Manhattan, New York.
Old York’s Pizzeria was packed.
Customers crowded the tables inside, while a steady stream of people waited near the entrance for takeout orders.
The little neighborhood pizza place was doing so much business that the staff barely had time to breathe.
A handsome young man with black hair and dark eyes squeezed through the crowd carrying a towering stack of pizza boxes.
Once outside, he hurried over to a delivery motorcycle and loaded them into the insulated box mounted behind the seat.
“Whew.
Guess too much business can be a problem too.” Leon Carter looked back at the packed restaurant and smiled.
The place hadn’t always been like this.
In fact, turning Old York’s Pizzeria around had been something of a birthday present from Leon to Ben York.
Years ago, the restaurant’s business had been miserable.
The pizza had possessed a flavor so uniquely terrible that Leon sometimes wondered whether Ben had been actively trying to drive customers away.
Leon owed the old man his life, though, so he’d refused to watch the place slowly die.
Drawing on what he remembered from his previous life, he’d experimented with recipes again and again—adjusting the dough, sauce, cheese, baking times, and everything else he could think of.
Eventually, Old York’s Pizzeria had gone from a nearly empty neighborhood shop to the thriving restaurant it was today.
And when Leon thought about everything Ben had done for him, improving a pizza recipe hardly seemed like much of a repayment.
Four years ago, Leon hadn’t even belonged to this world.
In his previous life, he’d been a chronically ill orphan.
The orphanage had been his entire world.
He’d grown up being cared for there, and once he was old enough, he’d started helping look after the younger children himself.
From childhood to the end of his short life, nearly every memory he treasured was connected to that place.
Then, on his eighteenth birthday, his body finally lost its battle against the illness that had plagued him for years.
Late that night, curled beneath his blankets and wracked with pain, Leon stopped breathing.
He’d thought that was the end.
Instead, he opened his eyes again.
He was somewhere completely unfamiliar.
His body had changed.
He looked different, and physically, he’d somehow become a thirteen- or fourteen-year-old boy again.
Leon hadn’t understood how any of it was possible.
He hadn’t particularly cared, either.
After spending eighteen years trapped in a body that could fail him at any moment, simply being able to breathe without pain had felt like a miracle.
There was only one major problem.
He had no memories belonging to the body he’d awakened in.
When he’d first regained consciousness, fragments of unfamiliar memories had flashed through his mind like streaks of light, accompanied by a headache so severe that he’d nearly blacked out again.
By the time the pain faded, so had those memories.
All Leon knew was that somehow, impossibly, he’d received a second life in someone else’s body.
No family.
No identification.
No money.
No idea where he was supposed to go.
He’d wandered through the chilly early-autumn streets until exhaustion and exposure finally caught up with him.
If Ben York hadn’t found him unconscious with a raging fever and taken him home, Leon’s miraculous second life probably would have lasted only a few days.
He might have ended up as a frozen corpse beside some filthy dumpster.
“Hey, kid!” A rough voice snapped Leon back to the present.
“How many times have I told you not to load that many pizzas at once?
You’re going to get yourself killed riding around like that!” Leon turned.
A thin older man in an apron was forcing his way through the crowd near the restaurant entrance, looking irritated enough to personally declare war on the motorcycle.
Benjamin York.
Ben marched straight over and opened the delivery box without even asking.
Leon sighed and lowered the kickstand he’d just flipped up.
“My riding is fine,” Leon said.
“And if I take a few extra orders, that’s one less trip.
Higher efficiency, less wasted time.
Everybody wins.” “Young people.” Ben pulled one order out of the box and glared at him with sharp blue eyes.
“Reckless and convinced they’re immortal.” Leon smiled.
Ben wasn’t finished.
“When I was in my twenties, I knew a guy who thought he was some kind of motorcycle genius.
And let me tell you, bikes forty years ago weren’t what they are now.” He removed another pizza.
“This idiot was just as confident as you.
One motorcycle, three girls.
One squeezed in front, two hanging on behind him.” Leon blinked.
Then his grin widened.
“Wow.
How many did you have?” Ben kicked him lightly in the shin.
“Don’t interrupt me, smart-ass!
I’m trying to teach you something.” Leon laughed.
“Sure sounds impressive, doesn’t it?” Ben continued.
“One guy, three girls, riding around like he owned the road.” He paused.
“Five minutes later, all four of them were dead.” Leon stared at him.
“What?” “Too much weight.
He lost control going into a turn, went straight off the road, over a cliff, and into the ocean.” Ben shut the insulated box now that he’d reduced its contents to what he considered a reasonable load.
“Bastard had borrowed fifty bucks from me for motorcycle parts, too.
Never got that money back.” Leon needed a second to recover from the abrupt ending.
Then he frowned at the box.
“Three people weigh a lot more than a few pizzas.” Ben slapped him on the back.
“An accident doesn’t care whether you’re carrying people or pepperoni.
Overload the bike and you’ve created a risk.
Doesn’t matter if you’re only over by the weight of a beer.” Leon opened his mouth.
Ben’s expression told him not to bother.
“Fine.” He climbed onto the motorcycle.
The engine came alive with an eager growl.
“And your helmet!” Leon froze.
Ben’s gravelly voice had come from right beside him.
Without arguing, Leon grabbed the helmet and pulled it on.
Then he looked back at Ben and waited.
Ben gave him another once-over, apparently conducting his final preflight inspection.
Eventually, he nodded.
“All right.
Go.” Leon reached for the throttle.
“And don’t rush.
Nobody needs a pizza badly enough for you to break your neck getting it there.
Take your time.
Safety first.” Leon waved a hand.
“I know, Ben.
Get back inside before the place burns down.” He twisted the throttle and pulled away toward his first delivery.
Ben stood there watching until the motorcycle disappeared around the corner.
Only then did the old man’s usually stern face soften into a small smile.
The two of them had depended on each other for years.
Whatever they’d started as, they had long since become family.
Ben had given Leon a second chance at life when he’d had absolutely nothing.
And Leon, in return, had given Ben something the older man had barely known existed.
A home that actually felt like one.
Family had never been much of a concept in Ben’s childhood.
The woman who’d raised him had spent most of her life drowning in drugs.
As far as Ben could remember, his usefulness around the house—cleaning, carrying things, handling odd jobs—might have been the only reason she hadn’t sold him for drug money.
Eventually, even that protection had stopped feeling reliable.
As her money dried up, she’d begun looking at him differently.
Not like a child.
Like merchandise.
Ben had noticed.
One night, he ran.
Those few miserable years were nearly the entirety of his experience with family before Leon entered his life.
Sometimes Ben wondered whether Leon was the answer to the birthday wish he’d made with a cheap lighter when he was ten years old.
If so, whoever was responsible had taken more than fifty years to deliver.
Ben watched the empty street for another moment before heading back inside.
He needed to hire a few more delivery drivers.
Leon would be starting college soon, and there was no way Ben was letting the kid sacrifice his studies just so the restaurant could save a few dollars in wages.
Leon had been one of the best students in his school throughout high school.
Now that he was entering college, Ben wanted him focusing on classes—and, if possible, developing something resembling a social life.
Ever since his rebirth, Leon hadn’t only gained a healthy body.
His mind seemed sharper too.
Learning came almost effortlessly to him.
He absorbed new concepts quickly, understood complicated subjects with startling ease, and had spent years at the top of his class.
Leon himself had no explanation for the change.
The best theory he’d come up with was that whatever had happened to him during his rebirth had strengthened his mind along with giving him another chance at life.
Whatever the reason, Ben couldn’t have been prouder.
Unfortunately, that pride was apparently visible.
One of the younger employees glanced over while preparing dough and quietly wondered why the notoriously grouchy old man looked so happy.
Had somebody introduced Ben to a woman his age?
Was the old tree finally blooming?
“Hey!” Ben’s roar detonated beside him.
“What the hell are you daydreaming about?!” The apprentice nearly jumped out of his skin.
Ben jabbed a finger toward the oven.
“That pizza is darker than your grandma’s bathroom towel!” The young man spun around.
Smoke was rising from the oven.
“Oh, crap!” He hurried to pull out the thoroughly burned pizza while apologizing over and over.
Ben followed him the entire way.
“I’m taking that crust out of your paycheck!
Pay attention, kid!
Making pizza isn’t something you can half-ass while your brain’s on vacation!” The apprentice nodded frantically.
“Yes, sir.” “If you’re going to keep working like this, get the hell out of my kitchen and go waste somebody else’s time!” “Yes, sir!” Ben continued grumbling while the apprentice hurried back to the dough station.
Strangely, the young man felt much better.
For a few minutes there, Ben smiling peacefully had been deeply unsettling.
This was normal.
This was the Ben York he knew.
The apprentice’s hands settled into a comfortable rhythm as he began kneading another batch of dough.
That’s more like it.
Don’t stop.
Keep yelling.
Because of that, characters and events may not follow the MCU timeline exactly.
There is no system.
Leon Carter will grow stronger through his bond with Venom, scientific research, combat experience, evolution, and the consequences of the choices he makes.
He will not begin the story as an unstoppable god.
This is primarily a weak-to-strong progression story with action, adventure, science, superheroes, antihero elements, comedy, and romance.
There is one main romantic heroine: Felicia Hardy.
The relationship between Leon and Venom is one of the central parts of the story.
Venom is not simply a power or suit—it has its own personality, opinions, appetite, and increasingly questionable ideas.
Expect the story to begin relatively grounded in New York before gradually expanding into larger conflicts involving heroes, villains, mutants, magic, alternate realities, and eventually threats far beyond Earth.
Most importantly, this is an AU.
Some familiar Marvel events will happen differently because Leon Carter was never supposed to exist in this universe.
And his bond with Venom changes far more than either of them realizes.
Enjoy the story.