Thursday, October 8, 2020

With Great Power Comes Too Much Responsibility

"Where ya goin' doll? You paid for the night."

"Keep the money. Room's paid for until Monday. Stay here, take a couple days off. Just don't trash the place or I'll come find you."

She watches him pull on his pants with a small level of disappointment. She longs for his toned body on top of hers. Her hands running through his salt and pepper hair. He's no spring chicken but still maintains his boyish good looks. As she daydreams about the weekend that should have been with the perfect client, he stares back at her with eternally sad eyes. She snaps out of her daydream and realizes that he's gone into the night.
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"Hey Mick" the scrawny toothless thug nudges his considerably larger friend. "Mick!" He pushes the large lump in the back of the van again. "MICK!" He yells as he dumps the remainder of his stale, cold, convenience store coffee in his slumbering friend. Maybe that was a mistake he thinks as his friend's sledgehammer like fist slams into the side of his head.

"Why won't you just let a guy sleep?" Grumbles Mick.

"Lookit!" Sammy says while pointing to the slumped shouldered figure walking down the dark sidewalk.

"Da hell? Doesn't that fool know this is a bad part of town? There ain't even any streetlights working. Haha, guess we'll have to hand deliver the memo." He says as he reaches behind him to grab his favorite bat. It's been a long time since he used that bat to hit a ball. Shoulda listened to his agent and laid off the juice.
Sammy puts the van in drive and slowly eases it forward, shadowing the unwitting figure on the sidewalk. As he gets closer he gets a better look at the man. He looks like he could take Sammy. One on one that is. This fight ain't gonna be one on one though, Sammy chuckles to himself. This is gonna be 2.5 on one.

Mick had the potential to make it in the big leagues, even without the juice. He had the forearms of Mark McGuire and the speed of Kenny Lofton. Now he had the acne of a teenage boy with a penchant for sweets. As they get closer to the mark, Mick eases the sliding door open. He hops out while still on the move, stumbles a couple steps and catches himself on a parking meter. Damn, he thinks, I used to be better on my feet. He gathers himself and walks quickly towards the sad looking shadowed figure. His clumsy size 14 feet slapping on the wet sidewalk as he practically jogs to catch up. He's surprised when the man doesn't even look back. He really doesn't know what neighborhood he's in does he? Mick thinks to himself. As he gets closer he reaches towards the man's shoulder. Just as he's about to grab it the man spins around, catching Mick by surprise. Mick, off balance and still lunging, trips over his own feet and finds himself face first in a pile of rancid trash.

As Mick turns around and tries to gather himself he sees large sad eyes looking down at him.

"Sorry buddy, you startled me" says the man as he extends a hand to help Mick to his feet.

As Mick grabs his hand he swings the bat at the man's head. The man watches emotionless as the bat swings towards him. He doesn't even brace for the blow and the bat connects with his jaw. The force of the blow spins the man around as Mick winds up for another at bat. He swings the bat again and at the last minute sees the man look towards the bat with... What's that? A smile on his face?! The bat connects with the man's ribs and Mick hears cracking as they break under the force of the blow. By this time Sammy is out of the van cheering Mick on from a safe distance.

After another hard blows to the abdomen Sammy darts in and eagerly searches the man for any valuables. He's disappointed to find an old, leather banded watch but pleasantly surprised to find a wallet flush with cash. He pulls out the wad of money and ignores the coin that falls to the pavement. Sammy quickly searches the wallet finding nothing more than a few pictures of some pretty girls, clothed unfortunately, and a couple old people. At least there was cash! Sammy nods to Mick and his brutish friend winds up and connects with a fatal blow to the head. Sammy laughs and scampers back to the van while Mick lumbers after him.
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Well it would have ordinarily been a fatal blow but this mark was far from ordinary. A couple minutes after the van speeds off the man slowly comes too. Smirking as he rubs his throbbing head. This is just what he needed. To feel, anything at all, even pain. He scans the sidewalk and tenderly crawls over to the coin. His one year coin. A year sober. Well one year, two days, sixteen hours and seven minutes since his last drink. Drinking numbed the pain. He didn't want it numbed, didn't deserve it. He NEEDED to feel the pain. The pain he had caused, the pain of losing everyone he ever loved. The pain of knowing he was the reason they were dead. Some may call him self destructive, he called it atonement.

He gingerly stands up and walks over to his wallet. He bends down and picks it up. He feels a twinge of pain, not from the beating he just took, rather pain from the beautiful blonde smiling at him from the picture. He drops to his knees and sobs uncontrollably. Why had things gone so wrong?

He walks into the dark alley and slumps down against the wall. He quickly falls into a restless sleep that he hopes is his last even though he knows he isn't that lucky.
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He wakes up to a police officer's baton prodding him in his surprisingly not sore ribs.

"C'mon pal. You can't sleep here. Hey buddy! Wake up! Hey Willie, wanna give me a hand? Looks like we got one to bring in" the cop calls to his partner. This day is turning out to be a hassle already.

"Another drunk?" Asks Willie.

"Nah just some poor sap. Looks like he took one hell of a beating. Probably brain damaged from the look of the bruise on his face. Let's take him to general and they can check him out while we find out who the hell this guy is."

The cops lift him and drag him to their car. They dump him in the back seat where sleep quickly comes again. Faces float through his dreams. All sad, all people he has disappointed, let down, failed.

Suddenly he is jarred awake as he slams into the roof of the cop car and then back down to the seat. The car rolls to a stop, the roof crumpled, the two cops as broken as the windows. Disoriented he tries to push the door open but it is badly mangled from the roll. He hears what he thinks is growling and the screech of the door getting pried open. He looks towards the door and sees a large dark hand reaching towards him. The shadows on the arm seemingly moving as the hand closes around his throat. He is yanked from the car and smirks at the toothy face he sees.

"Parker, I've been looking for you" growls Eddie Brock, a.k.a. Venom. "You're a hard man to find."

"What do you want Brock?"

"I want to give you something. I don't need it anymore. Something makes me think it can use you."

"Use me? What are you talking abo..." His words are cut off as the darkness flows from Eddie's hand onto his neck. He feels a familiarity that he hasn't felt in decades. Like an old friend has returned home. The darkness slowly works it's way over his body, relearning it's old host. Finally completely covering the body that was once Peter Parker, leaving only his sad, broken eyes.

Once the symbiote leaves Eddie, he drops to his knees. His face sunken in. His eyes yellow with jaundice. "I'm sick Parker. Not strong enough to be a good host anymore. It knew that we broke you. It knew it could finally control you. Finally turn the amazing Spider-Man into the blood thirsty Venom." Eddie laughs and coughs up thick sputum that's dark red with his vile, tainted blood. "Have fun with it, I know I did" growls Eddie with his dying breath.

As Peter watches the life leave his arch nemesis he feels nothing. The symbiote slowly creeps over his eyes as a tear rolls down his cheek and falls onto his wallet. The pictures were strewn all over the ground when Eddie pulled him from the car. The last things Peter Parker sees before being consumed by the darkness are Gwen, Mary Jane, aunt May, uncle Ben and Harry Osborne. All of the people he failed. All of the people he killed. He feels empty, he feels sad, he feels angry, we feel hungry!

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