Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Peter opened his eyes to darkness. Then he closed his eyes again, before opening them once more to make sure. The darkness was still there, though as his eyes adjusted he started to be able to make out some shapes.

Everything was covered in black liquid. The ground seemed to be completely covered by it, and it was making its way up the surrounding buildings, tendril by tendril.

Venom? But why is there so much, and how? Even with spider-healing, I’m pretty sure my body couldn’t produce enough blood for someone to make this much of it.

He heard the beating of wings overhead, and looked up to spy a dragon flying above him. One with some pretty distinctive features. Peter mused aloud, “What, is this Loki’s body-swap-to-facilitate-symbiote-monster-army-invasion plan 2: electric boogaloo? …Well, speaking of electricity, at least I’ve got my taser webs.”

A scream echoed from the distance. Peter couldn’t see anything from where he was, but he started swinging towards the sound. Building after building had tendrils wrapped around them as he passed, but everything else seemed eerily still.

Not long after he started swinging, he found a group of people. Unfortunately, said people were all bonded to symbiotes, and they didn’t look friendly. Though some looked familiar. “Hey, I know we haven’t always seen eye to eye, but replacing the spider symbol with a scorpion? That’s just insulting!” As he spoke, he shot his taser webs at one of the people in the group, activating them as soon as they connected.

As electricity surged through the webs, the symbiote was blasted off its host, revealing a teen girl in a red and blue costume. Hey, isn’t she one of the new Avengers? “Are you okay?” Peter asked. 

“Spider-Man?” She looked around a bit, getting her bearings. “Uh, why are there two of you?” Peter had been cautiously watching the symbiotes, who seemed to be waiting for something, but he spared a glance towards where Ms. Marvel was looking. There was indeed another Spider-Man, who seemed to be just as surprised as he was.

“I have the same question, along with several other ones,” said the other Spider-Man. The bottom part of his mask was torn off, and there were still-bleeding cuts on his skin. And he was holding an unconscious, barely-clothed man. “But if you want to have time to explain without having to fight them-” he nodded towards the symbiotes, who were slowly moving towards them -“see if you can do that electric web thing again on Storm.” He pointed towards the one with the mohawk as he said the name. Peter quickly obliged his other self, and used his taser webs to shock the symbiote off of her. 

After a couple seconds of gathering herself, Storm channeled lightning towards the rest of the symbiote group, quickly freeing the rest of the unwilling hosts; The Thing, She-Hulk, Captain America, and a guy with a visor that Peter didn’t recognize. Peter said, “So, is it question time, or…”

“I’d say we ought to return to the base and regroup. That way we can get Eddie some medical care, those injuries of his look serious. And you wouldn’t have to worry about an attacker interrupting the conversation,” said Captain America. 

Eddie’s gotta be the mystery unconscious guy, Peter thought. Out loud, he said. “Good idea. Hope you won’t mind leading the way, since I have no idea where this base is.”

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Once they arrived at the Fantastic Four’s lab, Peter asked, “So, who exactly is this Eddie guy? And what the heck happened to him?” 

“For someone who clearly has in-depth knowledge of symbiote weaknesses, I’m surprised you don’t know who Venom is. Especially since you’re me, and Venom and I have a long history. But as to what happened to him; Knull happened.”

“I know who Venom is! And he’s not him. At least, not in my world. And I’ve got the longest history with Venom out of anyone, since it technically starts before the symbiote even existed. No idea what Knull is, though.”

“Okay, that’s a lot to unpack. About Knull, though, he’s the guy causing the whole symbiote catastrophe.”

“How much blood did he even need for all this?”

“What would he need blood for?”

“Y’know, making all those symbiotes in the first place.”

“...I get the feeling this is probably another universe difference.”

“So… are the symbiotes here not made from your blood then?”

The other Spidey looked taken aback. “You mean to tell me that they are in your world?”

“Yeah…”

“Man, that’s weird. The ones here are aliens, but they also have a god for some reason, and that’s Knull.”

“Yours doesn’t sound not weird. But at least people don’t target you over it.”

Before the other Spider-Man could respond, the Human Torch entered the room with a teenage boy in tow. 

“Sorry I couldn’t come get you myself, Dylan, but as you can see, something unexpected came up. And thanks for doing that for me, Johnny.”

“No problem,” said the Torch, who then went to where most of the other heroes were gathered.

Dylan looked at Peter with a strange expression on his face. “What’s with this guy, then?”

“I’m just your friendly neighborhood alternate-universe Spider-Man,” Peter said. “I have no idea why I’m here, though.”

The strange expression stayed, but Dylan turned to the other Spider-Man. “Where’s my dad? I wanna see him!”

The older Spidey said, “C’mon, he’s this way,” and turned to walk towards the little medical bay in the lab. Dylan walked after him, and Peter followed after a few seconds. Once he spotted the hospital bed Eddie was in, Dylan ran towards it. He gripped the side of the bed as he waited for the others.

“I hate to break it to you, kid, but your dad’s not doing well,” said Tony Stark, in full Iron Man armor with the faceplate up. “His best bet of survival is if we can bring a symbiote to him. And we need your dad alive, so I’m gonna go get one of the big ones. I’m gonna tame a dragon.”

“Wouldn’t it be harder to get a symbiote if its host is a dragon?” Peter asked.

“They don’t have hosts, these symbiotes are dragons.” Peter’s eyes widened, but he stayed silent and let Dylan continue. “And they’re a lot more powerful than regular symbiotes, so if we could get one and disconnect it from the hive, it could be really useful against Knull.”

“What’s the hive? I don’t think my universe’s symbiotes have that.”

“The symbiotes are all connected to a hive-mind, and Knull can control them through it. That’s why we’d need to disconnect a symbiote from it before we could use one to save my dad.”

“This plan sounds pretty risky. It doesn’t look like we’ve got much time to waste, and it sounds like there’s a good chance it might not work even if time wasn’t an issue.”

“You got a better idea?” asked Tony.

“Well…” Peter sighed in resignation. “Remember how I mentioned my universe’s symbiotes not having a hive-mind? That’s not the only difference between them. My universe’s symbiotes are made from my blood. I know how to make them, and it doesn’t take long.” 

For once, Tony Stark was speechless.

Dylan said, “I guess that’s why you felt off. Dragon or no dragon, let’s just save my dad already!”

“I’m gonna ignore that for now. But you should tell me what you mean by that after I get this done. So, if nobody’s got any objections, I’m gonna go make another Venom.” Peter approached the lab equipment as he spoke.

“I guess maybe you do have a better idea, or at least a less risky one,” Tony conceded. “We might be able to use that lack of a hive-mind to our advantage in combat too, I should go mention that to the others.” He gestured to the other side of the room, where most of the heroes were having a conversation about the next move.

After finding a syringe, Peter started the process of making a symbiote, and as he continued he watched Tony talk to the others, hearing bits of the conversation and getting the occasional odd look before finishing. He turned to Dylan, who had been silent the whole time, and handed him the vial with the new symbiote. “Here, you should give it to him. If I do it it might just try to bond with me instead, blood connection and all.”

Dylan gave him another weird look, but took the vial and approached his dad’s hospital bed. “Please,” he said, before pouring the symbiote out onto Eddie’s chest. The symbiote spread over him, quickly covering him entirely, and soon his vital signs on the nearby monitor started to improve.

Peter let out a sigh of relief. The other version of him did so too, then turned to him. “Guess it’s a good thing you got stuck here, I don’t want to think about what could’ve happened otherwise.” He turned to Dylan, who had a conflicted-looking expression. “Is something wrong, buddy?” he asked.

“I can barely sense him. It’s kinda disorienting.” Dylan looked at Peter and said, “Actually, he feels a lot like how you feel right now, it’s gotta be because of that blood symbiote thing. But at least he’s okay.”

At this point the conversation on the other side of the room had stopped. Everyone was looking at either Eddie or Peter. From the looks he was getting, Peter belatedly realized that maybe creating a symbiote when there was an active symbiote invasion going on would make some people think he was in on said invasion.

Chapter Text

“Tony, when you told us what the kid Spidey said, I thought you were just really gullible,” said Blade.

Namor pointed his trident in Peter’s direction. “How do we know he’s not some saboteur sent to defeat us from the inside? To spawn those creatures when we least expect it? Maybe he was going to pretend to be the real Spider-Man but ran into him and changed plans!”

“Did you forget how he freed me and the others who’d been all gooped up? Doesn’t sound like something someone on Knull’s side would do,” the Thing said.

“It is a bit weird that he knew the symbiote dragons’ electricity weakness right away. But in my experience, dimension stuff is just weird like that.” Ms. Marvel gave an extra-exaggerated shrug, making use of her Inhuman powers.

Peter replied, “How’s it weird that I know what the symbiote weaknesses are? The very first time I fought Venom, I used my taser webs to electrocute it off my body, which was very painful by the way. Electricity was how I defeated symbiotes in a lot of our battles.” His counterpart gave him a look before speaking up.

“The dragons are weak to electricity, but normal symbiotes aren’t. If yours are, well, it certainly wouldn’t be the biggest difference here. And about that imposter theory, Namor, I’m pretty sure he and I have actually met before. A few years back, there was this thing with a bunch of spider-people from different universes teaming up to stop dimension-hopping spider-person-eating vampires. It was weird.” Namor looked dissatisfied, but seemed to concede for now. Before the conversation could continue, a shout drew everyone’s attention.

“Dad!” shouted Dylan at his now-awake father. The symbiote retracted from his face, Eddie’s brows were furrowed and a look of uncertainty filled his eyes. He seemed distracted by something. “Some stuff happened while you were knocked out.”

“What happened to my Other? It feels… wrong.”

“It’s not your Venom,” Peter cut in. “I guess it doesn't even have to be Venom at all, but in my universe, most of ‘em are called Venom. And it’s made from my blood, that’s just how it is in my universe.”

“I think I’m just more confused than I was before you spoke.”

Peter sighed. “I’m probably not the best person to explain the situation anyway. I actually need some things explained to me myself.” Peter looked at Dylan. “Like what exactly you meant when you said me and new-Venom here feel weird to your senses.”

“Remember when we went to see the Maker before all that stuff in the other world happened? This guy is also from another universe and it turns out that universe also has weird symbiotes. And they’re made from his blood. And you were dying so we needed to do something to heal you fast. And the sensing thing,” Dylan said, addressing Peter now, “it’s something symbiotes and I can do. Normally I can easily sense the presence of anyone physically close to me, especially any symbiote, but not the Maker’s, and it blocked him from my sense as well. For you, it’s where I have to be actively trying.”

Iron Man spoke up. “If symbiotes have it too, does that mean they wouldn’t be able to sense him without trying to either? If it does, it sounds like that could come in handy.”

“This one seems to be sensing him just fine,” said Eddie. “It’s really distracting. But, by my knowledge, Dylan’s sense works the same as that of a normal symbiote.”

Peter winced as he said, “Yeah… that’s gotta be the whole tracking thing. If it wasn’t expending all its energy healing you it probably would’ve already tried to get to me. We should probably watch out for that when it’s done, too…”

“Good to know,” said the resident Spider-Man. “Good enough that you probably should’ve already mentioned it, but hey, it’s a crisis, there’s not much time to think things through.”

Cap said, “Anyway, we ought to get back to planning. Being hard to sense could be useful for getting to where Knull’s real body is without alerting him, but we can’t just count on that working out. If one of them just sees him the jig would be up.”

“What about the blood symbiote? It looks about the same and it blocks its host from the sense too.”

“That might work, if it doesn’t just get angry and want to attack everything. When they’re just made they don’t really know any other way to deal with anything, kinda like a kid throwing a tantrum,” Peter replied.

“So, ideally we need to do something about that, but hopefully we’ve got our way to get up close and personal figured out. We still need a way to cut the connection between Knull and the hive-mind, because defeating his minions one by one clearly isn’t working.”

“I’ve been able to get into the hive before, maybe I can do something?” Dylan suggested.

“Dylan, you can’t go out there! Knull wants you for something. When we went up to confront him, just before my symbiote was ripped away from me, he said that he should’ve specified which Brock. I should go instead, once I heal. I’ve got more experience with symbiotes than anyone else here, I ought to be able to figure something out despite not being able to do what you can,” said Eddie.

“I assume you also want to get your friend back, right?” Peter asked.

“Well, ‘friend’ is one way to put it, but yes. I need to get my Other back. Knull probably has them close to him, like a trophy.”

“Think we could find it first, come back, and then do something about the hive-mind? Could be a way to actually test if the infiltration strategy could work before the riskier part too.”

Captain America said, “I suppose it’s worth a shot. Plus, if you go, maybe that’ll get Namor to ease up on you.”

“I’m simply being cautious. I’d be a fool to just believe someone who can do the same thing our adversary does is unaffiliated with them without good evidence of it,” Namor argued.

“You should count yourself lucky; I usually don’t tell people about it at all,” grumbled Peter.

Eddie interrupted them, saying, “I think it’s almost done healing me. Enough to where I won’t need to be on life support without it, at least.”

Peter took a deep breath. “I guess I should go ahead and get this over with. I’m sorry in advance if I end up attacking any of you.” He reached his arm out towards the symbiote, which reached back with a tendril that coiled around his fingers. It continued wrapping itself around him, more and more of its mass flowing further and further across his body until all of it covered all of him.

Peter could feel its excitement at bonding with him, its exhaustion from healing Eddie, its confusion-turned-curiosity about the many things it had overheard but didn’t yet understand, and it almost overwhelmed him. Claws formed on his hands, fangs formed in his mouth, and a spider shape formed on his chest. Tendrils sprouted from his back, curling around him. Newly-formed eyes opened and he said, “I… I think we’re good.”

“Do you think you’re up for the rescue mission?” asked Captain America.

“Yeah, I think so.”

“Probably best to get to it then, while the rest of us finish up other plans here.”

“Right.” Peter gave a light-hearted salute as he prepared to walk back into the chaos.