Tony was standing in his new Venombuster armour. It was around eight feet tall, with thick banded plates around not just its body but its legs and arms as well. The faceplate was snapped open and there was a smaller iron man armoured suit within. He had spent weeks designing the perfect countersuit to fight Venom. Nobody listened but he knew Parker was never going to stay good. He even snorted at that. He'd had several interesting conversations with Erik and Charles. So, now his helmet was lined with Vibranium.
As soon as Vision had started to shout about Ultron the Iron Legion had retreated. It was dark and with hidden jammers and countermeasures, nobody would get a clear image of Vision. Tony would make sure everything was scrubbed to hide his involvement. The government might like to push its nose into everything but he now had an image to protect. Team Iron Man might still be under scrutiny, but the public still loved him. Brawling in the streets, with someone who had their own following, was social suicide. Let Shield take that fall, they were good for it. Nobody really trusted them after Hydra, so he didn't care if they took the fall.
As he watched remotely, Peter was merciless towards Vision. He could hear Vision but couldn't respond. As he saw the damage, he wondered if they had crossed a line.
He had a file on Peter, created when their feud was at its peak. Ways to not just cripple Peter's financial situation but destroy him psychologically. It was cruel and unfair, but after Obadiah had turned on him he kept files like that on everyone. Only people he thought he could trust were exempt, and that was a small list these days. He had been told the profile was as good as they could make it without Peter finding out. He now figured he had paid too much for that file.
His mom was fine. Peter was right and they had nothing on her, his stepdad was a different matter. His use of the Oscorp formula had been discovered and he was currently under arrest. With May there the plan was to delay Peter long enough to drive him to the police station and into a confrontation. As an easily recognisable Venom, he would be forced to stand down or face unmasking. The presence of the police should have been enough to make him pause, and stand down.
He had never shown anything but respect towards authority figures. Even when the bullies made his life hell at school, he stayed low and kept his head down. Peter was a pacifist. He never talked back, and he never fought back.
They were wrong. The profile noted Peter as hesitant and slow to anger. The theory was it was only the Symbiote's influence that fueled his rage. With it being hosted by Flash Thompson, Venom was back to the meek and coercible Peter. Venom had all but disappeared. He was hardly out patrolling the streets and was more lenient on everyone he fought. But, as Tony watched Vision being twisted and maimed, he knew they were completely wrong.
Peter had been holding back, playing nice and trying to act more like a hero. He hadn’t been Venom to hide, he hadn’t been Venom to try and get his life together. The young overbearing superpowered teen had matured into a pragmatic and restrained adult. In their haste to control him, Tony and everyone else had just lit his fuse. He hadn't been hiding, he had been holding back.
After finishing his phone call with Scott, he had watched and waited but now he sighed and dialled his phone. “Yeah. Vision failed. I need permission to use it though.” Tony nodded and looking over at the sleeker and much larger armour, he grinned. “Yeah, I’ll be fine. We have a more complete picture of his powers. You shouldn't need Ross.”
As he hovered he saw Tony smirking and all he could do was shake his head.
“The arrests at the Parker building failed, my mom isn’t Enhanced so that's another strike, Tony. Want to keep going?”
Venom floated across from Tony.
“Well played. You got them all. So now, now I'm mad. This isn’t a game, and I'm not stopping. You made a mistake Tony.” Venom took a deep breath, allowing his muscles to thicken. His armour plates shifted and covered more of his body, matching the Venombuster in size and bulk. “And now you pay.”
Iron Man snorted, “Yeah, I don't think so. We have you on multiple felonies, we have your team on more. This ends here Peter.”
As the Legion carefully lifted Vision, Tony shook his head, “I thought better of you Peter. This, this is barbaric.”
Venom laughed. “And holding hostages isn’t? Hypocrite. All the charges you have were manufactured by you. Assault? Vision is a synthetic being, so fake. Arresting my mom, she’s not Enhanced, so fake. Defending the warehouse? Fake. All fake. You've got nothing, and after I'm done with you, Tony Stark will be nothing.”
“I’m not here to stop you, Vision did his job, I’m only here to let you know where they are.”
“Oh, and maybe snap a pic while I drop my armour? No proof of who I am, not unless you count all those cameras you have whizzing around us.” Venom's senses could count them all, and there were fifteen in total. Tony hadn’t come here to be a distraction, Fury was right, Tony was here right now to put a stop to him. Judging by the energy his armour was giving off, he wasn’t playing around.
Venom touched a finger to his ear, “Yeah, Matt. May Parker and Curt Conners are being illegally detained at the Thirty-Seventh Precinct. Can you get them out?” After he waited for a pause, “Yeah sure. Thank you.”
“See, detaining someone without charge gets you my attention. Detaining someone without charge to entrap me, just pisses me off. So, Tony, why don’t we have that test now? That armour looks fancy. Want to see if it's fancy enough?”
The helmet on the Iron Man Venombuster closed. “Can’t say I didn't warn you. Legion, attack pattern Gamma.”
As the Iron Man jetted upward Venom felt several missiles impact his back. He scanned the area and felt the presence of ten additional suits. Five had just fired missiles and the other five were powering up to hit the same spot with repulsors. The armour on his back burned and flaked, and Venom let it repair itself.
“See Pete, I have your cells. I know how to hurt you and I know how to stop you. Stand down. I won't ask again.”
Hey Liv, can MJ make a good fake face yet?
I think so, why?
Can she make one that looks like me, everyone’s fishing and I need a decoy.
He could feel Liv's laughter through their link, I’ll see what we can do.
As the Legion rose and repeated their attack Venom thickened the armour on his back. As they moved to using repulsors he spun and let them hit a more reflective part of the armour. They were a nuisance, nothing more. A tactic to tire him out dealing with a horde of minions. It was just a pity it wouldn't work.
He jetted after Iron Man, he spun and fired off webbing, hitting each drone in the chest. Where the webbing hit it hissed and bubbled as it ate through the armoured plating of the drones.
Iron Man was standing on the top of a highrise, watching the battle. He tutted as he lost connection to more and more of his Legion. Whatever acid webbing Peter was using was strong enough to eat through the drone's armour. It didn't matter, he had a lot of drones and a surprise.
Sloppy kid, he thought as Venom rose and punched. Iron Man caught his fist with a whine of servos. “Yeah, a lot stronger than before,“ he swung Venom down and caught him with a foot, kicking him off the roof. “A lot faster too.”
The tendrils at his arms disconnected and Venom caught himself with the extra four arms. “But not strong enough,” he said as he launched himself back towards Iron Man.
Stepping to one side he grabbed Venom by the waist and the harness limbs slammed down, holding him in place. Venom hooked an arm around Tony’s and shoulder threw him onto the roof, bringing up a cloud of dust. As Venom knelt on Iron Man's back he grabbed an outstretched arm and pulled it back. As he fought the armour he could hear the servos complain as they were bent in a way they didn’t like.
Iron Man pushed off with his other arm, lifting them both up, He shot forward and turned. Raising an arm, the disk at his palm changed colour. As it went from bright white to blue, a charged beam shot out and hit Venom square in the chest. As he looked down, his armour had flaked away completely and his chest was bare.
“See, your cells lose cohesion once they leave your body, and I just found out at what point that happens. Stand down. I can light you up with enough power that nothing survives. We can do this peacefully or I can take you in pieces.”
Venom stepped back, and the black symbskin covered him, reconstructing his armour. “Surrender? You want me to give up while you throw my mom in jail? They went after Augments, Tony. Nobody cared there were kids going to those cells. I cared, and I won't stop until this bullshit is over. I won’t, and if you think a small zap will stop me.” Venom raised an arm and a thin blade extended from it, glowing red at the tip. “Then you don’t know me at all.”
There was a snort from the armour, “Extremis? And you accuse me of stealing stuff.” As Venom brought the blade up, Iron Man caught it in one hand. “Vibranium alloy. Strong enough to stop even that.” He lifted a leg and a piston-backed kick sent Venom flying.
The thrusters on his back steadied his flight but several Iron Legion were waiting for him. Not this crap again, Venom swore as they would hit him from one drone to another. As Venom tried to fly up another was waiting. Even as he sent out a ball of webbing it returned fire with a repulsor blast and splattered it into nothing.
Iron Man snorted, "You can thank Rhino and Liv for that move. Yeah, I know about that as well. I have every file the government has on you. Every fight, every move. All the research Gwen has done. Everything,” Iron Man said smugly through the speakers on the armour. “You can’t win. I know you better than you know yourself.”
Hovering, Venom took a breath. “You have an adaptive logistics program. One that can track and predict my moves based on past fight data. I gotta say, Tony, that's impressive.” Venom shrunk back down. His armoured form shedded the extra weight and slimmed back down into his Venom Mark Two. “But we learned.” He darted forward. “Extremis but our own.” As he sped up he grabbed a drone and sent bio-electricity coursing through it. As its eyes flickered and died, he let it go, leaving it smoking and disabled.
His form shimmered and vanished. As Tony’s sensors scanned the sky, he failed to find a target lock. Dammit, he swore. He was too high up to open his helmet, and Peter had figured out how to hide from his scanners.
Venom looked around. There were too many to just disable them one at a time, and he knew that Tony would figure out where he was eventually. Even in the air, he couldn't hide the exhaust from the thrusters, or his air movements. He had to even the odds a little.
Venom grabbed a drone from behind. He twisted and struck under the joint of its arm and let symbcells leach into the machine.
The Iron Legion drone shuddered and Venom overrode its program. All he did was change its Friend of Foe protocols, marking every other drone as an enemy and then releasing it.
As it flew away it opened fire on its former brethren. It downed several before Tony sent a kill command and disabled its systems. If that was taken over, then Venom was in that area. As his HUD cycled through its modes, he finally found the air pressure change from a flying target. “Got you.”
As a drone lifted a repulsor and fired a blast of blue energy, it collided with something. On his HUD Venom shimmered into view. He had crossed his arms over his chest, and the pale blue energy from the repulsor crackled over a pair of bracers. Blue lines streaked up his arm and the arcstar reactor on his back glowed brightly for a second. “When you fight Augments that can neutralise your powers, you learn how to fight back.”
As the gauntlets on his wrist glowed a blast of energy shot out, destroying one of the Legion drones. “Oh, and thanks for the repulsor tech. A bit old-fashioned for my taste, but, from a hack, what did I expect?”
Edeol· May 3, 2024
dr4cos· Apr 24, 2024
