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Eddie stopped to take a quick break from his slow jog/fast walk through the park, taking a seat on an empty park bench. While his symbiote Venom was able to fix physical damage to his body, being bonded with the alien life form did not magically give him a six pack; this meant Eddie did have to make some effort to take care of himself so their new “let’s eat everything -now!” diet wasn’t actually detrimental to their health.
Eddie scanned the park doing a bit of people watching while enjoying the fresh air. It was a well-kept nice park that had other (more committed) joggers, couples strolling by holding hands, families playing together on the grass, a few people with their dogs and – Eddie quickly turned his head away.
He didn’t want Venom to see that.
But sharing a body with someone makes it hard to hide anything. And Eddie’s deliberate attempt to avoid looking at something just drew Venom’s attention to it like a ship sighting a lighthouse in a storm.
Firmly Venom pushed Eddie’s head back towards a group of people on the other side of the park.
There were lots of people, adults but lots of children too. They were making a lot of noise and looked very excited.
Eddie what is that?
“Hmm it looks like just some kids birthday party.” replied Eddie trying to sound indifferent hoping Venom would lose interest.
No Eddie, what is that? In the tree.
“Oh… that – that’s called a piñata. It’s um like a toy for the kids to play with.” explained Eddie nervously. Eddie almost feel Venom making their eyes narrow down and focus solely on the bright colourful Unicorn dangling from the tree.
The children gathered around it were barely able to control their excitement. One of the children had a blindfold put over their eyes and swung a big stick and smacked the piñata as hard as they could.
Why are they hitting it? Are they bad people? Are they the same as the men that smashed those cars?
“No, no, no – they’re not bad people. Those other guys with the baseball bats were vandals. Those kids are supposed to hit the Unicorn.”
Why?
“Um.” Eddie didn’t want to answer but he had an involuntary flash of memory. Pictures from his own childhood flickered in his mind’s eye - his own experience’s of breaking open a piñata. He felt a ripple of happiness flutter through his stomach as he remembered his joy as he hit it and then-
WE WANT THAT.
Eddie didn’t even remember standing up from the bench. Venom had taken control and caused them to surge to their feet facing towards the partygoers.
“No! Nope, we don’t want that buddy. That belongs to those kids, okay?” Eddie cried desperately but he could already feel them salivating at the thought of eating all the candy inside the piñata.
It does not matter who it belongs to. We want it, so it will be ours.
“Venom, Venom! Listen to me – we have food at home. Lots more food that’s in that silly piñata okay? And-and you know what? We can buy food, look we can go right now to Ms Chen’s and I’ll let you get whatever you want just-just forget about the piñata -oh god.”
One of the kids hit the piñata and causing a small split down the side. As it swung about wildly pieces of candy fell to the ground, all the children screamed with delight as they each dived trying to snatch up as much as possible for themselves.
OURS
Eddie winced as Venom roared in their head. The noise was so intense that Eddie didn’t even realise they were running yet. But they were running. At full speed. At super human speed as Venom pushed Eddie’s body faster than what should have been physically possible.
That memory from Eddie’s childhood flashed through their mind again. Joy fluttered through their stomach as they leaped from the ground lunging at the piñata. It was majestic like a lion taking down zebra on the African savanna. But the Unicorn went down without fight, the rope holding it the tree snapping easily under their weight and there was no blood as they opened their jaws wide and ripped viciously into the papier-mache throat and belly of their prey. There was screaming though; from the children and some of the parents as chunks of the piñata were torn away. But that didn’t matter because finally they got to the candy, the sweet delicious precious candy!
OURS, ALL OURS!
Cheered Venom from inside their head. Or is that me? wondered Eddie as they swallowed another mouthful.