A Symbiote Relationship

“Man it’s crowded here.” That was the first thing I said after entered Comic-Con with my friend, Brandon.

“It is a big event, many people come here to let their inner nerd off the leash and even act like their favorite character.” he said, his costume was that of Task Master. A white cloak draped over his back with the hood over his head and a white skull mask covering his face. His body had a dark blue fabric with a brown leather strap going across his chest from left shoulder down to the belt, which was also a brown leather material. He had a (plastic) shield in his left arm and a (plastic) sword in his left belt sheath and a (toy) gun in his right belt sheath. All in all he would look like a very convincing Task Master Cosplayer if he had more muscle, like A LOT more muscle, currently he was skin and bones and that kinda making him look like the average whimp. Kinda.

He still got praise from several people and even had taken pictures with them while I just stood on the sideline with my costume, if you would even call it that. I was wearing dark red running shoes with black jeans and black fingerless gloves that have some red on the back of the hand. The part that actually made this a costume was the hoodie that I was wearing, it was a zip up hoodie all the way to the head. It looked like it had veins and fibers spread out in a chaotic pattern that varies from red and black coloration with the face portion having a picture of a mouth with sharp jagged teeth and 2 oval-ish eyes. Yep, I was wearing a Carnage hoodie. The almost worst costume in the convention, I saw a guy wearing a cardboard box styled to look like Iron Man, so I guess mine isn't so bad after all.

This is my first convention and I had no time to prepare any outfit or costume since Brandon dropped by a week ago saying he had 2 tickets to Comic-Con and he was taking me. So I improvised, I went to a nearby clothing store to see if I can get a something to use as inspiration for a decent costume. Surprisingly I found a hoodie that was styled after one of my favorite Marvel insaniacs. So I bought it and used that as a costume, I later learned that wasn’t the best idea after all.

Anyways, me and Brandon are currently roaming around the convention after being seen as celebrities for the last hour (Mainly Brandon… Okay just Brandon). He’s looking for Stan Lee so he could get an autograph, while I gotta use the bathroom. But getting around is pretty tough when the whole area is crowded, and when you're 5’6 and can’t see anything cause everyone else is a goddamn giant, even Brandon.

“Do you see the bathroom, I can't see a thing with all these people.” I said.

“You sure it’s cause of them and not because you're a small guy?” he said with a smirk.

“Screw you,” I said in an annoyed tone, this is a constant joke with him. “Just tell me if you see where the bathroom is, I gotta piss.”

“That way” he points off into a direction full of people blocking the path ‘great’ “I’ll be looking for the Stan Lee booth, so look for that when you come back.” he said and started walking off in the opposite direction.

And so my great journey to the bathroom begins! I dodged, I weaved, I delved further in while every Cosplayers costume had some form of hanging prop that always manage to hit me in the face, ALWAYS, I even got an elbowed to the jaw...  After what felt like a mile (Few dozen steps) I got into an opening and managed to get my breath before continuing on.

“Hello there” I heard a gruff voice say from my left, I stopped and turned see ‘Thanos, The Mad Titan’ running a small vending shop, he was even wearing the Infinity Gauntlet with ALL the gems on it! Dude looked exactly like the Thanos from the Avengers movie to a point of being almost hyper-realistic, it’s freaky. The guy had a rack behind him with various authentic looking Marvel stuff, spider man's mechanical web-shooter, deadpool's mask (from the movie), thor’s hammer, tony stark's core, hulk's pants and many more nice trinkets just laying around haphazardly, they ALL look so awesome.

“Emm… Hi.” I'm kinda overwhelmed with all that i'm seeing that I didn’t even notice all the people giving me space and the fact that I still needed to pee, “Dude, you look so cool.”

“Thanks.” Holy shit his mouth moves too! “So, who are you supposed to be?”

“Uh… Carnage from Marvel's Spider Man… I know it’s not that good.”

“Nonsense, it’s actually really creative. Anyways, I see you eyeing my wares," I have the equivalent of a mask on, how does he know i'm eyeing his stuff? Oh, that sounds wrong... "planning on buying one for yourself? I have just the thing for you.” He says while i'm still in my stupor, he reaches under the table and pulling out a see through glass container with a sticky red fiber like substance inside of it. It almost look like…

“Is that a symbiote replica inside a jar…”

“Good eye, definitely a good eye, yes this is the Carnage Symbiote. But it’s not a replica, it's, The Real Deal.” he said the last part very ominously and with a smirk, still freaky.

“Uhh…” I've been saying that a lot lately, he’s probable just in character or something. “Alright, how much.” It would look pretty cool in my room, a nice conversational piece.

“How about… your utter devotion to serve me.” he says seriously, with a pause he later adds, “Or you could just give me 40 dollars.”

I chuckle nervously at that and take out my wallet and give him 2 twenty-dollar bills and he gives me the odd looking canister. I pocket my wallet and get a better look at the thing on the inside, seriously, what is this stuff?

“I see you're curious about what that is, you can remove the top of the canister and get a better look.” he tells me.

I comply and turn the top of the canister off and bring it close to my face, only for the damned thing to jump at me like a fucking face-hugger! I grab at it and scream a muffled scream before managing to rip it off, it then break into 2 separate pieces in each of my hands. It starts spreading and moving under my jacket and onto my skin! It feels like a million tiny centipedes walking across my arm, onto my shoulder and then all over my body except the head, it’s slowly spreading up my neck allowing it to cover the rest of my body first. I scream and thrashed around, turning around to see if anyone can help me I notice that everybody else was IGNORING me! Walking around like there isn't a person having a panic attack. I turn back to Thanos who has a grin on his freaky fucking face as he's watching.

“Good luck kid, don't die too soon out there will ya?” he said before the thing covers my eyes and then the rest of my body, I don’t see or hear a damned thing and I feel weightless. To make matters worst, I think I pissed myself.

<><><><><><><><><><><><>

(47 years later)

“You should have given in! I told you what we could have had! The entertainment, The power, THE *WORLD*! It all could have been yours, but you just wouldn’t listen!”

“We've been at this for YEARS NOW!!! I told you, i’m NOT a murderer, i'm NOT your tool and i’m certainly NOT going to listen to you spew your insanity!”

I’ve been here for years now. I'm not certain for how long, but I remember that I was 20 years when I came here… now im probable in my 60’s or 70’s if not older. All that time, gone. My youth, gone. The person I once was, gone... I could have been anyone. A doctor, a lawyer, a representative of the house or just a simple cashier. Anything, ANYTHING but this…

“You have NO CHOICE but to listen to *me! We are both trapped here and we are the only ones we can talk to… unless you can think of a way out of our little prison, than all you have is **me!*”

Me and this… Monster, have been trapped in stone after my first day in this strange land. Not in stone as in a stone prison but as in being petrified into a stone statue of our last action.

“God, why must you repeat yourself over and over again! I’ve heard this maybe a thousand times already! Each time slightly different but it’s always the same shit.”

Since we're in stone, we can’t verbally talk. This was all going on in my head, I still saw and heard things that went on around us, like the clouds, rain, singing birds and some conversations that I could pick up, but I never really got the chance to pay much attention to it thanks to my ‘guest’. All I know is that I am apparently some scary garden ornament.

“Why must you ignore EVERYTHING that I have said about the GIFT that you’ve been bestowed with!?! You keep calling me a *killer, a **monster, a parasite, when it's been us, it's always been US DOING THESES THINGS AND YOU KNOW YOU LOVED IT! The smell, the blood, THE CARNAGE!!!*”

“SHUT UP! I'M NOT LIKE YOU! GET IT THROUGH YOUR HEAD! I'M! NOT! KASADY!”

The firsts thing he did when we came to this world was take FULL CONTROL of my body and went on a killing spree against what I at first presumed to be some weird animals but later learned to be sentient equine beings! Their faces, full of fear… their blood, everywhere…their screams, was all that I could hear… it was enough to make me fight for control and stop this madness.

Some powerful alabaster horse thing with both horn and wings took advantage of my mental struggle with ‘it’ and hit us with, something, and now i'm a statue posed with my han- er… claws grasping my temples as I scream into the sky while on my knees. The worst part is, I can’t sleep while petrified… so I am forced to endure Carnages pestering for 24 hours a day, everyday.

Ever since the petrification we have been arguing about who was to blame for this to happen and then later went into why I fought back and then lastly what this ‘gift’ (more like a curse) can really do for me and why I should accept it. The fact my sanity is still intact is a miracle, at least I think it’s still intact… I don’t know anymore.

After a minute of silence, “You know what… your right.” WHAT?!?! “We have been at this for far too long…” Finally some progress “...YOU JUST WON'T ACCEPT THE *TRUTH!” *Son of a- “-and since abandoning you from being my host is currently impossible, I’m just going to have to consume you into my biomass so that I may be ready to take up a new host when I'm finally *FREE!!!” *Wait. He doesn’t mean-

I didn’t even finish my thought when I felt an unspeakable amount of pain coursing throughout my entire body. While I mentally screamed in anguish, the symbiote was laughing like the mad monster he was for doing this to me.

“Whats wrong? Can’t take a little bit of *PAIN*!!!”

I started feeling numb in my fingertips and toes, and numbness started spreading through my limbs and I felt absolutely nothing after it passed them, like there was nothing there…

“The only reason why I didn't do this sooner was because I need a host to survive. But, I realized that i'm perfectly preserved while in this prison, so i'm just going to kill you and think of ways to get out of here without you stopping me like *last time*. Seriously, I should have done this sooner, it would have saved me SOOOO many headaches!”

The numbness was now pass my limbs and was spreading all across my body. I no longer felt pain in my arms or legs but I felt pain everywhere else that wasn't numbed out. He was literally CONSUMING ME! I can’t do a damned thing about it! My screams fall onto sadistic ears who only laugh at my suffering. I was powerless… I was going to die… and the last thing i’ll ever hear will be this bastards laughter.

“When I get free, I’ll find a new host, a stronger, more powerful host that will LISTEN! Then we are going to do so much *destruction, cause so much **death, have so much fun doing it too~.*”

At this point the numbness is crawling up my neck, just like the first time it happened. Takes my whole body first and then goes for the head last, maybe a pleasure to watch the victim suffer, I don’t know and I don’t have time to think about it.

“I had hoped you were like my first host, I still don’t know what happened to him… but i’ll make sure to find someone who shares his ideals, another that appreciates the bond that we will make, UNLIKE YOU!!!”

The numbness reached my eyes and ears. I can’t see anything through anything and I can no longer hear the birds sing, the only things that I had for years and the only thing that I focused on to help me ignore the him has stopped existing to me. All I had now were my own thoughts… and him.

“I left your brain for last. I can taste your fear, so weak, could have been so much more. But that doesn’t matter anymore now does it? GOODBYE VICTOR, HOPE THE AFTERLIFE'S JUST AS CRUEL AS I WAS TO YOU!” he laugh maniacal before I felt a bit dizzy, and then there was silence. Pure silence. No birds. No laughter. Nothing.

And then something strange happened.

My sight started to return. From the center of my vision was a light, until is spread out into the bright sky that I have seen ever since I was placed here. The sound of birds returned as well. Singing their tune as if nothing has happened. ‘W-What the hell?!?’ I felt a pulse, it spread out from my still existing heart throughout my body, allowing me to feel everything that I believed that I lost. My arms, my legs, my fingers and toes. Still there.

“C-Carnage? Are you there?” Nothing… still silent.

Am I dead? Did he actually, Consume me? What the hell happened?!? All I know is that the maniac that has tormented me for years has finally fallen silent. All I hear is the singing of birds that are perched somewhere not far from me. So calm, peaceful, something I long forgotten…

I like this.