"I didn't know where else to go."

On every news channel, on every broadcast and radio, on every social media site there fucking was, the video of Spiderman getting his ass absolutely handed to him was circling around like vultures to a rotting carcass. And trust Erika when she said she'd looked through all of them, panicked and desperate and bordering on some kind of mental breakdown to try and make sure that no one saw who it was beneath the black abyss of her symbiote, trying to make sure she was safe from the possible mob that would burn her at the stake for beating the shit out of their masked hero before hording VENOM back to be prodded at by scientists.

However, by the grace of god alone, there was no sign of their 'secret identity' being brought to the surface, much to her hesitant relief that had finally burned through the grieving ice that had drowned and froze her. But that didn't exactly mean they were off the hook of course, considering they now seemed to be New Yorks number one public enemy if the comments and headlines were anything to go by, which she felt was a slight bit extreme considering there was worse fucking people than her haunting the streets and lurking in the shadows, just waiting for a moment to wreak havoc and shed blood.

Don't get her wrong, obviously and her symbiote were massive fucking assholes, but they most definitely weren't the vicious monsters everyone seemed to perceive them as...which was just all manners of rude and presumptuous.

Not to sound like one of those overbearing mothers from the movies, but what ever happened to don't judge a book by its cover? Don't judge someone before you get to know them? If you don't have anything nice to say don't say anything at all? Because hey, maybe the alien stuffing the Spiderman into a bin was just very misunderstood and honestly, had a very good reason for doing so...but no, of course people wouldn't see that. Where the hell was that woman they saved? She would come in handy by telling the public that they were menaces at most instead of some bastard supervillains.

"HE STARTED IT!"

"What? Yes- yes, I know he started it by calling you ugly- which you aren't, stop growling for gods sake- but they don't know that, Vee. He's like a national treasure, it's like us going to England and...I don't know, slapping the queen? Is the queen considered a national treasure? I don't even know." Erika grumbled, frantically coming her fingers through her thick and awfully knotted hair, focusing on the sting of pain on her scalp to ground her and not even caring all that much for the literal clumps she was yanking out from the seams because she had never been more stressed out in her fucking life.

And then there was suddenly a knock at her door, a deep noise that cut through the sickening silence that had swallowed them, ominous and loud and fucking terrifying...alongside the thick mouthwatering stench of blood that drifted through her nostrils like a beckoning whisper tempting her closer. For God's sake, who the fuck was that? Why were they bleeding? And most importantly why did they choose now of all times to stumble their way to her apartment when she was on the edge of having some kind of nervous breakdown because of her vengeful symbiote who almost ate the city's hero.

"WHO IS THAT? DID WE ORDER PIZZA?"

"Can you like, stop thinking with your stomach for one fucking minute." Erika hissed, hand frantically wafting the air next to her ear as if that would shut him up which was really just next to useless. However, she did have to take a minute to actually think to herself, to try and remember if she had ordered the two of them food considering they were going through takeouts like they were going out of business...which they very fine well might be if they kept eating the way they were eating, but at least one of the few benefits of being possessed by an alien meant she didn't fucking gain weight from all the shit she ate.

But there was nothing, nada, zilch, no sign of any recollection in her ruined mind torn apart by misery and grief, nothing but a metathorial tumble weed rolling around in its lonesome across the walls of her brain...the door trembled once more as another knock was placed upon the wood, but this one was quieter, almost weaker in a sense as the scent of crimson mortality grew stronger, seeping into her flesh, making her whole body sing and shake as she forced herself to hold her breath in desperation. "Okay, I'm going to open the door and if it's like the government or something...you're going to have to eat them, okay?"

"I SEE NO PROBLEM WITH THAT PLAN!"

"Yeah, of course you don't. You're not the one who has to pick clumps of brain matter from out their teeth." She grumbled quietly, still very sour about finding curly hairs in her mouth weeks after his little vengeful murder spree at the men that had chased her, the friends of the man that had slaughtered her in an alleyway to rot because she had the audacity to look him in his face and refuse to simply be another statistic, filling her mouth with his blood as she took her pound of flesh with her teeth as he did the same with his blade...he'd deserved death, he'd deserved it drawn out and painful...but that didn't mean it wasn't gross.

She was swift to shove those thoughts away as quickly as they'd come, refusing to fall into that abyss of destruction that was getting harder and harder to crawl her way out of, only pulling her down into the darkness where damnation came calling. Instead, Erika chose to focus on keeping her hands steady as she slowly approached the door, heart in her throat, pounding a way in her prison of flesh as the door got closer and closer...and then, she let her fingers curl around the handle to force it open...and honestly wished she hadn't.

"Peter?!"

Peter, it was her fucking Peter Parker standing outside of her apartment which usually leave her decaying with adoration, it would swallow the darkness of her rot and leave the ever blissful sun in its place because no other word would ever made her mouth as tender as his name. And yet when she whispered it into the quiet of the hallway today, it was full on unbridled horror, of fear, of damning agony...because Peter didn't look like Peter at all as he leaned against the side of the wall drenched in crimson sin and devoured by purple bruises littering his flesh like the devils kiss.

"Heyyyyy...fancy seeing you here." He smiled sweetly, swollen lips stretching as blood began to pool around the scabbed over seam of it once more...and then he abruptly fell forwards into her awaiting arms as she desperately lunged forward, wrapping her arms around his waist as she stumbled backwards, pulling him into the safety of the apartment with her breath a hyperventilating gasp because what the fuck, what the fuck, what the fuck? And trusting that the boy was too out of it to see, VENOM leeched a tendril out of her skin to slam the door shut behind them as she flounded and panicked.

It was by a mere miracle alone that she managed to practically crawl her way to the couch and lay him down upon it, trembling fingers grasping at his ruined hoodie and leaving creases in her wake, dancing over his features that were slick with blood and achingly swollen, and so very hot to the touch as she hovered her wicked palm above his hand and desperately tried not to start sobbing. He was breathing, she forced herself to remember, he was bleeding and bruised but he was live, not merely a melancholy ghost coming back to haunt her in the gloomy night and mock her.

He's alive, he's alive, he's alive, the thoughts echoed, quiet and forbidden as she sucked in gasping breaths that burned through her chest like smoke and ash, he hasn't left you yet, it's not another soul for you to remember, it's not another person for you to mourn. This is what she did you see, what she always did, carrying her loss around like a burden, letting it consume her, letting it take her until it resembled every bad memory, every terrible fear, every nightmare she had ever had in the darkness of grief...it was mortifying, it was humiliating to be the one that remembered, to be the one that mourned...to be the one that was always left behind.

And then Erika felt his hand twitch underneath her palm, heard the groan that tumbled out of his crimson lips, saw the flickering of hazel in his gaze as his eyelids fluttered and drowzily danced around her face as if trying to place her, as if trying to figure out if she was simply a hallucination of his friend in the dying light. But she wasn't, of course she wasn't, and even if she was she'd find a way to become whole, to become more than smoke and shadow to touch him, to hold him...she'd even find a way to cheat death for him. "Hey, look at me twinkletoes, come on, eyes open, yeah? What happened?"

But for a few seconds all she was given was a squint as he looked up at her with a miserable whimper that was bordering on comedic as his head rolled across the armrest, limp body jerking around, making a show of trying to get comfortable which she felt like was the last of his fucking worries and just a way to delay the inevitable as he hummed and hawed all the while she watched him with rising suspicion, feeling very much like she wasn't going to be given the truth because Peter was a horrible fucking liar...only to be proved right all of three seconds later as he muttered and mumbled awkwardly. "I got, I uh...I got mugged? Yeah, yeah I got mugged by...someone."

"WE WILL EAT THEIR HEADS!"

The sentiment is appreciated Vee but he's obviously full of shit! She smiled ruefully at the very thought that she pushed at the alien in an attempt to soothe him, baring sharp teeth at nothing in particular with a sharp muscle in her jaw twitching as she twisted it from side to side, trying to quell the rising anger that bubbled in her stomach at the blatant lie that she didn't even need her symbiote's super senses to hear. He'd plagued her with the illness of fear by stumbling to her and had seized her lungs by collapsing in her arms...and then he'd looked her in the face and lied to her.

"Someone mugged you? They must of been desperate."

"Yep, thankyou for that, really helpful, I'm feeling so much better, thank you." Peter groaned, rolling his eyes as he took his bottom lip in his mouth and held it there in the warm prison, tongue rolling gently across the flesh, dancing beneath his skin and tasting the coppery rust that pooled upon his tongue, something bitter and grounding as he forced himself to ignore the disbelief that coated Erika's every word like miserable sin...but most of all ignoring the desire to let everything he kept isolated spill out into the open air where only she was around to hear it, the only person he found himself wanting to hear it.

But he didn't, he couldn't...because the thought of her looking at him with hatred, with disgust, with betrayal filled his stomach full of rot that ached far more than his open wounds, that made him feel sick, that made him feel like he was dying in a fate far worse than the one he would no doubt be given...the day Spiderman would take a hit that he wouldn't get up from, the day Spiderman died and took Peter Parker with him.

"What did they even take?"

"Uh, my-my skateboard?"

"...your skateboard." She said slowly, barely resisting the urge to scoff, leaning back against her heels as she took a slow glance from the bottom of his converses to the ruin of his face, taking in every cut and bruise that had winded around his flesh, able to hear the wet rasp of his breath, the sound of his bones creaking beneath his skin, the devastation of every wound, a flower bloomed in blood and rot that was still decaying in the darkness of her presence. "So you're kidding, right? You look like you've went ten rounds with the hulk and you expect me to believe someone wanted that shitty ass skateboard that much?"

And then Peter made a choked sound in the back of his throat, twisting around go finally look her in the fucking eyes instead of here there and everywhere else, jerking his shoulders around like he was having some kind of fit upon her stained couch as she patiently waited for more of his bullshit...which of course, he delivered on, much to her own frustration as it festered inside her stomach like a swarm of stinging wasps. "Whaaatttttt? You know I wouldn't lie to you, well- I- I would but it'd be for good reason- ow! Don't hit me I'm fragile! What kind of nurse are you?"

"If you wanted a nurse you should of waited until Phil's shift ended. Now don't move, I'm going to go hunt for the first aid kit." Erika muttered, and then with a feral grin, she stood up and patted the bruises on the boy's caved in chest as he groaned miserably, hissing under his breath as she smirked in some kind of vile satisfaction. She knew exactly where the kit was of course, she was a clumsy kid and an asshole of a teenager so she wasn't exactly shy when it came to scrapes, but for gods sake she needed a fucking moment to breathe as she stumbled into the bathroom and heaved.

"DO NOT START CRYING! IT IS EMBARRASSING!"

"Shut up, please just shut up." She whispered, gripping the sink until she could feel cracks splintering beneath her powerful fingertips, flirting with the seams of her skin, threatening to sink into her flesh and let crimson sin bloom...before blissful silence eventually echoed in the hollow of her mind as VENOM finally took a step back to let his host breathe. However, the young girl couldn't stand there forever and suffer in her longing and grief, and so with a quiet sigh that was bordering on a sob, she pulled the first aid kit from the shelves and held it tight in shaking hands as she strolled back into the living room.

It didn't even look like Peter had moved, his head still resting upon the armrest, showing off the long column of his throat that was blackened with the echo of violence and his thin chest barely rising in the quiet air where she could still hear the wet rasp. But it was when she kneeled down beside him once more that he seemingly came back to life as he groaned, flopping his face over to the side to look up at her, all squished and bruised and oh so exhausted.

"So, why did you come here?" Erika asked quietly, dropping the kit by her knees before she leant down and brushed his hair from his forehead gently, only to grimace apologetically as some of the bloodied strands that had stuck themselves into one of the open cuts peeled away grotesquely. For gods sake she really hated blood, hated all things fucking horror and gore and he knew that...yet there she sat with a fucking parasitic alien that ate people inside of her and her only friend bleeding out on her stupid sofa all the while she desperately tried to swallow the bile and rage trying to claw it's way out of her throat.

And then there was a tender touch to her wrist that forced the world to a standstill, calloused fingers curling over her flesh, burning their imprints, making their home there as her dark gaze shot towards his own as Peter pressed her cold palm against his warm cheek as if dying for that simple touch, as if starved for tenderness and having no choice but to take it from her uninhabitable ruin. "I didn't uh, I didn't know where else to go...Aunt May would freak the second I stumbled in, and I don't know about you but I don't exactly see Flash putting bandages on my boo-boos."

"Ah so I'm the last option? Good to know."

"What? You? Never." He smiled, and she found herself doing the same, grinning down at him like a fool, his fool, her beating heart pounding in the rivets of her bones like a reminder that she was alive and was with the one that made her feel so...and then he was leaning to the side, eyes fluttering shut and pressing his lips against the thin skin of her wrist ever so softly without as much as a second thought, not daring to hold it there as if she'd break and shatter into pieces in his grip if he applied any kind of pressure stronger than the mere brush against her barbed skin.

And god the things Erika wanted to say to him, so many things she wanted to do without the means to do so. Hatred would of been far easier, grief and rage too, emotions that she was familar with, that she had held beneath her tongue until her mouth was full of blood and copper, with hatred she would of known what to do because it was clear, one-handed and unwavering...but love? Love was something she hardly had experience in, love was something she'd only seen in movies, only heard about in fairytales, had only felt for a few years before her parents became corpses and she became an orphan.

There were many things she wanted to say, it was true...and so she said nothing, she clenched her lips tight and averted her gaze to the task at hand as she soaked the cotton, as she iced his bruises, as she cleaned out the open wounds on his face and stomach, all the while desperately ignoring the way she could feel him looking at her, the way his hand had drifted until it was curled over her elbow, his thumb tracing the veins of her inner forearm and making her body erupt into goosebumps as she tried to focus on making sure he couldn't hear the hitch to her breath, the uneven beat of her heart as she swallowed tightly.

One final plaster across the bridge of his nose and she was finally done, slowly tearing herself away from his grip to pretend to mess around with the first aid kit, refusing to look back at him because she was absolutely terrified of what she'd see. Fuck, he was hurt really bad, it was a miracle that he'd even managed to make it to her apartment, even make it up the stairs...she couldn't just kick him out, could she? Especially considering he had a point with his Aunt panicking...she'd already lost Ben last year, and seeing Peter like this could genuinely be another nail in her coffin that Erika really didn't want to feel responsible for.

Looks like we're sleeping on the couch tonight, she thought with a grimace, upper lip curling in distaste because when Phil had bought the furniture she was pretty sure the word comfort was absolutely not at the front of his mind. It felt like sitting on an uneven cove of fucking rocks and by god the backache alone could kill someone...but there was absolutely nothing she wouldn't do for Peter and she knew it too. "Okay, well I think you'll survive unfortunately, though I'd avoid running into your skateboard 'thieves' if I were you...now come on, let's get you to my room so I don't have to look at your stupid face anymore."

"Hey, you could at least take me out for dinner first-"

"God you're an asshole, you know exactly what I meant. Either get up or I'm going to drag you up."

Obviously he was too busy finding himself hilarious to actually pay attention to her threat as she slung his arm over her shoulder and began to help him up with the burden of his weight, baring her teeth as she pretended to struggle while knowing for a fine fact that VENOM had changed many a thing about her body...and the ability to literally lift her couch up with one hand was one of them as she limped towards her bedroom, ignoring the sound of Peter grumbling and groaning under his breath beside her ear as she kicked the door open and practically threw him onto her bed with a scowl. "Alright, clothes off twinkletoes, lucky for you I've got some spare."

"You've got men clothes in your wardrobe? Have you got a boyfriend that I don't know about?" He gasped playfully, smiling up at her with that stupid look on his stupid face as he wiggled around on her sheets to yank off the ruin of his joggers as she swiftly turned her back with the tips of her ears burning uncomfortably. Bastard, she thought affectionately, before opening the drawers beneath them and pulling out her dads old ratty shirt that had definitely seen better days...and her own joggers that yes, she had bought from the mens section because they were far more comfortable and fucking roomy than womens and she'd die upon that hill.

She threw them over her shoulder without a care, biting down hard on her tongue to stop herself from giggling as she heard a light slap sound followed by a grunt as the clothes whacked the boy in the face...and then there was only silence as he began to get dressed, with only the sound of their breathing and the rustling of fabric to break it as they kept their eyes from one another as some strange tension bubbled and festered like insects burrowing their way inside their flesh...until Peter spoke up and sent her stability spiraling with absolute chaos.

"Can you...can you help me? Get the shirt on please because I can't lift- it, uh, my uh, my shoulder hurts." He whispered gently, an audible shake to his soft voice, a catch in his throat as she hesitantly nodded and turned around where the sight of him almost destroyed her...his forearms braced against his knees, the rough rise and fall of his shoulders as his hair hung limply down his forehead...and his smouldering gaze full of tender longing as he beckoned her forward with nothing but his smile.

There was a tremor to her bottom lip, to her unsteady legs, to her sin-stained fingers as she came to a stop in front of him, her breath a shallow pant as he looked up at her under the dull light of the lamp, brown eyes practically molten gold as they stared up at her like a sinner on their knees to a saint. And then, swallowing thickly, Erika grabbed the shirt and slowly began to help him into it, the back of her hand accidentally brushing over his bare flesh as she began to carefully tug it down his weirdly toned torso, feeling the muscles beneath her clenching as he grunted quietly in the open room that felt to much smaller than it had before.

Every breath he took she could feel it, could feel it dance across her neck, could feel it flutter through the strands of her hair, could feel the way his chest moved through the thin cotton of the shirt as she finally finished pulling it on and practically leapt backwards with her heart in her throat and an uncomfortable throbbing in her lower stomach. She needed to get out of here, she really, really needed to get out of here before she did something stupid...and yet the moment she took a step back towards the door, Peter's eyes were upon her and pinning her in place as she froze.

"Where you going?"

As far away from you as I can before I somehow manage to vomit up my heart on a silver fucking platter for you, the thought came aggressively, panicked and just as frantic as she rest of her entire being felt as she awkwardly shifted around in place, hand clenching by her side as if that would rid her of the phantom touch of his skin while throwing her other thumb over her shoulder with a breathy sounding laugh that was pathetically fake. "Oh, I'm uh...you know, going to sleep on the couch? Gotta' let you have your beauty sleep y'know...because you need it."

"What? No, no, no, no, I'm not kicking you out of your own bed Erika, just- you help me up and I'll take the couch."

"Over my dead body, twinkletoes- hey! Don't you dare get up-" Erika snarled, rushing forwards him with her upper lip curled in righteous fury, desperation lacing it way through her veins as she appeared in front of him and was swift to lay her palms upon his chest, intending to push him backwards until his back would hit the pillows and she'd fucking tie him down if she had to...well, that's what she intended to do anyway, but the moment her hands touched him, his own were suddenly around her wrist and holding her to him, pressing back against the pressure of her palms as she choked on the breath she'd been holding.

"Peter..." The word died off before it could even begin as his fingers slowly traced the column of her pulse, that simple, lingering, touch erupting lightning in its wake, burning her, searing into her flesh until it was all she could focus on, all she could think about as everything else became nothing more than background noise. She looked up hesitantly, gaze flickering over the contours of his face that was mere inches away from her own, their noses brushing and breaths mingling around the sudden tension that had filled the room like thick smoke, threatening to choke them on their desires as they looked at one another and just...watched.

Fuck, she wanted him, wanted him in every sense of the word as his hands slowly trailed up her arms and settled on the sharp juts of her hips with his thumbs pressing against the soft skin above the bone and the wide berth of his palm holding her entirely, nudging her forward until she stood completely between his legs, crowded in by his broad shoulders freckled with scars and bruises that she wanted to kiss until it had healed beneath her lips and had settled back into his blissful flesh that made her heart sing because it was him, it was always him.

His fingers twitched for half a second from where they were splayed out upon her skin as if just realizing they'd moved from her wrist, as if just realizing they were there against her hips...before tightening his grip and then letting softening it just as swiftly, debating whether to pull her in or push her away as he looked up at her with his mouth half open and Oh so sinfully breathless. "Why- uh, why don't we just share? It's not like the beds small or anything so, we can just share, me and you, you and me, it's not like it'd be weird...unless it would be weird for you and then-"

"No, no it's okay. We'll share, just give me a minute to get changed."

Idiot, idiot, idiot Erika cursed, internally screaming st herself for being so fucking whipped as she pulled herself from his damning embrace and swiftly strolled over to her wardrobe and began to yank off her pants, desperately trying not to think about what the fuck just happened and what was just about to happen because what the fuck? But she only remembered that she had an audience when she heard an audience swallow...and turned her head just in time to see Peter forcing his gaze away with his hand covering his eyes and his cheeks a burning pink as he apologized softly.

Honestly she didn't know how she was going to do it, how she was going to just...lay down beside him and not pretend that something inside of her wanted more than he could ever give her, that she was his echo and she'd rather break the world and swallow it whole than lose him. But as she stood there, wallowing in her own self pity as he kept the warmth of his palm over the upper half of his face to give her the privacy she desired...and she found her lips quirking into a fond smile without her permission as she swallowed her fear and finally crawled into her bed with a sigh. "Okay, you can open your eyes now."

Peter huffed quietly, peeking between his fingers just to make sure before finding himself chuckling when he saw Erika practically tucked in between the sheets with them drawn up to her chin like a child...and then he was moving, slowly lying down beside her carefully, his teeth bared and his breath a pained hiss as his whole body erupted in agony, trying to keep himself quiet to not make his friend anymore worried than she already was, clumsily fighting his way into the sheets all the while she stared up at the ceiling as if it held all the answers to the questions of the world.

Don't be weird, don't be weird, don't be fucking weird, he's just lying down beside you, it's just Peter, your best friend, your...only friend apart from the parasite fucking possessing you, the thought wasn't exactly comforting actually, in fact, she was pretty sure it had the opposite of effect of calming her down as she grimaced in the darkness of her room, trying not to start hyperventilating because how the fuck did she even get here?...and then there was a pressure against her hand that stilled her, a palm against hers, long fingers intertwining with her trembling ones in the comforting silence of the night.

"Sweet dreams, Erika."

"Yeah...you too, Peter." Oh, she was definitely in trouble now.