We are...

𝘖𝘯𝘦 𝘩𝘰𝘶𝘳 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘵𝘩𝘪𝘳𝘵𝘺 𝘮𝘪𝘯𝘶𝘵𝘦𝘴 𝘢𝘧𝘵𝘦𝘳 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘴𝘵𝘢𝘳𝘵 𝘰𝘧 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘰𝘶𝘵𝘣𝘳𝘦𝘢𝘬...

Spider-Man perched himself on a building, looking down at the streets that were crawling with symbiotes of all types. This place had a considerable amount of symbiotes running around it, far more than any area Spider-Man had seen in this timeline. Pressing his finger against his mask, Eren spoke to Lily and Harry who were watching from Oscorp through his eyes. "Y'all seeing this, right? It's crawling with these guys. Literally." Spider-Man scanned the area, glaring at the Bolters zipping around, along with the Deranged crawling around on all fours, searching around for victims.

It appeared that they were all coming out of an abandoned factory, which had black web-like sludge hanging off the sides of it. "Holy shit, dude." Harry whispered. None of them had seen so many of them lurking around in one spot before. "Is that one over there a Mimic?" Lily asked, pointing at the screen. "I think so." Harry whispered. "Eren, you see that one by the black car? Looks just like you but with fucked up teeth."

Eren nodded his head. "Yeah. Those are them." Just as Eren spotted him, the Mimic flung itself in the air and began swinging through the city using webs that shot from its wrists just like Spider-Man. From a distance, it looked no different than Spider-Man himself.

"Parker." Fury's voice spoke through Eren's ear loudly. "You still have the charges I handed you, right?"

"Is that what's in the bag?" Eren asked, removing the backpack from his back and looking inside. There were multiple bombs that looked similar to the ones that Harry would use as the New Goblin, though with subtle differences.

"Yup, designed by me. These guys can take down entire buildings." Harry sounded a little too proud as he said this as this was something he'd been working on for a long time, even before the invasion.

"So... how long have you had these lying around?" Eren asked, pulling one out to get a good look at them. They looked almost identical to the Goblin's other grenades. It was the size of a baseball, using Harry's green and black color scheme.

"Couple months. Just in case. Just a few of them would light the whole building up. Their weakness is fire, right? It'll do big damage." As Harry said this, Spider-Man felt a bit uneasy having had such powerful weapons on his back unbeknownst to him.

"Okay, I'll place them in the hive. I'll try not to be spotted." Spider-Man placed the bomb back in his backpack before web-zipping over toward the factory, landing on the roof with quiet feet. He looked around, seeing that none of the symbiotes seemed to have noticed him before crawling in through a hole in the roof.

Once he was inside, his lenses widened upon seeing the operation inside. People were being shoved into these black pods that looked to be made of that same black sludge that the Prime Symbiote was made of, the one that bonded with Eren, by Bolters.

Meanwhile, other pods would open up, releasing a Deranged from the inside of them. 'So they start off as the Deranged ones? Then what? Do they transform into Mimics or Bolters?' Spider-Man thought to himself before crawling to the ceiling and webbing a bomb onto it quietly.

Lily, Harry, and Fury looked on with horrified expressions as Eren continued to investigate the symbiote hive. It was far more organized than they'd imagined. It was as if they were workers in the very factory they found themselves in.

A Bolter would sprint inside, place someone in a pod, and immediately zip back outside as if they were working for a delivery service. People being shoved into the pods would scream, for a few seconds, however, tendrils from inside the pods would subdue them rather quickly. Eren knew that if he blew the place up, those people would die, but it was a sacrifice he was willing to make at this point.

He wanted more than anything to jump down there and open every single pod to release them, but he knew that it would be impossible.

Spider-Man continued to place the New Goblin's bombs, despite knowing that he would be sacrificing innocent people, making sure not to be spotted. There were a total of five bombs placed by Spider-Man before he climbed back through the hole that he came from. As he stood on the roof, Spider-Man whispered into his comms. "All the bombs are-"

𝘾𝙍𝘼𝘾𝙆!

Before he could even finish his sentence, Spider-Man was struck in the face by a massive black fist, one shrouded in Eren's very own Godspeed energy. Spider-Man's body soared through the air before coming to a rolling stop at the center of the street. His body bounced like a ball upon making an impact with the hard pavement. This punch hurt worse than any attack that he'd ever been hit by in his life, giving himself a taste of what he'd given the Green Goblin not too long prior.

The symbiotes on the ground didn't move a muscle, all they could do was watch as Spider-Man tried to push himself off of the ground with his two hands.

𝘾𝙍𝘼𝘾𝙆!

Again, that same fist rocked the hero, slamming his face into the pavement below him. Still, the symbiotes watching did not move in the slightest, they all just stood in place as if they were malfunctioning machines.

The same hand that punched Spider-Man lifted him up in the air, grabbing him by his skull before Spider-Man found himself face to face with his one and only arch-nemesis, the one that had been haunting him for decades through time.

It was Venom.

It found a new host.

Venom was enormous, being around eight feet tall himself. His muscles were incredibly large, bulging out of the black sludge that covered the host's body. His eyes were massive and white, just like Spider-Man's, and he had a gigantic mouth with dozens of sharp teeth and a long tongue. Saliva was dripping from his disfigured mouth as Spider-Man repeatedly kicked the spider symbol on Venom's chest in an attempt to break free from his grasp.

However, the Prime Symbiote had the ability to absorb its host's abilities, carrying them forward even if a new host was found. Therefore, Venom was just as strong as Spider-Man when Spider-Man was attached to the symbiote. Without it, Spider-Man was far weaker.

"Paaaarkeeeer..." Venom spoke, sticking his tongue out with a gross smile on his face. "Long time no see..." His voice was deep, sounding like gravel as he continued to grin grotesquely.

Suddenly, he threw Spider-Man into a vehicle, breaking it into pieces before zipping over to him using Godspeed and grabbing him by the leg. Spider-Man couldn't even react to this speed, allowing Venom to slam him into the pavement a handful of times. With each slam, Eren could feel himself drifting out of consciousness as he was completely outmatched.

"Eren!" Harry and Lily watched from their monitor as their friend was getting outclassed in front of them and there was nothing they could do about it. "I'm going." Harry said, getting up out of the chair beside Lily before pressing a button on his glove, summoning his glider.

Lily then spoke to Silk through her comms. "We need you in Midtown! Eren is-" before she could finish her sentence, Silk responded.

"I know. I'm already on my way." she spoke with a determined voice, swinging straight to where she was able to sense Eren being injured due to their connection.

Back in front of the factory, Spider-Man, trying to pry Venom's grip from his throat, spoke to the monster. "Who are you?" Spider-Man asked, getting a quick reply from the beast.

"We. Are. Venom." Venom replied, slamming Spider-Man into the ground and creating a massive crater beneath him. Venom then formed a spear with his arm, placing his foot on Spider-Man's throat as he stabbed the spear downward, penetrating Spider-Man's Spider-Matter costume.

Beneath his mask, Spider-Man coughed up blood as he grabbed onto the spear while attempting to pull it out. "I mean- who is underneath?" Spider-Man clarified, barely being able to speak due to the amount of pain he was in. Venom pulled the symbiote back to reveal the man underneath. As Eren had suspected, the man beneath it all was none other than Flash Thompson.

Eren could tell that Flash was not in control of the situation. It took dozens and dozens of hours of practice for Eren to be able to gain control of the symbiote, so he knew that there was no possible way that Flash could have learned to control it so fast. Even if Flash somehow could practice, he didn't have Spider-Man's strength to handle it. He was merely a puppet.

"Flash?" Eren asked the young man beneath the black monster.

Venom lifted Spider-Man up in the air using his spear-formed hand, reforming his own face over Flash's, though Flash's face could be seen behind Venom's almost endless rows of teeth. Spider-Man continued trying to break free, but the spear would not budge. "Flash is gone. Only Venom remains." Behind the rows of teeth, Flash's body spoke with Venom's voice. It was similar to what was happening with Dr. Octavius, but Flash was still alive. It was as if he were in a deep, perpetual slumber.

Venom then flung his arm, sending Spider-Man crashing through a traffic light and into a wall, completely breaking it and causing him to come to a rolling stop inside of some sort of bar. As Spider-Man lay there, he could barely move a muscle. Just as he began pushing his body upward, Venom flash-stepped over and grabbed him by the back of the head.

Venom then threw Spider-Man behind the long bar table, slamming him into the many alcoholic drinks that stung his wounds. Venom, with a grin still on his face, slowly walked up to the bar, knowing that Spider-Man was practically finished.

𝙩𝙝𝙬𝙞𝙥!

However, Spider-Man wasn't done yet, shooting a web from his wrists toward his contrary. Venom, being leagues faster than Spider-Man, caught the web in his hand with ease. Spider-Man expected this and used the web to yank himself forward, reeling back his fist to throw a punch filled with everything he had at Venom.

𝘾𝙍𝘼𝘾𝙆!

Using a Godspeed-infused punch, Venom socked Spider-Man directly in the chest, somehow having enough strength to rupture a hole through the bar and the Spider-Matter suit itself. Considering the fact that Spider-Matter could withstand the heat of the sun or stretch with Reed Richards, this was a ridiculous feat.

Again, Spider-Man found himself clinging to consciousness in the street, barely able to move. Venom, walking normally and with confidence, grabbed Spider-Man by the top of the skull and forced him to look at him in the soulless eyes. As he began to speak to him, Eren could still see Flash behind Venom's rows of teeth.

"And now, just like in every other timeline, we will kill Spider-Man!" Venom opened his mouth wide enough to consume Spider-Man's entire head whole, however, just as his mouth opened, so did Flash Thompson's eyes. Eren Parker and Flash locked eyes and in that same instance, the symbiote began to crawl onto Eren Parker's body once again.

However, things were different this time around. The symbiote that bonded itself to Eren did not appear black as it once did. This time, it was all white while also giving Spider-Man a more armored look to his costume. He grew white talons on his fingertips and a black spider symbol began to form on his chest.

"What!?" Venom was shocked, this was something that hadn't happened in any other timeline before. "What did you do, you imbecile!?" Venom said, speaking to his host, Flash Thompson.

Now that Eren had a symbiote of his own once again, he could finally use Godspeed to its fullest. Spider-Man then charged both of his legs with his cobalt Godspeed energy before kicking Venom in the chest with both legs, using his energy to springboard off of the monster and release himself from his grasp.

Spider-Man landed a few dozen feet away, posing with his legs spread and his hand on the ground. His skull-like mask looked as if he were frowning at Venom. Where his lenses used to be were nothing more than soulless, black holes with white pupils.

"I'm sorry, Flash." Spider-Man said quietly, gaining Flash's memories and understanding everything that had happened to him within the last few days. What Eren saw was truly horrifying and heartbreaking. Though it saddened him, he transformed that sadness into anger, prepared to destroy Venom where it stands once and for all.