WARNING: The following article contains spoilers for Absolute Carnage #2 by Donny Cates, Ryan Stegman, JP Mayer, Frank Martin and Clayton Cowles, in stores now.
When Donny Cates and Ryan Stegman took the helm of the Venom title, they turned Eddie Brock's life upside down. The comic series altered the character's relationship with the symbiote, revealed the hidden origin of the Klyntar and their god Knull and introduced Dylan Brock. When Dylan was introduced, he was believed to be Eddie's step brother. However, Venom later revealed he was actually Eddie's son. His mother, Anne Weying (Eddie's ex who is now deceased), apparently kept him a secret all this time and left the boy in the care of Eddie's father, Carl.
Since finding out about Dylan, Eddie has kept his son at his side. While Dylan doesn't know the truth about who he is yet, Eddie intends to keep him safe at all costs. However, in a recent interview, Cates and Stegman hinted that Dylan may not exactly be Eddie's son, but rather a product of the Venom symbiote. While the tease was cryptic, Absolute Carnage #2 finally reveals the truth about Dylan Brock.
As Venom and Spider-Man set out to collect Norman Osborn from the Ravencroft Institute in Absolute Carnage #1, Eddie left Dylan in the care of the Maker, who has built a machine he plans on using to safely retrieve the codex from anyone who has bonded with a symbiote before. As we know, Carnage is currently looking to collect all of these codexes -- the trace amounts of symbiote left behind in a host -- in order to wake the all-powerful Knull. If the Maker can remove the codexes before Carnage gets to them, they can stop his plan to destroy, well, everything.
Now, after the Ravencroft mission goes all sorts of wrong, Eddie gets a call from the Maker. He explains that after quickly hacking the FBI database, he discovered that Anne Weying's body was not in Carnage's mass grave from Issue #1. This is surprising to say the least, because since she had a stint as She-Venom, her body should have a codex for Carnage to claim. But her body is not among those Carnage has gone after -- and the Maker believes he knows why.
The mad scientist explains that Dylan is the codex that was once inside Anne. Somehow, she passed it down to him, which means that now Dylan is a target. It's unclear how exactly this may have happened, but it appears as if the codex manifested itself into a pregnancy. We know from previous issues that symbiotes are able to take on the appearance of a human, as was the case with Eddie's friend and mentor, Rex.
However, Dylan doesn't know the truth about himself yet. He believes he's just a human, but the truth is he's a symbiote, a codex given life. And he might be the final piece of the puzzle for Carnage to collect before he wakes his god. Now, the stakes have become even higher. The fight against Carnage has been bad from the start. Now, it just got personal.