After I recuperated from my trip to Westchester, I stalked another set of codices to a deceptively cozy-looking pub that was, in fact, the current location of the infamous Bar With No Name. It was trivia night. Is it weird that the villains of New York had a trivia night?

The guy at the door didn't want to let me in, citing that they didn't serve minors, but I forced my way in anyway and was greeted by the most perfect setup for an entrance imaginable.

"Who is the strongest symbiote-host?" asked the man on the stage.

"Me!" I shouted as I transformed. Yeah, that got everyone's attention. I saw some familiar faces here, the Sandman off in one corner, Rhino in another. I wasn't sure if they were in on Fisk setting me up though.

"I'm looking for a man," I began, "about yea tall, caucasian, wears green armor. Mechanical tail, used to eat live squirrels like they were popcorn." I don't know why MacDonald Gargan's codices decided that that was important information but they did. "Ahh, never mind. I see him."

The Scorpion was sitting at a table in the back, alone. He'd been nursing a beer when I came in but downed it quickly when I called him out. He marched up to me, tail curled threateningly overhead. "And what business do you have with me, little missy?"

I responded by decking him in the stomach and leaping up to grab him by the tail, which I then pulled down and webbed to the floor, heaving him bent over. I then jammed my needle into the small of his back and harvested his codices. His were weird. He'd been bonded to three symbiotes, but the first two codices had been ripped out of his spine and then grew back from remnants after bonding with the third so they were all sort of entangled. The third was also from a different universe, which was fun.

I dropped him as veins of black, pale green, and dark green streak through my mass. He started muttering "Not again" and I turned to leave.

"Gentlemen as you were," I said to the room on my way out the door.

My primary reason for going there had been the codices. One of them came from a symbiote that interfaced with his armor and another came from one that mimicked it and I had a use for that, But when I figured out exactly where he was I decided to make a show of it. Striding into the Bar With No Name like I owned the place and whipping a B-List Spider-Man villain in front of everyone would help me build a rep which would help Fisk not forget my threat.

Now... Now there was just one more thing I needed... See, when I was thinking about how to shore up my weakness, a random, small.. barely a feeling popped into the back of my head, barely noticeable. But that's when I started to recall things or notice them in the hive mind. And the more codices I took, the stronger my connection to the hive, the more I realized that there was something calling to me, an answer to my problems, a big prize. And it was telling me what I needed to do to get it. Not, not like something like another symbiote with its own mind. Something more like, like the doppelganger I had. Or the will thing that Malus had been talking about. No mind, but a drive to be part of something.

The stronger my connection, the more I could feel it, and the more I understood what it was, where it was, and how to get it. I just needed one more thing.

That's why I was making my way to Brooklyn now. One more thing to prepare, and then tomorrow I could perform the heist and get the big prize.

Specifically, I was making my way to a specific Brooklyn apartment. Recently moved into by a family of four. Two parents, a baby, and a teenager. You'd be surprised what you could learn about someone, once you were plugged into the Symbiote Hivemind well enough, Look hard enough, and you could get their whole life story.

Soon enough, I was camped out, invisible, on the roof of the building waiting for Spider-Man the Younger to get home from patrol. The symbiote that left his codex was another Carnage doppelganger, which meant that his clairvoyance wouldn't ping me.

I could feel his codex getting closer. Come on, just a little more... Yeah, there. I can see him... Just had to time it right and... I lept.

I became visible just as I tackled him and we both tumbled down to the ground. He was strong, but I was stronger and in no time I had him pinned face down.

"I want to say this is nothing personal," I began while I jammed my needle in his back, "but getting punched through a window hurt like hell."

Oh, that was interesting. It seemed that unlike the OG Spider-Man, who was infamously radioactive, Miles here got his powers from some kind of adaptive mutagen. Whatever, the point was that I was absorbing his codex and DNA and in doing so gaining his powers and physiology.

I let him up after that, because I had no reason not to, and he immediately turned around and tapped me with what I was now learning was called his 'venom strike,' gonna be an interesting 'whose on first' situation if he ever had to work with Venom long term.

He seemed rather taken aback that it had no effect. This was just a taser tap, after all, not a punch.

I held up my fingers and let bioelectricity crackle along them. "Now I have your power," I sang to him. "Oh, and before I leave, Miles, I want to set the record straight: I didn't kill anyone that night. That was Bullseye and maybe the Melter, I'm not sure what he was doing. I'm like... an accessory at worst. Unless you're going by Felony Murder statutes but that's confusing and often misapplied."

After that, I reactivated my Camo and made it a point to bolt as quickly as I could, and... Camo seemed stronger now and... Oh, cool. Spidey Junior could go invisible. Didn't know that.

Anyway, tomorrow was a big day and I needed to be rested and absolutely sure I was used to all the powers I'd picked up over the last few days.