TheRedeemer1995: Greetings, prospective readers, and welcome back to The Venom Inside! As per usual, the last chapter did great, and quite honestly, I haven't had this much fun writing a story in a long time! Then again, I always was a big superhero nut, particularly when it comes to Marvel characters and anything to do with Spider-Man in particular, so that kinda helps quite a bit, as does everyone's support for this project, especially considering just how long we're gonna be chipping away at this. It also helps that I'm getting super invested into My Hero Academia. But, I digress.

Additionally, LegionnaireBlaze will not be able to make it to this chapter, as they are currently dealing with a personal issue, and out of respect for their privacy, that's all I'm gonna say about that. But, with that out of the way, let's begin!

Chapter VI

Duel With Desert

Swinging through air high above the city streets, Venom made his way towards the largest hospital in all of Mustafu City, making sure to keep his guard up as he traveled in case a hero who worked the proverbial night shift decided to pick a fight. Venom knew that there was a decent chance that he would be able to access the city's medical networks at that particular hospital, and through it, he would be able to locate the body of the Trigger-Enhanced Thug as well as the evidence he would need to clear his name and tie the Hero Public Safety Commission up, for however short of time he was able to buy.

Soon, the black-clad vigilante arrived at his destination, perching himself on the perimeter wall as he surveyed the hospital entrances.

"Okay, with our shapeshifting abilities, we should be able to sneak into the hospital fairly easily… now, the devil in the details… how do we access the medical networks? Simply intimidate the medical director, perhaps?" Venom muttered to himself. "Yes… perhaps that would be the best course of action-hmm?"

Venom was pulled out of his thoughts as his early-warning danger sense kicked in. Damn, he REALLY needed to think of something cooler to call that power. Maybe Spider-Sense? His symbiote did say the ability had come from a race of man-spiders, much like the formula for his black web fluid had, among other, highly useful abilities. Sadly, the man-spiders' power to generate electricity was not among the abilities that Venom had picked up from his host from that planet, but Izuku could make do.

Back to the matter at hand, however, Venom soon realized that a sizable group of people had gathered at the side of the building. Using his camouflage abilities, Venom turned invisible and saw that these people were apparently trying to break into the side entrance of the building, and among them appeared to be two or three villains from the looks of things, and judging from the containers they had, they didn't look like they were going to do anything especially horrible like destroy the hospital. No, they looked like they were going to steal something.

'Hmm, odd,' Venom thought to himself as he leaned closer at the group. 'Why would villains want to break into a hospital looking to actually steal something? Still, the distraction caused by the chaos of the villains and their minions' little heist could prove useful for allowing us to take a look at the medical networks undisturbed. Once we have what we need from them, we can take out the villains and their flunkies, and make our escape with the data we need.'

A grin forming on his unseen face, Venom quietly joined the group of thugs just as they popped the lock on the door and began to storm inside the hospital, making a beeline for… cold storage?

'Weird,' thought Venom as he followed the thieves into the cold storage. Upon arriving, Venom soon realized that the thieves were, for some unknown reason, stealing human brains that were clearly intended for brain transplant procedures.

'Uh… Venom, you didn't hire these guys while I was sleeping last night, did you? Because I don't exactly have a lot of money to be blowing on brain heists! Or heists at all! Plus, we're anti-heroes, not villains!' Izuku thought from within Venom.

'What, no, of course not!' the symbiote said within Izuku's mind. 'Although… there might be something else that we need to worry about sooner or later…'

'Oh? And what would that be?' asked Izuku.

'...never mind, I can't be certain if it is what I think it is,' Venom replied to his host and partner. 'In any case, we should head up to the medical director's office and get the data we're after, and then deal with these punks.'

'...okay, if you say so,' replied Izuku.

And with that, Venom made his way out of cold storage, sneaking past the security guards who were more than likely about to have a bad night thanks to the villains, and made his way to the director's office, the door of which was left ajar.

Upon entering the room, Venom's concealed grin grew even wider at the sight of the director's computer, which had apparently been abandoned… with the director still logged into it.

'Thank you, Lady Luck!' Venom and Izuku thought simultaneously as he became visible, made his way over to the computer, and took a seat… and soon found that not only were the medical networks pulled up, but so was a webpage for…

"'Lonely Loser dot com'? The crappy online dating website? Ugh, some people… whatever happened to just growing a backbone and asking someone out? Worked out nicely for us when we asked Ochako out for coffee… ugh, focus, Venom, focus," Venom growled to himself as he began his search for the Trigger-Enhanced Thug.

It took a while, but eventually, the black clad being found what he was looking for, a John Doe with a muscle-enhancing Quirk that had been enhanced far more than it was supposed to through illicit means, and was apparently murdered by a vigilante. Apparently the autopsy was done at a morgue on the far side of the city that just so happened to be under the oversight of the Hero Public Safety Commission. Unfortunately, that was all the information that Venom could find.

'Okay, got what we came for, now we just have to take care of those villains that are stealing brains,' Venom and Izuku thought to themselves as he closed out of the medical networks, turned invisible, and began to sneak his way back down to the Cold Storage… only to find that the villains had already been defeated, that there were large piles of sand all over the place, and that he was currently standing in one such pile of sand.

'Oh, no…' thought Venom mere moments before what felt like a sack of bricks slammed into his face, sending him flying through a nearby wall and out into the street, causing several cars to swerve out of the way and end up in a bit of a pile up as he became visible again and flipped through the air to land sliding onto his feet as the source of the attack revealed itself.

It was a young man a couple years older than Izukuwith short brown hair wearing a green striped sweatshirt, khakis, and brown loafers, whose right arm was currently reverting from a giant, stone hard fist made of sand back into a regular hand.

'And who's this guy?' Venom asked his host.

'I think he might be the Sandman Hero, Desert, son of the Sand Hero Snatch and his Quirkless wife, hence the epitaph. That also means his Quirk works a bit differently than his father's. On top of that, he's fresh out of U.A, so he doesn't actually have a ranking yet on the Pro Hero charts,' explained Izuku from within Venom.

Desert, meanwhile, spoke loudly as he approached Venom, a triumphant look on his face. "The HPSC was right about you! I knew you were nothing more than a villain who was just deluding himself into thinking he was a hero, and now, here's the proof: breaking into a hospital with a group of known villains and wanted criminals to steal human brains for some ungodly reason!"

'Well, that answers that question. Clearly this guy bought the bullshit the HPSC has been lying down,' Izuku said bitterly from within Venom as the black-clad monster stood up and roared at the hero.

"Shows what you know, sand for brains," Venom said aloud. "For starters, we're on a strict chocolate diet, and for another thing, we were here to STOP the villains and criminals, not help them!" the black-clad being lied easily. Desert didn't need to know the real reason he was at the hospital.

"Even if that were the case, the fact still stands that the HPSC wants you brought in for the murder of that red abomination you fought the other night," said Desert. "So, the question is, are you gonna come quietly or covered in sand?"

Venom roared again. "We will NOT confess to crimes we did not commit! We have a strict No-Killing Rule! Beating villains near-death, yes, depending on the severity of their crimes, but never outright murder! Even if, admittedly, some of these villains actually deserve it, like that Overhaul guy!" the vigilante snarled.

"Who are you to talk about rules when you don't even play by them, vigilante?" retorted Desert. "In any case, it seems like you've chosen face-punch so let's dance!"

And on that note, Desert launched himself in a whirl of sand at Venom as his fist grew in size and landed square on the vigilante's chest, sending him flying through another wall.

"Ow…" growled Venom as he pulled himself up to see Desert walking through the hole in the walk, one hand in a giant stone fist, the other in the shape of a giant mallet. Acting quickly, Venom threw a solid punch at Desert, which landed firmly on his head, scattering the sand it was composed of before quickly reforming.

"Missed," Desert said nonchalantly before Venom tried once again to strike him in the head, only for the sand it was composed of to once again be scattered, only to quickly reform. "Missed again."

With a furious roar, Venom attempted to punch Desert in the stomach, only for his fist to sail right through the Sandman Hero's stomach, and promptly become stuck thanks to the rest of the sand that composed his torso. "Uh-oh…" said Venom before he was sent flying through the far wall and out into the street on the other side of the building before slamming into a parked car and coming to a stop.

"Ugh…" groaned Venom as he pulled himself out of the car. "Okay, so brute force is out of the question, which means we'll have to get crafty, and we'll need to do it quickly before Sandy over there gets himself some reinforcements."

'Okay, okay, lemme think,' Izuku said from within Venom. 'Got it! His body is made up entirely of sand, right? So, all we'll need to do is sprinkle a little water on him, and he'll solidify, and he'll be out for the count, but we'll need to be careful about how much water we use, otherwise we could risk dissolving and killing him… or turning him into some kind of Mud Monster. A fire hydrant should do the trick.'

Quickly spotting a nearby fire hydrant, Venom leapt over to it and waited for Desert to follow him out of the building. Once the Sandman Hero appeared, Venom quickly ripped the fire hydrant from the ground and used his arms to direct the gushing stream of water at Desert, almost instantly turning the sand that composed his body into a grainy mud. Once he had been sufficiently doused with water, Venom leapt into the air, shot a webline, and broke Desert apart in one swinging kick, effectively rendering the hero out of action. However, movements that Desert's shattered body was making in trying to pull himself back together were a clear indication that he was still alive.

Venom gave a triumphant roar of victory before leaping into the air again, firing a webline, and swinging away from the scene, just as other heroes arrived on the scene.

'So, how'd you know that'd work on Desert without killing him?' Venom asked his host.

'Well, you see, I heard about an accident he had during the U.A. Sports Festival a few years back. When he won, his teammates dumped the water cooler on him, and his body started turning to mud, and began falling apart. It was a complete mess. But once the mud dried, Desert was able to piece himself back together. He even regrew the parts of him that fell off. So, I figured as long as we didn't use too much water, we'd be able to put him out of action without killing him,' explained Izuku.

'I see…' replied Venom. 'So, do you wanna head over to that morgue on the other side of the city, get the evidence to clear our names?'

'No, not tonight, I have school tomorrow. Plus, I wanna try and figure out why those villains and criminals at the hospital were trying to steal human brains, but I get the feeling you know more about this than you let on,' Izuku said.

'And like I said, I'm sure it's nothing. I mean, I do have a suspicion, but I highly doubt there's any merit to it. Although, if there is any merit to it… we might have bigger problems to deal with than petty crimes and misguided heroes…' said Venom.

TheRedeemer1995: And that's a bingo! Well, I certainly hope that LegionnaireBlaze finishes dealing with their personal issue soon, as given the number of plans and designs the two of us have for this series, I'm definitely gonna need some help with it. In any case, if you liked what you saw here, then be sure to fav, follow, review, and join us next time as Izuku meets some of Ochako's friends, and Venom has a run-in with a certain photo-negative man. See you then!