Appearing in 1st story
Featured Characters:
Supporting Characters:
- Guardsman (Ozkar Waters) (Name revealed)
- Agent Anti-Venom (Flash Thompson)
- Silence (Andi Benton)
Antagonists:
Other Characters:
- Friends of Humanity
- Senator Peter Krane (Only on screen as a static image or video record)
- Wiliam (Vision or hallucination)
- Buck Cashman (Vision or hallucination)
- Mitch (Vision or hallucination)
- Riot's new host (Vision or hallucination)
- King in Black / Toxin (Eddie Brock) (Mentioned)
- Toxin (Pat Mulligan) (Mentioned) (Deceased)
- NYPD
- Hank Hensley
- Carnage's Hive
- Phage Symbiote (Mentioned)
Races and Species:
Locations:
- Earth
- United States of America
- New York
- New York City
- Staten Island
- Todt Hill
- Waters Residence
- Todt Hill
- Manhattan
- Staten Island
- New York City
- Washington, D.C.
- New York
- United States of America
- Symbiote Hive-Mind
Items:
Synopsis for 1st story
Eating breakfast, Bren Waters and his father Ozkar watch one of Senator Peter Krane's televised interviews, Bren incredulously asking his father how anyone could believe the demagogue. Speaking mentally, Toxin sneers at Senator Krane's support of the xenophobic Friends of Humanity before noting that something about him doesn't feel right - each word pulsing like a drumbeat in its mind. Ozkar retorts that he doesn't need some politician to tell him who or what to be afraid of, though he states that in the wake of recent events Krane has a point that aliens are dangerous. Bren probes for more details about his father's job at Alchemax, but Ozkar reprimands Bren to wait until he has a job before criticizing how the bills are paid. Toxin scoffs that Bren has a lousy father, though it admits its own parent is exponentially worse.
A few weeks later, having seen on the news that Alchemax has been attacked, Bren desperately pedals his bike across a bridge, Toxin offers to take over and get him there faster. A Guardsman flies overhead patroling for any rogue extraterrestrials, spooking Bren - who is frantically worried about his father's safety. Toxin sneers that Alchemax makes money vivisecting aliens like itself, and when Bren insists his dad is just a security guard Toxin retorts that no-one who works at Alchemax is a simple security guard these days. Bren insists, saying that his father is tough but that Bren is all he's got, then decides to accept Toxin's offer to take over despite the risk of being attacked by the patrolling Guardsman. However, Toxin doesn't reply - leaving Bren uncertain and concerned as a rhythmic thrumming becomes audible.
In the Symbiote Hive-Mind, Toxin looks around at the corpses strewn about and says it heard the summons, surmising he can reasonably assume whose handiwork it is. Carnage's voice mockingly replies that he's surprised that Toxin is still alive to admire it, Toxin retorting that the feeling is mutual before retorting that it thought Eddie Brock killed Carnage. Carnage's voice scoffs that Brock is an absentee god with a universe of problems to worry about, sneering that Toxin was never very good at surviving on its own. Toxin demands to know what Carnage wants, and Carnage replies that he forgives Toxin for being a pathetic embarrassment who keeps dying over and over. Furious, Toxin roars that some of those deaths were at Carnage's hands. Red-and-black hands burst from the ground and grab at Toxin as Carnage snarls that Toxin has two options - to willingly surrender to his will, or have its consciousness be disposed of and have its body forcibly taken over. Toxin angrily refuses, Carnage sneering that Toxin's hosts have made it soft and weak, Toxin retorting that it and Bren are a team and that it's not a bloodthirsty parasite like its progenitor. Manifesting a massive head from the ground under Toxin's feet, Carnage tries to devour Toxin, saying that it's joining his Hive either willingly or by force. Forcing Carnage's maw open, Toxin rips off Carnage's lower jaw - cutting off his threats - and retorts that he was never much of a joiner. Sneering that he never took Toxin for being into mouth-play, Carnage forms a new body from his severed lower jaw and grabs Toxin by the throat, impaling it with tendrils and decapitating it. Holding up Toxin's severed head, Carnage snarls that his progeny needs to accept how pathetic it is, scoffing that his offspring - as the 1000th of their lineage - should have been a prince, but that he figured it wouldn't measure up and was fight.
As the mental struggle turns in Carnage's favor, Dylan is abruptly overcome by a splitting headache and falls off his bike, screaming in pain. In the Hive-Mind, Carnage sneers that Toxin's most-recent host is the most pathetic of the bunch, commanding it to eat Bren from the inside-out as an initiation and find someone more worthy - and threatening to take his time doing so himself if it refuses. Toxin extends a flurry of tendrils from its neck stump and wraps them around Carnage's neck, Carnage snarling that if it turns its back on him Bren will end up like Toxin's other hosts sooner or later. Forming a fanged maw out of its neck stump, Toxin snarls that this time things will be different. As Toxin devours him, Carnage sneers that the only way its progeny can break its cycle of failure is by joining his army like the rest of their relations, and that if it refuses it and its host will end up victims of the coming bloodbath. Reforming its body, Toxin tells Carnage to bring it on, saying that if it can beat him in the Hive-Mind it can beat him in the outside world, and that it would never join him since he's been a cruel monster whereas Bren is its friend.
Standing outside Alchemax, Bren notes that it looks like a bomb went off and laments that moving to New York was supposed to make his and his father's lives easier. As Bren wonders aloud why Toxin has abandoned him, a police officer accosts him and tells him to vacate the crime scene. Retorting that his father works there, Bren spots a badly-wounded Oskar being loaded into an ambulance and rushes over. Oskar asks what Bren is doing there, his son replying that he saw Alchemax was attacked on the news and was worried about him. Projecting bravado, Oskar scoffs that no alien could take him down, Bren outright asking if his father is one of the Guardsmen. Lying to his son's face, Oskar says that he's a simple security guard and doesn't need a suit of powered armor to kick ass, telling his son not to worry about him. Horrified by how beaten up his father is, Bren mentally calls out to Toxin again and says he could use its help and advice.
In a Washington, D.C. subway station, Hank reports to Flash Thompson via an earpiece, saying that it's taken him a long time to figure out what Senator Krane is up to since his campaign is running on doublespeak, but that he's afraid the Friends of Humanity are going to assassinate the President during his monument dedication speach and that Senator Krane knows he's a mole. Hank says he'll need Thompson on-site, suited up and with all the backup he can muster, and hopes he's still alive to help out. Watching from the shadows, a woman mentally asks if they should report Hank's treachery to Senator Krane. Emerging from the woman's body and transforming her, the Agony symbiote - sporting a red-and-black upper body in symbolism of its allegiance to Carnage - replies that Senator Krane is already aware and unconcerned, and that if Hank gets close enough to pose a problem they'll teach him the true meaning of its namesake.
In the Hive-Mind, Toxin revels in its victory over Carnage, scoffing that its "father" makes Bren's seem like a sentimental softie. Sensing a faint presence reaching out to it, Toxin wonders if the trespasser is a friend or foe. Tuning back into the real world, Toxin finds Bren resting with his hands on his knees and swearing revenge on whoever hurt his father. As Toxin lauds his rage, Bren demands to know where it's been and the symbiote explains what went down in the Hive-Mind and that Carnage was the one responsible for hospitalizing Ozkar. Clenching his teeth in grief and anger, Bren asks if Toxin has any good news, the symbiote engulfing and transforming him as it replies that it might have found them some allies just as eager to take down Carnage as they are.
In the Hive-Mind, Agent Anti-Venom asks Silence if she's sure she felt a presence. Silence retorts that she knows even less about the workings of the Hive-Mind than he does, but that she felt something or someone there. Agent Anti-Venom asks if it was Carnage, but Silence says it isn't - though she notes he was there recently. Toxin appears and announces itself as the new sovereign of the Hive-Mind, Agent Anti-Venom shocked to see it alive again. As Toxin brags about having beaten Carnage, Agent Anti-Venom fills it in on Carnage's plan for a bloodbath in Washington, D.C. Toxin agrees to Agent Anti-Venom's proposal of an alliance, saying that its new host has a grudge against Carnage and wants to make him pay in blood, and the three symbiote-augments set out southbound to take the fight to Carnage and his Hive.
Solicit Synopsis
TOXIN RETURNS!
Bren Waters, the new host of TOXIN, enters the fray! Will he be enough to turn the tide?