Archive of Our Own ^beta

The old god is familiar with devotion. Their worshippers showed it, gave it and sacrificed their pathetic flesh and mortal wounds to try to live up to his glory. Foolish, foolish. Believing that could ever be enough for the respect of their fear they called God.

Sentiments through shrines, topped with jewels and candles and prayers. Offerings that came from their own pockets, last week's dinner spent giving to something that didn’t listen.

Bent over every night, there could be a child, a woman, or a man. Their heads bowed in respect, they’ll pray to the god who’s deaf to their pleas, trying to prove their loyalty. Hunger for approval, unsatisfied by what they could give, but what they could have in return.

Noli thought he understood devotion. He sits now, in a rundown dorm with a mop of messy brown hair in his vision. Phone in hand as he pretended to be interested in the nothing on his screen.
His attention was focused on the mortal, eyes drawn and ready. A predator poised to pounce on every exposed edge of being, as soon as opportunity presented itself.

He wanted him to see him and know him and understand every flawed inch, every hidden secret buried deep. He did, he had, and he’d wanted more.
The greed he showed was unbecoming, but the deep unsatisfied need to take from this mortal was much too alluring for his unrestrained hands.
His wish was to know how to break him perfectly, to trace over old scars so precisely there would be no need for new ones, his need to grasp human emotion and take cold rejection and know how to press a hand to his throat so charmingly. To dig deep and open old wounds with such finesse. To take all brashness and cold lines and return it word to word.

How a mortal man had dug this sort of sensitivity from the old gods cold heart is a mystery to all. Noli did not need the exploits nor his energy. Noli can demand companionship from his followers, chaos by his strength. He is tended to and loved by people who needed him. His power well exceeds the strength 007n7 held. 007n7 did something his followers could not bare to do, however. He is cruel.

There was nothing a mortal could give in physical favors, he knew that well. There were no acts of piety or charity from him. No worship, no fear embedded into his soul, no need for his acceptance.
007n7 did not return the same requirement to lay himself down, did not show the same want of attention. His carelessness and disrespect should’ve been repulsive, but instead Noli finds himself stupidly drawn to the mess of a man. He wanted to be a snake, to control him not in fear, but in affection. He wanted to take something with no strong interest and make it stay.

He believes power is in his hands. That, for some reason, Noli enjoyed. Noli enjoyed his soft moments, his harsh moments, his most vulnerable and hated. His human attributes he wove into something that Noli can delight in. He enjoyed the biting words, the rough hands and the metaphorical knife to the throat. He loved pushing his buttons and balancing on the edge of his patience, and to get the same behavior in return. But hunger there was, and continuous intrapersonal torment, and pulling affection that swayed his motives.

Above all of it, the little mortal proved devotion that Noli can consider. Not in gifts. Not in offerings. Not displays of power and wealth Not in tangible actions of destruction, though he did create such wonderful destruction.

007n7 gave himself in a way that no mortal had a chance to do. He has laid himself bare, time and time again, exposing to Noli all little flaws and imperfections. His troubles were told to a point where Noli felt they were his own. There was no necessity that drove his words, tumbling out of his mouth sloppily.
He was raw, not the rehearsed way that any other mortal has tried to approach Noli, with every line polished and scripted. Noli’s coldness did not upset him, when he turned his back 7n7 would appear right in front of him and push past his walls into his perspective, wagging his thoughts into something that matched his. He demanded mutual understanding.

His faith was proven slowly, quietly through his loud defiance.

Noli loved the hitting back, the fight he showed against things that are grander. He is oblivious to what he is. Noli cannot bind his chaos. Loud noises, empty promises, shared incivility that made Noli ecstatic. Intoxicated by the venom of words, the sting that sinks deep.

He wished to fight now, to tear tooth and nail to pain the other as deeply as he could. He wanted to make the stubborn crawl back. He wanted to need the other’s wrath and for him to need it back. He wanted to unravel in soft moments, in times of softness. To be choked out of all response. They outdo each other in how much they can take and how much they can handle giving.

This was devotion. This was true trust, to be able to take and give, push and pull, stealing each other's viscera, tearing flesh and basking in the growing pain. Metaphorical slaughtering and as they bled out together then he can think; this is what dedication is. This is what we need.

007n7 provided the wounds that Noli craved. Noli would take all bleeding injuries to the heart if he would run his hands over them later. The passion of a leech who took and held and grasped for a higher being ichor. A leech would need the host. A parasite is to die with nothing to feed on.

And Noli had an upperhand. He’d know when a knife is being twisted he is in power. If he ever kneels he has something else. His vessel is for the taking.

This is loyalty. Not just giving, being taken from and still crawling back. Noli’s head is bowed in prayer to the mortal who can give him this so perfectly. This is no mercy from the agony. This is no one sided giving. This is obligation to the one who hurt you, a need to bite back.

It was not one sided loyalty, unlike the followers who make themselves bleed and not him. It was mutual need. There is no hurting like the other could do. It was unrest without the other. He was listless without the burn.

Noli did not need 007n7 and 007n7 did not need Noli. Naturally they can exist without the other. The coexistence is pure choice. Their inner turmoil a drug that pulled them back. He could be sweet.
They could tangle up and trace sharp claws gently against exposed backs, forced gentleness that was carefully preserved. Because it meant something, to find comfort in your killer. It meant to be able to trust something that can mutilate you. It wouldn’t break you, your roughness could not break them.

Noli, in all his years of existence, had not been hurt in such a way, emotionally tearing out other's innards and laying them bare, poke them with needles and peirce and leave scars deep inside, knowing that it was love.

Leaving would not erase the old scars, open and reopened and traced and torn and an ache in their joints, a reminder. Old ghosts that settle within the cracks that were left. Haunting, waiting to be reopened by one person who can.