Recede
The hospital was too sterile and too bright- both things that made Venom uneasy. The stinging smell of antiseptic permeating through the walls. So they spent most their time inside Eddie's body trying to repair the damage because medicine and surgeries alone wouldn't cut it. Eddie had an emergency operation twenty-six hours ago which sent Venom into his bone marrow so they wouldn't be separated, finding refuge in the porous tissue and stimulating it to help his body create more white blood cells. In the seconds, minutes and hours after the accident Venom kept Eddie's heart pumping manually from the inside until it could beat on its own again after medical intervention.
Venom could heal Eddie from almost anything but this time they were too weak and injured from the fire that had almost consumed them both. The sight and smell and feel of Eddie’s charred clothes and skin seared into their every thought. It would take time to recover and regain the strength to heal their husband properly, relying on medical professionals to do the work in the meantime. It was one of the times in their life that they were grateful about not needing sleep, they could watch him day and night. Lending all the energy they could spare to his body.
Annie and Dan dropped everything to come here, Dan translating the medical jargon between them and the doctors. Flash arrived shortly after, Felicia was with him but Venom didn’t ask. Miles and Andi had both been kind enough to stake out at the house to watch the kids who didn't know what was going on. Two days passed like that before both teenagers had to go back to school after the weekend so Anne, Dan and Flash all started staying at the house- dropping the kids off at school, picking them up, making meals, playing, helping with homework, late night feedings. Filling in all the gaps their parents left in their absence. Venom finally gave Anne permission to tell them a little bit of what was happening, that their dad needed to rest but nothing else. Nothing about how bad it was. Nothing about how it was Venom’s fault. Nothing about how they failed to protect him.
Venom was examining Eddie's more comforting memories when Flash came in with Sleeper. Venom had asked Flash to bring him because he was too young to realize that Eddie was anything other than just asleep. He was too young to be afraid of what was happening or ask any questions.
Venom laid Sleeper on Eddie’s chest where he contentedly put his claws in his mouth and listened to his father’s heartbeat which always drew him into a happy calm. Venom hoped it would be good for Eddie to feel their little one there even if he couldn’t see him.
“Thank you for bringing him, Flash.”
“Sure thing, V.”
“How are the others?”
“They're holding up. Carnage is angry because they're scared. The others are mostly anxious.”
They stayed there in silence for a while before Flash spoke up again.
“You know I'm here for you no matter what. You and the kids. I'll purge the Anti-Venom and we can rebond or...whatever you want.”
“Stop talking to them like he's dead, Flash. He's not dead.” Anne stood in doorway glaring at him with mist in her eyes.
Flash jumped.
“I didn't mean- I just...Sorry.” Flash stammered awkwardly.
“No. It's appreciated Flash, really.” Venom assured them both.
It was unsettling to hear their rumbling deep voice sound so uncertain, they were always certain of everything. Flash really did mean what he said, they could feel it in the remains of their former bond. Flash had always meant a lot to them and always would but they were in love with Eddie. He was their destined and that was different. They sat there for a few more hours, Anne coming in and out, Dan speaking with the doctors who apparently trusted him enough to divulge information and Flash striking up conversation but typically letting it die off without ceremony.
Andi called and put the kids on speaker phone, they were really excited to talk to their parent. It was obvious they wanted to ask about Eddie but they didn't, probably having been instructed by the other adults not to. Dan and Anne fell asleep resting against each other on the stiff vinyl couch while Flash stayed awake with them. They protested and told him to sleep but he refused. They didn't want to admit it at the cost of his sleep but his presence really was a comfort. Once it got late, the quiet hospital halls even quieter with just beeps and hums echoing around, Flash left to take Sleeper home and despite their other friends in the room Sleeper’s leaving made Venom very lonely.
In the middle of the night there was a sudden jolt to Eddie's system, the man began sweating profusely and his breath and heartbeat quickened rapidly. His breath was stuttering and his heart was beating without any kind of steady rhythm but he didn't wake up. Anne snapped up and hit the emergency call button as the machine alarms rang. Venom receded into Eddie's bloodstream to keep the flow going to his organs. Doctors and nurses worked over him and Venom worked to stay out of their way, pooling in his limbs to ease their seizing. They were saying that he was going into shock, that he'd lost too much blood.
Eddie had been badly burned before Venom healed the puckered knitted scarring and they’d had been acting as his blood to replace the lost volume but it wasn't sustainable and probably wasn’t even a good idea. Venom could only feel that his blood pressure had dropped dangerously low when he started jerking and convulsing. One of the doctors hung blood bags on IV poles and pressed a needle under Eddie's skin. The blood tasted strange and unfamiliar and definitely not like Eddie but it was saving his life. The sweating stopped and his heart started beating normally again as they spent the next three hours feeding anonymous blood into his body. The more blood went in to him the less the symbiote resided in his bloodstream to make up the gap. Eventually they took their usual spot settled languidly under the netting of his cardiovascular system.
On the fifth day Venom felt much stronger and accelerated Eddie's healing until there was nothing left that wasn't in perfect working condition. They heaved his lungs to expand his ribcage and take in a healthy amount of air and the days long silence was broken by a gasp and cough followed by Eddie finally waking up.
“Venom?” He mumbled.
“Don't talk to me. I'm mad at you.” Venom answered inside his mind sounding very irritable.
“What happened?”
“You ran into a burning building, Eddie. I've never seen anyone do anything so inane.”
“If it was so inane why didn't you stop me?”
Venom didn’t answer for a while.
“You did it because a kid was trapped, suffocating and the fire department couldn't have gotten there in time.”
Venom knew that letting a kid die was something even Eddie couldn't forgive and they never thought it would end up as bad as it did.
“I have a feeling you're the reason I'm alive, am I right?”
“If you want to get technical about it then yes.”
Eddie laughed and he felt Venom ripple under his skin, the symbiote's own unique form of a chuckle. A black tendril pressed the call button to alert a nurse that Eddie was awake.
“Let's get you out of here. I can name six symbiotes who are anxious to see you.”
There was a fraction of a second before the children and the adults registered that they had come in the front door where they all turned around to look to see who it was. They all stared at each other before it clicked that it was Eddie and Venom who were finally home after five days. The kids all tripped over themselves running to them, hugging them so hard it almost knocked them over. Eddie had never seen them like this before, he wiped the tears off Lasher's face with his thumbs and smoothed Agony's hair. Phage threw his arms around Eddie's neck and buried his face into his shoulder as Venom pulled them all in closer. Scream grabbed both sides of his face with her hands.
“You made everybody sad.” She told him firmly.
He raised his eyebrows in surprise at her pointedness and in his head he heard Venom agreeing with her.
“I'm sorry, princess. I won't do it again.”
Carnage stood away from their siblings with their arms crossed and a sour look on their face.
“Carnage, your dad is home.” Venom's deep voice stated.
Carnage's frown deepened and they turned their head away. Venom reached out and wrapped around Carnage's shoulder, Carnage looked down at their shoulder and then over at their parents. They held their gaze for a long time before their face relaxed into helplessness. They dropped their arms and lurched into them, hugging them tightly. After a lot more hugs the kids detached themselves from them and they stood up to lay their gratitude on Flash, Anne and Dan who were in the foyer with them.
That night after making absolutely sure all the children were firmly asleep and moving Sleeper into the girls’ room for the night Eddie and Venom wanted to celebrate their homecoming in a more adult way. Maintaining a sex life with five little kids and a baby was difficult but not entirely impossible if they were smart about it. Venom rose out of his pelvis and ran their hands from Eddie's shoulders, down his chest, over his abdomen and into his boxers- the man already growing hard. Venom grasped Eddie and stroked him making him gasp sharply. Eddie tossed his head over exposing the side of his neck which Venom slid their tongue up from his collarbone to his earlobe, gently biting the sensitive skin. The stimulation made Eddie unconsciously draw his knees up and spread his legs in a Pavlovian way to which Venom gladly obliged. Pressing a hard extending a mass of themselves into his tight entrance, inching in slowly as it grew thicker, stretching him the way they knew he liked. Eddie's eyelids fluttered and his brows knit together.
“Ahhn fuck.”
Venom was dragging their sharp teeth along Eddie's jaw when an unmistakable cooing came over the baby monitor on the nightstand. Eddie's eyes snapped open and he looked over to it, they were both still and quiet for several seconds listening to the nearly inaudible babbles. Eddie moved to get up but Venom pinned him down to the mattress stopping him.
“We gotta get him.” Eddie struggled slightly.
“We don't. He's not even crying.”
“He’s…”
“He doesn't even want anything, he'll go back to sleep in a minute. We can't run to him everytime he wakes up. You're going to give him a complex, Eddie.”
They stayed there for several more moments until the noises stopped and turned back into soft breathing. A surefire sign that he was sleeping soundly. Eddie's eyes dragged from the monitor back to Venom who hovered above him. He reached around Venom's neck and pulled them towards him, giving the signal to go ahead.
Venom coiled tighter around his cock making Eddie let out an uncontrolled loud moan. They obstructed his mouth with their tongue before the moan could peak, they loved hearing him but they couldn't wake anybody up, especially after that close call. Eddie writhed under them gripping the massive biceps of their manifested upper body as they thickened further and began pumping in and out of him slowly.
Tendrils snaked down his legs and wrapped around them just to feel his tensing and relaxing pattern from the outside. His hips lifted off the bed and bucked desperately for some sort of friction and as far as Venom was concerned, what Eddie wanted Eddie got. They enclosed around his length fully and applied the right amount of pressure. Eddie gasped and moaned around the tongue still filling his mouth. Venom brushed along Eddie's swollen lower lip to wipe away some escaped saliva while Eddie moved to claw at the expanse of their back in a way that would draw blood from anyone else. As Eddie thrust into them more quickly they quickened their own pace inside him, working him up as sweat started to bead up along his chest and temples. They pushed further into him, reaching the spot that made his knees shake, prodding it with a steady repetition. Eddie's urgency soaked all the way through Venom as they reveled in his heat, feeling everything he was with the added bonus of knowing they were the one making him feel it. Eddie had lost the ability to continue his own thrusting, hips jerking purely on nervous stimulation, so they were happy to stroke him in time with their own thrusts.
“Haaah, oh God, V...” Eddie quietly whispered it like a prayer.
Venom didn't have the concept of God or religion in their own background but people here on Earth tended to take it pretty seriously so the idea that they could elicit such pleasure from Eddie that only an omnipotent being could help him now was quite a compliment. They ran their tongue from the prickle of hair above his base, over his stomach and the spread of his chest to tug and tease at his now leaking nipples. They thickened themselves a fraction of an inch inside Eddie mid-thrust and the man tightened around them. He clutched the sheets with a grunt as he came white and hot onto the two of them. He stayed there for a moment- sweat glinted temples, arms fallen to his sides, palms upturned and gasping for air. A sight Venom knew they'd never tire of. Venom relinquished their corporeal form to more fully wrap around Eddie and they lay there entangled in each other.
Venom felt a sudden pang of shock course through Eddie's mind followed by him grabbing the baby monitor off the nightstand.
He pressed it to his ear, holding his breath and listening intently.
“Still asleep?” Venom asked inside his mind.
“Still asleep.” Eddie sighed relieved and flopped back onto the bed.