[ 'What if'. Those questions are apt, and the concerns are founded upon a groundwork of bad luck and left turns that would need millions of black cats and years of walking under ladders to replicate.

But Venom is... well, he's Venom. His 'what if's are gentle hallucinations and phantom pains (drink for the use for the game title), and they've always been speculations that he's had to walk away from, head held, horn bleeding. ]

No. This isn't how we'll end.

[ He says so with conviction, with the steady gravitas of someone who has nothing at all left in him to lose but his principles. The same quiet strength that Venom displays in times of mourning, because he differs from Big Boss so starkly with respect to where he digs his heels and stays upright: Venom is strongest when people need him. His morale, his presence. ]

I've made too many promises to think otherwise.

[ "Plant your roots in me. I won't see you end as ashes."

"Another mission, right, Boss?"

He turns to Kaz, features hardened but compassionate. It's fine for his XO to have his misgivings, but it's his duty to his friend as his CO, as his bolster, not to waver. ]

You're gonna have to stick with me until I take us home.