[vency] angel effect

[responds]

[ It has been reported for decades that near-death experiences can be a diverse reaction. Some claim to see nothing but light. Some claim to replay the major moments in their life on repeat. Others? Claim to see angels parting the heavens, a salvation to deliver news that their time was not yet here.

It was not the first time one of her patients made the comparison – she had heard it multiple times during her career, but Angela didn't like it. There was no divine intervention here, no holy significance. It was science. Science that allowed her to practice medicine, join an organization that seemingly wanted to make the world a better place, and keep those in good health alive for one more day. It brought her to cross paths with someone that would leave a mark... that would show fleeting faith was not what would save someone.

A scientific mind wants to know how, to know the workings on something that was presented to them. She couldn't. Angela fails time and time again to think of what the symbiote did to her – for all methods to her own knowledge? She should be dead. Then again, so should the man recovering in Room 319 in the Valkyrie Medical Facility.

Angela monitored him – one of the few who dared to – for days, maybe even a week solid. Her time tending to his wounds were not purely physical, but there was something heavenly about how she treats her patience. Something an oath or medical degree can't provide. ]

Again. I do not care if you can run a marathon... I want to see your gait. Walk slowly from one side of the room to the other.

[ Her coat drags against the floor, her pen tapping to her clipboard. She treats him like any patient, no matter the... complications... he may bring. They had crossed paths back and forth, her notes on the symbiote adding to be its own novel – but she doesn't share it, doesn't publish it. It's for them. For their own benefit. The wheels of her chair scoot away, giving him room to walk – freeing him from an elongated bedrest. Her voice was a bit more pinpointed, less warmth and more direct. He responded better to that side of her. ]

The faster you oblige, the faster you can leave.

Comments

[primevil]

[ From a purely scientific perspective, Venom represents an anomaly to a world still living in the shadows of the Omnic Crisis. Though the world continues to be in turmoil, Overwatch firing at all cylinders to stop the Talon threat, this remains an era of omnics, enhanced cybernetics, and increasingly powerful weapons. Technology is at its zenith in this age, the stuff of dreams for the Starks, Pyms, and Richardses of the past. But this is also an age of reason, of humankind's mastery over the world, despite the many ways humankind continues to threaten itself. No matter the politics, everything can be explained by science. Everything is science.

Which leaves little to account for something so otherworldly, so radically out of context from the universe Mercy knows. She's on the forefront, now, of something that - in a world of technological wonders - is a bona fide marvel. What, after all, is the black substance coursing through her patient's veins? The murky, undulating void that emerges from his body on a whim, enveloping him in armor that trivializes everything Overwatch has thrown at him-- what Talon has thrown at him, when he defected. Armor, for that matter, that endows him with strength that Reinhardt would envy. The power to leap great distances without the aid of a jump pack, like Winston's. There is no sure sign of the upper limits of this Venom's abilities, as no preceding framework in all of human science exists to describe him... this unholy fusion of man and symbiote.

The prospect might scare Mercy, in her core. But more truthfully, it might excite her. No matter how belligerent and aggressive her patient is, Angela Ziegler is on the precipice of something. Not that she has any interest in disseminating that knowledge, of course. Rather, the mere fact of understanding this creature might be harder while she's still mystified by her own experience. Wearing the suit. Having the blackness envelop her moments before Juggernaut, new hired muscle by Talon, could deliver a fatal punch. And this was another anomaly in his own right... powered by what appeared to be magic. Endowing him with an uncanny strength that he's demonstrated on buildings just to level them as an example.

But no matter Juggernaut's power, the blow didn't save Mercy. For once, she was protected. She was healed.

And the only thing more mystifying than that is why Venom did it. ]

Just what do you think this will prove, doctor? That we know how to follow directions?

We know it's not as simple as letting us leave when we're done.

Overwatch is aware of us. We are their enemy.

[ He's not even sure how spiteful he wants to be, but clearly he isn't a fan of being told what to do. Less so is he a fan of the ambiguities of his situation, feeling like to some extent, he is currently at Overwatch's... mercy. None of this stops him from getting up anyway, and beginning to demonstrate his gait. ]

Then again, we are now also Talon's.

[ In his own impatience, though, his gait's faster than man and symbiote both realize. It causes him frustration, Venom growling at himself and looking down at his body, wondering why he can't just slow down. Why is his every step compelled by an urgency he can't even articulate? Something he hasn't been able to do since he agreed to a truce with the first man he ever vowed to kill: the initial catalyst of Venom's union, forever placing him on the path of "lethal protector." ]

It's... hard, staying slow in this form. Thoughts racing. Thirst overwhelming.

[ Despite his ramblings, he's making a clear effort to slow down. To reach one side of the room and then the other as normally as he can. ]

Look at us. We've never slowed down. Stood still.

Everything was a fight. Everything still is.

[responds]

[ There's something in her heart now – some warm feeling that she can't explain. Maybe it was a phantom pain... a phantom feeling. Something that countered any darkness that could encroach upon her. By all measures, her work would never reach the full potential. She remembers the push back – how Moira, another prominent 'healer' would take a path that made Overwatch fearful that Angela would follow. There were rules she lives inside, boundaries that her mind can't even begin to think outside.

A moral compass does little to help the world in the name of science, someone once told her.

So, now she sits – watching as something that had quite literally felt like it was near death not too long ago take controlled and restrained steps. She knew that was the real test. Not getting him on a treadmill, not sending him through an assortment of strength tests. Restraint... true restraint. Her pen clicks idly, a habit of her anxiety that usually felt suppressed – now apparent as much as her eyes following him. ]

Nonsense. You would not be here if you were their enemy. [ That much she would defend. Overwatch was shakey, but she doesn't dare believe they would keep him caged like an animal. Science had a purpose, sure – but Angela was the one that brings humanity back into it. She tests him without really testing him, in a sense. This was safe. This was overcoming mental as well as physical. ] But, focus. Step by step. No leaps, no bounds. Let your form work together, yea? If you can go fast, you can go slow.

[ Her words were cold, sure – but there was encouragement there. Something to keep him on track. She furrows her brows as she looks to the charts still pinned to the wall – a few tests she ran that only she understood. Charts of mental strain, graphics comparing symbiote versus non-symbiote brain patterns and heart monitoring. ]

Do you feel resistance?

[primevil]

[ Funny. Eddie wasn’t trying to acknowledge it, and neither was his other. But since the symbiote’s contact with Mercy, both it and Eddie received a taste of that phantom feeling. A smaller flicker than what resides in her, but a spark substantial enough to cause a disturbance in the dark pit where both of their psyches swirl... where Venom, their minds acting in unison, comes to be. Perhaps that’s why he exercises so much lenience before her. Spares her of the violence he has heaped upon others for far less.

This change, causing sympathy for the doctor, prevents Venom from acting upon his worst instincts. From doing what he can to escape this facility and destroy as much of it as possible along the way. There are innocents here, he has to remind himself. Angela too is innocent. We cannot forget that! The debate in their shared mind would ordinarily cloud their judgment, preoccupy them all too much for them to be present enough for others in the room. But something about Angela has not left Venom unscathed. Because of the way a connection was formed with her, Venom is left with a heightened awareness of her presence. He cannot not look at her, not think about her, even when she leaves the room.

And now, with her eyes on him as he struggles to still himself, it’s as if all else falls away.

There is only Eddie and his other. There is only Angela. ]

Why should we trust them? Whether it’s them or Talon, they all look at us the same.

They don’t know what we are, and they’re scared.

[ Her words matter to him. Her testimony does. He wants the truth from her, and has faith that he’ll receive it, as much as he tests her in the process. And if it turns out to only ever be her truth, all the better. In a world of competing agendas and narratives, of appearances and illusions... particular truths have always mattered more than truth with a capital T.

So Venom will help Mercy with her truth. What she believes the truth to be, and the methods she employs while seeking it.

And though he produces a gravelly murmur when speaking, there is something explosive in Venom’s voice. Monstrous. Like he’s seconds away from loosing everything that he is upon the world, upon innocent and guilty alike. He stops speaking only to heed Angela’s words, attempt to follow her commands, step by step. One foot forward at a time, no longer about the destination, but about the sole act of walking.

It might be surreal to just hear Venom breathe. No ferocity ignites him, no rage compelling him. His gait, instead, is motivated by serenity— or something resembling it.

That same phantom feeling. ]

We are always resisting, doctor.

[ Despite his hyper-awareness of Angela’s presence, he can’t bring himself to look at her. To make eye contact, even beneath an alien “mask.” Something about her is too good for Venom’s eyes. Too radiant for the walking abyss that he cannot help but be. ]

But for now, we walk. Unsure though we may be... as to how this benefits your study.

[responds]

[ They had run tests on her afterwards too. The two had been side by side, in a tank full of bio-organic fluid and steadily secured until their release. By all results, they were both healthy, but there were things that linger. Parts on the test she read after her own dismissal that allowed her to take control of his treatment. Angela stays up late in the next room over – he can see her through the window most nights, falling asleep at her desk. He needed observation during this period and she tries to become a buffer between any control of Overwatch or even a government attempting to lay claim.

He is not ready for testimonials nor do I think he would do much to for interrogation. He is a patient first.

He could hear her last night, advocating that there was a person there, as much as he may expect someone to stand up for omnic rights. Whatever he had become, whatever duality that ripped through him... she speaks for both Eddie and what 'plagued' him. She feels it – even now when she feels herself alone... that prickle at the back of her neck raises goosebumps against her skin.

And now, she yields her expertise to shield him, like he did to her. ]

I can not tell you who to trust. They are good. They mean good, at least, if you are pessimistic.

[ But, the road to hell was paved in good intention. She stands up slowly – stuffing her clipboard to the wall with the rest of her test results – and instead, their eyes meet in that moment. ]

I see nothing horrifying before me. The world grew up with boogeymen, monsters under the bed... they will see horrors are not in the monster but instead in what they do not understand.

[ She sees no monster. An abnormality? Yes. ]

It shows you have control. For the past 48 hours... I've seen the symbiote slip from your form. It feels as if it is reaching away – for something. Do you feel control when you focus? When you go slow?

[primevil]

What we are is simply not blind. We are demystified to the ways of this world... what separates the innocent from the guilty!

[ That doesn't sound like a direct response to any charge he may have against Overwatch, because it isn't. Venom's just getting carried away again, like he tends to... moralizing as he must, being a self-proclaimed lethal protector. Even here, despite the tenuous connection that has formed between himself and Angela, Venom must shield himself with his convictions. Proclamations less for Angela's benefit than for Venom's, like it's all a mantra. His words are also utterly questionable, since he had to join up with Talon to defect from it in the first place. It might have been easy, from Venom's nature, for Angela to deduce that he was simply coaxed into their service, led gullibly to believe that Talon's cause was righteous. Pointed, subsequently, like an attack dog in Overwatch's direction.

Leading him to Angela.

At his core, Venom cannot trust what he wants to feel. The closeness to Angela, even as she watches him from several feet away. He can almost hear her thoughts, feel every sensation of her changing emotions. But how much of that is mere imagination? A fleeting dream of intimacy, where once there was only coldness? Only the abyss?

While he listens to Angela speak, Venom still cannot face her. He can only wonder how much of him that she feels. The tangle of both Eddie and the symbiote's anguish, rolled into a mental and emotional tempest. What effect does that leave on another person, as his spiteful predecessor once left an impression on him? ]

And what do you hope the world will understand, Doctor, when they see us for what we really are?

[ He hasn't stopped walking, at least. Already, he's making a third lap across the room, stepping slowly. Maintaining control, despite everything.

Her observations intrigue him enough that he finally looks at her. When their eyes meet, he wonders what the doctor sees. Venom wonders how he must appear in her eyes, if not a boogeyman. Not a monster. His own eyes quiver perceptibly at the thought, but he fails to notice this. Angela, on the other hand? Well. ]

We are... connected. But we are not solely connected to each other.

Not anymore.

[responds]

You could live your life for thousands of years on Earth and have no solid answer.

[ There's something primal about survival, even if science yields it to biological breakdowns over time or shifts mental health into the equation. She was a doctor, one gifted with the desire to do good... but there was flexibility. Grey. Innocence in some light could yield to extinction, while a need to survive would muddle morals worse than a thin line in the sand. Which was the 'wrong' choice? What is right... sometimes it leads her away from missions. Is it right to abandon her comrades to save an innocent? Perspective, perhaps, was the difference. Silently, she brings her hand to rub gingerly at the side of her neck, almost empathetic with a strife that is not so clear. ]

I hope the world would see difference. It is not black and white, has not been for a very long time.

[ Was it wrong for him to have taken her when she did not accept? It happened so fast – and it still haunts part of her dreams. It haunts her reality at times. When she looks at him, she thinks of what was almost taken from both of them. He would not be here if he was guilty, she feels. She knows.

There's a caution though, even as he paces like a caged animal. She may not have noticed his gait before, noticed the way it feels as if he was following the lines of tiles leading around – but now she does. There was no glass separating them and many operatives in her division would deem it a risk for her to be in here with him.

But, this was not the first time she sat by him. Perhaps he'd catch the reflection in the blue of her eyes – one of a form he must accept. It would be foolish of her to think he was not testing her, to seize perhaps a moment that she lets her guard down. There was no pistol at her hip, no syringe lining her coat. She stands as she did without taking a step to him. If he wanted to, he'd come to her. Slowly. ]

I don't... understand. [ She does. He can sense the way her lies fumble past her lips. ] Tell me. Why do you linger here if you know you can leave?

[ She can't stop him – Overwatch can't stop him. ]

[primevil]

Oh, our human half obviously hasn't lived long enough.

But even with all your fancy tech today, you have no frame of reference for what our other half has seen.

Cosmic, primordial awareness. Something to make this entire world and its oceanic turmoil feel like a mote of dust.

[ And yet he chooses to help people, in his own twisted way. As reports from San Francisco and New York City can attest, no problem is ever too small for Venom. He's committed, like he said, to discerning the innocent from the guilty. Dispatching justice where institutions fail or practice a willful blindness. Angela surely notices this discrepancy between Venom's words and deeds. She must soon wonder why, then, that Venom continues to do things despite belittling the world in which he wanders. It's like she already asked-- why is he still here, when the might of Overwatch is supposedly beneath him?

His vacant expression, however monstrous by default, contorts into a eerie smile. Fangs on full display, tongue drooping like a broken limb out of his gaping maw. He seems to take pleasure in Angela's question, in the lack of understanding that it indicates. How little you know, he seems to say, while still silent. As if in meditation on the question, however, he does pause. Slows into a halt atop the tiles he has indeed been minding. ]

We linger because "we" no longer stands for two minds.

Saving you has changed us.

[ In Venom saying it, Angela might feel like she's being drawn even closer to him, despite neither of them moving an inch. Venom can feel her quickening heartbeat as if it were his own, and Eddie's - his anatomy intact within the black suit - cannot help but quicken in unison. Both man and symbiote soon wonder, then, if Angela can feel them too. If she can feel their essence coursing through her body as hers does their own. ]

Juggernaut would have killed you in a single punch.

In breathing now, you enjoy your second chance at life. The price of admission, however, was a bond.

A bond to us.

[ While speaking, he does come to her, and come to her slowly. Every word is another inch closer to Angela, until Venom's hulking mass positively towers over her. Her heartbeat is louder in him now than ever before, her adrenaline-- all her fear and wonder belong to Venom now. But it is reciprocal, because she is equally exposed to his. ]

Do you feel it, Doctor? We do.

[responds]

The promise of a doctor to her patient is based in understanding. I am here to understand you.

[ It is not what textbooks teach you. Books don't offer humanity. Tests do not measure empathy. There was something in the way Angela guards herself, falling to a doctor and patient relationship when it was insulting to ignore that it was more. That they had become part of her. That she still feels it inside of her, the phantom feeling that expands like a black tar over her mind at times.

Angela knew as much as anyone did before – the assumed perception of what Venom was. What he would bring to this world. Yet, she orders her wards out of the building when she monitors him. Demands the wing be shut down and only she be his point of contact. This could have went other ways: a test subject and a scientist or a prisoner and their warden. She is neither of those, not as she watches over him. Not as she cares for him.

He confirms the suspicions – the truth she knew was there. Since awakening, since healing... it was there. Breathing down her neck and now as the 'monster' approaches... She doesn't yield. She doesn't step back. He's bigger than her, menacing and if he wanted to harm her – he would have. Was it her idealistic and hopeful nature that keeps her rooted? Or was it – was it something else? The connection they feel... the bond that binds them?

Angela closes her eyes at his question, remembering quite clearly the moments before their 'union'. What grave instance, what horrifying risk was presented... ]

I do. It does not show on any test... does not show an abnormality on any scans. I feel it, yes, but I do not understand it. Do not... understand how it is possible.

[ And for a scientific mind, this was torture. ]

[primevil]

Why describe what we can instead demonstrate?

[ He should be gloating, should be lording her ignorance over her as he does others... but he relents. They are now too close to her to deflect from the possibility of a connection, to attempt vainly to mystify and numb himself to the deafening rhythm of Angela's beating heart. The circulation of her blood, the expansion and contraction of her lungs, the pit in her stomach that she ignores to stand resolute before her monstrous patient.

All that she feels, all that she is is beholden to Venom without her necessarily even knowing.

It is time, then, for a transmission of knowledge. What some might call the opening of her third eye. ]

Give us permission, and we will share with you what we know.

[ Gentler now than he's ever been, as if slowness is a thing he'd just learned moments prior, his massive hand encircles Angela's forearm. Fingers like curved knives guide her hand towards his undulating solar plexus, stopping short of letting her touch it. ]

Open your hand, if you wish. Then push.

Embrace us.

[ If Angela complies, small tendrils emerge from the surface of Venom's chest, ensnaring her hand. The same tendrils expand, like an oil spill spreading through clean waters, corrupting all that it touches. Steadily, the black mass flows, covering her arm. Her chest. Her stomach. All before descending lower, until all of her is covered by the blackness except her head. But then it surrounds her there, too, until only her face is exposed. She is otherwise circumscribed, and that is more than enough for what awaits her.

Because now, she's in the abyss. Not staring down at it, not blinking back at it-- she is in it.

She is it.

And she sees what the Eddie Brock sees. What the symbiote sees.

As well as what they have seen.

The expansion of human comprehension's upper limits would be otherwise maddening. But Angela has her expertise. Her intellect. She has the psyches of both Eddie and the symbiote as additional grounding wires.

Because what she is beholden to is not dissimilar to what Venom has evoked previously, when enumerating what a former enemy was giving up. ]

Do you see it... Angela? Do you see it all?

[responds]

[ Was it something to prove to herself? That she could look upon them without fear? To swallow pride and instead push down any trauma she may have experienced for the greater good? The world needed Angela, who despite her looks, was growing older and saw things most doctors have not. They needed her at her best. With such a close strike to death, she feels ... an odd invigoration. Something changed, but hope still rooted her in the room with something seemingly feared.

H.P. Lovecraft once said that the fear of the unknown is what scares humanity, but to her... it was a challenge. To find an answer. To find something that she can make sense. Not just for the greater good, but for the being that saved her life.

She does not wear Venom like a suit, does not feel them like something she could take off. They...the ghost-like presence that coasts her nerves and fills parts of her mind... was not as easy to remove. Eddie would know that well. They were synced, at times. Maybe in moments of confusion or by a calling their bodies can't ignore – Angela swears she feels two heartbeats at times, she thinks things she never had before. It confuses her, frustrates her – and even now, she tries to find an answer when it was right in front of her.

Instead, restraint was truly the name of the game right now and she's presented with a choice. It looms over her, the unknown... the unsure... the uncertainty of it all. He can hear how hard she gulps, objections falling short of her lips.

She's desperate... she wants to know what is happening to her, wants to understand the one under her care. The one who saved her. Hesitantly, her palm opens up as an offering, the doctor a sacrifice in the pursuit of knowledge. When the expanse ensnares her, it was a sensation she had never felt. Snug, warm, cold, slippery – she can't pinpoint it when the symbiote takes hold of her. As if, despite the claim for needing to understand, there was mysteries still locked away. They can hear the croaked gasp, a stumble back of resistance only out of instinct before she feels her body swallowed.

They were tangled together into something bigger. And when it takes over her – her mind is opened to the view cast to her. It plays like a movie, knowledge forced inside of her and a clarity provided to a cloudy mind. Up was different than down and even in an expanse of darkness... it makes sense. The navigation clearer and clearer.

Embrace us.

Those words echo in her mind, beating at the sense of individuality she once took for granted. There was no her, no him – us. The bond and the need for more than one, single being.

They say her name in ways that make her stomach knot up, as if that would be one of the last times she was purely Angela. The connection they share hooks into her as much as it guides them and – for once, she looks not to the future but was forced to learn the past – something far beyond recorded history. ]

I –

[ The words fail at first, but it takes strength to push them past the tightness in her throat. ]

I see it... [ Does she really? ] Do you understand this all? You may see it, but do you understand? All of this – what has come to pass, what is now... Whatever binds us, consumes us now – does this make sense?

[primevil]

[ Watching Angela accept what was given to her, Venom would find it unfitting to say she's succumbed to the symbiote's influence. What she embraces is not so much the external imposition of an alien force, but a greater awareness of the fabric in which she dwells, an existence wish she now shares intimately with the symbiote. With Eddie Brock.

With Venom.

But as her trance breaks, and the cosmic deluge has finished passing through her mind, the blackness gradually recedes. Venom's form begins to separate from her until finally, the two are no longer touching... but no less connected. Now, she is as marked by Venom as he is by her. And now that the connection is finished, the dissemination of knowledge consummated, Venom steps back. He responds to the more human compulsion of Eddie Brock to give Angela space.

After all, she had been hit with something that would drive lesser minds to madness.

And then she intones her question, practically begging to understand her new level of understanding.

But Venom only laughs. His sinister cackle fills the room, a door being all that prevents it from sounding across the deserted halls of the facility. ]

That's entirely up to you, Angela. How much sense it all makes.

[ And then he permits silence to fill the room, to let the scale of it all sink in. Germinate. ]

Or how much it all doesn't.

The cosmos is so vast, Angela. And despite many civilizations out there in the stars, it's still so empty.

In the grand scheme of things, this is why we protect the innocent. Because life is scarce, and the innocent among us even scarcer.

[ Not that this is a recognition Venom came to overnight. His two minds wasted too much time being so fixated, so obsessed with the destruction of their first enemy, it clouded their judgment against the more pressing concerns of the world. The omnics dwelling in precarity, the global poor growing poorer-- an entire cosmos of suffering just crying out to Venom. Needing him to seek vengeance for the sins of both Overwatch and Talon... among many, many others. ]

But this is why we won't leave.

[ He gestures at himself and at Angela. ]

You're a part of us.

To be without you is to wander a desert without water. To let the elements break us down, waste us away into nothing.

We need you now, Angela Ziegler. Mercy.

We need you because you are ours.

[ And Venom is hers. He neglects to elaborate because of their bond, this irrevocable psychic pull between them. It gives Angela enough to fill in the blanks.

To insist to her that she's safer with Venom than she's ever been with Overwatch. Than she's ever been alone. ]

[responds]

[ Angela had seen some shit in her time. She's seen death. She's seen life. She's seen organic matter fuse with machines. She's seen questions with no answers and answers to questions never asked. Here? She is facing something bigger than a scientific mind. There was risk involved in the pursuit of knowledge. Some had lost their lives, some had been silenced with their tongues cut out or eyes plucked from their heads. This was no... war, however. This was no battle.

It was a marriage, in a sense. One bond, connecting two beings together. Something that was less on-paper and more through feeling. Through every nerve-ending that lights through Angela's mind. Eddie had time to adjust to the symbiote's tug, Angela not so much. She feels as if she's swimming in an ocean with no sense of direction. When she focuses one way, thinking shore awaits her – she is met with nothing.

So she swims, until she feels weight drag her down as she becomes overstimulated. Overwhelmed. Drowning for a brief moment before their 'bond' pulls apart, allowing her to surface. Angela had never experienced a sensation like that, something fearful as much as it was on the cusp of truth. Clarity. Hope.

When she is free from this, the feeling lingers like a ghost against her skin. Her knees buckle and she has to catch herself on her rolling chair for a moment. Never before had she felt vulnerable as much as empowered – and all she does is look up at him. Her eyes hold an intensity – of emotions she wasn't sure she could surmise. It takes his cackling to go through her, the claim that she was part of him. ]

You need because you hunger... A purpose, be it to survive, to pursue, to bond, to reach...

[ A staggered breath befalls her but finally, she stands up straight. He towers over her, but her frame was far from tiny. Far from frail. Even if he had saved her, they had saved her, there's resilience.

And that was the test.

She spent her night up and awake. A cold sweat trickling down her collarbone. Thoughts of what is she now racing through her mind. It was risky to do this, to be alone with this 'monster' with no observation, no 'back-up'. But... she had to know. Something called her. The desire for knowledge, the curiosity that had killed so many cats before her? Who knew. It was a calculated risk and she takes it – and he had taken her.

Angela does not like the feeling of being property. He can feel the shift in her, how her stomach churns and see how the color on her face flushes away. Yet... the saving grace was she knows the implication. Knows what this means. A bond. It was beneficial and comparable. ]

Congratulations, your dismissal... is pushed up. [ She begins collecting the tests on the wall, stripping proof that he was ever here from the room. Any trace – she's busy already. ] However... you will still be under my care. That is non-negotiable. You will not be under Overwatch or Talon's jurisdiction. Mine. Only mine.

[ And she will not be alone.

That was the only alternative, wasn't it? ]

[primevil]

[ From where Venom stood, Angela wasn’t small at all. Maybe literally, sure, but after their connection? The formation of their bond? Her presence towered over his. Surrounded him as it still does, well after their tendriled exchange of knowledge. He stood back not only to give her space, as Eddie Brock wished it, but to give Venom room to breathe. To absorb, in his own pace, all that this new bond represents. For they are as much beholden to the cosmic implications they have shared as she is. ]

We try our best to be a good patient. Don’t we get a lollipop on the way out?

[ Spoken as Venom watches Angela clear the evidence, keeping the findings for herself (he does think they’re in better hands than they would be in Overwatch or Talon). Yet he is interrupted by Angela’s big “However.” He stands at attention, dwelling in something of a tunnel vision. For as long as he’s still accommodating Angela’s presence mentally, she is all he can see. All he can focus on. ]

Oh.

[ He stops to consider what it must mean to remain under her care. More time... in her proximity? More time subjected to her tests? Perhaps she’ll find a way to help him manage his weaknesses to fire and sonics. Not that he’s ever been taken out of a fight when, say, Lucio blasted him. As Venom continues inoculating his body to such weaknesses, they continue to pose a very annoying setback at times.

But more to the present matter. Venom’s monstrous visage offers the closest thing to a quizzical look that he can express. ]

That only makes sense, really. If you are ours, of course we are yours.

So study us all you like. Understand this body, if you can.

Learn from our physiology what you can pass on to the sick. We know you’ve got the mind for it.

And we’ll make sure no meddling organization distracts you. No Talon. No Overwatch.

For we are under your care, and you are under our protection.

[ Though she knows as well as he does that she’s not all who he protects. That when before and during his recruitment to Talon, he was saving people from other evildoers. Punishing the wicked wherever it festered. And he was ready to punish as much of Talon as was present in the skirmish if not for Juggernaut, whose strength was insurmountable. Whose blows were barely survivable, if Angela’s experience was any proof.

Now that they’ve bonded, she must understand that she’s a party to Venom’s crusade. She would have to purge the symbiote from her system to abjure, as Venom’s former enemy once did... if that’s what she even wants. ]

[responds]

[ In a sense, he's showing fire to a caveman. An understanding that feels simple, but it's foreign. Unknown. New. She has not and will not live thousands of years to soak up society, culture, and the history of the world – but he presents her with a cheatsheet in a sense.

Their bond was unlike anything anyone had come across. Nothing in Overwatch's history could prepare her for this. Dealing with Omnics was a hurdle that the world had to overcome, Null Sector came next. Talon, like a parasite, was always lingering – always there. However, there were limited studies on alien life, limited testimonials of conspiracy theories that may just be true. Angela didn't want that badge – she didn't want that honor.

She moves silently, stuffing the tests into her medical bag with a few additional medicines that seemed to be somewhat responsive to the symbiote – everything else went into the disposal for medical waste. There would be no trace, as even now – Angela had ensured their conversation would not be recorded by the security camera. It takes a moment for there to be anything else from her but actions, how she stumbles every so often from a disoriented and rushed state.

Angela knows him not by knowledge or wisdom, but by feelings. But, feelings can't be explained. They can be subjected to interpretation and it makes her want to find the words. She stops when they give a permission she did not need and he can see that a mundane life was being uprooted infront of him. Eddie can see that, maybe that symbiote would as well. A doctor, a hero she may be... but – this flies her into a gray area. Medicine was full of those. ]

Then you are to follow your doctor's order. We are to leave this place now. [ She can feel him – feel the curiosity and feel the willingness to stay close. To follow. To accept. Angela's way was mostly by the book, but how could she when this was not... anything she could have studied for? She does not purge the feeling of possessiveness, the lingering note that she was being watched even when rooms separated them. ] I am extracting you to an area few know of, something suitable for your freedom and something suitable for my studies.

[ She's to the door, bag at her hip with everything packed away. Her absence will not trigger Overwatch to hunt for her – as Venom is not the only one able to deal with a duality. A double life.

The door opens and the hallway was empty, from the windows peppered across, there was an unmarked truck. Their way out. ]

Do you have questions?

[primevil]

[ Angela hears no protest from Venom, who listens silently as she explains the imminent proceedings. She acts with a haste that fascinates him, her clear cognizance of the institutional structures that she must navigate. It's something Venom both pities and admires, seeing her have to live by such constraints when he so clearly doesn't. Because it's true... he really could have just left if he wanted to, and no one short of the Juggernaut could really stop him. He's spent so much time getting blasted with lasers and sonics that the symbiote matter has practically been inoculated to its natural weaknesses-- like an immunotherapy of some sort, as one would receive for allergies.

Overwatch is lucky that Venom has learned how much worse Talon is. Means they're living on borrowed time. Vishkar. The Gwishin. The Shimada Clan. The Deadlock Gang. Talon's joined a long list of targets with blood on their hands. Blood that Venom will force them all to answer for.

But first things first. The matter of their escape. The matter of what comes next.

Venom follows Angela to the unmarked truck, assumes immediately he's not necessarily invited to shotgun. But watch him take it anyway, reverting until it's solely Eddie Brock who sits beside her. The world doesn't know exactly who he is beneath the visage of Venom, so it's Angela's call how cautious she wants to be. Whether or not to banish him to the truck's interior, as an extra precaution. ]

Just one.

[ It might be jarring to Mercy, seeing the man beneath the symbiote. The humanity in his eyes that was missing before, as his gaze is entirely locked onto hers. There's a sincerity in him, a weariness from all that he's seen, that differs from the zeal whenever the mask is on. Like he's no longer driven by hunger, but drained by it. ]

Only a matter of time before Overwatch notices. Will they hunt me down?

[ He shakes his head. ]

Make that two questions.

Will they hunt you down?

Because I can say that I escaped. That I kidnapped you.

We're-- we're bonded, but you don't have to go down with us. Unlike us... you have a way out.

[ This is the price of the freedom that Venom relishes, the freedom that he pities Angela for lacking: until now, it's only ever been Eddie and the symbiote against the world. For all the lives they've saved and will continue trying to save, they're scorned for their monstrousness. Assailed by hero and villain alike for a disposition so easy to distrust. So easy to dismiss as evil.

He was practically an enemy of the state before this. Recent events only reinforce this position. So the human side of Venom, Eddie Brock, wants to leave no stone unturned, here. Wants Angela on the same page, given their bond. A possible way out that he can never give himself.

Not if it means giving up his other. ]

[responds]

[ This was the definition of risk. Angela was not a woman so huffed onto her own ego that she would believe herself to be free of warcrimes or going against international law. Angela works in a technicality that makes her feel better about her choices, but her heart feels tugged at seemingly going against the help of Overwatch. But... Overwatch was good-natured, too idealistic and banking on things going right. They can not rely on that. Not when there is something inside of her at risk now too. This was wrong to do... the symbiote and Eddie had to know she feels it, but she does not allow her patient to go untreated, even if he was in full health – there was something missing.

She does not abandon or go AWOL – but she lies. She keeps something to herself and for the "angel" of the team? It feels forbidden. It feels selfish.

When they reach the truck, she does not correct him – she's packing the back and by the time she sits down into the driver's side, she nearly jumps out of her skin at what was before her. It felt different – she felt confused, but at the same time comfort washed over her. A human tether, something familiar about this whole mess. ]

They will not know. [ Angela is confident, albeit a little reckless. Overwatch puts their faith in her, in her skill and compassion. She is one of the hearts of the team that still was there after their dismantling. If she needed to, her case would be clear – that the symbiote and its host would not be made to be a weapon. It would not be made to go under as some test subject. She had seen Overwatch lose grasp of the leash it kept on its most skilled agents before – she won't let it happen again.

Gabriel, even Moira. ] Your answer is right on your lips. We are... bonded, is the word you keep using. A bond on organic lifeforms are a balance. Severe the tie, remove the bond that they share... there is a loss. One side suffers, perhaps. Both sides perish, perhaps. It would be immensely foolish and cruel to do anything but understand.

[ To ensure their ... bond continues.

The truck hums to life when she turns the key in the ignition, starting the drive out of the hospital base they had been secured in. There's little reason for her to trust him, but she feels it too. Something that she desperately wants to understand. It was quiet for a few minutes, her hand causing the steering wheel to squeak, tighter than she means – nerves and anxiety rooted in her stomach.]

I have a clinic in a small village. Abandoned for some time. Overwatch has no knowledge of it, it was from my first... tour, if you will. It has been storage. My storage. We will continue our work there. You can rest.

[primevil]

[ "We are... bonded," she says. And she goes on, laying bare her understanding. ]

Then it's settled. You and I are in this for the long haul.

You and I... and my other.

[ A black tendril emerges from his back, slipping out of the gap between himself and the car seat. The appendage waves 'hello' as a human hand would before slinking back inside Eddie's body. ]

See? He says hi.

[ Not that the symbiote's attempt at niceties succeeds in elevating the mood. Eddie himself hasn't been hoping for it, the stakes of the task before them all too salient for relaxation to be possible. Without Eddie, perhaps his other would fail to see the necessity of fleeing. Without Eddie, it has no real obligation to the customs of human society, to the idea of a reputation that must be defended or upheld. Angela, in her silence, is clearly calculating the consequences of her actions, and how to ameliorate them. How to ground her choices in reason, despite the cosmic irrationality circumscribing the three's bond.

Soon enough, Eddie hears Angela's plans. A way forward for both Venom and Mercy. ]

We'll follow your lead, Doc. Take us there in one piece, or... two, I guess. And you'll get that protection.

My other and I, we didn't plan this. All we wanted to do was save your life from the Juggernaut.

[ A split second's decision, whose consequences they could hardly predict. Whose consequences they're facing now. ]

But you happen to be a brilliant scientific mind. I was an investigative journalist before all this, so excuse the creepiness... but I know a lot about you. About Overwatch's activities, its whole network of relations before and after the Omnic Crisis.

I know our reputation might precede us, but we believe in our work. Venom's work. Because we're fighting for what's right. But we know we can fight it better by understanding ourselves better.

[ Eddie feels like he has to say all this to speak on behalf of Venom, taken as a totality. He knows that when he's in that form, he can get carried away with taunts and riddles. Grandstanding about his place in the world as some lethal protector.

Given the enormity it all, as well as the potential awkwardness of just spelling this out like it needs justification, he sighs. His posture weakens, the weariness of a life of vengeance catching up to his human body. ]

I'm just saying all this so you know. This whole arrangement benefits us as much as it does you.

The cure we want is an answer to the riddle that Venom represents. The reason we are what we are, and the reason for our bond.

[ Because he knows it's more than the hatred that brought them together. They like to think they've transcended that for bigger and better things. ]

[responds]

It looks that way, doesn't it?

[ She has no opinion. How can she formulate one? She's running on under a dozen hours of sleep for the past week – he can feel that she's invigorated only by them. For what plagues her at night, gives her life? It makes no sense, yet here she was – alert and able to parse the trip outside of a monitored zone, a safezone that Overwatch had liberated from an invading Null Sector unit months prior. As Eddie speaks, she glances over to him, brows perked at the tendril with a life of its own. Two entities, two mannerisms... she is not sure how to react with that but there's a courteous nod of her head to him and a small smile. ]

I would be a poor doctor if I was not able to ... adapt to situations. I did not expect this... and I feel guilt – [ That perhaps others had died in the line of 'duty' and she survived. Albeit changed... she survived. ] What is done, is done. There is no going back to undo, no matter if you would have chose another option or the situation would have been different.

[ Angela hits a turn that leads to a 14-mile stretch of road. 14 miles of forest would be a cover that leads them to a small village – the depths of the forest still ripped with strife of decaying machines, of where nature was beginning to reclaim. The crisis before – it was not a festering wound thanks to Overwatch, but there were still scars. She's use to the drive, use to how haunting each tree felt whipping by.

She feels a cold shiver roam down her spine when he mentions her accolades – she was not humble, but instead proud. One of the few things breaking the media's presumed "watchful angel" persona they make from her. She's worked hard – sacrificed enough, so when he says he knows her ... she wonders if he really does.

It was obvious they were on equal footing with this. When she took him into her care, when she recovered faster – there had to be some glimpse of the man underneath the symbiote. Some murmurs of who he was. She has questions – on if his own snooping and career had put him in this "line of fire". That makes two (three) of them. ]

You give a doctor a purpose, a reason to continue to do good and help. This is not an ailment. This is not a sickness. You... need care. Many doctors view it simply: a prescription, a routine, a therapy. This is much more, yes? I may not understand – heaven's know I will not fully – but ... I believe that forward is the only way.

[ And he feels that belief, doesn't he?

The miles tick by. Marker after marker until the expanse of a rural countryside greets them. There were peppered houses, small businesses in a more central part of town. There had to be maybe 150 people within a 5 mile radius – it was a place still healing. Trees were planted in their infancy to reclaim the earth that felt like ground zero after the crisis, buildings were mis-matched with bricks to rebuild. When they end up to a small clinic... it couldn't be more than 3 rooms at most. A hanging sign read "NO DOCTOR", the doors chained and windows fogged with dirt.

Angela sits in silence when she puts the truck into park. ]

[primevil]

True. We can regret the past all day, but damn. There'd be no point.

Moping won't protect us from the threats to come. The threats we'll also have to protect innocents from.

As a doctor, you must know what I mean. Despite appearances, you've probably seen more death than we have.

[ It's almost flippant, the way he says it, but he believes there's no dancing around such subjects. Treating such things delicately, he finds, does a disservice to their magnitude. Their gravity. And though Eddie's addressing Angela, he feels no need to prolong any stares. His eyes are pointed to his side's window, watching city become forest. The woods grow denser, darker even, as the vehicle progresses, Eddie trusting Angela's familiarity with these winding paths. A trust, of course, grounded in their bond. He doesn't have to know, intellectually, what she's planning. He can already feel it. ]

The only way out is through.

[ That's all he musters in response to Angela's explanation - her talk of "purpose" and "care." Invoking the Hippocratic Oath without needing to spell it out. From Eddie's perspective, Angela seems to speak more for her own edification than his, and he can't blame her. This is her first exposure to the symbiote, her only beginning to grasp what Eddie's been grappling with for god knows how many years. And despite his experience, he's unsure what more to offer as a word of comfort. There's no way to really countenance the experience of being Venom, verbally... it just has to continue being experienced. Being felt. ]

If it's all the same to you, Doc...

[ He opens the truck door on his side and steps down, dropping down from the elevated height of the truck car to hit the dirt. ]

...could use some fresh air.

It's pretty quaint here, right? Almost pastoral, if not for the scars.

[ Some of the countryside that they passed was postcard worthy, but Eddie couldn't help feeling a distinct emptiness on the way here. Was that a symptom of a sympathetic tendency in the symbiote, or a symptom of his history in journalism-- his mind trained to spot trauma beneath the surface of things? At the very least, he knows it's trauma that's made its home in certain places, that needn't be seen to be felt. Places that have seen war, unrest, calamity... stuff that's made Eddie feel powerless and small, no matter his desire to disseminate the truth.

And then, of course, along came Venom. ]

Are you okay?

[ Angela's reticence isn't lost on him. Nor on the symbiote. It is, in fact, the symbiote who brought it to his attention. ]

Dumb question, I know. Just sounds to us like you might need some care, too.

[responds]

I was aware of what the world offers those who wish to help it. We can only do our best, to try to learn. [ She remembers families torn apart, she remembers people dying in the field, she remembers innocent lives dead before she could even ail them. As a medic, sure – but even as her time as a student... she walked empty halls with the sick with no way to help. Overwatch gives her gifts and knowledge an outlet and for that? She is thankful. The rocky end of the last iteration of Overwatch did something right. ] And have hope that we can do better the next time.

[ They weren't honest with each other fully. There was some... bending, however. She speaks to him in a way she doesn't to her teammates – not even her own staff. Angela, for the most part, remains guarded. Yet... he was part of her. She can feel him inside, like a bad feeling she can't shake. An eagerness in her chest that makes her heart skip a beat every so often.

The clinic in front of them has not had visitors for some time, but it is as she remembers it. It brings a small bit of sadness to her, to know it has not been repurposed. As Eddie leaves the truck, she follows – gathers her things and looks out into the expanse far beyond the small clinic. ]

It is. There use to be festivals every season to welcome the change, it would be around time for one, I think. Visitors would come by to experience it before, now... I don't think many people even know of this place. [ It was truly a sight to remember, now that she thinks back on it. She noticed when the festivals stopped as a child, but... at least this place was still standing. Becoming part of Overwatch... gave her a reason to feel like celebrating again. Even for little instances of just "existing". ] I'm fine. Tired, in ways I never have been. It will pass.

[ Even among their odd relation, their unknown bond – where it feels intimate and invasive at once... Angela offers a respectful, small smile to him. Reassuring. Telling him what any patient would need to hear from their doctor: to trust them.

Angela ushers them inside, the lights a dull flicker fortunately enough when she tests the power. Inside the clinic would be a small waiting room, check-in area – and when Angela continues on, two rooms equipped with beds and the typical medical supplies one could expect. Further on was a small washroom. If Eddie shut his eyes, maybe he could imagine it in better standing but for now – it was packed up with supplies, chairs stacked high, and plastic wrapped around outdated computers. ]

How do you feel?

[ She asks, stacking her bag onto the check-in counter. She knows the answer, but it felt like cheating to even assume. ]

[primevil]

Maybe we want the same thing then, Doc. To keep getting better.

[ That's the last thing he says before actually departing from the truck, having listened to Angela carry on about hope. Not the schmaltzy stuff that can be put on a pedestal, aggrandized by politicians who do nothing. No, Eddie thinks instead of a desire to move forward despite the ugliness of what's come before, and what may come after. The recognition that we can only do our best, and that we must at least try. It puts a small smile on Eddie's face to hear Angela's words, but he doesn't quite know what to think of where they stand.

The symbiote has conformed to the shape of a black leather jacket around Eddie. He keeps his hands in his pockets as he follows Angela to her clinic, which has clearly seen better days. Not that Eddie was expecting much, of course. He knows a thing or two about being a fixer-upper... so he has little room to judge the place. Instead, he gives the structure a once-over before turning to regard the same view that's seized Angela's attention. Breathtaking, to be sure, but Eddie's never learned to sit still. Never really been the type to stop and smell the flowers, even before the symbiote entered his life. Maybe this is why he was a journalist and not a photographer, never one to truly consider what spectacle can do for a story. The lost history that Angela speaks of, though-- the dying local traditions, intrigue the journalist in Eddie. ]

Sounds to me like the world needs to be reminded of what this place once was.

If not for, well... everything, I could've published something on that. Revived interest in some of the local flavor.

[ He shrugs, though. This is more a passing fascination than a genuine investment. There's little reason, currently, for his heart to actually be in it. ]

But you heard it from Venom, didn't you? The way civilizations rise and fall. Cultures come and go, the minutiae lost to the sands of time.

There's so much that's passed that we'll simply never know, let alone know to look for. Makes me wonder if everything here will be a distant memory too, someday... if even that.

[ That's Eddie's little soliloquy for the day, happy to also hear that Angela could be worse. He's not expecting the Venom experience to be a five-star treatment, but he frets imagining just how much Angela might come to resent their bond. Eddie recalls a time long ago, when he lashed out at those who needed his help, people like him who were desperate to understand how they could communicate with their own symbiotes and use those powers for the greater good. But cruelly, Eddie dashed those hopes. He rejected them outright, fought them off and spat in their faces for even reaching out to him... just before watching them all kill each other.

But that's not who he is anymore. He thought he was doing something right by joining Talon, but that was just another error in judgment. If he hadn't saved Angela from the Juggernaut, the symbiote laboring to heal otherwise fatal injuries, Venom might've continued to drink Talon's kool-aid. They might have taken Venom and pointed him at the wrong targets, like he's no better than a glorified attack dog.

These thoughts swirl in Eddie's mind, in the symbiote's, and perhaps a feeling of dread lingers beneath the surface of Angela's own mind, as a result. Dread over bridges burned, regret for errors in judgment, and sorrow for pain inflicted. ]

I feel... like this is more than I deserve. Than my other deserves.

[ Though the place is more like a warehouse than a clinic, let alone a home... it's better than many of his past living situations by several thousand miles. Relative to his own experiences, this place is practically a luxury hotel. ]

I know we're your patient, and you have your obligation as a doctor, but... Angela.

It's your prerogative what you do beyond that.

Seriously.

[responds]

[ Is he looking for kinship? Even after this apparent bond now intertwines their fate... their goals, their desires – the way he speaks to her was with comfort and ease. To make her feel not so alone. Walking through the memories of better days, ones with more hope... Angela's emotions were clear on her face but she thinks she masks it well. ]

You worry yourself on things long buried. Even now, there is still some life to this place. Albeit... growing much slower than previously. Set-backs.

[ She isn't cold about it, but the forced smile tugging at her face was reassuring enough. She doesn't want to dwindle, Angela was ever the idealistic even in the years that were the toughest. Her hand pulls out his tests clearly, laying them down across the dusted tabletop and stops shy of him asking about what she saw – ]

It could be a million civilizations, but the feelings still remain. There is something beyond human nature. The common thread all organisms on Earth, in specific, have? To survive. It is time that will be their enemy, not predators.

[ Time and place was almost Angela's undoing. The near fatal blow nearly ending this all before it started. She wondered why Eddie did what he did – her eyes catch him from afar as he's inspecting the clinic, lost in a trance. Thoughts race over him, mapping an unfamiliar face with a warm sensation – as if they knew each other in another life. It was the symbiote's doing, she knows even though the specifics were lost to her. The how, the why? It just is.

He interrupts her and she shakes her head. ]

No. Be quiet.

[ Another thread, another foreign tongue. This one German, with a Swiss hint to it. ]

No occupation on this planet is based on what one deserves. I took oaths. I've saved horrible... horrible people and could not save innocent ones. It is how it is, if we are bonded – you should know.

[ But, accusatory, more guarded. ]

Unless... you have business you must contend with. Say the word. I will be returning back to my main campus to file incident reports. I... can not change that Overwatch and Talon will show interest in apprehending you. I am no shield, but I can offer you what I can. All that I can.

[primevil]

[ Thanks to Angela's first remarks, Eddie realizes he should know better than to assume human life is all life. He's bonded to a non-human entity, after all, but more to the point: a lack of human attention won't slow down the way nature heals, no matter how long it may take. No matter how differently that healing might look from before, depending on the nature of the scarring. And then the macro-level stuff, what Angela addresses about a universal tendency to desire survival, commands Eddie's attention. Compels him to consider how the vastness of this bond is going to show itself in the duration of his life. How it might affect it.

Based on what the symbiote can do for Eddie, and what their bond has done for Angela, he doesn't doubt her pronouncements on a grand instinct to survive. ]

I've survived a lot that I shouldn't have, thanks to this bond. Wouldn't be surprised if this happens to slow down my aging, as well as yours.

[ So time just might be a weaker enemy to them than it is for all other lifeforms. Time itself will tell if this proves to be a blessing or a curse.

And then Angela pushes back at him. Forbids him from self-flagellating, punishing himself for his and the symbiote's many sins. He who at least meditates on his past actions, devoting more than a passing thought to the weight of his misdeeds. Can the same even be said of Juggernaut? Of Reaper? Of practically the rest of Talon?

Not that Eddie's expecting a cookie for having a conscience. ]

It's probably written all over my face, isn't it? That I've made difficult choices. Impossible ones.

Despite all this power, things still fall apart beyond my control. People get hurt.

Seems I've finally met another person who truly gets it.

[ With that, Eddie gives her a wistful smile. Nothing conciliatory, like he's trying to lighten the mood or save face, but one that he hopes to express in understanding. He didn't take any oaths as a doctor would, but he did swear to protect the innocent as Venom. To be a lethal protector who would dare to go the extra mile, to cross a line many heroes would never consider. He's allowed blood to accumulate on his hands, as long as it means saving as many innocent lives as possible. ]

You've got that right, Doc. Ain't my first rodeo, anyway, being an enemy of the state. Now just so happens that Overwatch and Talon are both on my ass.

And this hideout is more than enough. More than we've ever gotten. So you don't have to put your career on the line just for me.

My other and I do have a lotta loose ends that need tying, outside of this. The kind of work only Venom can do.

Speaking of--

[ Within seconds, the symbiote envelops Eddie's body, emerging from inside him. The blackness takes over, pouring down every inch of him until the man is fully subsumed into the symbiote, and Venom is born again. In the privacy of this facility, it seems he couldn't stay away from his true self for long. His whole self. And his voice radically changes, made monstrous by the transition to this form. If not for the knowledge that it's Eddie Brock under there, he could be mistaken for an entirely different being. An alien in the fullest sense, not only to this planet but to the heights of human understanding in this advanced age. ]

--that's more like it.

Now, Angela... if you're still figuring us out, no one else knows what they're really up against.

But we promise not to kill your colleagues. We just want to convince everyone to back off.

None of that is urgent, though. No one is currently in pursuit of us.

So we must ask you, Angela. What will you do now?

[responds]

[ With whatever bond they share now rooted inside of them, they were still learning. Eddie's experience with the symbiote was one thing – he's able to accept or at the very least, control parts of it. The sensation to Angela's form felt a few degrees colder – that was one of the major changes in her own tests during the recovery process, aside from the insomnia and sense of feeling... off.

Eddie was the veteran here. Whatever the symbiote had done to his life – change it, ruin it, uproot it, divert it... his experiences gave him valuable 'data' to learn and improve from. Be better, as he wants to keep bringing up. The innate call to survive, even in a simple form like improving would be crucial at times, right?

She walks by without so much as making eye contact with him as he speaks. That wasn't cold, he could tell she was instead focused. The run-down clinic had seen better days, had once seen people lining up for her treatments and working well into the night. There was once life here, but now... who knows what they would call this.

Angela disappears into one of the clinic rooms, an overturned medical bed hoisted up with less concern and resistance. She felt a little stronger, despite feeling so fatigued. ]

In all of this endless knowledge, you do know you still must take it one day at a time.

[ Was she ... teasing him? Was she being too scientific with her words? There was warmth there – really, there was rarely a person who did not find the Doctor at least pleasant. Her empathy, her kindness, the sass of her character... there are reasons why those people stood in lines in this very clinic.

Now, even in another room – she feels like part of her is missing. The bed may be flipped over and the sheets stripped of it, caked with dirt and who knew what else – but she stops and looks at the wall... as if she knew Eddie was on the other side of it.

She listens, eyes shut and formulates her own confusing, unsure thoughts. ]

I am not worried about my career. Take me from a fully-fledged hospital to one 10 years behind in its equipment and I still can do good. You must not –

[ Worry? Her steps took her to the doorframe, and by the time she tried to reassure him, mainly to keep his vitals calm – she is greeted with something else. Something she is still adjusting to seeing. He can feel her heart sink, not out of fear but out of ... familiarity? As if she missed the sight... ]

We need to have time to convince. Time to be clear. Clarity inspires, clarity leaves little to doubt. If we understand, if we are clear – that will convince our story.

[ Our story. Our story. Our story.

There was no he or her – only them. ]

As it currently stands? Sleep. I am of no use if I do not get rest. Be it a fight, be it helping, be it... anything. This bond has kept me shivering at night... thinking of – you. All that you are, all that you have been trying to tell me.

[ Her hip catches the doorframe as she leans against it, running her hands through her own blonde strands, pushing stray hair back from her face. ]

Then after that? Making this place suitable. Setting up a secure connection and perhaps... trying to find where Talon has been in this area. They have to be within a 50 mile radius.

[primevil]

[ Before Eddie's already changed into Venom, it's clear he doesn't mind standing back and watching Angela inspect her surroundings. All the better, after all, that she go ahead and check just how well the place holds up. He can only imagine the memories here, the many nights spent doing her job-- abiding by the oaths she swore. From afar, he can feel the swirl of emotions within her. The nostalgia perhaps, for a simpler time. But also the recognition that even back then, things were complex. Bigger in implications and scope than she could grasp without hindsight, especially when she was in the business of saving people's lives, often tending to the sick and wounded.

There's more dignity in her profession than in the task he's chosen for himself. He once protected a vulnerable community that had fled from society, taking refuge in an abandoned city beneath San Francisco. That was the most he was ever considered a pillar of some community, and now... he's a complete renegade. A dark soul drifting. His dedication to his and the symbiote's shared purpose should be its own reward, but the absence of recognition - of validation - can still be demoralizing. He's learned to understand what his former enemy has had to deal with, public maligning and all. Eddie's former hatred was fed by the same misunderstanding-- so he can only imagine how many people hate Venom for the wrong reasons. ]

My other and I have spent the past several years on the run, Doc. The days sort of just blend for us now.

[ He laughs, though, matching Angela's warmth. Simply making light of what he's been living with for so long, as well as how he's been living. It's worthwhile to have a perspective other than the symbiote's for once. The two of them might have been Angela's anchor for the transmission of knowledge back in the hospital, but Eddie's starting to think that she can be his anchor: yet more of the human element Venom's always needed. More of the demystification Venom would profess for himself.

Speaking of which, it's as Venom that he later addresses her. Heeds her words about their ability - his and Mercy's, as one - to testify the truth. ]

Sleep sounds good. The restoration of our strength will be vital to subjugating Talon's goons.

[ Despite the fact that he's unfamiliar with the place, Angela's memories here bestow upon him familiarity by proxy. He understands where there's a back room containing a hospital bed, and quickly proceeds towards it. But to get there, he must pass through the very doorframe in which Angela stands. ]

You have been... cold, then. Cold without us.

[ With something of a neutral expression, Venom hasn't bared much of his fangs since transforming. He stays that way looking over Angela's shoulder, which isn't difficult, to then assess what was once used as a patient room. ]

The warmth of our bond is why you shivered, Angela. Your body recognized what it was missing.

[ Instead of looking over Angela, Venom looks down at her instead. ]

We don't know how to ask this of you. But it doesn't have to remain that way.

[ And for the first time, as fearsome a monster as Venom actually looks nervous. Like him in his colossal stature is fretful of walking on eggshells. Not wanting to impose in case Angela would prefer that room for herself, Venom takes a step back, crossing his arms as he awaits a response. But then he clears his venomous throat, sensing the clear tension in the air that connects his and Angela's bodies. While the bond that's formed between them presents a powerful pull, Angela represents the presence of a third conscience. In quiet moments such as this, with no other stimuli present, the mere perception of her can be staggering. ]

You need only join us. That's all we're saying.