Venomous

23. About That

"Get Down!" I shrieked at Natasha as the same time as AV was forming around me in a protective shield. Natasha ducked just in time to miss a flying projectile at her head.

"What the..."

"Fight now, answers later," AV mumbled, extending a white tendril, grabbing Natasha by the ankle and pulling her back towards us. "We've got you." Natasha looked up at us, eyebrows raised.

"I can take care of my..." her no-doubt well-argued sentence was cut off by the sound of shots being fired, and AV immediately put a shield wall between the two of us and the direction the bullets were coming from.

"Clearly," AV smirked at the redhead as she glanced around the white barrier, looking for our attackers.

This place is not all clear. I rolled my eyes as I glanced in both directions. The shooting had stopped, but the silence was a lot more ominous. And there was a strange, inexplicable squelching sound that I couldn't quite...wait. We squinted our eyes as we stared down the darkened hallway. The bullets had nothing to help the already-sketchy fluorescent lights, but I could have sworn that I saw something moving in a way that wasn't human. In fact, it was more like...

"Блядь (fuck)." Natasha cursed beside me. It looked like the thing was actually moving along the wall rather than the...

"Shit, get down!" We leapt over Natasha, who – for once – obediently crouched down to the ground. We clashed with the creature, its grey tentacles wrapping with our white ones, its teeth snapping with not-nearly controlled rage. We roared back at it, snapping our teeth together threateningly at its neck just as it moved backwards out of range.

"Is that..." Natasha's voice trailed off behind me but I didn't have the time to argue with her. We were locked together with the other symbiote, dodging its attacks but not able to make a lot of progress. We were bigger and stronger without question, but its speed and agility were countering our efforts nicely. I watched as two sharpened blades appeared from the hands, swiping towards us with an inhuman yell. We rolled out of the way, but as we did so one of the blades disengaged, flying forward and embedding itself in Natasha's thigh. Shit. To her credit, she didn't make a sound. "Now I'm pissed. How do we stop this thing?" She leaned around the corner, taking a look, firing a few rounds at the slimy-looking figure in front of us. We watched closely. Something wasn't quite right.

The host is incompatible. That made more sense.

"We need sound. Sonic, specifically. Or fire. Or bombs." We hissed at her, getting back on our feet and stretching to our full height.

"Where in this suit do you happen to think I'm hiding sonic sound, fire, or bombs?" Natasha snapped, her green eyes flashing. We chuckled, appreciating the sarcasm, glancing around the room for anything that may prove useful. A tentacle reached out, snatching an old-fashioned microphone off of the workstation beside us. AV withdrew from my hands so I could still twist the wires normally – AV was dexterous but not nimble – at least not with small, breakable, things. Natasha watched my movements closely, firing a few shots off when necessary to keep the thing from rebounding and moving towards us. Luckily for us, one of the shots triggered a spark which set some kind of fluid on the cement floor alight, and the fire alone was doing a decent job of keeping it at a minimum safe distance.

"Feedback, loop it and crank the volume," we ordered. Natasha nodded, rising into a crouch to examine the desk in front of her. She plugged in a few wires, found the volume and hesitated, her hand on the dial.

"Is there a chance that when I do this it will shut you up for once, Brock?" We smirked at her.

"Not likely." She shrugged her shoulders.

"Can't blame a girl for asking." I watched as she turned the volume dial all the way up and as it reached its peak, I smashed the buttons on the microphone together harshly, wincing slightly in preparation for what was coming. The sound came blasting out of the speakers, and Natasha immediately crouched back behind the desk, her hands pressed firmly against her ears. The sound wasn't exactly pleasant, but it didn't bother us. I watched as the host separated from my kin. The host collapsed on the floor, unmoving. The sinister liquid, however, kept moving in my direction. I glanced around quickly, looking for anything I could use. I smashed the lid of the lockbox on the desk, hovering it above the goo below me, catching it at just the right moment. "Tell me that wasn't what I think it was," Natasha's voice sounded beside me. She was sitting on the ground now, examining her thigh where the blade had penetrated. AV began retreating from my fingers and toes, and the rest of us reappeared rapidly.

"This won't hold it for long, but hopefully long enough for us to get back to the compound." Natasha's eyebrows lifted.

"Hopefully? What happens if it escapes while on the way?" I shrugged.

"There's a blowtorch on the jet, right?" I held out my hand, helping Natasha to her feet as we slowly made our way out of the compound back towards where Steve and Wanda were waiting. Natasha was far too stubborn to admit that she was in pain, and she wouldn't let me help support her – besides, I was still carrying the symbiote safe. I finally convinced her to agree to at least use one shoulder for support, and we made our way back to the jet at a gradual pace.

"What happened?" Wanda rushed towards us immediately when she saw us approaching, and Steve wasn't too far behind.

"Parker got me stabbed," Natasha grumbled. Wanda tilted her head to one side, while Steve raised his eyebrows.

"That's a really funny way of saying thanks for saving your ass, Romanoff."

"Language," Steve warned. I groaned.

"What's that?" I finally remembered what I was carrying as Natasha and I exchanged glances.

"About that..."