Carnage USA #4
Oh Say Can You Scream!
The town of Doverton, Colorado has been taken over by Carnage who has enslaved most of its citizens. At the Ralsby Family Estate, Spider-Man rallies the few citizens who remain free. The estate had a private zoo that has provided them with enough tranquilizers that Spider-Man thinks they can stop Carnage. During his speech, the web-slinger is distracted by a gorilla that wanders over. The locals scare it off and he watches as the animals run out of the broken gate and worries that this might be a problem later.
In town, Mercury Team — a Special Forces unit enhanced by symbiotes of their own — clash with the citizens of Doverton who are being forced to attack them by Cletus Kasady. Luckily, the Carnage symbiote makes the people bulletproof, allowing the soldiers to open fire upon them. Inside the Last Chance Church, Kasady tries to think about what to do next but can’t get his thoughts together because 7-year-old Cole Morrell and his baby sister keep crying. Their mother, Hannah, is happy that help has finally arrived. Eventually, Carnage has had enough and he emerges from the church with the Avengers that he has under his control.
Finding themselves outmatched, Mercury Team’s leader Marcus Simms radios to Tanis Nieves, aka Scorn, who remained behind at the Ralsby Meatpacking Planet. There here techno-organic symbiote has been cannibalizing the equipment there to fashion into weapons. Tanis ignores Simms’ radio distress call as her symbiote assures her that she is doing the right thing.
As things start looking bleak in town when suddenly Spider-Man and his team of locals arrive. They lob Molotov cocktails as those possessed by the Carnage symbiote at bay. While Spider-Man attacks Carnage, he tells Eric Morrell to head into the church to rescue his family. He struggles to get the Carnage symbiote’s tendrils off his wife as they slowly choke her. Back outside, Spider-Man is not faring very well against Carnage either until someone strikes his foe in the back with a sonic grenade. The shooter is none other than Agent Venom.[1] Thanks to Agent Venom’s intervention, Eric Morrell is able to pull his wife free from the symbiote.
Back outside, Agent Venom blasts Carnage with another grenade and its sonic shrapnel begins weakening him. This also beings loosening his hold on the townspeople and the Avengers. However, when Agent Venom puts a gun in Cletus’s mouth, Spider-Man stops him because he won’t allow anyone to die — not even Carnage. This allows Carnage to regain control of his symbiote. That’s when Scorn arrives in a souped-up bulldozer and rams into both Carnage and Agent Venom. When Marcus asks what took her so long, the Scorn symbiote responds that it needed some time. He drives its two prisoners back to the meatpacking plant where she has set up a device to separate Carnage from his symbiote and contain it.
The plan works, and everyone is freed from Carnage’s control. However, in the process of containing Cletus Kasady, she has also trapped Flash Thomspon, aka Agent Venom, in the containment unit with him. Since Flash has no legs without his symbiote, he is at Kasady’s mercy.[2] With a broken piece of glass in hand, Cletus asks Flash what happened to his legs.
Recurring Characters
Carnage, Agent Venom, New Avengers (Spider-Man, Wolverine, Thing), Captain America, Hawkeye, Scorn, Mercury Team (Marcus Simms, Lasher, Riot, Agony, Phage), Spider-Doppelganger, Eric Morrell, Hannah Morrell, Cole Morrell
Continuity Notes
Spider-Man doesn’t recognize Agent Venom even though the two crossed paths in Venom (vol. 2) #2. At the time, the Venom symbiote assumed it’s the original form and attacked the web-slinger, hence why he doesn’t recognize him here.
Flash Thompson lost his legs in combat while on a tour of duty with the military. See Amazing Spider-Man #574.
