Absolute Symbiote Chapter 11.

Chapter 11: The Jungle Secrets.

(Thomas' P.O.V)

Three days since the mudball incident.

Three days of stall cleaning, animal hunting at night, and whispering "please hurry the hell up" to Carnage every time I felt him twitch in my bloodstream.

Right now? I was crouched over the corpse of a knock off Hydra, a two-headed snake the size of the biggest horse in the stables, covered in dirt and still steaming from the beating I gave it.

I pressed my hand against both heads and let the neural energy pour into me.

The rush hit instantly—like someone plugged me into a socket and whispered "shut up and evolve." Muscles buzzed. Thoughts sharpened. Light bent around my skin.

And then I was gone.

Not me, but visibility. My body shimmered and disappeared.

“Well, hello again, Martian party tricks,” I said under my breath, moving my invisible and intangible hand through the rough bark of a tree.

Invisibility and Intangibility were back.

I grinned as my outline flickered back in with a thought and the vindication of two heads are indeed better than one.

On top of that, I could feel Carnage getting close to digesting the Flash’s powers. Speed, reaction time, temporal perception. All of it cooking in the red goo oven that lived inside me.

Soon.

Soon, I’d be faster than anyone who’d ever tried to punch me in the face.

But then I heard it—low, rhythmic, steady.

Drums.

From the moon lit jungle around me.

I paused, eyes narrowing, and went invisible again on instinct. Then I levitated myself and the still-warm snake corpse up to a thick tree branch. Higher ground. Better view. Cleaner exit if things got ugly.

I hung there in the shadows like a spider, waiting.

And sure enough… torchlight.

A procession.

Hooded figures, about a dozen of them, moving in a slow, deliberate march through the trees. All Amazons. Their footsteps barely made a sound, but the beat of the drums seemed to follow them like a heartbeat.

And at the front?

Silver hair. Regal posture. Wrapped in ceremonial cloth that shimmered like woven starlight.

Themiscyra’s High Priestess.

So, not a random forest stroll.

I reached out with my telepathy to get a read.

Nothing.

No surface thoughts. No static. No resistance.

Just… blank.

Like they weren’t even there.

That wasn’t normal. Even when someone had strong mental shields like Artemis, I could still feel the edges—the outline of a mind rejecting me.

But these women were ghosts.

And that energy surrounding them—faint, but familiar.

It buzzed in my skull like static from Diana’s lasso. The same hum I’d picked up from some of the weirder creatures I’d absorbed on the island.

Magic.

Old, subtle, invasive energy. The kind that didn’t care what species you were. The kind that rewrote rules without asking.

I started to back off. No need to stick around and tempt divine wrath.

Then I heard it.

A cry.

A baby’s cry.

I froze.

Down below, one of the hooded figures cradled something small and wrapped in deep violet cloth.

An infant.

I couldn’t see much even with the pale light—just soft movements. But it was real. Alive. And crying.

My brain switched gears immediately.

What the hell were a bunch of torch-carrying, magic-cloaked Amazons doing walking through the jungle with a literal newborn?

Worship? Sacrifice? Ritual?

I didn’t know. But now I needed to. Remnants of fatherly instincts from the man I was before, be blamed.

I kept my invisibility tight and silently drifted along the trees above them.

Perfectly hidden. Always quiet.

Just another night in paradise.

Unaware they were being tracked, they moved like shadows. Silent except for the slow tempo of the drums.

I kept my distance, high above them in the trees, snake corpse discarded and mind swirling with too many questions.

Eventually, the path curved into the side of a mountain—dense vines, slippery rocks, steep terrain. Nothing I couldn’t handle.

Then we reached it.

A massive waterfall poured out of the cliffside, roaring with the kind of noise that drowns out thought. The procession halted.

The High Priestess stepped forward, raised her hands, and whispered something—barely audible beneath the thunder of falling water.

But it didn’t matter what she said. The moment the last syllable left her mouth, the waterfall split like it had been waiting for her command.

The curtain of water parted clean down the middle, revealing a narrow, dark tunnel carved into the mountain.

They walked inside like they’d done it a thousand times.

And then—just like that—the waterfall closed again.

I hovered there, still invisible, staring.

Alright. Challenge accepted.

I drifted toward the cascade, holding my breath more out of habit than need. The moment my invisible body touched the water—

Thunk.

Like hitting glass.

I floated back, rubbing my shoulder. Not just water. Magic. A barrier layered so thick even my intangibility couldn’t slip past it.

I scanned the area. No alternate entrances. No pressure plates or secret switches. Just jungle, stone, and moonlight.

So I improvised.

If I couldn’t go through, I’d go under.

I dropped straight down and phased into the riverbed below. Water rushed above as I sank into dirt and rock, moving through compact soil like a ghost on autopilot.

Blind. No eyes. No light. Just feel.

But I wasn’t navigating by sight. I was tracking the baby.

Even a newborn has thoughts. Faint. Fragmented. But they shine in a psychic’s mind like a match in a dark room.

I locked onto the heightened emotions—fear, hunger, confusion—and used it like a beacon.

Ten meters in.

Fifteen.

Stone turned to smooth wall.

Then—open space.

I emerged from the earth inside a wide underground chamber.

I didn’t move.

Didn’t breathe.

The place was quiet. Reverent.

At the center stood an altar carved from dark stone, worn with time and soaked in meaning. I hovered behind a thick stone pillar, still invisible.

The Amazons were gathered around in a circle, cloaks pulled low. The High Priestess stood closest to the altar. Her voice hummed low, rhythmic.

In her hands, the baby squirmed.

Above, a shaft of moonlight streamed in through a circular opening in the ceiling. Natural spotlight. Convenient for rituals.

That’s when I noticed it.

The altar wasn’t just stained.

It was caked in dried blood. Blackened trails dripping down the altar's stone steps. Bone fragments littered the base. Not animal. Too small.

I’d seen death. I’d been death.

But this?

This was something else.

The drums stopped.

A second Amazon stepped forward. I recognized her by the scar on her wrist—one of the Ares' guards under Artemis. She handed over a ceremonial dagger. Curved. Silver.

The High Priestess raised it.

Then came the haunting words:

“Under the light of the Goddess of the Blessed Moon, we offer this new male soul to our beloved patrons—Hera, Hecate, and Athena. May their divine grace continue shielding the island from the evils of man’s world.”

My heart slowed. My grip tightened. My mouth tasted bitter.

I knew what this was now.

This wasn’t pageantry.

This was a sacrifice.

The baby started to cry.

Soft at first. Then louder.

The kind of sound that grabs your spine and makes it clench.

I could feel the child’s terror like it was my own. The confusion. The sheer wrongness of what was about to happen.

It sickened me.

Logic told me to stay hidden.

Let it play out. Walk away.

This wasn’t my fight.

But then again…

Neither was Arkham.

And I still destroyed it.

“Fuck it,” my voice sounded hard to my ears.

The blade came down.

I thrust out my hand—telekinesizing like a whip.

The knife jerked off-course, just inches before the baby’s chest. It sank into the High Priestess’s thigh instead.

She screamed—loud, raw, full of disbelief.

Chaos.

Gasps. Shouts. Movement.

I was already gone.

I phased through the ground again—slipping beneath the altar and coming up through the stone like a ghost made of rage.

Hands out. I reached for the baby and yanked him through the rock with me before anyone noticed.

Stone rippled around us.

Then I turned my attention upward, focused on the moonlit opening above—and detonated a blast of telekinesis.

The ceiling cracked. Then split. Then fell.

Massive chunks of rock rained down as the women screamed, diving out of the way.

I didn’t wait to see the outcome.

I phased through the floor, baby in hand, vanishing into the earth below.

My heart was pounding.

Not from fear. Not exactly.

More like the realization that I had just crossed a line. A big one.

This was supposed to be simple. Lie low. Recover. Keep my head down until my mental landscape rebuilt itself—or until Diana’s situation with the League boiled over. Whichever came first.

Then I’d vanish. Quiet. Clean. No mess. No goodbyes.

But now?

I’d just stabbed a High Priestess with her own ritual knife and leveled a chunk of sacred cave ceiling while abducting an infant sacrifice.

Yeah. That plan? Dead on arrival.

The Amazons weren’t just going to be mad.

They were going to go full Wrath-of-the-Goddesses on me.

I sank deeper into the ground, gripping the baby tight against my chest. He had gone quiet again, heart rate steady now, mind still humming faintly against my psionic senses. Like he knew I wasn’t going to leave him in the darkness to be crushed against the soil.

Smart kid.

I kept phasing, deeper and deeper, just to put distance between me and that damn blood altar.

Then the ground beneath me changed.

Cooler. Wet.

I phased out without thinking and landed with a splash.

I’d emerged inside an underground cave—wide, echoing, filled with ankle-deep water, reflecting the faint glow of teal-blue crystals hanging like chandeliers from the cave ceiling.

I blinked.

“…Okay, definitely phased too deep.”

The air was damp and heavy, but still breathable. The walls shimmered faintly from the crystal light, casting long shadows across the uneven rock.

The baby stirred in my arms, cooing quietly like this was just another day in babyland.

His blue eyes locked on mine, curious now. No panic. No fear.

Just that dumb newborn calm like, “Oh hey, you’re still here. Cool.”

I exhaled, sitting carefully on a dry patch of stone. “What am I supposed to do with you?”

He responded by peeing on me.

Through the blanket.

Of course he did.

I stared down at the spreading wet spot on my tunic and sighed. “You know, it’s a good thing you’re cute.”

The baby giggled—a toothless, gurgling laugh.

“Great. First thing on the list: diaper. Second thing on the list: find a damn list.”

I considered ripping off part of my shirt. The material was rough, but it’d do. Not like Themiscyra had a diaper aisle or a supply chain.

I reached for my tunic—

Then froze.

My instincts screamed.

Move.

I jumped backward just in time for a thick, scaled tail to slam into the spot where I’d been crouching, cracking the stone with enough force it exploded into shards and dust.

Water splashed.

The baby shrieked in my arms.

But my focus was elsewhere. From the shadows, a form slithered into the light.

Long. Massive. Reptilian.

Another snake.

This time, five heads emerged from the gloom, each twisting and hissing in sync. Blue-green scales shimmered under the crystal light, covered in a sheen of almost visible magic energy. Fangs bared. Eyes like polished obsidian, all five pairs locked right onto me.

Not a knock off Hydra, this was over half of one. And probably much deadlier than the one I'd killed.

The baby cried louder.

“Yeah, kid,” I muttered, backing up, “I’m not thrilled either.”

Kinda. I mean...if two heads gave me enough neural energy to recover 2 lost abilities, what about 5? Assuming we didn't horribly die.

The heads flared out like a hydra, each one licking the air with a forked tongue.

It didn’t attack.

Yet.

But it was sizing us up. Calculating. Just as I was. There was still a chance to phase out of it's Den but then I'd lose out on the perfect prey.

That said, I was far from a hunting state—half my abilities gimped from psionic overload, holding a peeing newborn, standing ankle-deep in a forgotten death cave, staring down a five-headed snake from Greek mythology’s reject bin.

“Awesome,” I said out loud. “Because this night wasn’t hard enough.”

I lowered into a defensive crouch, one arm keeping the kid secure, the other crackling with low-level telekinesis.

No running.

If this thing wanted a fight, I was giving it death.