Absolute Symbiote Chapter 5: Arkham Raid.

Chapter 5: Arkham Raid.

(General P.O.V)

Arkham stood like a monument to failure.

Thomas watched it from the roof of a neighboring building—rusted ventilation units at his feet, old rain stains on the ledge. The sky above was low and gray. The asylum sat behind a thick wall of fencing and reinforced stone, with security patrols cycling every four minutes.

Carnage stayed silent for once.

After three cycles, Thomas finally spoke. “Front entrance is too obvious. South wing’s ventilation shafts lead straight to the medical cells. We go in that way.”

Carnage slithered up briefly from his arm. "You think one of them is in there?"

“I don’t know yet. Joker’s the real target. But to get to him, we need to map everything first.”

Carnage twitched like an irritated dog. "We should just rip the whole roof off. Go loud. Be art. Be terrorrrrr."

It really was that easy. And using invisibility/phasing would make the task even easier. Thomas was aware of all that, yet, he still shook his head. “Not here. Not in Arkham.”

He pulled out a cracked phone from his coat—stolen earlier—and opened the floor plan he’d pieced together from blueprints and satellite photos found in the internet.

“This place is wired to the teeth. If the inmates don't kill us, the fail-safes might. We go smart, or we don’t go at all.”

Carnage grumbled. "Suit yourself. It's your revenge."

"Damn right it is." Came Thomas's reply as he slowly dropped towards the Asylum.

Across the city, three shadows moved through Ruin's aftermath.

The diner was quiet when they arrived. Batman moved first, scanning the area with a silent sweep of his cowl’s sensors. Miss Martian floated beside him, eyes glowing faintly, searching for the trail.

Wonder Woman followed last, hand on her lasso, eyes narrowed.

“They were here,” Miss Martian said softly. “Both of them.”

Batman nodded. “The waitress saw a man leave in a rush. Covered in sweat. Looked sick.”

“Psychic energy residue is strange,” Miss Martian added. “Like it split here. One became two.”

Diana looked around. “So we’re not tracking a parasite inside a host anymore.”

“No,” Batman said. “We’re tracking two symbiotic identities.”

He turned toward the alley beside the diner. “Let’s keep moving. The imprint’s weak but traceable.”

Thomas crouched low at the edge of Arkham's main building roof as the security light passed by him.

Carnage’s voice returned. "What if Joker’s not even here?"

“Oh he is,” Thomas responded. “I feel his mind. This whole place stinks of it's rot.”

Carnage made a dry noise. "You’re guessing."

Thomas didn’t answer. Instead he excited his molecules and phased through the roof.

Back in Gotham’s east side, the League trio arrived at Thomas’s apartment.

The lock was untouched. The inside wasn’t.

The door creaked open as Batman entered first, followed by Diana. Miss Martian stopped at the threshold, her face tightening.

“Psychic afterimage... strong here,” she whispered. “This place was important to the host.”

Batman swept a flashlight over the floor. Furniture covered in dust. Footprints on the carpet. And in the hallway—black streaks leading to the bathroom.

He opened the door.

They all stopped.

The cocoon had split apart like a deflated lung—black and red fragments clinging to the inside of the tub, partially crystallized, partially organic.

“This is where it happened,” Miss Martian said through gritted teeth. “Where Ruin changed.”

Ruin, a single name was all she managed to get from J'onn's ruined mind.

Batman knelt, pulled a tool from his belt, and scraped a piece into a sample vial.

Diana stared down at it. “That thing was never just a parasite.”

“No,” Batman said. “It’s something new now.”

Miss Martian closed her eyes.

“Whatever it is… it’s learning fast.”

-0-

Arkham’s lower levels were colder than Thomas expected.

He moved silently through the ventilation shaft, suspended mid-air with the help of subtle telekinetic levitation. Carnage remained withdrawn, coiled beneath his skin like red wire under the surface.

They were deep in now. Beneath the visitor floors, below the staff areas. The main asylum gave way to secured superhuman containment—the real Arkham.

No alarms.

No sounds, just muffled voices and the distant pulse of flickering lights.

Thomas closed his eyes and reached out with his mind.

Telepathy had once been foreign. Now it responded to his will like a second pair of lungs. He could sense minds nearby—dozens—some loud and broken, others quiet and sharp. Many weren’t sane.

Green Martian memory fragments told him how to filter. He ignored surface noise. Focused on intention.

He scanned for cruelty.

That was the signal.

"You’re getting good at this," Carnage whispered inside him, already salivating.

“I’m getting used to it,” Thomas replied. “This body—Ruin gave it pieces of Martian DNA. I can feel it. Not just the strength, the telepathy. It’s deeper. Natural now.”

They passed over a guard station. Two guards sat beneath a hanging light, sipping coffee. Thomas felt their boredom, their detachment. Unimportant.

He floated onward.

Another floor down. Prisoners in locked rooms. Reinforced glass. Reinforced minds.

He paused. Reached deeper.

There.

Cell 4-C. Thomas focused. The man inside was smiling—thinking of what he’d do to his next victim if given a chance. Detailed thoughts. No guilt. No remorse.

Carnage stirred.

"That one?"

“Yeah,” Thomas said.

Carnage slid out like a ribbon of red muscle, dripping from his back and through the wall. There were no screams—just silence and a soft thud.

Then Carnage returned, licking blood off his teeth.

"That one tasted like rust and old cigarettes."

Thomas moved on.

Cell 5-F. Another one. This one had done worse. Deliberate. Repeating patterns of violence. Cold logic beneath insanity.

Thomas nodded once.

Carnage was gone again in an instant.

They continued deeper, the air growing heavier as the layout changed—stronger barriers, more psychic shielding.

Superhuman wing.

These weren’t the random killers. These were Batman’s rogues. Enhanced, mutated, or just too dangerous to be held anywhere else.

Thomas scanned again, slower this time. Minds in here weren’t always accessible. Some had blocks. Some twisted back when you probed. Others didn’t feel human at all. Even more were simply...broken.

Carnage hissed.

"We’re close."

“To what?”

"To someone useful."

Thomas paused in front of a vault-style door marked 6-Secured/Meta. The minds beyond this point weren’t all evil—but they were unstable. Some were dreaming. Others were broken. One or two were dangerous just by thinking too hard.

Thomas placed a hand on the door. Telekinesis coiled under his palm.

“We start here.”

He didn’t need to break the whole thing open.

Just slip through.

The wall rippled slightly as Thomas phased inside, pulling Carnage with him, their bodies shifting molecularly—another Martian trait inherited through Ruin’s old feeding.

Inside the wing, lights flickered overhead.

The cells weren’t labeled.

But the minds behind them pulsed with meaning.

Thomas whispered, “We take what we need. We leave the rest.”

Carnage grinned through his skin.

"I call dibs on anyone who thinks in screaming."

Thomas smiled faintly.

“Then start listening."

Arkham's quiet broke and Carnage descended.

The moment the Symbiote consumed Scarecrow and the Riddler, the balance shifted.

Thomas hadn’t expected Scarecrow, let alone The Riddler to go down so easily. He should’ve known better. The former's mind was too fractured to be useful and the latter was too gimmicky. 'Riddle me this' carried no weight to an uncaring Carnage who tore through both heads like wet paper.

Then came the Ventriloquist—less of a fight, more of a cleanup.

But the noise drew attention.

Rogues who usually stayed in their cells stepped into the halls.

Thomas stood still in the flickering light of the meta-secured wing. He counted six of them.

Poison Ivy.

King Shark.

Firefly.

Victor Zsasz.

Copperhead.

Killer Moth.

Not a lineup meant to fight side-by-side—but even fractured enemies were dangerous in numbers.

Carnage withdrew slightly beneath Thomas’s skin. Quiet for once. Focused.

“You’re not supposed to be here,” Ivy said first, eyes glowing faint green.

Thomas didn’t answer. He looked past her, toward the hallway leading deeper—where the Joker’s cell sat. He couldn’t get there without going through them.

“I don’t want to kill you,” he said simply. “I just want what’s past that hall.”

Zsasz stepped forward, blade in hand. “You killed Crane. The riddler too.”

“He was food,” Carnage muttered, partially surfacing. His presence was immediately taken as a threat.

Ivy’s vines slithered across the floor. “You should’ve left.”

Thomas didn’t move. “You should.”

They attacked together.

Ivy struck first—vines created from a few seeds whipping toward his legs. He dodged, countering with a wave of telekinesis that shattered nearby benches and sent debris into her face.

Firefly unveiled 2 spray cans and a burning match stick held by his teeth. He exhaled, releasing a stream of fire that splashed across Thomas’s side. It didn’t burn his skin too weak to be anything but a sad attempt, but it blinded his vision for a second.

Zsasz came in from the left—fast, stabbing with a shiv. Thomas caught his wrist and snapped it without hesitation.

Copperhead leapt from the ceiling. Thomas phased through her and slammed her into the ground with an invisible grip.

Then came King Shark.

Massive. Too fast for his size.

Thomas turned—hesitated.

He looked at Ivy for half a second. She wasn’t attacking anymore. She looked afraid.

He froze.

That was enough.

Shark clamped down on his shoulder and ripped.

The pain was instant. Flesh tore, muscle split, bone cracked.

"Motherfu- aaargh!"

Thomas screamed as blood sprayed across the wall.

Carnage reacted—exploding outward, forming a massive claw that shoved Shark into the ceiling.

Thomas stumbled back, arm hanging, still healing. But lesson learned.

No more hesitation.

No more empathy.

"Carnage...give them hell."

Cackling in insanity, Carnage took over mid-swing, cleaving Firefly in half with a bladed tendril. Moth tried to run—Thomas threw him into the wall with a kinetic burst that flattened him.

Zsasz got up. Carnage didn’t give him the chance to speak.

Three tendrils. Three holes.

Dead.

Only Ivy remained. She backed away slowly.

Thomas limped toward her.

“You taught me something valuable. That's the only reason I'm letting you live.” he said. “Now go. You don’t want to see what comes next.”

She did.

Alarms began to ring overhead. Red lights flashed.

Security was on its way.

Thomas didn’t care and Carnage was too busy munching on heads.

-0-

The hallway beyond was empty. Carnage coiled around his wounded shoulder, helping reinforce the healing process.

They reached the end of the hall. One final door.

Steel. Reinforced.

Thomas phased them through.

Inside, the Joker sat alone.

He wasn’t restrained.

He sat cross-legged, grinning. Waiting.

Thomas stepped in.

The door was sealed behind him. No escape

“Hello,” Joker said. “New face. New smell. Old blood.”

Thomas didn’t speak. He reached forward with his mind, brushing against Joker’s thoughts.

And recoiled instantly.

He fell to his knees and vomited on the floor.

Carnage shuddered. Even he didn’t want to touch what was in there.

The Joker chuckled.

“That bad?”

Thomas stood.

“Batman should have snapped your head a long time ago, you sick bastard.”

He walked forward.

Joker didn’t move.

“You’re not going to talk me down? To beg for your pathetic life.”

“I’m curious,” Joker said. “But I’ve never been one for final words. We both know how this ends. One last thing though, Batsy will be upseeeet...hihihihihehehehahahaha!”

Carnage surged forward from Thomas’s back—tendrils expanding into a wide, jagged maw.

Thomas didn’t stop him.

Joker’s head was gone in one bite.

Blood hit the wall.

The body crumpled.

And just as the last twitch left Joker’s fingers, the door behind them blew open.

Batman. Miss Martian. Wonder Woman.

Too late.

Thomas stood over the corpse.

Carnage licked his teeth clean and looked at them.

“Speak of the devil...and he appears.”