This is my first and probably last Venom fic. I loved Tom Hardy's performance and am hoping to get the movie out of my head by writing this.

Takes place sometime after the events of the movie.

In Which Venom Does Some Light Housekeeping

"For fuck's sake." Eddie muttered under his breath, flinging himself off his couch for the fourth time that hour. He hastened towards his bathroom, banging his shin on the coffee table along the way. He only spared enough time to hiss in pain, needing to relieve his bladder NOW.

You hurt us Eddie.

Eddie tore into his bathroom, the fly of his jeans already undone. "Yeah, sorry buddy, but when you gotta go you gotta go." Finally standing in front of his toilet, he let out a loud sigh of relief as the room filled with the sounds of his bladder emptying. "Besides, you already fixed it." He stated, shaking his dick off before he tucking it back in.

Wash your hands.

"Yeah I know." The man muttered as he twisted the knob to the hot water. Running his hands briefly under the warming water, he studied himself in the mirror. "Hey, V?'

The response was a bit delayed for the symbiote.

Yes?

"What are you doing?" Eddie met his own eyes in the mirror, studying himself for the first time in months. Venom liked to project himself into any mirror that Eddie looked into, making faces at his host. It usually made him laugh, even if it did make shaving a bit difficult.

Busy.

He watched as his reflected face bubbled with black goo, enveloping his features. The sharp teeth jutted forth, the tongue lolling out as the white eyes sprang forth from the oily black. Venom's familiar visage grinned at him as its tongue twirled around.

Better?

A hand went to Eddie's face, reassuring himself that Venom hadn't taken over his body, only his reflection. "Yeah, I guess so bud. But what are you doing?" He moved away from the mirror, shuffling back to the couch. Now that he no longer had the distraction of trashy daytime television, he was aware of the rippling underneath his skin, the sticky feeling as Venom clung to his bones and organs before pushing off, propelling him through Eddie's body.

We are cleaning Eddie.

He could feel Venom settling around his left femur. "What do you mean you are cleaning?"

We are cleaning us.

Eddie took the time to mull this over as he flopped on the couch again. It took some effort, but he was learning how to feel the alien moving underneath his skin, nudging its way past organs and around blood vessels and bone. Running his fingers down his leg, he swore he could feel the swirling mass that was Venom through his jeans and skin.

"Isn't that what showers are for?" Eddie asked, tracing where he imagined Venom to be huddled beneath his skin. Maybe it was just his imagination, but his thigh was starting to tingle. He shifted uncomfortably.

Showers cannot clean beneath the skin.

It was like Venom was suctioned to his bone, and it was an unsettling feeling when the alien pulled away. His fingers trailed along Venom's path through his body. "I didn't realize it was so dirty in there."

Eddie has not taken good care of our body before it was ours. There are many… He paused, searching Eddie's brain for the best word. Many pieces of shit floating around in here.

"Like literal shit?" Eddie chuckled at the image that floated in his brain. "And you decided to stick around why?" His fingers lost Venom somewhere in his lower abdomen, and he abandoned his task in favor of grasping the TV remote. "Oo Price is Right!"

The symbiote growled. You are amused that our body is a shit hole?

He hummed noncommittally in his throat. "I just think its funny." He glanced around his apartment, eyes glossing over the chipped paint, shabby furniture, and discarded food containers. "I live in a shit hole, you live in a shit hole."

Not funny Eddie.

He tapped distractedly on his sternum, not wanting to miss the wheel spin. "You must be awfully focused in there. You hate the Price is Right."

We do not hate it. Wheel of Fortune is just better.

He could feel Venom slithering back past his hips and settling on the left femur again. It caused him to start jiggling his leg, but he was too focused on his show to pay it much mind.

By the next commercial break, Venom had disappeared back into his abdomen. Stretching as he stood up, his show over, he was about to ask Venom if he wanted to get something to eat. But his body's other occupant heard his thoughts before he could open his mouth.

Yes, we are very hungry. We think it is time to find some bad guys.

"No, no bad guys!" He bent down to retrieve his socks. "Fuck. I gotta piss again." Abandoning the socks, he sped walked to the bathroom, annoyed at the sudden urge.

We have been working very hard Eddie. We deserve some bad guys.

"Aaaaah."

Hungry!

"Yeah yeah hold on. What are you so busy doing in there anyway?" He asked as he finished zipping up his jeans. Eddie tried to focus, feeling his body out for where his symbiote was currently hiding.

We are fixing.

A shudder ran through him when he zeroed in on Venom's current position, curled around the delicate finger bones of his right hand. Venom missed the shift in Eddie's mood, focused as he was.

"Venom. Get away from there." The words were cold, flat, and emotionless. The spreading tingle of the appendages was stirring deep, long buried emotions.

We are almost done. Then time for some bad guys.

The hand curled into a fist, fingernails digging into his palm. "Out." He hissed, and Venom finally clued into their elevated heart rate, the tightness of their lungs, the flood of emotions that was overtaking his host.

The symbiote surged under his skin, tendrils grasping onto muscle and bone as they hauled Venom's mass to Eddie's core. The weight of him settled around lungs and heart, twisting into veins and sinew as he sought out the source of Eddie's distress.

But Eddie was too far gone for the feeling to comfort him. He was now staring at his right hand, at the two fingers that had not been able to straighten in years, despite four surgeries to correct them. For the first time in years, Eddie could feel the strain in them, could feel the pressure on the nail from digging into his palm.

Eddie. What is wrong with us?

"Shut up." It was all Eddie could manage before he crumpled to the ground.

Venoms panic was growing. Let me-

"No." Growled the man, his arms wrapping around his head protectively.

The symbiote remained silent, but carefully monitored his hosts systems. He was able to slow the heart, make the lungs take in steady even breaths, but he could not reach his hosts mind. Eddie was blocking him, shutting down their bond, as he curled around himself. His fingers and femur were buzzing, the ghosts of past injuries starting to awaken along with the nerves that Venom had been repairing.

Thoroughly alarmed, Venom snakes a tendril up, behind Eddie's esophagus, twisting along his brain stem before branching out, tracing the wrinkles and folds of Eddie's brain. Fragmenting into even smaller, barely there tendrils, he dug his way in, seeking his host to where he had buried himself deep in his own brain.

A sudden flood of chemicals and emotions nearly shocked Venom into withdrawing. He was not prepared for what he found there.

Eddie.

The symbiote tried to make the name as soothing as his rough growl of a voice would allow.

The man's consciousness flinched away from him at first, too far lost in the quagmire of bad memories. Venom tried again.

Eddie. We are here. You are not there.

"I… I didn't mean to." Eddie's voice whimpered, voice softened by the draw of past memories. Please.

More of venom surged through the tendril connecting brain and lungs, allowing him to dig firmly into the space where Eddie had retreated.

I got us.

He could feel Eddie relaxing, could feel his consciousness grasping onto his tendrils. Venom spread himself thinner within his host, clawing tendrils down his spine, following the femoral artery down before grasping onto his joints and tendons. Careful to keep Eddie's heart and lungs steady, while still remaining a presence in the brain, he flexed Eddie's legs for him, guiding him to stand and wobble into the bedroom.

He didn't want Eddie to come back from his PTSD flashback on the cold floor of the bathroom.

Letting their body collapse in bed, he let the tendrils push out through Eddie's pores, snaking their way through the fabric of his jeans. They grasped at the blanket crumbled at the bottom, pulling it up. These parts of Venom, task complete, joined the mass of him snug around the brain.

Eddie wasn't aware of any of this. He was huddled in the corner of his father's garage again, blood smeared on the front of the beat up pickup in front of him. Hands clutched against his chest, his whole body trembled as he waited for his father to come back. The pain in his hand assured him it was broken, the fingers bent at odd angles from when his father stomped on it.

Eddie. We are here. You are not there.

Another sob choked out, and he clamped his uninjured hand over his mouth, lest his father have an excuse to beat him further.

"I… I didn't mean to." The words were strangled, and he didn't know if he was referring to the tears, or the boy he had just ran over.

I got us.

The voice came again, along with the sensation of a familiar, welcome presence standing over him. The garage faded away, the pain in his hand faded away, and Eddie found himself floating in darkness.

Eddie woke with a start, his body trying to convulse him into a sitting position, but there was a firmness in his bones that prevented this. His muscles didn't strain for long before he relaxed into it, letting his other relax their body back into bed.

Welcome back.

The greeting was so… normal yet unexpected. Eddie coughed out a laugh. "Fuck you." Venom was not insulted by the reply. He could feel the anger, shame, and regret surging through his host. He couldn't be offended that Eddie blamed him for the flashback.

Venom was still entwined in his brain, making their bond closer and Eddie was able to sense this. "If you had just listened. I told you to get out." Another flood of chemicals, but Venom intercepted these in time. He had learned enough about humans, and about Eddie, to know that him crying right now would only serve to make him feel worse. They needed to be strong right now.

I was cleaning.

"I don't know what that means." Eddie slumped against the pillows, exhaustion winning the fight against all his other emotions. Venom was pleased by this outcome.

Our body has many old deposits of amino acids, uric acids, discarded proteins-

Eddie interrupted his symbiote. "I don't know what that means." He insisted, closing his eyes. He could feel the ruffle of indignation that passed through Venom's gooey form inside him.

You are the one who told us it is not polite to interrupt.

Silence. Venom took that as permission to continue.

We have many old injuries slowing us down. They slow us down. We were fixing them.

Eddie swallowed roughly. "Some things can't be fixed buddy." His voice cracked, and Venom spread himself thin just below Eddie's skin. Venom was silent for a few long breaths. He closed his eyes against the unwelcome images. The neighbor boy's body, mangled in the middle of the road. His father's pickup, the front crumpled from impact. His father's angry face when he learned that Eddie wanted to confess, to plead guilty. His angrier face his father wore as he beat him. The pleased look in his eye when he crushed Eddie's hand with his boot.

I can undo the damage, Eddie. Make it like it never happened.

"That's what you were doing in my leg." He ran a hand along the leg in question, imaging the bone beneath. He remembered the x-rays, the jagged way the bone had healed. The limp he suffered as a result was a daily reminder of how his father had taken great efforts to first break his leg, then to put off taking him to the doctor.

We make each other better, Eddie. Together, we are more than we are alone. No one can hurt us ever again. I got you.

He could feel Venom pool in his lower torso, the bulk of him placing an uncomfortable pressure on his bladder. "Hey V?"

Yes Eddie?

"Are you the reason I've had to piss a million times today?"

I will not live in a shit hole Eddie!

He smiled, despite himself, despite the exhaustion. Inhaling deeply, he shuffled deeper under the covers, giving in to the need to sleep. This time, he knew, he would not suffer any nightmares after this episode.

Hungry Eddie!

His eyes snapped open. So much for a nap right now.

I hope you liked it!