Everything changed after the Doverton disaster. The town was saved, but just barely. And Cletus Kasady, the monster behind it all, was locked away once again—this time in the high-security prison known as Ravencroft.
He was kept in a special cell, designed just for him. It held him suspended in the air, his arms and legs restrained. No ground to touch, no shadows to hide in, no chance for the Carnage symbiote to find him again.
He just hung there—silent, watching, waiting.
But trouble always finds Cletus Kasady.
One night, Ravencroft shook as alarms blared and red lights flashed through the halls. The prison was under attack.
The attackers were part of a deadly alien species known as the Poisons—creatures that could bond with symbiotes, consume them, and control both the host and the symbiote completely. They were hunting for more power.
Poison Hive had come to Ravencroft.
Cletus looked up as three figures entered his chamber—twisted versions of people once known on Earth.
Poison Morbius, with glowing white eyes and sharp fangs.
Poison Kraven, still wearing his hunter's vest, but now barely human.
And Poison Lady Deathstrike, her claws longer and sharper than ever.
They floated above him, staring.
"You still want to be Carnage, Cletus?" Poison Morbius hissed. "You still want the power to kill… to burn the world?"
Kasady smiled. His eyes lit up with madness.
"You know me too well," he rasped.
The Poisons cut him free and brought him aboard their massive flagship, hidden in orbit above Earth.
There, they made him an offer.
"Join us," Lady Deathstrike said. "Become Carnage again—stronger than before. With us, you won't just destroy a town... you'll devour worlds."
Cletus Kasady didn't hesitate.
He laughed that awful, bone-chilling laugh and said,
"Let's paint the stars red."
—
But things didn't go the way Cletus Kasady had hoped.
Instead of giving him back the original Carnage symbiote, the Poisons used him as a test subject.
They bonded him to a new, unstable symbiote—one that his body, already tainted by the remains of Carnage in his blood, tried desperately to reject.
The result was agony.
Cletus screamed for hours, his veins burning as the two alien forces inside him battled for control. It felt like his bones were melting, like his skin was being torn apart from the inside.
Poison Doom, the cold, calculating leader of the Hive, watched from behind a reinforced glass wall. He believed Cletus would either become the ultimate weapon—or die during the process.
But something strange happened.
Even in all that pain… Cletus didn't break.
His mind—twisted and full of rage—managed to resist being fully taken over. He let the Poisons believe he was theirs, that he was now Poison Carnage, a loyal servant of the Hive.
But deep inside, Cletus was still in control.
And he was waiting.
It didn't take long before Poison Carnage turned on the Hive. He broke free and launched a brutal attack on Venom and Spider-Man, who had tracked the Poisons across dimensions.
The fight was savage.
He almost decapitated Venom, slashing deep with blades made of living alien matter. Then he turned on Spider-Man, catching him mid-swing and impaling him through the chest with a jagged spike.
But even in the face of death, the two heroes didn't give up.
With their final strength, Venom and Spider-Man worked together to toss Poison Carnage into space, throwing him out of the ship and sending him crashing toward Earth like a meteor.
As Cletus fell, gravity pulling him faster and faster, the last pieces of the original Carnage symbiote—still hidden inside his body—emerged, trying to protect him.
The flames of atmospheric reentry tore through it. The symbiote burned away, piece by piece, leaving only a charred, broken body to crash deep into the desert below.
Hours passed.
The wind howled across the empty sands. Then—among the rocks of a desert cave—a low groan echoed.
"So… much… pain…" Cletus whispered, his voice barely more than a breath.
His body was burned, shattered, and barely alive. But his mind, filled with hatred, still clung to life.
He dragged himself deeper into the cave… but it was no use.
His wounds were too severe. His strength was gone. And the Carnage symbiote… was no more.
For the first time in a long time, Cletus Kasady was truly alone.
And then—quietly, in the heat of the desert sun—he died.
But death was not the end for Cletus Kasady.
His burned, lifeless body was found in the middle of the desert by the Cult of Knull—a secret group of fanatics who worshipped the God of the Symbiotes, the ancient dark being known as Knull.
The cult was led by Scorn, once a human bonded to a symbiote, now corrupted beyond saving. Her eyes glowed with madness, her skin twisted with dark tendrils, and her mind fully loyal to Knull.
They carried Cletus's body deep into an underground temple, carved from black stone and filled with strange runes. There, lit by flickering red candles, the cult began their ritual.
A hooded figure stepped forward, kneeling beside the charred corpse.
"The ritual is ready, friend," he said with a cold smile. "Let us make you a vessel… for the Great Devourer."
From the shadows, Scorn revealed their most dangerous weapon—a stolen sample of the Grendel symbiote, the primordial piece of Knull himself, taken from the Maker's Project Oversight lab. This was no ordinary symbiote. It was old. Angry. Hungry.
Scorn placed the piece onto Cletus's chest.
The black goo slithered, then struck like a snake—burrowing into his flesh, wrapping around his bones, crawling through every inch of his body.
Cletus's eyes snapped open as the pain hit him.
He arched off the stone altar, body twitching as psychic screams echoed in his head—Knull's voice, deep and powerful, trying to take control.
"You… belong… to me..." the god whispered in his mind.
"Fight… must… fight..." Cletus growled through broken teeth, his body jerking violently as the Grendel symbiote fused with him, refusing to let go.
The agony was worse than anything he had ever felt—even worse than when he became Carnage. But through the pain, Cletus fought back, struggling to keep his identity from being swallowed.
His skin reformed in patches of black and red. His heart, long dead, began to beat once more. But this was no miracle. This was unholy resurrection.
He was no longer human.
No longer just Carnage.
He was now something more—and something worse.
Cletus Kasady, reanimated by the Grendel symbiote, was now psychically linked to Knull himself. And while his body served the god's dark purpose, his mind refused to kneel.
A silent war had begun—inside his own head.
"Embrace your destiny!" Scorn cried, raising her arms toward the shadows above. "Submit to the dark god! Let Knull take you!"
But Cletus Kasady was never one to submit.
With an inhuman, bone-chilling howl, Cletus tore free from the altar. His tendrils lashed out like serpents, ripping through stone and cultists alike.
Then—with a savage snarl—he grabbed Scorn by the spine, yanking her into the air and using her like a weapon, her body limp in his grip.
Memories flooded him—his past as Carnage, the blood, the chaos, the purpose. The bonding with the symbiote had brought it all rushing back. The pain, the glory, the freedom.
His voice echoed through the dark chamber like thunder:
"I… AM… CARNAGE!"
The Grendel symbiote, reacting to his will, twisted and burned bright crimson, reshaping itself to match the familiar, terrifying form of Carnage—but stronger, older, and far more deadly.
He turned to the trembling cultists.
"You dare defy me?" he roared, rising high above them, his new form glowing with pulsing veins of red and black. "I am the chosen vessel, not your puppet!"
The cult dropped to their knees, silent, broken, obedient. Scorn's crushed body hit the ground with a sickening thud.
From that moment forward, Cletus Kasady—Dark Carnage—assumed command of the Cult of Knull.