Haze Mancer returned to his ship to find Loki waiting in ambush from the top of the spacecraft.

"Hello." Loki greeted. "Mr. Mancer, I presume?"

"That'd be me." Haze replied. "And who're yew s'pposed ta be, a heroic host come ta rescue his lil' Klyntar buddies?"

"Not so cliché, I don't know any of them. I'm a detective for hire, and unfortunately for you, my client is no fan of yours."

The hunter ignored him and checked with another holographic image on his wrist. "Hmmm... yer not on the list, either of yew. Ah well, I might as well snag me an extra to sell off!"

"List? So Eddie and Venom were specific targets, but why?" Loki promptly conjured a green barrier around himself just before Mancer grabbed his sonic gun and blasted him.

"Ha! Your noise is useless, you rednecked Freddy Krueger wannabe!" Healer mocked him.

"I guess I'll just hafta try somethin' else." Haze then switched to a flamethrower and shot a blast of fire at his opponent. However, Loki blocked it with a wall of his own fire magic, distracting the hunter while he waited to make his move. "Hooee, a magician! What's wrong, hosty, why ain't ya wearin' yer suit? Yer Symbiote makin' yew do all tha fightin'?"

"Well for one, my Symbiote is a healer, not a fighter." Loki then dodged a spray of the red-orange liquid he had analyzed from the crime scene. "And I don't know what suit you're referring to, but if I did wear one, that poison you're spraying could leave a nasty stain!"

Haze grinned. "It'll do more than that... it's a special neurotoxin I harvested from a Xenophage, a big ol' monster what hunts Symbiotes and eats their hosts' brains! Not only does it immobilize ya, I heard it makes the Symbies taste extra good to 'em!" Loki and Healer simultaneously winced as Mancer licked his lips. "I don't s'ppose yew got a defense for that?"

Loki blocked the oncoming spray with a wall of ice and shrouded himself plus the surrounding area from his cover with mists. "I believe you'll find that I always figure out something." The Jotun-Asgardian prince boasted before he fired a blast of frost in return!

The hunter then melted both the icy attack and wall with his flamethrower, following up with another sonic blast and prompting Loki to move back again until he stepped on a trap that released a powerful electric shock!

"Gotcha!" Haze then shot another stream of fire at him, engulfing him in an explosion. "Whoo, he was a tough 'un, but there ain't no way he's walkin' 'way from that!" Haze approached the resulting cloud of smoke, preparing to capture Healer, but he suddenly felt his hands yanked together from behind as Loki bound them with handcuffs.

"On the contrary, Mr. Mancer, we have got you." Mancer looked behind him in bewilderment, and then he looked back to his trap.

"Then what did I-" He squinted past the sparks to see a burning trash can where Loki's duplicate was.

"You'll pardon the smell of burning vomit, as your own ship's security is to blame for that." The real Loki quipped. "Now, are you going to tell me the code to release the Symbiotes and where you've hidden their hosts, or am I going to have to pry that information from you? And after that, you're going to tell me about this list and who it is you're working for!"

"I ain't tellin' yew jack squat! Ever heard o' buyer confidentiality? I may be a bit below the law, but I do have integrity: I ain't no squealer, so go ahead and try whatever ya got!"

Loki maintained an unamused expression. "If you insist." He placed a hand on Haze Mancer's head, and it glowed bright green as Loki searched his mind for answers. "Ah, your buyer is from Earth as well... how convenient! Malachi Malatesta, was it?"

"Not that sounds like a comic book character nameee!"

"I suppose. As for the hosts, they're stowed in the cargo locker of the ship, but it's cloaked. I say it's time for a heartwarming reunion." Loki then dragged his enemy with one hand while he reentered the spacecraft. He then typed in the sequence from the hunter's memory, opening each container one at a time.

"NO!" Haze struggled to slip his hands from the restraints, but Healer bashed his head against his as Loki gripped the cuffs tighter.

"YES! Accept your loss, you freakazoid pussy!"

"Pardon his terminology, his previous host was a small child." Loki excused. "Though he makes a valid point."

"Are you going to eat that head or not?" One of the freed Symbiotes asked Healer. "If not, I call dibs!"

"You!?" Another hissed. "He kidnapped me and my host while we were about to chow down on a fresh brain! He owes us a brain!"

"You think you are the only one whose plans he has screwed up!? He attacked my host and me while we were about to propose! If anyone deserves to eat his brain, it is me!"

"That is nothing! He blasted us while we were waiting for the repair man to come... now we will never get our air conditioning fixed!"

The Symbiotes proceeded to argue until they began to physically fight over their captor's brain, despite not having their humanoid forms!

"Um... what are they doing?" Loki wondered, confused at the sight of an army of blobs squishing against each other in a frenzy.

"Oh yesss, you probably could not hear them without their hosts to give them form, but they are all fighting over which of them gets to bite Mancer's head off." Healer snickered. "Of course, without any of their teeth, I have a major head start!" Healer then proceeded to bite off Haze Mancer's head before Loki could stop him. The other Symbiotes complained as Healer swallowed the brain and addressed them. "Oh shut up! We are the ones who saved your sorry asses, so we are the ones who truly deserved to eat that brain!"

"Hey, you can't just decapitate him like that!" His host scolded. "He might have had more information we need from inside his head!"

"We got the code to the cages, the hosts' location, the list of his targets, and the name and appearance of his buyerrr. That is everything you asked for, isn't it? And remember, we are detectivesss, so whatever we do not know we can figure out in time."

"Yes, I suppose we'll have to now!" Loki groaned as he freed the hosts, and their partners wasted no time in merging with them again. The detective looked them over for a second. "Excuse me, which of you are Eddie Brock and Venom?"

"They're not here, boys." One of the Symbiotes answered. "Venom left us when he heard his host escaped."

"Escaped? How?"

"Right after we stopped here, his human must have figured some way to slip out, because Venom could sense it, and Mancer let him go to find him."

"Mancer needed his host that much, did he? Obviously it was a trap to lead Mancer back to Eddie as well."

"It was; the hunter put tracking devices in all of the Symbiotes he captured, and Brock slipped out just before he stuck the needles in the hosts."

"Needles? He injected them with something?"

"Not sure... whatever it is, we can't detect it." The recently freed Symbiote paused while his host told him more. "He says that Mancer stuck it into his back, and it really hurt; he felt as if our spine was about to break in two! I wonder..."

"Perhaps he drew something from your hosts instead, like blood or bone marrow?"

"No... it think it's much, much worse than that..."

Loki raised an eyebrow. "Why? Has he poisoned you?"

Rex shook his head. "You know what a codex is?"

"No."

"Then I guess it's explanation time. Every host we Symbiotes bond with, we leave a piece of our DNA we call a codex attached to their spinal cords, so even if we're separated, we never truly leave them."

"Oh, that's beautiful. You're going to make me cry." Loki dryly teased.

"You will be crying if those codices ever get into the wrong hands."

"Why? What comes from them?"

"The end of everything good... of life as you know it."

"Now that is clichéee."

"...Right. Then perhaps those codices are what Mancer's buyer is really after." Loki turned to Healer. "Well, if we had Mancer's mind to access, we could see what he did with them, so we'd best find Mr. Malatesta and see what he knows. For now, we can search this ship for any clues."

"Yeah, search for clues!" Healer echoed.

"You'd better search fast, boys, cuz we're leaving for Earth soon! By the way, who are you two?"

"I go by the name Mr. Ouroboros, or Mr. O if it's easier, and my Symbiote's name is Healer. And what do you call yourself?"

"You can call us Rex. You did well to defeat the hunter singlehandedly."

"Rex? Like the dinosaur?"

"Pleasure to meet you, Rex, and thank you. I'm curious though, why these earplugs didn't stop the noise Mancer used against us? They're advanced technology from a future further than this, and they don't seem to be faulty."

"Against 4000 to 6000 hertz vibrations? Those would be useless; it isn't the noise reaching your eardrums that causes us all pain, it's the vibrations going off around us that mess with our very Klyntaran DNA, causes us Symbiotes to destabilize and lose our hold on our hosts."

"Is there a reason behind that?"

"Yeah. A long long time ago, when the creator brought us into existence, there were two distinct sensations we all remember: the blazing heat from the forge, and the earsplitting ringing of his hammer being struck against us, and we cannot forget, no matter how hard we try. As a result, we are weak to fire and high frequency sound, the fear instilled in us from birth, though the creator didn't mean to do so."

"Ah, I... suppose that makes sense. Now when you say 'the creator,' you refer to the god who created All-Black the Necrosword? The one who slaughtered the Celestials for fun?"

"Yes. He is the only other thing in existence we fear."

"Is he now...? Then I assume those pieces of your DNA bring forth something especially malevolent of his design when used nefariously?"

"Good assumption."

"And your weaknesses are partly psychosomatic, but they affect us hosts as well. Why is that?"

"We share a lot through our bond, not only our powers, though if the vibrations had succeeded in separating you two, you would no longer feel his anguish until you rebonded. I am surprised your Symbiote could hold onto you for so long when you tripped the alarm, though I've never seen it make someone lose their lunch before. How long have you two been together?"

"Let's see... about half a year, if I'm not mistaken."

"You have a strong bond. Who are you, exactly, Mr. Ouroboros?"

"I'm a private detective, and I need to find where Eddie and Venom went."

"I can't help you there. We are curious... we can see you are not human, but why did you not let your Symbiote out to fight?" Rex noticed. "Was it to protect him? You know he's the one who's supposed to be protecting you, right?"

"Like I told Mancer, he's a healer, not a fighter, and aptly named so. Unlike most humans, I can more than handle myself, as you could see for yourself, so he's free to stay around my spine or wherever and heal any damage I take, if any."

"All of us Symbiotes are naturally able to heal and fight simultaneously, even the weak ones, no matter where in the body we are. Is he afraid?"

"You want to be next on the headless hunt, Rex?" Healer snarled.

"Hmmm...funny enough, there is a glimpse of you inside of the hive mind, Mr. Ouroboros... or Loki, but there's no information in it about any Healer."

"That makes sense. Healer is the name that I gave him, but he originally went by the name Grievance. Is there a Grievance in your hive mind?"

"...Nope, no Grievance. There is a Symbiote who looks similar, but his name is Malice, not Healer." Loki felt Healer writhe inside of him as he heard that name while Rex continued to discuss Healer. "He must be a real nobody for none of us to know him!"

"Or perhaps your hive isn't as all-knowing as it claims to be." Loki countered before his partner could lash out. "Besides, you're bound to hear of Healer soon enough, after he becomes the first of his kind to open a chocolate-covered brain shop." Rex raised one of his host's eyebrows in curiosity as Loki began to walk away. "Well, there don't seem to be any needles or traces of your separated DNA here, but there are quite a few chemicals here to analyze, so we'll just take these and be on our way. Now we've got a symbiotic pair to find, so bon voyage!"

"Do you see!?" Healer shouted at Loki. "There is no getting along with my species; we are complete assholes to each other! It is only hosts that we can bond with!"

"Then perhaps you could be the exception, demonstrate proper manners for your more uncivilized peers, and next thing you know, you'll have a swarm of loyal, sophisticated customers!"

"Mmm... your optimism is naive, but I appreciate you being so supportive of my dream. You are very sweet."

"Certainly not naive!" Loki refuted. "I've just seen so many unbelievable changes in people across the multiverse, so many possibilities and variations, that it's more the opposite. And despite my own seemingly savage background, I learned to be civil, much more so than either of my people as a whole!"

"Trueee. You are certainly very good at arguing your point."

"I know, it's a gift." Loki's grin faded as he spotted a lone Symbiote in the distance, caught in a trap that zapped it with electricity. "Could that be Venom?" The duo moved closer until Healer recognized the squirming black blob.

"That is not Venom, it is... him!"

"Malice? Your father?"

"Quickly, let us conjure up some popcorn and a movie camera! We must record that douchebag suffering so we can relish it for millennia to come!"

"So much for being civil..." Loki muttered. "Though from what you've told me of him, I can't say I blame you. If it were me but a few years ago with my biological father in this exact situation, I would have wanted to savor his suffering as well."

"We are one, Loki, but our fathers are not the same! You hear me, Malice!? Your suffering and humiliation will be our new favorite movie!"

"Nnngh! Youuu!"Malice grunted.

"Wishing you had killed me, aren't you? Now it's your turn, FaTheR!" Healer gleefully laughed as his father continued to struggle against the trap.

Loki watched for a moment and sighed. "We should probably go and find Venom soon."

"We have time, it's not like he's going anywhere! You promised me we would watch him get captured and writhe in pain! Then again, if this gets too dull for you, I could always just eat him at the end!" Loki nodded and conjured a bag of popcorn for them until Malice managed to speak again.

"Just... as useless as always. Like always... you do... what you're best at: nothing, while I... I sufferrr... for it... you... could not help me if you wanted to... just leave me alone... to die..."

"And that's exactly what we were planning on doing." Loki answered after Healer linked his mind to the inaudible conversation, and he turned to his own Symbiote. "Popcorn?"

"Hold on!" Healer interjected. "I could escape a trap like that with my eyes closed! You are just too pathetic to do so yourself!"

"Um, Healer?"

"I am not the one... who is a failure in everything... that he does." Malice grunted. "That... is youuu! I would rather die... than be saved by you... you embarrassment..."

"Oh, would you now!?"

"Healer, you see he's baiting you, yes?"

"Yes, he wants us to kill him, to do nothinggg, but that is too good for him! We will show this sad old loser, Lokiii!" Healer then grabbed Loki's sword from his back and used it to destroy the trap with a fiery explosion, while his host displayed a look of concern. "Ha ha, who is the useless one now, Malice!? That's right, it is youuu!" Healer then proceeded to devour the rest of the popcorn while his father recovered.

"That's showing him."