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There's only so much symbiote-wrangling a person can take. And after spending more than a little time trying to settle Toxin down and convince him to act as close to reasonable as he can get, Pat's decided on a new plan: he's going to wear out Toxin until he's too tired to complain.

Why are we doing this is again?

"You're always saying you want out, so come out. Exercise time."

What?

"You heard me. Suit up, we're going for a run."

It's not long before Toxin's given up on prodding for answers and the two are just scrambling through the city, running, jumping, and webslinging, with only occasional pauses on the side of a building to see if anyone else is out and about.

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Rose's eyes pop a little wider but she just raises a hand and waves back at the tendril a little bit.

"I'm Rose, and as I like my fingers I will remember that about the biting." She tilts her head. "So what were YOU doing when you got yanked into creepy spaceship land?"

She should start asking everybody that. It's like 'where were you when JFK was shot' for the alien-abductee crowd.

That prompts another sigh, this one more weary than the first. "I was going to go meet my wife at a restaurant-I was going to explain Tox here to her. Next thing I know, I'm surrounded by more goo than usual."

He frowns beneath the blank face of the suit. "What about you?"

"Jogging. Thinking about how to write a letter to pretty much the only person I care about having left behind telling him why I couldn't come back and work with him and his team again." She crosses her arms, sighing. "So... I wasn't gonna see him again anyway, but yeah."

It makes her seethe to think about all that unfinished business. Clock King still alive, Eddie left hanging... She wonders if Megan has talked to him. Told him anything about what happened at the Dark Side Club.

"Hope your wife is understanding when and if you ever get out of here."

"Yeah, so do I." Pat finally jumps down from the building, landing in a crouch then standing back up. As he does so, the suit goes from suitish-and alarmingly alive-looking-to normal clothing.

It's not a pleasant thing to watch, really.

"I think everyone got their lives interrupted by this."

Okay that? That's more like a five or a six on the freaky scale.

"What... is 'Toxin' exactly? I'm assuming a name like that is supposed to be slightly self-explanatory?"

There are times Rose is glad that her metahuman attributes are as 'basic' as battle skills and precognition. This is one of those times.

"He's a symbiote," Pat says as the said alien slithers partially out of his shoulder, flopping down and eyeballing Rose with blank white eyepatches. He chirrups a little at her in greeting.

"And don't blame me for his name; Venom's the one who came up with it."

The mention of Venom prompts a hiss.

"A symbiote with, I'm guessing, daddy issues? Charming."

Rose smiles a little bit and wiggles her finger near Tox's 'face' but just out of reach, a miniature wave.

"But don't you look like a deadly little thing. How long have you two been body-buddies?"

"Daddy and grandaddy issues-and it really doens't help that Venom's here now."

Toxin's eyepatches narrow, and he stretches himself out further-apparently aiming to prove that Rose's finger isn't as safe as she thinks. He twists himself in an O-shape around her hand, chattering briefly at her.

"Tox-" Pat starts to warn.

he shoots back with a snort.

Pat looks back to Rose. "Over a year now. I've been his host since he was born."

Rose ALMOST yanks her hand away, but her precog isn't pinging her with a vision of a bite so she stays very still instead.

"Cocky little thing aren't you?" She tilts her head at Tox then slowly lowers her hand to her side, looking up at Pat with a raised eyebrow.

"A year and you were only just now going to tell your wife? That's a hell of a confession. Unless this whole sticking to walls business is just fun for you, but most people I know with powers tend to end up using them for a cause."

Toxin chirrups again-his face isn't terribly expressive, but he manages to get across a feeling of smugness. He returns to Pat's shoulder, coiling up.

"We'd been doing the heroing thing-or trying to, anyway-and yeah. I was afraid I'd get her and Eddie killed because of the whole heroing thing."

Toxin grumbles.

"I know better now," Pat says, sighing. "But yeah, it was...a safety thing." He raises an eyebrow. "I'm guessing you've got powers?"

"I could pretty much just break you over my knee hand to hand. Enhanced reflexes and endurance, I heal up faster than most, and I can see whatever you got coming." She smirks a little. "I go by Ravager for all that though."

Pat frowns. "I'd rather not fight, honestly. Spent enough time brawling lately-or trying to stop fights," he says, with a look at Toxin.

"So who're the major heroes in your world? We might be from the same place."

Rose shrugs. Pfft. If you can't even enjoy your powers...

"Major heroes? Well, Superman's from my universe, or at least a version of him. Batman, Green Lanterns, Wonder Woman?" If he doesn't know any of the above they're probably out of luck on universe commonalities.

He shakes his head. "Sorry. I don't recognize any of them. There's lots of people with powers, though-somebody's probably from one that's close. The problem's that there's a lot of variations."

"There's a whole SQUAD here that are pulled from different points in my world's history." Rose grumbles a little on that one, rubbing the back of her neck to work out a kink.

"From what I hear from the others I might be further ahead in our shared timeline than any of the rest of them. Blue Beetle and I MIGHT be pretty on par but I still need to talk to him."

She sighs. Being stuck in this damn place is a frustration on SO many levels.

"So, are you a major player hero in your universe or something?"

"Yeah, the timeline thing makes things...weird. That's the problem we ran into when I was talking to Spider-Man; he's years behind Tox and I. Or we're years ahead." He shrugs.

The question makes Toxin chuff-it's an odd noise, closer to a cough than a laugh. But from the sound and the shift in his eyepatch shape, it's apparent he's amused.

Pat sighs. "No, I'm not. Which means you aren't either, so stop laughing," he adds to the symbiote. "I haven't been heroing very long-still a rookie, basically. And not exactly a household name."

Yes, they're Z-listers.

Rose smirks at the amused expression on Toxin, then laughs a little herself when Pat tells it it's not famous either.

"Low man on the totem pole, huh?" She shrugs a bit and starts walking slowly, nodding for him to follow her. Stopping cold after a hard run is gonna lock up all her muscles like a vice tomorrow if she doesn't keep moving a little.

"I've been on and off a major hero squad a couple of times over the last few years, so I'm semi-well known but I don't really want to be an A-lister in the first place. Stigma's bad enough with what little notoriety I have now." She grumbles a little on that one, reaching up to re-do her ponytail.

"I'm a villain's legacy brat out playing hero and everybody in the business so to speak still knows me for the time I spent being daddy's sidebar instead of for my own accomplishments."

She doesn't want to get into details about Slade really so she leaves it at that.

"You got something better to live up to I hope."

Pat follows along, nodding as he listens. "You'd think the major hero team would help balance things out a little better." He shrugs. "Seems like bad press is easier to get than good press, though." Particularly in a universe where, say, the Daily Bugle exists. He hasn't been the subject of its fury, but he's seen it slam plenty of other heroes.

"As for something better to live up to...not really. Toxin's father is hosted by a serial killer, and Venom-his grandfather-isn't much better."

Toxin hisses at the mention of both, coiling in on himself and narrowing his eyepatches.

"Ow." Rose frowns. "That's... yeah. And it's true about the bad publicity. It's SO much harder to get good press, and even when you're considered a boneafide good guy you screw up ONCE and the public finds out and they're on you like HOUNDS unless you've got the money to shut them up. It's ridiculous."

He nods. "I never thought much about it before I started heroing, but after-it's something you start noticing." Pat smiles in a wry sort of way. "Joys of being a public servant? I'm used to that, at least..."

She raises a brow, smiling a bit.

"Oh yeah? What's your normal non-hero job?"

"I was a cop. Quit after Tox was born, though-busy trying to figure everything out...and trying to teach him some manners."

Toxin prods at Pat with an annoyed squeak.

"Doesn't change the fact that you had to learn them."

"You make it sound like you and the wife just had a baby or something." She finds that both slightly unnerving and REALLY amusing. "How do you end up a symbiote host anyway?"

Edited 2009-04-12 02:58 (UTC)

He sighs. "Actually, we did. Tox was like an unexpected second kid." Pat shrugs, glancing at the said symbiote. "By accident, honestly. I was in the wrong place at the wrong time-Carnage was giving birth, and I was closest."

Toxin makes a grumbling noise, flattening himself out.

Rose nods, considering the idea for a few moments.

"So... that's gotta make sex hella-awkward. Or can he separate from you for short periods of time or something?"

Pat pauses and stares at Rose, while Toxin's mood picks up as he looks over at his host and snickers. After a moment, Pat breaks out of his 'what the hell, kid?' moment.

"...No, he can't. He's too young to, as far as I can tell."

"Sucks to be you huh?" A pause. "Sorry, I always wanted to ask Beetle that but he's painfully Catholic. He gets flustered when I wear short shorts around him for godsakes."

She leaves out the part where she thinks he's kind of afraid of her.

"So if he gets older and stronger he might be able to exist separate from you?" She looks at Tox. "Jeez, you ARE just like a baby."

Pat rubs at his forehead. "It's not something I think about that much," he mutters. And besides, he was still focused on getting his wife to forgive him for the whole seperation-on-account-of-alien thing.

"Might," he repeats. "Symbiotes still need hosts to feed, and from what Spider-Man told me-the one back home, not here-they can have some trouble splitting form hosts even when they're older. It sounds like it depends on a lot of things."

Toxin, meanwhile, just looks indignant, squawrking at Rose.

Pat sighs. "Honestly, right now? He's more like a teenager."

"With all the ego of the age, I'm sure." She smirks at Tox, then looks back to Pat with a sigh. "Well, you're winning the prize for most frustrating day to day life so far. Anything else I should nominate you for?"

"It's not always that frustrating. And I'm sure somebody else around here has a worse one-how many people have you talked to? I know there's still a lot of new people I should talk to..."

She lifts her arms above her head to pull on each elbow and work the lingering tension out of her shoulders a little.

"Not very many. I'm kind of avoiding that whole command structure business as much as possible until I get my own bearings here a little more."

Truth be told she's still sorting through that nightmare vision Lyta showed her in bits and pieces. Every time she gets the crawling sensation that the ship is watching her (which happens more than she would like) that black monster's gaze meeting hers rears back into her thoughts and grips her insides like an ice fist.

"I should probably talk to a couple of people, actually..."

Lyta for starters.

"Talking's a good idea. Might find someone from the same place you are, or find out something interesting anyway." He sighs. "Or you just might find out what names to yell to duck for the next time we get in a fight with something that wants to kill us."

Pat makes a face. "You're lucky that you missed the roaches."

She snorts.

"Dude are you kidding? I'm PISSED I missed the roaches. From what I've heard it sounds like it would have been an awesome fight."

Pat sighs as he looks to Toxin. "Of course of you." Looking back to Rose, he frowns. "It was a hard one. Roaches everywhere, and they were huge."

She smirks. "Huge like 'hey that's the size of my hand' or huge like 'I could ride on one of those'?

"Huge like 'I could ride it, but it's trying to eat me right now'. They actually did eat somebody before we killed them all."

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