone up a bit, so I think we're obligated to reevaluate that so she might be getting a raise soon... anyway, the point is that all the perks you two get, your consultation pay, and what Weaver is getting for her costumes all total up to exactly the value of the services and information you two provide, and everything in your contracts is completely legal. You seem like a good enough kid," he finished, "I don't think you're going to abuse your right to refuse direct orders for any reason, the power to veto any Ward being transferred out, as long as they want to stay here, and the fact that the PRT is contractually obligated to ask you for information first and can only ask others after you explicitly state you don't know or give the okay even if you quit. As uh, any randomly given examples." He said with a huge, cheesy smile.
"I've been meaning to ask about some of that stuff..." I said, suddenly remembering some concerns. "Like, the bit on transfers makes it sounds like Wards are traded around a lot whether they like it or not, but that can't be right, right?"
"Don't worry about it," Luke said. "It really isn't something you need to be concerned about right now. Just... Remember, as long as you don't violate your Non-Disclosure Agreement or break the law you're basically immune to anything they can do. Don't go crazy with it, but don't be afraid of acting your age. Everyone needs a little mischief now and then." He gave one last cheesy smile and then walked around Klara and I to head to wherever he was going, but that last sentence made something click in my head.
"Are you Loki!?" I blurted out without meaning to. I turned to see that he'd stopped walking.
Slowly he turned around. "Now what would make you ask a question like that?"
"So, uh... the old gods are real where I'm from," I said. "The Asgardians, the Olympians, and so on. Some of them are superheroes in my world. My grandpa met Thor once. Not that long ago, I fought a villain who'd stolen Mjolnir and t looked and behaved exactly like Mjolnir does in my world." I was still kind of bummed out that I wasn't Worthy. "So I know that they're real, or they were, here too. At least, the Asgardians. I didn't realize it at first, but the reason you look familiar is that you look almost exactly like the Loki in my world does." I paused for a second. "Except you're prettier than he is."
"Thank you."
"And 'Luke Lafayette' sounds really similar to 'Loki Laufeyson.' Your last name is probably spelled different, but it's really only the last syllable off in how it sounds... And playing tricks on people to teach them humility and insisting that people need mischief, that's basically what trickster deities do..." And that's as far as I'd thought out.
Luke kneeled down to look me in the eye... Well, eye lenses. Klara and I were in costume. "That sounds well reasoned out," he said, "but would the God of Lies and Stories really use such an obvious alias?"
"N... No," I admitted. "Sorry, that was dumb."
"Don't feel bad about asking a question," Luke said with a smile. "It's the best way to learn and kids your age get punished for curiosity far too much... And, if you really want, I suppose you could call me Loki. Being compared to the God of Lies has got to be the most flattering 'Evil Lawyer' joke there is." He was still smiling and sounded playful. "Now, I do need to head back to my office," he finished and left.
"So that was weird," Klara said after a second.
"Sorry," I said awkwardly.
I was about to ask if she wanted anything out of the vending machines since we were here but then my PRT issued cell-phone started vibrating. I pulled it out of the little pocket-space where Mister Snuggles keeps his extra mass with a sound like a boot being pulled out of the mud and checked my messages.
"Uh, they're saying that I need to either head back to Wards HQ and activate lockdown or get to Office C-6 in the first basement and lock the door." It didn't say why but I was suddenly really worried about Taylor and the others. "Whichever one I can get to faster. We should..."
"C-6? That's the one that doubles as a panic room, right?"
I nodded. I couldn't quite remember the tour of the facilities but that sounded right. From where we were now it was closer to head to the first basement floor than back to HQ so we started off that way, quickly marching to the stairs.
We'd gotten down to the basement okay enough but then I heard... Something. Like, something skittering around on metal. I started to speed up, but before I could say anything to Klara something ripped out of the ceiling with a sound of tearing metal and I got tackled to the ground.
I was flipped up on my back and held down by my arms by one of the Poisons, the Bonesaw one, staddled me. I tried to pull away but she was stronger than me. So much stronger than me that it wasn't even funny.
"So," I said while trying to ignore just how fast my heart was racing. "You're probably thinking to yourself, 'should I eat this kid?' The answer migh—"
My voice cracked. I... I always figured that I was gonna die of pneumonia or something... Just, one time I'd get sick and not get better. This was... I couldn't even try to fight her... The symbiote goo, she looked like Toxin. If she's got Toxin powers then I don't know anyone strong enough to beat her.
"Might surprise you, but..."
"I spent an hour sneaking around in the vents trying to find you," she said with a voice full of frozen anger. "Then five minutes ago... Poof. Mama-Pan goes, just a bit after Mama-Tay follows, the hivemind goes down... There's no one there to absorb you anymore, I'm the only Poison left in this sector of the Multiverse. We could have given you a purpose, a family, more power than you could have ever wanted." A slimy orange tentacle came out of her back and split into six others, each with a scalpel, scissors, a saw, or something poking out of the end. "Instead, I'm going to make a diorama out of your organs and frame it in a box made of your skin and bones, sew your face on the back, and fed-ex to Weaver just to make her hurt."
Well crap. "Before you kill me," I started, trying to buy time, "there's something I want to know. Did you kill—"
I was interrupted by a bunch of Thorny vines with roses on them that grabbed the Poison and yanked her off of me.
"Sorry about taking so long," Klara said as she walked around the giant plant, pulled back the anti-venom on her arm. "She didn't seem to realize I was here so when she grabbed you I went for my emergency seeds but uh... I'm having trouble with the pocket trick." She reached down with her safe hand to help me up.
"It's fine," I said. "Took me a couple of weeks to get it right. So now what?" I said, gesturing to the Bonesaw-Poison.
"I have no idea," Klara admitted. "She said she's the only one left but I don't think we can take her at her word. I suppose one of us should call in that she's captured then keep going to the safe room."
"Yeah." I started to pull my phone out, but before I could there was a whip-crack! sound, a shattering sound, a squishy sound, and then I noticed that my chest hurt. Like, a lot. It all happened so fast.
The first thing I noticed was the scalpel about an inch to the left of where my heart should be if my biology textbook was right... I could see it, I could feel the pain, and some of my blood was leaking out around it, but it didn't seem like it was real.
I gripped it by the handle and yanked it out. It hurt a little bit more, but once it was out Mister Snuggles covered up and filled the whole and it didn't hurt as much. I crouched down and sat the scalpel on the ground. And then I noticed the orange and blue goo on the floor. An orange line stretched out all the way to me, but there were chunks of broken crystal and goo all around Klara's giant killer rose plant.
"I'm sorry," Klara said. She sounded the way I felt. "I... I thought I had her restrained, but she grew another tentacle. I just, I saw her stab you and panicked."
"It's okay," I said as I tried to stand up. I couldn't. My legs were too shaky. What was wrong with me? I hadn't been this scared fighting Lung. "They said that this world's Bonesaw had been tried and sentenced to death in absentia, and that wasn't really her, it was just a monster that ate her and absorbed her mind, but..." I really don't like that she had to die, but... I didn't know how to feel.
"But she's our age," Klara said. "She, she seems maybe a year older than you, or one younger than me... How does someone that young end up doing something that bad?"
"I was gonna ask before you ripped her off of me," I explained. "When I was trying to keep her talking. I uh... I asked about Bonesaw a few days ago and they said there was some confusion about how she got started... I guess there's no way to find out for sure except by capturing the one who lives here." Except they'd said she was too dangerous to capture alive, and...
"There might be a way you can still learn from the Poison," Mister Snuggles whispered in my ears. "The Klyntar leave traces of themselves in a host, which records the genetic code, physiological information, and memory of the host. This codex can be analyzed to learn about the former host's suitability for a new symbiote, or a klyntar symbiote could consume this codex to gain this information permanently as well as a small measure of raw power."
"So," I started, "if I met Spider-Man and took the piece of Venom that was leftover in him from when he was wearing the black costume, I'd get Spider-Man's memories?"
"And skills. This one would get stronger and gain the adaptations of the klyntar who left the codex."
"Who are you talking to?" Klara asked.
"Mister Snuggles. My Symbiote."
"Yours talks?"
"Yours doesn't?"
"The codex possessed by this Bonesaw may still exist within the remnants of the Poison that devoured her," Mister Snuggles continued. "If we harvested and consumed it, it could render the information you seek."
"Okay. So, how do we do this?"
"Allow this one to take control, this one will demonstrate."
I let Mister Snuggles take over, which immediately made my legs stop shaking. He stood me up, walked over to the plant, and produced one of our own tentacles. He lowered it down with the machine-like pincers open as far as it went. Our tentacle sort of... Melted into the goo. that didn't stop Mist Snuggles from flexing and wiggling it though, and shortly afterward the tentacle pulled out with a ripping sound and a thin strip of orange and blue goo, maybe a foot and a few inches long, with a bunch of short branches forking off of it.
"Wait," I said. "You're a symbiote, and this is made of symbiote mass, and we're basically gonna eat it ...So, does this count as cannibalism?"
"Yes," Mister Snuggles said bluntly and then the little bit he pulled out sort of got slurped up and swallowed into the tentacle and the next thing I knew it felt like shards of glass were being driven into my brain.
"Hurry. You have time. You can fix her, can't you?"
...
"You can do it. Don't you love your mommy?"
...
"I don't love her."
...
"Goodbye, mommy."
...
"Be a good girl."
ᚷ
Blood. Blood and death and violence and organs and... The clearest memories were of that first night, but it'd gone on like that for six years. Riley Davis...
The worst kind of villains were the ones that turned innocent victims into monsters, and...
I'd have to tell someone what I saw... As soon as... Even if it doesn't change anything, people should know the truth, and... And there was other stuff. About the Poisons and what they were doing here. About how powers worked here, and some other stuff that I was already forgetting, but...
My head cleared up. My mask was off. I was crying. And I'm pretty sure that the new pile of chunky, orange-brown goo that smelled icky was what I'd eaten for breakfast this morning.
Someone was holding me. I looked up and it was Taylor. Her mask was off too. She was okay. Behind her I could see a tall, muscular man in torn tights and Gallant's mask, and... I smiled. Knowing that there was someone Worthy on our side made me feel a little better. Gallant... Thor... He was talking to some PRT Agents. The hall was a bit crowded.
I was tired all of a sudden. I closed my eyes and everything went black, my last thoughts being to tell Mister Snuggles that I never wanted to absorb another codex ever in a million years.