CHAPTER THREE
RUN RABBIT RUN
QUEENS
. . .
. . .
Peter Parker
. . .
. . .
I tear recklessly through the sewer tunnel, pushing so hard and so fast each step sends a painful impact shuddering through my shins and knees. It's too dark, the terrain too precarious to be sprinting like this.
I could twist or break an ankle. I could fall and lose precious seconds scrambling to my feet.
The thoughts try to pierce through the panic, but they can't get through.
My converse slip on something wet and slick, my gut dropping as I lurch into the stone wall. I push off it, my footing clumsy.
RUN—RUN—RUN—
May—oh God, May—
Have to lead it away. Have to keep it away from her.
There's a deep, throaty rattling somewhere behind me. I think it's a laugh.
Slotted grates above offer thin shafts of light, separated by thick swaths of black. Just get to the next one. The next one. Like checkpoints in a videogame.
Lead it away. Don't stop. Don't let it catch you.
The ground beneath me slopes down, rounding out, growing wetter and wetter, until my shoes are splashing through god knows what.
Something sharp scrapes against the brick from somewhere behind me.
I clench my teeth. I run faster.
I have to think. Plan. Strategize. Remember my training, remember how far I've come and use it. I've already pressed the emergency beacon on my watch. Help is coming. I have my web shooters, and all I have to do is buy time, to lead it away from May—May, covered in blood—
The path splits, and I'm suddenly tearing down one without remembering which one I chose. The water is ankle deep now, the stone beneath slimy.
I know it's behind me. No idea how close, how far. I can't sense it.
God, I can't sense it.
There are only the sounds of my own frantic splashing. Any lead I had I'll lose making so much noise.
Doesn't matter, it can see me, it can smell me-
The water's slowing me down. I push off the ground, hands and feet sticking to the curved ceiling. It's sickening, the world flipped, the water now flowing above my head as I crawl along the ceiling as fast as I can, deeper and deeper into the underground tunnels of the sewer.
No more splashing. Just the steady trickle.
The tunnel opens into a wide, circular chamber, a round grate at the peak of the dome letting in stripes of burnt orange light from the setting sun above like a spotlight in the ankle deep, murky water. Like the spokes of a wheel, more tunnels branch off in every direction, their archways pitch black.
I pause, panting as I perch on the ceiling just outside the tunnel I just crawled from. My ears strain to hear any sign of movement beyond the gentle lapping of water, the scurrying of tiny rat feet echoing in the distance, the muffled sounds of the cars above.
My heart is a heavy beat in my chest.
I could crawl to that grate, slip out into the open streets, into the last bits of daylight. Would Venom follow? Would it ravage the streets of Queens, killing innocent bystanders just to sink its claws into me? Would it double back to use May as bait, to finish her off?
Can't. I can't.
I drop back down to a cement platform that rings the chamber, haloing the water in its center and sink into a crouch, pressing myself against the wall. My eyes scan the dark.
"Why do you run?"
My muscles lock up as I frantically look around, fists clenched.
"Why do you hide in the shadows?"
It knows exactly where I am. It's toying with me. Enjoying the hunt.
Wouldn't be the first one.
Slowly, carefully, I step down into the water, staying in a low crouch as I move for the center, toward that shaft of striped light. Better to keep equidistant from all my escape routes than to be trapped against the wall.
"Who's hiding?" I call back, keeping my fingers against the triggers of my web shooters as I turn a slow circle, eyeing each black tunnel for movement.
"Are you ready to say yes? To join with us again?"
"Not gonna happen."
"Why do you resist?" This time its voice is right next to my ear.
I whirl, firing a web, but it zips through the empty air to splatter along the curve of the distant wall.
"Remember our strength, our power. The world lay at our feet."
"I remember being your puppet," I say through gritted teeth, my blood heating as I keep up my slow spin. "I remember you using me to hurt the people I care about."
An icy breath against the back of my neck. I throw a punch this time, sharp and wild, but it hits nothing but air.
"They were trying to tear us apart. Together, we belong. Together we are home."
I spin again, swinging wildly, shooting webs at every moving shadow, at every laugh skittering across my shoulder blades. "Stay away from me!"
A low blow lands against the small of my back, shoving me forward. I lash out with my fist, snarling, filthy water spraying all around me.
"Peter."
"Stop!" I whirl, staggering back into the light, growing fainter, smaller.
"Peter."
"STAY AWAY FROM ME!"
"Peter!"
I turn, breathing hard, my eyes wide as bright, white light glares suddenly from one of the tunnels. My hand lifts to shield myself from it as I squint. The beam lowers, revealing three figures at the throat of the archway before me, light glaring off a metal suit, a vibranium arm, a shield.
"Mr. Stark," I croak as his helmet retracts enough for me to see the wild severity of his face, the relief painting it, as if he was sure he'd find me dead or worse. Bucky and Steve wear similar expressions.
Before he can speak, a shadow falls over me, and their widening eyes snap to something behind me. I spin, heart in my throat as I hurl another punch.
It lands in the center of a black, icy palm as a hand curls over mine, squeezing, trapping my fist in its grip.
Venom bares its teeth in a savage smile.
In a flash, he twists me around, bending my arm back painfully, unnaturally, so that it nearly pops my shoulder out of its socket.
Its other hand wraps around my opposite shoulder, the talons poised at the skin of my throat as I'm forced to arch back.
Steve has dropped into a crouch, shield at the ready, and there's an assault rifle in Bucky's hands, aimed squarely at Venom's face as the Winter Soldier's expression ices over into its familiar killing calm.
Mr. Stark has taken two steps forward, his hands raised and palms glowing white blue as fear and fury war on his face.
"Remove your hands," he says in a low, vicious voice that promises death. "Now."
Venom's low laugh rumbles into my bones, wet saliva spilling onto my neck, making me cringe with disgust.
Bucky's hands tighten on the rifle.
"You should have stayed in your cell," he says.
The symbiote hisses, low and throaty. "We will repay you for the agony you left us in."
"Let. Go." Mr. Stark says, eyes blazing. "I'm not going to ask again."
Venom's face lowers until I can feel the slickness of its teeth against my cheek, making the others stiffen, readying their weapons. Then it says in a low, hushed murmur, "You will watch them die. We will feast upon their corpses, and you can listen to the crunch of their bones."
I flinch, thrashing, but the strain on my arm forces me into stillness as I clench my teeth, breathing hard through my nose.
"Or, you can say yes. Let us in, Peter. And we will let them live."
"Hey," snaps Mr. Stark, and his helmet closes over his face, the slashes of his eyes burning bright. "Get your ugly face away from him."
"Say yes, or you will taste their blood on your lips."
An image flashes before my eyes. May collapsing onto the floor, half of her body wet with dark crimson. "Go to hell," I say as savagely as I can through the tightness of my throat.
A sharp yank, a loud POP, and then I'm yelling as my vision goes white from the pain lancing through my shoulder. Venom hurls me to the side, and I go crashing into the water, landing on my bad arm. My whole body spasms from the agony as I choke.
Gasping, throwing myself to the side of the cement platform, I stare down at my deformed shoulder, my arm completely out of socket.
Light explodes all around me.
Bucky Barnes
. . .
. . .
Nothing could have prepared me for the sight that awaited us in the tunnels beneath the streets of Queens.
Hearing Peter's shouts echoing back at us as we rushed down the damp, slick path to where his emergency beacon said he was located was one thing.
Seeing that monstrous face emerging from behind Peter's shoulder, hearing that voice again after all this time is another.
I expected danger, the threat of death at Ultron's hands or his hive-minded androids that Steve debriefed me on during the frantic race to Peter's location.
But seeing the kid in Venom's claws?
Venom, who should be nothing more than a speck within a vibranium container in the heart of the Wakandan vaults. Venom, who shouldn't have been able to escape unless Wakanda was destroyed, its king and people slaughtered.
Can't think about that now.
I mark Peter's location where he leans against the cement, his shoulder deformed and out of place from his arm being yanked out of its socket. And as I empty clip after clip into the symbiote charging, my feet move automatically to put myself between Venom and the kid.
Venom's slick black skin seems to absorb the impact of every bullet.
It snarls, baring all those teeth, lunging for me, claws raised.
Steve's there, sliding through the filthy water, shield raised as he takes Venom's feet out from under it.
The symbiote crashes to the ground for only a second, and then Tony unleashes twin blasts of sonic waves straight into its face.
It reacts instantly, writhing in the water like a thrashing seal in the jaws of a great white. Black tendrils shoot out from its skin, spasming in agony as an ear-splitting screech echoes along the tunnels, mixed with the pulsing sound waves in a chaotic symphony.
Ironman bears down on the symbiote, furious, no trace of mercy or hesitation as metal plates along his shoulders raise. Within them, something glows red-hot, and the air in the sewer is suddenly sweltering, the stench so bad my stomach lurches.
Venom's shrieks reach a new pitch.
And within the writhing tendrils, I see a glimpse of a gray t-shirt beneath its chest.
Steve sees it too, and together we lunge, seizing handfuls of black, icy coils and wrenching it apart.
I grit my teeth as I yank with all my might, each tendril like a lashing boa, all muscle and strength, and I reach in to curl my fingers around the t-shirt, to free the host underneath it all.
"NO!"
Hundreds of massive tendrils strike out at once, slamming into me, into Steve, knocking us away. I go flying through the air, managing to turn my body just enough so that it's my back hitting the cement of the wall instead of my skull before I fall to the water below.
Pain sings through me, but a bellowing roar has my head snapping up.
Venom bears down on Ironman, those tendrils wrapping around his forearms, his shoulders, his chest, constricting despite the way they shudder violently from the sonic waves.
The chamber is filled with the sounds of screeching metal, illuminated by the spray of sparks, and I hear Tony cry out through clenched teeth as parts of his suit begin to crumple. As the sonic waves skip a beat, then cease entirely.
Their absence leaves my ears ringing before Venom snarls, "Not this time."
Its jaw distends unnaturally wide, the whites of its teeth catching in the light streaming down through the grate above before they clamp over Tony's shoulder.
The vibranium threads Shuri installed in his suit are the only things that prevent the metal from collapsing entirely under the weight of those piercing teeth, but within his suit, Tony yells as plates crunch together from the pressure.
I'm on my feet, charging through the water, and behind Venom, so is Steve.
We lock eyes, and he swings his arm back, hurling his shield through the air.
I leap, catching it, my arm slipping through the brace on its underneath, and as I land, I bring my vibranium fist down against the shield.
The sound echoes across the chamber, sending enough ripples of pain through the symbiote that it breaks away from Ironman, shrieking. Tony collapses to one knee.
I charge, keeping a steady, heavy beat against the shield, and each time, Venom spasms and snarls, backing away. Steve launches himself onto its back, his teeth clenched as he digs his hands into the black skin of its face, tearing.
Venom shrieks loudly, and suddenly there's another voice screaming too. A man's.
I see a jaw, a flash of teeth—
Venom throws itself backwards, slamming Steve against the wall of the chamber, loosening his grip and knocking the breath out of him before the symbiote's claws are reaching up.
I only have time to raise the shield before Steve is hurled straight into me, sending us both crashing into the water.
Peter Parker
. . .
. . .
I breathe hard through gritted teeth as I clutch at my shoulder, watching the horror unfold before me.
With Tony's suit damaged, Venom is just too strong.
They're going to lose.
Panic cinches my chest, making the pain pulsing through my left arm even worse.
They're going to lose, and Venom will kill them for what they did to it, or worse, it will take over me, then make me kill them.
How is this happening? How can this be happening?
It's like a nightmare, seeing that monstrous figure from my dreams and worst memories lashing through the darkness of the sewers, beating down Bucky, Steve, Mr. Stark—sprays of filthy water, cracks of crumbling cement, roars and shrieks and cries of pain—
My eyes squeeze shut against it, against the fear rising in my throat like bile—
Bucky lets out a shout of pain. Steve yells his name.
No. No.
I'm done being the victim, being the puppet for others to take, to control, to hunt. I've come too far, faced too much, to sit here cowering in the dark while my own personal demon hurts my friends.
I'm done.
Clenching my teeth, I open my eyes and shift my body to brace my shoulder against the curve of the wall. I suck in a breath, seize my wrist, and push.
My vision goes white from the searing pain as my shoulder snaps back into place, leaving me breathless. I roll it tentatively for a moment, wincing at the pain, the swelling, knowing I likely messed things up.
But it's mobile. I can move it, I can clench my fist. And my super healing is already at work, taking the edge off the pain.
I shove to my feet, my eyes snapping to Venom, bowed over a thrashing body in the water.
Bucky.
I fire a web, the end of it sticking to the round, heavy grate above, and as I wrench, it comes free, spinning with my movement as I swing it around with a yell.
It slams into Venom, knocking the symbiote away from Bucky as it goes crashing into the water.
Releasing the web, I charge, landing on top of Venom's chest, hurling fist after fist with all my strength into its hideous face. Pain lances through my left arm and shoulder with every blow, but I don't care, not as rage burns its way through my blood, my chest, leaving me aflame.
Tendrils shoot out from its chest and slam into me, knocking me up and away.
I flip through the air, firing two webs at the wall, and yank myself forward, feet first, slamming into Venom's face just as the symbiote tries to get up.
"Enough," it snarls, and as I hurl another fist toward its jaw, a massive hand curls around my throat and lifts me into the air. "You will succumb!"
"Succumb to this, asshole," comes Mr. Stark's voice to my right.
There's the sound of a shot fired, but it doesn't hit Venom.
It hits me.
It impacts my ribs without pain, and as Venom and I glance down at the metal embedded into my shirt, it explodes into movement. Thousands, millions of tiny metal plates unfurl in an instant—nanotech, I realize—covering me in a wave, settling into place, solidifying.
For a moment, my vision goes black, and then the lenses covering my eyes whir to life, illuminating Venom's perplexed, snarling face.
F.R.I.D.A.Y's lilting voice sounds in my ear. "Activating Anti-Venom protocol."
Venom's features are suddenly glaring red as shifting plates on my suit burn searing hot, though I only feel a fraction of the heat.
It shrieks, but doesn't relinquish its hold on me.
Metal shifts at my back, and suddenly six long vibranium spiderlegs erupt from my spine, curling around my front protectively, digging under Venom's hand, then snapping out, forcing it to stumble away from me.
Venom roars, crouching low, ready to lunge.
Plates lift at my shoulders, and sonic waves scream straight into the symbiote, my helmet blocking out the horrific sounds and vibrations.
Tendrils erupt all over Venom's body as it cringes away, and I charge.
My spiderlegs lift me into the air, towering over the symbiote the way it towered over me, and I unleash myself upon it, hurling punch after punch into its jaw, sending it staggering back. I spin, delivering a brutal kick to its chest, and Venom goes flying, slamming into the opposite wall so hard, the entire chamber shudders.
Inside my blood, I am burning as hot as the metal plates of my Iron-Spider suit. All I know is rage and hate.
Searing, boundless hate.
I fire a web, and it cinches around the symbiotes throat. It only has time to lift a clawed hand before I'm yanking it toward me, rearing back my fist to plow straight into its hideous teeth.
Venom slams into the ground, sending waves of water splashing into the air, and then I'm on the symbiote, pinning down its limbs with my extra ones, concentrating all my suit's heat and sonic waves straight into its torso.
The shrieks are deafening as Venom arches its back, tendrils lashing out at me blindly.
It narrows its milky eyes, baring its teeth. "You—will—give in—to us—"
I snarl back, "I'll die first."
Black fills my vision, and I'm thrust back. My spiderlegs stretch out, keeping me stable as I land, and when I look to wear Venom was just lying, there's nothing but the waves of murky water slapping the cement.
Breathing hard, I quickly scan the room, but the symbiote has vanished.
The sonic wave emitters embedded in my shoulders shut off abruptly, metal hissing as the plates settle back, and the red glow emitting from my body fades away.
The moment I think it, the helmet retracts, leaving my face bare as I look to Mr. Stark, to Bucky, to Steve who all stare back, equally stunned and horrified by what just happened, by the repercussions we can't even yet imagine.
Still panting, I focus my eyes on my mentor, my fists clenched and trembling. "Where is my aunt?"
A/N: I have no idea how long this wave of inspiration from watching the new playstation Spiderman game will last, or how much time I will be able to devote to this. But right now, I am riding this wave, and the words are pouring out. So for the moment, I guess I'm just uploading chapters of Sound of Silence? And then whenever I run out of time, I will post the remainder of the plot summary/future scenes I have planned for this book and series. And don't worry, the most epic moments/finale/angst/fluff at the end, I do have written out in full.
RedHood001: SO HAPPY YOU ENJOYED THE REUNION! Hope this initial fight was everything you hoped it would be! I do have some epic Peter vs Venom moments to come, but hopefully some extra new chapters before then! Thank you so much for your kind words, it really means a lot. This series has never stopped being important to me, even though I've had to set it aside.
Hopefully I'll be able to post more soon! I can't make any promises, but to those of you that are still sticking around to read this, thank you so much! Sending you all the love!
-Queen