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Meridius is a major antagonist in the Marvel Universe, serving as the main antagonist of the 2021 Venom series and the Venom War Event. He is a future iteration of the codex of Eddie Brock strapped in the Symbiote Hive-Mind in a paradoxal timeloop, in which Eddie will go through five iterations before Eddie ultimately becomes him.
He has an intense grudge and hatred against Eddie Brock and his other past iterations for condemning him at the timeloop and wants to corrupt the Venom Symbiote to prevent himself from becoming the final future iteration of Eddie Brock, the Eventuality.
Biography
Preface
Meridius is a future iteration of Eddie Brock that have gone through five previous in a timeloop perpetuated by himself. Eddie would be stranded into the Garden of Time and become Finnegan, Bedlam, Wilde, Tyro and then Meridius. However, Meridius isn't really the last iteration, but Eventuality, a cosmic caretaker of the Multiverse. Rejecting this fate, Meridius (as Tyro) decided to do everything he could in order to escape.
Past iterations
King in Black
Following Eddie's rise as the King in Black, he would receive a cryptic message from his future self in order to toy with him, declaring his reign as the King in Black would end soon and that his son and the Venom symbiote were in danger. Eddie returned to Earth, however before coming in contact with Dylan, his son, he would use the Hive-Mind to project his conscienceness into the future in order to understand the nature of this threat. However, he realized his son and the symbiote were being targeted by an organization called the Absent Throne.
He would stay in a hotel before he could relay this information to Dylan, but he was lured in the hotel by the Absent Throne, firing a missle and killing Eddie's physical body; in the process, Venom appeared and bonded itself with Dylan, triggering its mutation.
Eddie's codex was pulled into the Garden of Time, were he was greeted by Meridius. Meridius guided Eddie into the Garden and introduced him to the other Kings in Black, Wilde and Tyro. However, their discussion was interrupted by the sudden arrival of Finnegan, who tried to warn Eddie of something, but was stopped by the angry Bedlam, attacking him. Eddie tried to save Finnegan, but this caused Bedlam to direct his attention at him, declaring he hated Eddie more, leaving him confused. Eddie was more confused when Finnegan encouraged Bedlam to eat him; however, Bedlam directed his attention again to Finnegan, taking him away. Eddie confronted Meridius about this but was dismissed, left in the care of Tyro.
Having spend some days at the Garden, Eddie received a vision of Bedlam attacking Dylan, so he rushed to use his time-traveling powers to return to the present, but was stranded in the 602nd century, piloting the symbiote Warstar, a soldier of Kang. Kang trained him in order for him to control his powers and return to the present, unaware he was working with Meridius. However, Eddie's attempt to change the past only set in motion the very events he was trying to prevent, as he alerted Dylan of his past self's location at the hotel, which would make Dylan bond with the symbiote.
Finnegan
Eddie's codex was pulled by Bedlam, making him watch as he attacked Dylan, but was horrified when he revealed his identity as Eddie Brock, Pulled again into the Garden by Meridius, he manifested as Finnegan. Meridius forcefully merged Finnegan's biomass with his and flew above the Garden, giving him a panoramic view and explained the Garden as the timeloop: seven conjunctions crossing with the present. He explained the nature of the timeloop and how each King in Black he saw previously is a future iteration of himself, including Meridius.
Traumatized, he tried to warn his past self, only to be attacked by Bedlam to repeat the infamous scene, only through a different point of view. When Bedlam was about to kill him in order to erase himself and the others from existence, Meridius manipulated him to return to the past and face Dylan, as it would make him stronger in order to beat Meridius in the future. Bedlam agreed, however Finnegan took note on the seven junctions, realizing there's a seventh iteration.
Later, Wilde appeared and declared he never wanted to hurt Dylan as Bedlam, declaring he's still alive and that Finnegan can travel not only in time but between dimensions. Finnegan ignored his protests as he couldn't really change the past, deciding to return and save his son. However, he appeared in Limbo, where he was found by Madelyne Pryor, the Goblin Queen, sealing a deal that she could help him find his son if he helped her and Chasm in their plans.
However, Chasm brainwashed him and took off his memories, returning him into his villanous mindset as Venom, rekindling his hatred for Spider-Man. Chasm and the Goblin Queen (along with Chasm's lover, Hallow's Eve) invaded New York in order to retrieve Spider-Man's and Jean Grey's formative memories, as they were both clones. Eddie, now returned as Venom, would fight Spider-Man and be defeated. However, he and Hallows' Eve later invaded Krakoa's headquarters to retrieve a drive containing a copy of Jean's mind. There, Venom faced-off against Synch, who can copy one's powers. During the fight, Venom realized he's a King in Black, his memories were stolen and he wasn't wearing the Venom symbiote. He then run away, declaring his hatred for who ever "stole" the Venom symbiote.
Bedlam
Transforming into Bedlam, he was confronted by Dylan, and both of them fought. Normie Osborn, now the Red Goblin, and Miss Marvel joined the fight. Dylan has now evolved to Codex, ripping Bedlam's arm and eye during the fight. Meridius appeared when Bedlam was alone and restored his arm into a chainsaw, in order to prevent temporal paradoxes. Bedlam faced-off Dylan once again but when he was about to kill his father, he was saved by the Goblin Queen, whose throne was usurped by Chasm. Taking out anger on Limbo's demons, he directly attacked Chasm but was teleported away.
Now in the depths of Limbo, three demons tried to infect him with the transmode virus, but he purged it from his body with his divine powers. However, he was confronted by Darkoth, indicating he was in a different time in Limbo, as time flows different through there. As in Limbo, the timelines can bifurcate into many others without creating another univese, two scenarios occured: one in which Darkoth defeated Bedlam, accidentally merging with his symbiote biomass and ending up in Asgard through a portal that appeared, making this Eddie an outside element of the timeloop; or one in which Bedlam kills Darkoth and return to the Garden through a portal that suddendly appears, being rejuveneted and attacking Finnegan.
In the latter, Bedlam continued the timeloop and would be persuaded by Meridius to return to the past before he could kill Finnegan. There, in an earlier point in the timeline, he returned to the present piloting an offshot of a symbiote Meridius was also piloting. He would eventually locate Dylan into Baywater, where a biker gang war was occuring. Facing off against his son, he injured him, declaring pain would make him stronger and leaving him for dead; at the same time, he made his past self watch as he tortured Dylan after pulling his codex. He would subjulgate the remaining gang until his anger cold out.
Wilde
Returning to the Garden as Wilde, he would replace his anger with cold cinism and sarcasm. He would witness once again the infamous scene and later apoligize himself with Finnegan by what he done as Bedlam. He warned Finnegan about changing the past and that Dylan was alive, prompting Finnegan to return to the past. He realized Finnegan would return whether he warned him or not and that all of this was meant to happen. Giving himself into despair, he decided to join the "winning side" and became Tyro.
Tyro
As Tyro, he became a boot-licking groveller towards Meridius, wanting to learn everything from him in order to become him. However, Meridius didn't want to teach him anything as he despised his past selves and, when Tyro tried to warn Meridius about a possible outside the loop Eddie, he was dismissed, prompting Tyro to seek knowledge for himself. Meditating, his codex was pulled into the Un-Beyond by the Eventuality. Realizing the King in Black's true purpose as a cosmic caretaker, he rejected it and pulled his own codex to the 602 century again, seeking Kang's help. However, this is an earlier point in which they haven't meet yet.
Kang was willing to teach Tyro the knowledge he needed to become Meridius and use it to escape his fate, but only if he agreed to create an army of soldier symbiotes to his past self, the same army Warstar would be in. He helped Tyro remember his face as Eddie, and slowly trained him in ages of combat and temporal control. Spending eons training, Tyro wanted to take a last look at his son, seeing the final form Venom would evolve, Venomworld.
Perpetuating the Time-Loop
Having at long last became Meridius, he became much more pragmatic. He realized that in order to break his fate, he would need to evolve Dylan and regain the Venom symbiote - and through it All-Black - to cut himself from the Hive, thus escaping the Eventuality. He blackmailed Kang threating to turn his symbiote soldiers against him should he betray him and persuaded him to find the Final Hive, the remaining symbiotes awaiting for the next cosmos. Kang's armada eliminated their bodies for Meridius to enter the Hive-Mind and devour their astral forms, creating the Garden of Time. Further, he also manipulates Archer Lyle, Carlton Drake, Arthur Krane, and Liz Allen into tormenting Dylan and forcing Venom to evolve, founding the Absent Throne in the past and forcing Alchemax and the Life Foundation to his will.
With the stage set, he perpetuated to Eddie, Dylan and the Venom symbiote the same events he suffered to bring himself to existence, obtaining his remains when the Absent Throne killed him in order to monitor them for any unusual activity. Speaking with Carlton Drake, he left Bedlam possess the symbiote biomass he was piloting in the past in order for him to hunt Dylan down.
He then introduces himself to Eddie Brock who ended up in the Garden of Time alongside other Kings in Black, pretending to be an ally, reliving the same infamous scene again as Bedlam attacked Finnegan. However he can barely hide his content for the other Kings in Black, causing Eddie to see through his lies. Meridius decided to mock Eddie a little, sending a vision of the future to his past self in a space adventure in order to scare him. He then returns to the past to try to persuade Dylan to come with him, masking as past Eddie but a then "future" iteration alerts Dylan through the phone, setting the events into motion to meet him at the hotel.
Later, Meridius talks to Kang about his plans for Eddie Brock, the temporal warlord informing him that Eddie had been sent down the path that led him to try to contact Dylan. Meridius then trapped past Eddie in Bedlam's mindspace as he tortured Dylan, mocking him for trying to change fate and tells him that he is inside Bedlam, forcing him to watch as Bedlam killed Dylan, pulling his codex to the Garden as Finnegan. He forcefully explains the Garden's nature and the time-loop, later persuading the past Bedlam to return to the past and hunt Dylan.
He then appeared to Eddie Brock who had lost his memories and became Bedlam, mocking him and explaing on why Bedlam is obsessed with being Venom as it is his sense of self and later heals him convincing him to make his own weapon before leaving. When Darkoth ended up in Asgard, Meridius disguises himself as his past self Eddie Brock to help stop Bedlam's child and later reveals himself after the child escapes, taking the red hammer "Hellnir" it made but was stopped by Thor and escaped.
Royal Rumble
During Bedlam's confrontation with Darkoth, the time in Limbo bifurcated into two timelines. In the other, Eddie escaped the timeloop and meet the Eventuality. He then bonded with the past iteration of Bedlam, got the Fantastic Four's Time-Sled from Kang and crash-landed the Time-Sled onto Meridius when the infamous scene of Bedlam attacking Finnegan happened, shuting the time-loop down. The original timeline was shutted into a pocket dimension where it was left untouched, while the shutted timeloop became the main timeline. The original Meridius' codex was pulled into his duplicate, becoming one.
Eddie and Bedlam's duplicate attacked his alternate self as Meridius reformed into a colossal version of himself, as he not only created the Garden but IS the Garden. However, the fight was interrupted when the Carnage symbiote appeared inside of him, absorbing his powers and seemingly killing him. However, Meridius would reform again but just in time for Carnage to destroy the Garden of Time with All-Blood, leaving him to be cut in half as he was not fully reformed. He, Eddie, Bedlam, Tyro and Wilde falled into the Timestream.
An enraged Meridius tried to kill Eddie but the other three Kings turned against him as they are not bound to the timeloop anymore, absorbing his biomass and leaving his codex to fall into the Cretaceous Period, possessing a symbiote recently fallen into the Earth in a meteorite. He bonded with a nearby Tyrannosaurus rex and founded a past Eddie facing Doctor Doom and declaring that where and whenever his Time Platform goes, he's going too--to the end of the line. As they left to World War II, Meridius declared his word contain more truth then he realizes.
Meridius would hibernate to the next 66 million years until humanity developed itself while plotting revenge, watching from afar his past self. However, he sensed a future Dylan Brock from a dystopian timeline in the present. He faced his alternate son but the poison that was in his symbiote passed through him and he saw a future in which symbiote-machines wiped humanity and were imbued with radiation. Dylan escaped and returned to the future, leaving Meridius with his poison, that he would weaponize with Alchemax years later.
Exploiting this poison, which weaponized became the K-Chemical, he decided to use it to recreate his Garden and Venomworld, using humans as his symbiotes. When the Venom symbiote was targetted by the Captive, who revived the symbiote's former host Lee Price as a Zombiote, Meridius hijacked Lee to merge his symbiote remains with the K-Chemical and create more Zombiotes, which would assist him in the Venom War.
Venom War
Meridius disguised himself as a businessman in order to gain a deal with Alchemax and it's CEO, Liz Allan (current alias Misery). He, along with Alchemax develop the "Zombiote", an extremely dangerous offshoot of symbiotes which makes its victims mindless and hungry for flesh. Shortly after arriving to the Alchemax meeting room, he unleashed the Zombiotes upon New York City, causing them to consume innocent people, Several heroes such as She-Hulk and villains such as Shocker were seen defending New York City or themselves amongst the madness.
As the Zombiotes continued to invade New York City, Carnage arrived with All-Blood the Necrospear at the Alchemax asking for Eddie Brock's "soul on a platter". Meridius explained to Carnage that the purpose of him being there was to watch from the sidelines as Dylan and Eddie fight for the Venom symbiote. When he claims the Venom symbiote for his own, he will "kick things into high gear". Meridius noted to Carnage that the zombiote strain spreaded like a disease, with each bite birthing a new Zombiote. While corpses of the zombiotes become "crawlers", living victims are even more dangerous, retaining all their original speed in strength in addition to unknown abilities that Meridius has as well. These living victims are referred to as "swingers".
After Meridius explained his goals and intentions to Carnage, he laughed in his face and told him that the vision that he showed Eddie of him destroying the Garden only assisted him and that the future he will be building is all his, not his "idiot sons". Carnage then proceeded to threaten him with All-Blood the Necrospear, however Meridius quickly laughed it off saying that despite all the power Carnage has within the spear, he was still standing. Carnage tries to descalate the situation, and gives Meridius a warning "That no matter how much he may has rigged the game, there's always a wild card."
When both Eddie and Dylan bonded with the Venom symbiote at the same time, Agent Anti-Venom arrived on the scene, the three of them destroying Bedlam possibly for good. Toxin greeted Agent Anti-Venom, being happy to see him. Spider-Man left the scene to fight the Arachniote, which he would save Jackpot from. Agent Anti-Venom explained to the team that Zombiotes were invading New York City and they had to stop them from infecting more citizens. Toxin and Venom looked at Agent Anti-Venom with a confused face, asking what Zombiotes were. The Zombiotes broke into the Arena and bit the announcers, as well as several more people that were in the crowd. The team proceeded to fight the Zombiotes. Sensing Dylan's ideia to use the Anti-Venom symbiote and his powers to cure the Zombiotes, Eddie proceeded to modify Flash's Anti-Venom symbiote and bonded with it. He entered into a tranquil state, sending a healing wave through the Hive "freeing the living, and letting the dead rest." Sensing his defeat was close, Meridius used All-Blood to corrupt this wave adding the attribute of the Carnage symbiote to the Zombiotes.
Dylan understood that this was Carnage attempting to establish a symbiotic bond with Eddie and begged him to fight it. Eddie refused, succumbing to the Carnage symbiote. Dylan stabbed his father, disconnecting him from the Hive and rendering him a noral human and was no longer a human-symbiote hybrid. Meridius then appeared and tried to stab Dylan with All-Blood to absorb the Venom symbiote. However, Future Dylan appeared and shot his present counterpart with a magic bullet, transforming him into "Eganrac" or "Anti-Carnage", with the appearance of a golden hue.
As Meridius fatally wounded Eddie, outlining his intent to kill Dylan, reclaim the Venom symbiote, and conquer the universe, Dylan took All-Blood and combined it with Eganrac before impaling Meridius through the heart with it, destroying his codex once and for all along with the Zombiotes.
Powers and Abilities
As a King In Black and one of Eddie's Temporal Offshoots, Meridius had access to the following abilities:
Venom Symbiote:
- Superhuman Strength
- Superhuman Speed
- Superhuman Durability
- Superhuman Regeneration
With his authority as the King In Black, Meridius had additional abilities:
- Symbiote Authority/Lordship
- Time Travel
- Weapon/Tool Manifestation
- Wing Manifestation
In addition, Meridius was also a master strategist, businessman, and manipulator, able to coerce scientists at Alchemax into developing several Anti-Symbiote weapons as well as the Zombiotes for him.
Trivia
- Issue 9 of the 2021 Venom series ad shows Eddie in the Warstar Suit very similar to Merdius hinting that Meridius was a version of Eddie Brock from an alternative future, something that was confirmed next issue.
- As of Venom War #3, his ultimate goal was to have the majority, if not all of Earth transformed into "Zombiotes", thus making it into a "Venomworld". in addition to rebuilding his beloved "Garden Of Time" - his former base of operations made up of every symbiote that has ever lived.
