Note: this is part of the We Am Venom! series.
San Francisco.
3 PM.
In a room at Saint Francis Memorial Hospital, a man sleeps in a bed, his torso wrapped in gauze, his wife having fallen asleep in a chair next to the bed.
She was up all night, waiting for him to wake up.
A few nights ago, at the curry restaurant the man owns, he was savagely attacked by a mysterious woman who gouged his chest open with a slimy white claw, and promptly swung off into the night.
Fortunately, there were plenty of witnesses, so the man was quickly brought here. He’s alive, and he was in critical condition for a while.
And even more fortunately, any resulting medical bills are being covered. But with all the incredible technology and magic available these days, medical care is becoming a lot cheaper.
Or did you expect the superheroes to hoard all of those goodies for themselves?
On the other side of the window, Venom the symbiotic fluffy clings to the wall, looking into the hospital room with a forlorn look on their face.
They know exactly who did this, and that the man in the bed was targeted purely because he had a connection to Venom.
A tenuous connection, that being Venom regularly eating at his restaurant, but a connection nonetheless.
So both halves of Venom are feeling guilty right now.
Venom crawls up the wall, onto the hospital’s roof, looking down at the city below.
The Klyntar speaks up, and as usual, only Tom hears it.
“Where do you think she is now, buddy?”
Tom replies out loud, the Klyntar distorting his voice, as it does whenever they’re in Venom mode.
“She gutta stiww be in da sitty. It am US she wan.”
“Honestly, I think it might be best to leave town. At least until we can kill Michelle. Wherever we go, she’ll follow. And she’s CLEARLY looking for a fight, so, if we lure her to the right place, we might have the advantage. She’s been living in San Francisco longer than WE have, she knows this city better.”
“Mebbeh we cud git hew to fowwow us tu CAW sitty.”
“Y’know, that’s NOT a bad idea! We can have all of our friends in the ChaotiX who live there keep an eye out for her. Carnage brought a damned army, but Michelle seems to be going it alone.”
“We can onwy hope dat dey nu bof shu up tu fwo down at da same time.”
“God, that would be shitty. Shittier than that guy with the ugly sweater, after he went through the sewers.”
Venom leaps off the roof and swings away.
thwip
Elsewhere, in a white void, Anti-Venom, also known as former attorney Michelle Howard, meets with her benefactor: Father Lucian Pax, leader of the Peacemakers and puppet of the Light of Peace.
Both of them are sitting on white armchairs, and Pax is staring at Anti-Venom, a disapproving look on his face.
“Michelle, I hope you have a very good reason for what you did.”
Anti-Venom shrugs.
“I wanted to send a message to Venom. Also, I ate at that restaurant once, and the food gave me the WORST sh–”
“I did not want you to announce your empowerment just yet, Michelle. You may end up leading our enemies directly to us. That, and I would rather avoid unnecessary bloodshed whenever possible.”
“That sounds like something you should have told me BEFORE you Klyntar’d me up and sent me on my way.”
Pax pauses for a few seconds.
“I suppose you are correct. But have you forgotten that Venom is allied with the ChaotiX? What will you do if Calvin Korkea comes for you?”
“…I… uh… hadn’t… thought about that…”
“Of course you hadn’t. Michelle, I am not angry at you, I am merely disappointed. I have big plans for you, and if you keep doing things like this, those plans will not happen. I am not going to punish you this time, but I will be keeping a closer eye on you, and you are not to act outside of my instructions.”
Pax points, and a white door appears.
“This door will lead you to an alleyway in Boise, Idaho. You are to lay low there until, as they say, the heat dies down. And you are to hide your powers until I say so.”
When he points at Anti-Venom next, the mindless inverted Klyntar shifts, becoming a white hoodie, jeans and sneakers, and Michelle groans.
“Idaho, Pax? For real?”
“For real, Michelle.”
“Are you sure this isn’t a punishment?”
Pax nods.
“I am sure. This is just to ensure that you aren’t caught by the ChaotiX. They will not think to look for you so far away from San Francisco. They will assume that you intend to remain close to Venom.”
“And you can’t just send me back to New York? Because I’m starting to feel seriously homesick.”
“No. There is at least one ChaotiX member living in New York, and he could find you without you even noticing him. A filthy little alley fluffy by the name of Gaspode, who could easily blend in with all the other feral fluffies of New York. I am sending you to Boise instead, because I know that no members of the ChaotiX live there. There is, however, a branch of the Peacemakers there, which will serve as your place of residence for the time being.”
Pax gets up, patting Michelle’s shoulder in a gentlemanly way.
“So you will not be sleeping on the streets. Have no fear, Michelle. Your time to help make the world a more peaceful place will come, if you obey my instructions.”
The tone of his deep, calm voice, the voice of an incomprehensible being trying to sound human and not quite nailing it, indicates that it’s time for Michelle to go.
So she gets up, walking over to the door.
Before she goes through it, she looks back at Pax.
“So you’re really not a wizard, huh?”
“I thought I said that already.”
“Are you ever gonna tell me what you are?”
Pax chuckles.
“Perhaps.”
“When–”
The door opens by itself, and Michelle finds herself compelled to walk through it.
Once it closes itself behind her, Pax sits back down.
“For a lawyer, she’s not very good at choosing her words wisely.”
Back in San Francisco, Venom waddles past their favorite curry restaurant, but of course, it’s currently closed, and the front is covered in police tape.
Past the tape, the dark interior of the store can’t really be made out by most, but Venom can see in the dark just fine, and they can see crime scene markers in there.
Were you expecting a chalk outline on the floor?
They don’t do that anymore, it contaminates the crime scene.
“It’s probably gonna be a while until this place opens up again, Tom.”
“Den whewe am we gunna git sum nummies?”
“I think there’s a kebab shop near here.”
“Wut, wif da big spinnin meaties? Dat AM kinna fun tu wotch.”
“Yeah! And they might be willing to comp the meal for a couple of ChaotiX members.”
Venom waddles away from the curry restaurant.
“We weawwy gutta git sum muh-nees.”
“I dunno if anyone around here would hire a FLUFFY, Tom.”
“Hey, dewe gutta be SUMFIN we can du. An we can du a wot mowe den MOS fwuffies.”
“Ha! Yeah, we’ve got OPTIONS. Ooh, here’s a thought. You know how a bunch of ChaotiX members have their own merch, and they’re collecting royalties? Well, they could make merch of US. Like plushies, or comic books…”
“A comic booksie? Abowt VENOM? Nu, nu wun wud wanna weed DAT.”
“We can at least pitch it, Tom. How does Niek put it? You have no, you can get yes?”
“Sumfin wike dat.”
Meanwhile, across the bay, northeast of Oakland, a teenage boy walks through the woods with his fluffy.
As they pass one bush, the boy sees a beautiful bird on a tree branch, and snaps a quick pic of it.
snap
Then he hears something.
thwip
rustle
He turns to the bush, seeing that his fluffy has apparently vanished.
“What the… aw, he’s probably hiding in the bush again.”
The boy walks over to the bush, hearing an odd crunching, munching sound coming from it.
“Did someone leave some food in there? Jeez, people! Give a hoot, don’t pollute!”
He sticks his head into the bush.
“Buddy, you’ve gotta stop doing this, or I’m gonna put you on a le–”
And then he sees the slimy, red, vaguely fluffy-shaped thing looking back at him with jagged white eyes, and chewing on one of his fluffy’s legs with sharp yellow teeth.
“–eeeee-eeeee-eeeee-eeeee…”
The monstrous fluffy grins at the boy, bits of fluffy stuck in its teeth.
“Oh, wook. It am da main couwse.”
The boy opens his mouth to scream in terror, but…
thwip
“MMMMMMMMMMPH!!!”
…the thing covers his mouth, by shooting a wad of red slime at his face with a hoof.
thwip
Then a tendril just as red and slimy drags the boy into the bush.
A few seconds later, the crunching and munching gets louder, and the earth around the bush is stained red.
crunch munch crunch
It takes a couple of minutes for the noise to finally cease.
buuuuuuuuuurp
Then a bone is flung out of the bush.
It’s too big to be a fluffy bone.
Back in San Francisco, at a kebab shop, Venom sits on one of the tables, happily wolfing down a plate of donor kebab.
“Um num num num num…”
The owner, a heavyset mustached man of Turkish descent, watches this with a smile on his face.
He runs this shop with his three sons, all adults.
The eldest of them looks at his father.
“Baba, why did you–”
The owner holds up a finger, shushing his son.
Then he jerks a thumb over his shoulder, at the street outside.
A couple of local women walk past, seeing Venom going to town on that kebab.
“Hey, is that Venom?”
“Venom eats here?”
“It must be pretty good!”
“We’ve gotta try it!”
As the women enter the kebab shop, the owner winks at his son.
“That’s why.”
Then he turns to the new customers.
“What can I get you, ladies?”
One of them pulls a wallet out of her purse.
“We’ll take two of those doner kebabs!”
The other points at Venom.
“Like he’s having!”
Venom hears that, and they stop eating, turning to the women with a grin.
“Jus su yu knu, ouw pwoh-nowns am dey/dem. Nu cuz we am nun-binawy…”
Venom giggles.
“…but cuz we am wit-uh-wah-wee TOO nigguhs!”
The women turn to each other.
“Can they say that word?”
“Well… they are black.”
“Yeah, but they’re not that kind of black…”
Meanwhile, in Boise, Idaho, Michelle walks down one street, a scowl of extreme dissatisfaction on her face.
Seriously, Kratos could learn a thing or two about scowling from her.
Michelle mutters to herself under her breath.
“Goddamnit, I haven’t been here for six hours and I already feel like I’m gonna die of boredom. Why didn’t Pax give me an address? I don’t even know what the place–”
When she passes one building, she gets her answer.
“–looks… like…”
The building is white, looking vaguely like a church. There’s people with white uniforms and white floppy hats tending to the garden around the place.
If you could see their faces, you might be rather concerned.
And there’s a sign, too.
The Peacemakers
May The Light of Peace Shine Upon All
One of the apparent employees, a woman younger than Michelle, is standing outside the front doors, and waving at Michelle.
“Ms. Howard! We were informed that you’d be coming! We have a room ready for you!”
There’s nothing out of the ordinary about her face, but she’s a new hire.
She has yet to truly see the Light, unlike those pottering about in the garden.
All she’s seen is the little slivers of the Light, shining through the cracks around the door.
So her imperfections have already begun to be burned away. Like the pesky suspicion that something is wrong with her colleagues, the troublesome notion that joining the Peacemakers was a terrible idea, and the dangerous hunch that she should probably be running away to call the authorities, or possibly an exorcist. Those were the first flaws to go.
At least, Pax considered those to be flaws.
And when that poor, naive young woman will see the Light in full?
It’ll blind her.
But she’ll be far too happy to worry about that.
Or anything else.
Like losing her free will entirely.
Michelle walks over, looking relieved.
“So I’m getting a room, huh?”
The employee giggles.
“Of course, silly! Did you think you’d be sleeping in the broom closet? Father Pax called ahead and told us that you’re a fellow Peacemaker, and that you’re in need of a roof over your head. Said you came all the way from San Francisco! You poor thing! Must have been a long trip!”
Michelle realizes that the employee knows even less about Pax than she does.
And Michelle was a lawyer, so she tries to word her reply carefully.
“It… didn’t seem very long. So can I just come in?”
“You’re a Peacemaker! Sure you can!”
As she’s lead inside, Michelle shrugs.
“Well, at least I have some company.”
And as they enter the lobby, just as white as the exterior, so well lit that there aren’t any shadows, the employee nods happily.
“Remember: in the Peacemakers, you’re never alone!”
They pass through a door, walking down a white corridor, and Michelle tries to make small talk.
“So… you been here for a while?”
“Just a few months. I’m still on Level I. But Pax says I could make it to Level VIII in no time. That’s when you get to undergo Enlightenment, like the guys outside! I can’t wait for that day to finally arrive, so I’ve been doing my best! Did you see Hector? He’s such a sweetheart! Wouldn’t hurt a fly!”
“Hold on. There are Levels? Pax didn’t tell me that there’s Levels.”
“Here, let me explain a thing or two. First up, there’s Level I, which–”
I think you’ve heard enough, reader.
Begone. The secrets of the Peacemakers are not for you to know.
But do not fret, child.
For a time will come when you too will be…
Enlightened.
What the hell was that?
Did he really just…
Oh, let’s just move on.
Back in San Francisco, Venom waddles out of the kebab shop, which is now rather crowded, the owner and his sons serving customers as fast as they can.
“Dat happuns a WOT, huh.”
“That’s what happens when you’re famous, Tom. People find out where you have lunch, the crowds start a-comin’. Maybe next time, we should go there in our CIVILIAN identity.”
“Mebbeh, yuh. Su wut am we gunna du nao?”
Tom’s question is answered by the sound of police sirens blaring, and Venom sees several cop cars drive past, chasing a car full of bank robbers.
“How about we go lend them a… hoof, ol’ buddy ol’ pal?”
Venom nods.
“We can haf dis dun in too shakesies of a fwuffy taiwie.”
They leap into the air.
thwip
And Venom swings off on black webs, joining the chase.