Archive of Our Own

There are a handful of certainties of which Soap is completely sure. 

That the sun will rise each day and give way to the glowing light of the moon. That air will move through trees. That his trust in Ghost is unyielding.

He’s owed the man his life countless times. Aware of the oddity of his entire being to be at the brink so often that he’s grown accustomed to the notion. Of regarding his Superior, his lover, as a watchful protector. A guardian angel residing at his six, always in place — always poised — to kill and fight. 

Soap has relied on it, endlessly aware of Ghost’s steadfast nature, placing the trust in him to keep his heart thumping away behind his rib cage. 

He has done so for years, even before he could freely flaunt his bare gland to Ghost and not fear the accusation of sexual harassment. He knows his Alpha and every part of his working capabilities. He knows so much about this beast he’s chosen.

How he’s adept in leading a unit of varying experience; in keeping as many people safe; in pushing Soap beyond what any other commanding officer has ever asked of him. He knows it as well as a priest would know scripture; able to retell it with such emphasis and certainty that even the fleeting attention of a non-believer could be captured.

But he’s always known he’s missing something from his quiet assessments of Ghost. Something lingers for a moment before it dissipates to nothingness.

It rests just below the skin, held in by tight yet paper-thin defences. Always in check when they’re working. Kept in close when Soap’s curled up in his bed, tired and in need of body heat. 

It only ever presses to the surface when Soap has a visceral reaction to something Ghost does; if he barks an Alpha command at a Lance-Corporal who's been testing his patience all day and Soap has to fight the urge to bare his neck and fall to his knees. To show how pleasing he can be. How obedient and submissive he can be to this Alpha he adores.

It rears its head when Ghost catches him pressing his thumb into bruises so deep they sit in shades of deep purple and black, tinged red with burst blood vessels, to feel that satisfying ache as he digs in harder.

But he never lets it remain. Ghost always dampens and ushers out that foreboding expression before Soap can truly make something of it. 

Since, even as Ghost wraps around Soap in bed, he never loses himself, never lets his restraints crumble. He doesn’t fall apart with abandon, like Soap does, when Ghost mouths at his body and groans long and deep into his ear. And he likely doesn’t think that Soap has noticed.

But he has; he’s tracked everything that tells him enough.

He doesn’t grab at and clench his hands around Soap’s wrists and ankles, he keeps them buried in the sheets below them. Holding so tight his knuckles pale and the cotton strains where it’s taut across the bed. 

His eyes, even when they’re blown wide with genuine arousal, have a sharpness to them — an awareness — that Soap would love nothing more than to see fizzle out or snap. He would adore to have Ghost rampage into his body, to tunnel through him and possess him inside and out. 

Soap has toyed with the notion that this is simply what being loved by an Alpha is; to have the beast keep itself in check as some sign of devotion to their Omega. Yet, that doesn’t feel quite right.

He’s sure poetry from the many greats would speak of this hidden away nature. They would confess to this idea of something beyond the feral possessiveness, that runs even deeper than the unbridled lust and barely tempered aggression. That it’s some secret awaiting to be unlocked and unleashed.

Yet, it isn’t.

There is no call to God and his Angels to form ranks and free Alphas of this last remaining shackle laid upon their instincts.

Instead, Soap is left to marvel and adore, with no inkling — not even the faintest of suppositions — as to what his Alpha could be holding closest to his heart.

But he wants to dig them out, be it by tooth or nail.

╋ ╋ ╋

In the mornings they stay in Soap’s off-base flat, Soap wakes slowly. Drowsiness clings to every part of his being, the sheets so warm and comfortable that it feels like a burden to leave them. The smell of the room, of his own scent and the whisper of Ghost’s tied together, along with that of body heat, the warmth of it all retained by the rising morning sun. 

Sometimes Ghost vacates the bed early, to eat his breakfast or go on a run through the housing estate Soap’s flat resides in. Most often, however, he will still be beneath those covers, curled up as the main, most integral component of Soap’s nest. 

His scent will be hidden away by blockers, as it always is, to be neutral whilst the morning brightens with time, bracketed around Soap and keeping him close.

It’s an Alpha instinct Soap enjoys the most, that need for Ghost to have him close, to protect him even outside of his own territory. 

But sometimes, after one of those nights where Ghost has been unrelenting in his urge to hold Soap’s spent body in place whilst they kiss and fuck, Ghost will shift.

When bruises have blossomed and formed on Soap’s hips or behind his knees, darkening where Ghost’s hands had gripped him tightly enough for those lasting reminders to emerge. That secretive glint in his eyes will flash before it retreats, driving Ghost to fist at the bed sheets instead. Giving way to Ghost kissing the bruises, and languidly switching between suckling on the tip of Soap’s cocklet and lapping at his moistening cunt.

There’ll be a tenseness to the Alpha the entire day following, until he can lose himself in the gym or partake in his many meticulous routines. Constantly preparing himself for their next operations. 

Soap watches his Alpha now, from where he’s still sleepily tangled up in those sheets, and tracks the movements Ghost makes to open the wardrobe and prepare the kit he leaves behind in Soap’s flat. 

It’s quiet as Ghost tinkers. 

The only sounds are of coat hangers being lifted and put back in place; the rustling of the gym shorts that sit low on Ghost’s hips and bunch up at the apex of his thighs; the crinkling and tapping of Ghost’s med-kit being opened and checked thrice over.

As Ghost begins to methodically pack his Bergen, Soap shuffles to sit up in the bed, enjoying seeing how Ghost’s bare torso ripples and undulates with every twist and reach that he does.

He appears unfurled and relaxed — the sign of an Alpha who has been satisfied by having their favourite Omega welcome and milk their knot — and Soap leans forward to get a better look at him as he crouches low.

It’s been six weeks since they first arrived back on base, enjoying their downtime as some other group of soldiers take their place on rotation. And even now, it’s not a return to work to head directly back into the fray. They’re not being sent off on anything high-octane; just reconnaissance training deep in the rainforests of Brunei, joining a squad of Marines and coaching them through it.

“You do Belize or Brunei?” Soap asks, breaking that silence that had sunk over them since they went to sleep, realising he’s never asked anything much of Ghost’s Selection training.

“Belize,” Ghost responds, peeling the velcro cover of his Leatherman, pulling it out and checking each and every tool. For rust or to remind himself of what’s on there? Soap isn’t sure. “So that’ll make you our tour guide when we touch down.”

Soap crawls to the foot of the bed, pitching himself up on his knees, as if the metal framing there is some cold altar for him to kneel at. He leans forward, gripping the frame in his hands until his nose can skim along the freshly shaved skin of Ghost’s chin.

Ghost’s movements slow, letting Soap draw his blocker muted scent in deep, until he’s tilting himself to Soap’s nose and mouth. Permitting his Omega into his space.

“I’ll keep you safe,” Soap murmurs into his ear, nipping on his Alpha’s lobe before giving it a gentle swipe of his tongue, enjoying the instinctive growl that erupts from Ghost’s chest. A warning of lust that neither of them have the time to act upon.

Soap pulls himself up, displaying his firm chest to Ghost, who tracks his movement with his eyes. Just as Soap had with him.

Ghost is looking over his shoulder, at the way Soap’s looming towards him, his sharp teeth being revealed as his lips pull back into a feral grin, “Think you’ll be the most dangerous thing there for me, Sergeant.”

“I don’t doubt it,” Soap snorts, sitting up further. His own muscles stretching as he moves, and he’s watching as that dark, foreboding look makes itself clear in Ghost’s eyes for a split second when the finger-shaped bruises on his hips must peek into sight. 

He tries to show more of himself, only to see that yawning abyss be ushered away by something more calm. More collected.

In a final, almost nonchalant attempt, Soap lets one of his hands slip down across the bruises Ghost has bestowed him with, caressing them in hopes of seeing that look for just a second more. 

But, Ghost looks away, returning to his kit.

╋ ╋ ╋

Despite preferring colder climbs, Soap thrives the moment he steps off the transport in Brunei. His Omega body uniquely suited to deal with heat and humidity, compared to the dozens of Betas and handful of Alphas that pile out beside him. They’re momentarily strangled by the denseness of the air, with Soap primed and ready to make calls from the first instant.

Ghost, despite being covered from head to toe, is the only Alpha who manages to keep pace beside Soap; not choking on the weight of humid air pressing on his chest. He hangs back at Soap’s side. His mere presence is the sign-off for all the soldiers in front of them to listen to what Soap commands of them.

They spend their first day preparing to begin their trek into the jungle, the Marines jittering with their eagerness to begin their training exercise. The local forces are there, intermingled with them all, giving direction and advice to anyone wise enough to hear them.

In the morning, they divide into two camps. A third of them syphon off to pose as the opposition — a mix of local experts from the RBAF and their own Marines, and the rest of them all represent a Task Force.

Alongside the comfortably competent RBAF soldiers they’re collaborating with, the men Soap and Ghost are in command of are a cluster of young Green Berets. Still wet behind the ears. Not entirely prepared for what the rainforest conditions will demand of them. 

Once they’re given a full briefing by the local forces, they’re left to prepare. Ghost, with his painstaking packing regime, was ready the moment he got onto their aircraft and left British soil. Instead, he stands there at Soap’s side, like an Omega’s sentry, unwavering in his support of his subordinate in this relatively unfamiliar territory. 

He checks Soap’s kit through; a subconscious action of an Alpha taking studious care of their Omega. He only does it once, reshuffling Soap’s items to place his mosquito head net right at the top, with his quick-dry towel just beneath it.

In the afternoon, they head out, ready to hunt the opposition through the fauna and flora. Soap knows this could take days, keeping close to the RBAF soldiers who coordinate most of their tracking. He blurs his own appearance with CFP, dominating his features with green, with smudged stripes of brown running through it, until it fades down his neck.

He slides his own gloves on, but he can feel Ghost’s eyes on him, and instinctively stands in front of his Alpha to be checked over before they move out.

Ghost is in a green balaclava, eyes darkened by the same colours that cover Soap’s entire face, and he assesses his Omega with an appraising stare. He doesn’t touch, but Soap can feel the tension coiling up between them, of Ghost wanting to fiddle and pick at Soap’s kit whilst he’s wearing it.

Instead of giving in to his wants, Ghost turns his head and nods towards where the rest of their team lingers at the forest edge. “You take the lead, I’ll move through the back.”

“Aye, Sir,” Soap grins, reaching his own hand out to tap it on Ghost’s shoulder, enjoying how satisfaction ripples through his Alpha’s body at the contact. “Don’t complain if you can’t keep up, though.”

“Get moving, Sergeant,” Ghost huffs, and Soap grins as he trots to the formation of soldiers, letting Ghost be the one to take the helm of giving orders.

╋ ╋ ╋

The exercise is three weeks long, and Soap spends much of it in a constant state of dampness, either perspiring through his uniform or soaked by wading through rivers with his gun held well above the water line. He knows the others are much the same, quiet grumblings of discomfort echoing through them all, especially when it comes to sundown. 

The cooling air has skin prickling with goosebumps, hair standing upright, and body warmth only able to be retained by sleeping in close quarters. 

Soap and Ghost take alternate watches through the night, keeping an eye on the younger soldiers they have under their command, but they always take their rest nearby to each other. 

It goes unspoken that they would prefer to curl up like an ampersand together, to share that intimate warmth, and be tangled up like they had been in Soap’s flat. Especially when it comes to waking the other to take over, with gentle touches and quiet words exchanged, and Soap knows Ghost must be aching to kiss him — much like he is with Ghost — because their damp, glove-covered thumbs skim over the other’s lips.

They don’t steal moments to give in to their affection. Professionalism is at the core of everything they do, but Soap’s instincts run in overdrive when Ghost leans in and gives his orders to quiet, serious soldiers around them. He wants to nuzzle into Ghost’s throat, purring as a reward for his Alpha’s competence in tracking their opposition in this staged guerilla warfare.

They manage to pick off their opponents, taking vantage points and losing very few of their own in this exercise. Soap’s natural capacity to handle the heat comes into its own, his mind is the clearest out of everyone’s, and he can easily lead their team across the lines they’re dispersed through.

They stick together in pairs, with Soap slotted in alongside a young Beta, who covers the communications between them and the dozen other pairs they’ve got. Soap can focus on the world around them, only needing to speak or motion to his partner, and leaving them to relay it to everyone else.

It’s towards the end of their exercise, when they’re closing in on the final group, where things derail slightly for their team. They’ve not lost anyone else in terms of theoretical kills, but the insect activity creeps towards the biblical as they’re swarmed with them. Even with each one of their faces protected by netting, the sound and sensation of it is something even Soap struggles with. 

Their pace hastens and their opponents begin to make mistakes; their Alphas falling out of sync and growing disoriented with the swarms around them, leaving them open for them to target. 

However, it is the middle of that final afternoon, right when their closing in on the opponents, at that monstrous peak of heat before the cooling night air helps to dissolve it, when Soap’s leg throbs with a pain he’s never known before. He’s ripped muscles, ligaments, and tendons, had his skin torn open by bare nails and jagged, rusted edges. But this pain is unique to them. It makes its home right beneath the skin, penetrating deep enough that any downward pressure on his foot is close to excruciating. 

He doesn’t stumble, but he needs to displace his weight onto something else, so finds himself tilting towards a thick, moist tree trunk

“Christ,” he bites out, his hand instinctively curling the leaves that climb up the tree’s bark, bracing himself there. The exclamation isn’t loud, but it’s sharp in its quietness, and stills his partner where he’s been scanning behind them. 

The Beta goes wide eyed behind him, when Soap glances at him, and sees how he immediately turns on his heel to tap two fingers on his shoulder, the Alpha that’s stood just behind him does the same until all movement ceases and Soap can sense a predator moving in close. It’s making its way through the forest, steps featherlight across the bracken and undergrowth, but still swift and foreboding.

He doesn’t shy away; it’s familiar in the way it threatens. Like the worn handle of a shepherd's crook that fends off baying wolves from its flock.

Soap looks in the direction the presence is coming from and preemptively begins to unlace his boot and yank it open without taking it off entirely, pulling down his sodden sock. The motions of the fabrics rubbing against his leg have bile climbing up his throat as nausea takes over. Even once they’ve all been moved, revealing a festering bump beneath his skin that hadn't been there when they’d set off at First Watch.

It’s swollen, hot, and trickling with a sticky fluid. It feels as though he’s been branded with a spike, right into that little gap, and he hears the Beta whine softly. 

“Johnny,” the predator calls, deep and quiet, comforting as Ghost nears and manages to assess the situation quickly. He seems to know and understand it in a split second, pulling at his own kit.

He’s detaching the med pack, the very same one he’d fiddled and spent time meticulously repacking in Soap’s bedroom, and pulls out everything that he needs. He doesn’t even need to look into it to find exactly what he requires and holds it in one of his hands.

His gloves are pulled off with his teeth, followed by a fast but thorough scrubbing of his skin with an alcohol wipe before he’s crouching down. Still much too large to be in the eye line of the wound.

“Down on one knee,” Ghost commands the Beta, who immediately follows and offers his thigh up to act as a table for Soap to place his muddied boot on. “Keep steady, Corporal; I’ll need to cut it out of him.”

The movement is almost unbearable, but he manages it with gritted teeth and a slow exhale. It burns up through Soap’s leg, so inflamed he can feel his heartbeat centralised to that one horrific mound beneath his skin. He only feels some semblance of relief when Ghost’s breath skims across it; an Alpha there to care for this man he’s chosen.

Ghost pulls the small medical blade out of its packaging and — without any semblance of hesitation — makes fast, expert work of slicing open the skin. He takes no time in using some sterile tweezers to pull out a yellowing bulb shape with a viscous string tailing after it. He doesn’t even root around in the flesh, just dives in and grabs the parasitic intruder from Soap’s body.

It’s over so quickly, the pain of being sliced open somewhat only registers moments after Ghost has pulled the whole little thing out. So he keeps his eyes on Ghost, reminding himself that his Alpha has hurt him to bring some kind of relief. To save him from a much worse fate. Seeing Ghost there, he doesn’t even think to wail in pain, just tries to let it all go with each breath.

Ghost crushes the creature against a tree and sets about dousing the wound in iodine before it’s deftly wrapped up, his fingers skimming across Soap’s skin. His eyes are fixed on the wound even after it’s been covered in its entirety.

Soap sees that certain something comes to the fore in Ghost’s gaze. Strangely, that hidden thing that he only ever sees in short intervals remains. It’s imperceptible to anyone other than Soap, but he can see how Ghost’s chest heaves a little heavier beneath his kit. Stuck in some trance, holding Soap’s bandaged ankle, edging his thumb towards the epicentre of the pulsing, hot pain. 

It feels absurd to him, but Soap finds that he likes it. He enjoys the passionate yet deadly stare at his wound, takes great pleasure from the fact that he’s having some kind of effect on Ghost. On the man who’d always tried to keep him at arm's length before he caved in. 

Soap licks his lips, on the verge of calling out to Ghost to kiss him.

“What was that, Sir?” The Beta asks, looking at where Ghost has crushed the thing with the blade, breaking the moment entirely.

That has awareness drifting back into Ghost’s gaze and he is swift in standing upright again, cleansing his hands with another alcohol wipe. Then he’s tucking everything he’s used into the compartment of his bag that Soap knows Ghost uses as his stash for any rubbish they may leave behind.

“Burrowing insect. A nesting one.” Ghost informs, ready to resume his previous position, no trace of his quick fix left. “If you leave them, the eggs hatch and begin to infect the entire leg.”

“Shit,” someone murmurs behind them and Soap glances at his Alpha’s retreating back, before it’s consumed entirely by the forest.

Soap takes his foot off the Beta’s thigh and tests standing on it, sure that he’ll be able to finish off their trek to where their RBAF contacts outlined would be best to make camp for a decisive pre-dawn assault to finish the exercise.

He knows he’ll be able to, especially with the lingering adrenaline of seeing Ghost leave his hidden side open for so long, so he turns to the men that have caught up with them and motions to step back into formation.

╋ ╋ ╋

That night, before he’s set to sleep, Soap isn’t entirely surprised that Ghost pulls him aside to check on his dressing. The area of forest they were advised to come to is dense, rock and fauna so close together that it feels like they’re constantly surrounded. But it’s secluded enough that Soap struggles to make out the lines and bodies of their subordinates, despite knowing where each sleeping body and on duty soldier is. 

Ghost kneels this time, pulls Soap’s boot and sock off entirely and relies only on his advanced Alpha sight to look at the wound in the dark.

“How’s it looking?” He asks, chancing placing an affectionate hand on Ghost’s head.

When Ghost doesn’t shrug him off, he keeps it there, unmoving. Just sharing warmth in the night.

Soap can hear how Ghost’s liberal with his application of more iodine before sealing it all up again, “Better than before.”

Each pass of the bandaging over his skin feels like a gentle kiss from his Alpha, even as it presses down onto where he’s been cut open. He starts to curl his fingers into the balaclava covering Ghost’s head and face, uncaring of how sodden it is from the Alpha’s sweat.

One of Ghost’s hands, large and warm, cups at the prominent line of Soap’s gastrocnemius muscles, rubbing them tenderly between his fingers as his other hand fastens the bandage in.

Soap can feel himself letting go of the control he keeps himself under. There’s an ache in his hands, not one of sharp pain like what emanates from just above his ankle, but one of longing. One of heat from how Ghost had looked at him with that unknown, predatory gaze as he’d bandaged him up earlier in the peaking afternoon heat.

He wonders, unable to make out anything but the shape of his Alpha’s hulking body, if he’s being stared at just as ravenously now. 

If Ghost longs for something untold in the darkness of the night.

So Soap coaxes with a near-silent whisper.

“Kiss me.”

It’s entirely unprofessional, against every rule they outlined to one another, to ask each other such things. Blurring that line between what is and isn’t appropriate; this isn’t some wish for intimacy upon their deathbed, nor is it any hard-won victory to celebrate.

It’s a request for closeness for the sake of closeness — the kind Soap will ask for when it’s just the two of them in taxis, in pubs, and in the safety of his flat. 

But Soap wants it too much to not ask. He wants to have the adoring mouth of his lover rewarding him for this pain he feels.

He expects Ghost to refute, to reinforce the boundary they’ve set, but is faced with a hushed approving growl.

Ghost’s touches change, holding tighter to Soap’s lower leg, before Soap starts to feel Ghost’s touch growing closer and closer until his lips press against the surely sweat-slicked line of Soap’s shin.

He isn’t bestowed one kiss there, he gets dozens, interspersed between flat-tongued licks and fanged nips from his Alpha’s teeth. It isn’t inherently foreplay. However, Ghost’s saliva is one of the only carriers of Ghost’s scent that hasn’t been smited by their suppressants — no matter how muted and dull it may be. It’s a simple act of his protection and care for his wounded Omega; a promise that he will continue to care for Soap’s body as if it’s his own.

It feels sensational to Soap, to be scented and soothed with the same meticulousness that Ghost displays when organising his possessions before they leave for operations. He can feel every change in texture, every intention in Ghost’s movements, and he adores it wholeheartedly.

It has him trembling to keep his purring quiet, to keep him from pulling his Alpha upright and pleading for him to take him, roughly yet silently, against the craggy rocks. He keeps his hand fixed on Ghost’s balaclava, hoping that his feeling is conveyed with how tightly he holds it clenched in his hand. That even in this rainforest, uncaring of the dirt and grime layering on their bodies, he still wants Ghost to fill him inside and out.

And Soap longs for home, for his bedroom, so he can pull Ghost into it and be devoured.

But Ghost retreats backwards, not in any sharp or jolting way. Just with the threateningly low grumble of an Alpha being pulled from their favourite possession. 

Soap can take the underlying message of a line being crossed, and releases his hold on Ghost’s head.

╋ ╋ ╋

In the following weeks after the mission ends and Soap’s leg heals, miraculously avoiding infection, they don’t speak of breaking their promise to keep their relationship away from their work.

Soap isn’t even certain if it plays on Ghost’s mind like it does on his. In any moment of pause, it consumes his thoughts. Thinking in adoration that Ghost hadn’t questioned his want to be kissed in the field, that Ghost had laid such a claim to Soap’s leg after one minor injury. Thinking in shame that he’d wanted Ghost to let go entirely.

He knows himself well enough that he would have let Ghost touch him hotly and deeply, stripping him bare beneath the dense canopy. He would have let Ghost eat him whole whilst he was blind in the night.

And those thoughts press heavy upon him. Like those voiced by believers who place their hope for absolution in the sanctity of the confessional booth, as if he needs to be forgiven and pardoned because of his love and longing for his Alpha. 

Like that is some sin to be spilled to the ears of some listening priest, for them to give meaningless platitudes in return. Telling him that their God can love all, even those weak-willed and swayed by desire. Telling him that he must repent to ensure he can climb his way to heaven, to not forsake their God’s love.

Soap knows it’s an irrational path that his thoughts take. He is aware that his guard was down; that in some other setting outside of a training exercise, he wouldn’t be so vulnerable. 

He knows Ghost would have denied him. He is well-aware of the fact that nothing of that affection would have bled through, unless he’d been on the cusp of dying. They would have kept it inside, for it to be a mere want or desire, rather than a rule they had both broken.

So Soap ignores the pressure that mounts, and he enjoys every moment of Ghost standing in his kitchen, slow and sleepy from a restful night spent together.

╋ ╋ ╋

Soap truly forgets about his short-lived spiral over whether it was a sin to break his rules on intimacy to have his Alpha scent and adore him, even if they’re working. Until eight months later and they’re working their way through a town in a valley surrounded by mountains.

The town is deserted, but signs of recent life reside around every corner. Tables with dinnerware are laid out, with food left to rot or scavenged by animals, as if the family have only left momentarily only to never return. Bedsheets remain untucked and thrown aside. Bikes and cars have not been left long enough to rust, but enough for air pressure in tires to deplete and dirt to build. Even as the houses around them have been collapsed by artillery fire and air strikes. 

They aren’t meant to linger long here, just passing through as they come to their rendezvous site, using the rubble to eat and rest before they head into the forests around.

Soap isn’t sure why he approaches the steps up to the town’s church, but he does so alone. Drawn in by the desertion of something that seems to be the core of the town, standing in such vastness to everything else surrounding it.

The arched, tiled roof is caved in entirely, shrapnel having blown holes straight through brick and cement. 

He ignores it all as he comes to the door and pushes it open from where it sits ajar. He takes a moment to absorb the sight around him.

Dust coats every surface and hangs in the air. Rubble rests in some decrepit oblation upon the altar. And the figure of Christ, malnourished, his stigmata weeping blood, looms down over Soap, cobwebbed and cracked. He stands there, for a minute or two, staring up at the false body of the man he once thought would deliver him to something better. He thinks of the people of this town, driven out by something they could barely escape from; wonders if others stood where he stands, rosaries held white-knuckle tight between trembling, frightened fingers. 

He contemplates closing his eyes; the muscle memory of praying for redemption bleeding through, teetering on muttering words to a God he’s lost connection to. As if he could take the place of voices whose prayers, pleading for the aid of their saviour, and wonders if his calls to God would go just as unanswered. 

As if his wish for forgiveness for asking his lover to kiss him could compare to that. He thinks of trying anyway, if he’s to stand in his carcass of a building.

But before his lips can part and his eyelids meet, a voice cuts through it all.

It’s a deep, vibrating sound that bounces off the dulled acoustics left in the skeletal remains of this crumbling chapel. His eyes seek out the source, glancing over his own shoulder to find the calm, steadfast stance of his superior.

“Soap,” he commands, fingers poised expertly over his L119 at the doorway of this house of holy ground, tilting his head back out into the decimated town square, “let’s move.”

With his boots scuffing over worn tombstones underfoot, Soap follows the order, leaving his Redeemer in his wake. Along with any thoughts of prayers chanted in hours of darkness and biblical sacrifice.

He gets to Ghost’s side, lets his head lift to meet the eyes of this man he follows, and gives a short nod. He expects them to move off right away, but Ghost looks into his eyes for a moment, before they drift back to look beyond Soap and to those archways that stand like ribs amidst the decay. 

Then Ghost’s eyes drop to some low point of Soap’s throat, where his Omega collar peeks out of his clothes, searching for something that doesn’t seem to be there. He does turn his head quickly to look over his shoulders, before he leans in close to Soap and nips at his ear, wrist coming up to rub over where his protection collar hides his un-bitten gland.

He does nothing else as he turns, pacing down the church’s steps, back toward the route they’re supposed to be taking to their rendezvous point. It’s unlike Ghost to be momentarily affectionate in such a way, to risk someone seeing them, but Soap enjoys it nonetheless, fully aware that the gesture was entirely symbolic. To have Ghost’s scentless wrist rubbed against a reinforced bite guard.

They trek through the buildings up towards the snow-capped mountain range, shoulder to shoulder, picking up the Marines they’re scouting with as they go. And Soap doesn’t glance back at the church once, he keeps his eyes fixed on the road ahead. And his mind on the man barely a hair’s breadth away from his shoulder, treading protectively behind.

╋ ╋ ╋

They’re headed through the open landscape, the northern hemisphere deep in the throes of the cold transition from winter to spring, and Soap keeps thinking of the church they left behind. About that body of Christ, dangling like a spectre over him.

He closes his eyes and sees that greying, pale face of a dying saviour. He imagines someone calling for their God to save them before it’s too late. Only to be struck down by something falling from the skies they’d likely been whispering their prayers to.

It’s difficult for him to think of much else. Always is when the weight of civilian losses hangs over him.

The weather, as they had all anticipated, takes such a turn that it slows their pace immeasurably. They’re all prepared for this terrain, but the winds and ice are too much for them to reckon with. So they dig in and set up camp, sheltered somewhat by the thick firs that lay between them and the base of the mountain.

They have more than enough MREs, an excess of water purification tablets, and skill to keep them camped for weeks, if needed. There’s no sign of tension or stress with anyone, all more than knowledgeable and trained enough to pass the time through.

There’s a worn deck of cards fished out of someone’s kit, where they play poker and blackjack for fallen pine needles. They share stories of previous missions going amusingly awry or of — as the Marines call it — ‘shore leave’ where drunken tattoos have been designed and inked. They cluster together in the quiet landscape, keeping warm and sane with only the cries of birds and wolves to be heard in the night.

They eat together, most of all, apart from Ghost. Lots of them clustered around Tommy Cookers to feel the meagre warmth through their clothes.

Ghost, however, makes sure to stand, rifle in hand, to guard them as the rest of them get their fill. Once he’s finished his own, Soap will boil up Ghost’s food, open it up and mix it all in with his own fork, and take it to his Alpha for him to eat.

Soap takes over, then. Guarding his Alpha as he relaxes and eats through his unfortunate imitation of vegetable biryani. 

No one complains about the food, but Soap has seen the men using their chocolate cake packets as winnings for whoever takes the most pine needles and wins the many hands of cards they play. 

After a few days, they walk for thirteen hours until they come to the bank of a river. The water still flows downwards, filling some great lake that Soap believes is south east of their location, and Ghost makes the call for them to stop a couple of hundred metres from the river bank.

They fill up canteens with the fresh, flowing water, and a couple of the Marines set up some netting from their packs into the river. Neither Ghost nor Soap stop them, especially with how far they are from living civilisation, and the unspoken understanding of none of them being able to stand another bite of sausage and beans in the absurdly sweet and salty tomato sauce it comes in. 

Nothing is caught on the first or second day of the netting floating in the water flow, but someone brings back a handful of palm-sized fish on the third afternoon. It’s an Alpha who does so, bristling with satisfaction at their capacity to provide for the makeshift pack they’ve formed.

He only falters when someone gives him one of their flat-bottomed mess tins to fillet them on.

“I don’t actually know what to do with it,” the Marine confesses, lip curling downwards as he speaks. “I’ve only ever done catch and release before.”

There’s a stillness in the air, until a hand reaches in to take the overturned metal dish, and it’s the gloved hand of Ghost taking them on.

He sits as he pulls out his knife, using one of his thinner, longer ones and deftly slices in behind the gills. His motions are fast and confident, pulling out of the fish to turn and cut decisively down its body, following along the line of its spine. 

He cuts and guts each fish faster than the last, methodical in his movements, and Soap is mesmerised by the sight of it. His Alpha’s fingers dipped in the red of the fish blood; skin expertly sliced away, and the fish given in neat, smooth-edged fillets.

Soap runs his finger across one of the discarded bodies, feeling the even, level surface of the carcasses left behind. Staring in wonderment at just how pristine it is. With such little fat and meat left to hang from the tiny pin bones, Ghost has truly taken it down to the very wire of preparing these treats.

But Soap isn’t thinking of how it will taste on his tongue. He isn’t thinking of cooking off the skins for something extra — something different — to eat. 

He’s transfixed by the blasé way Ghost had taken over and delivered. How he’s now wiping the blood across the thigh of his fatigues. Far too adept with a knife than he likely should be.

But that sets Soap’s mind ticking, murmurs of attraction and lust brewing beneath the surface, like the starting echoes of a cathedral’s organ.

He wonders what it would feel like to have Ghost butcher him with the same competent precision. Whether that blade would slice through him just as beautifully, just as efficiently and terrifyingly, in Ghost’s hands. 

If his blood would stain through gloves to touch skin. If his body would be stared at with the same ravenous hunger that the others all gaze at the sizzling flesh of the fish with.

He wonders if Ghost would do that for him. And he wonders if God could forgive him, if he lets himself be consumed by this man he loves.

He wonders if he can backtrack through the forests to lay himself at the figure of Christ’s feet and pray for his thoughts of Ghost loving him violently to cease.

╋ ╋ ╋

He never does turn on his heel to find that Christian altar of forgotten promises. He presses onwards with the operation until he’s snuggly trapped between the lithe body of a mated Alpha and Ghost’s heaving, monstrous one on their transport back to base.

He focuses on his lover. Taking him home to wrap around each other for hours, until their exhaustion has them sleep in a love drunk stupor. He pushes out those errant thoughts of Ghost cleaving him open and whether that would be a sin, to replace them with ones of beauty and homeliness. 

He gives no thought to that hanging body of Christ that dangled as the last remaining bastion of a gutted, deserted town. Until they’ve been back on home soil for long enough for him to feel more rested.

Three days is enough time for his mind — to square everything away before they decide to regroup with the Marines in a pub. Just before they all head back to their home bases in the south. 

It’s not all of them, just half a dozen plus Ghost and Soap, all spread out across wonky wooden chairs and worn fabric seating in the back corner. They take communion of over-priced lager and blue packets of Burt’s crisps, the floor and table sticky to touch after years of spilled beverages. 

The pub is a local haunt in Hereford for Ghost and Soap, the most recent in a long line of Special Forces operatives that came before them, filling out those seats and greeting the pub landlord with a knowing nod.

Soap spends his evening with his thigh pressed against Ghost’s, hidden beneath the table, barely containing his excitement for a fortnight of leave they have coming up. He’ll get to be covered by the almost non-existent scent of Ghost, who will ease off his military suppressants in favour of civilian ones, and spend their time wrapped around one another in the sheets of Soap’s bed. 

But part way through the night comes a shift. 

Soap feels it more than anything, with how Ghost goes from lax and civil, to tense and quiet at Soap’s side. Pitched forward minutely from where he had been lounged, shoulder nestled perfectly against’s Soap. There’s no teasing whispers or inside jokes spoken to the lobe of Soap’s ear, nor the rumbling laughter when someone tells a particularly sharp story of being stationed overseas.

Ghost’s gaze fixes on a point near the door, and Soap pins it down to something Ghost can smell or hear around them that he can’t. Some Alpha instinct he’ll never be able to tap into. 

But the one other Alpha on their table doesn’t mimic Ghost’s reactions — he’s still tilting his head back to laugh freely at something someone else says quietly into his ear.

So Soap trails his eyes to where his Alpha is looking at, hoping to see something he can relax and soothe, to help bring Ghost back into the room. Back to orbiting Soap and everything he does. 

Surprisingly enough, Soap clocks what has Ghost’s hackles raised the moment he looks at the faces of the people clustered by the door, still taking their coats off and eyes searching for somewhere to sit.

There’s a Beta, smartly dressed in a high-collared coat and dark trousers, that Soap could recognise anywhere. Despite never knowing their name, or even what their voice sounds like.

Because for a time, a few months before Ghost had made his first courting gesture to Soap, this pub would be the meet-up place for Ghost and this Beta.

Back when Ghost would spend the first half of his night huddled around the table beside whoever he’d arrived with, then this Beta or another — one Soap could easily recall from memory, too — would arrive and he’d slink off for the rest of the evening with them. 

No one ever said much about it, beside the odd snarky comment from Gaz, when it happened. And Soap wishes he had, back when it used to happen. Because, as he sits with Ghost’s cool body up against his, he doesn’t know how to read the situation. 

Because whilst Soap knows Ghost when he’s hostile, he has no read on this kind of defensiveness. Something about this Beta has uncovered a part of Ghost that Soap has never seen or known before, and they have far too much of an audience for Soap to nuzzle submissively into Ghost’s throat. To soothe and coax him into unfurling once more.

Instead, Soap creeps a discreet hand to tap on the inside of Ghost’s elbow, to draw his attention back onto him. “Do you want to leave?”

He can see Ghost weighing up that as a valid option, even though he’s only just taken a couple of sips from the pint of Heineken another Sergeant has just hauled back from the bar. 

Soap keeps glancing back and forth between the Beta and Ghost, and sees the moment the Beta clocks the eyes Ghost has laid on them. They smile politely and Soap feels himself tense as the Beta makes a small performance of taking off their coat. 

It makes him curl his nails into the rough, coloured fabric they’re sitting on, threatening to tear through the almost threadbare material. Seeing someone else appearing to flaunt themselves to his alpha has the near jealous caw of his inner Omega cry out. Making him want to bare his teeth, to hiss and bite, until the Beta realises that Ghost has someone already by his side.

The Beta shakes the neckline of their silken blouse, and Soap catches sight of something beneath it. It’s dark, only a couple of fingers wide, and Soap keeps his focus there. Especially as the moment Ghost clocks what it is, it has his demeanour changing entirely.

Because it’s something that causes Ghost to resettle, reminiscent of a finger withdrawing from a gun’s trigger to engage the safety mechanism instead.

And in the final motion of the Beta’s movements, Soap can finally place what it is.

It’s a collar. Not the kinds given as mating gifts; which usually are made of soft fabrics and precious stones and metals. It’s not too dissimilar to the type you’d see hung around the throat of a pet. A leather band with a clear metallic clasp, alongside what appears to be a tag dangling from it. Some kind of symbol of ownership, but the different kind to the lasting, branding bite he hopes Ghost will leave on his throat one day.

“No,” Ghost hums as he returns to settle into the benched backrest behind them, with his large paw of a hand coming to squeeze on Soap’s thigh and remain there. Possessive and comforting, for both him and Ghost. 

That gesture from the Beta has an impact on Ghost with an immediacy that it doesn’t have on Soap. 

Instead, his own thoughts begin to pool as he considers what it is that he has just seen. Just been witness to.

He may have joined the military young, striding into the careers office to sign up the moment he turned sixteen and nine months, only waiting a handful of weeks before he was in for his psychometric test, given a date for his away weekend, before he got his sign-up date months before he would even be eighteen. He may not understand the lives of his peers who went on to university or apprenticeships, and he may be sheltered by the catch-all lifestyle of the military.

But he certainly understands sex. 

He is well aware of the kind of relationships pet-like collars symbolise, and he takes no issue with the fact that the Beta has something like that in their lives.

His mind lingers on the fact that Ghost understands. That the Beta knew, with indiscreet certainty, that Ghost would grasp the meaning. Without words being exchanged. Without them being close to one another. 

That silent communication of ‘I will not bother you; I belong to someone else’ crawls under Soap’s skin, and he finds himself gulping down his drink to hope it’ll settle the uncomfortable churn it leaves in his stomach. 

╋ ╋ ╋

It’s raining by the time they leave the pub, hard and heavy enough that the raindrops bounce as they hit the pavement in front of them. Soap has the hood of his waterproof coat hauled up over his head, as does Ghost, but the Alpha positions them so that he’s walking almost directly behind Soap. 

Blocking the way the wind and rain blows towards them, using his larger body to take the brunt of the weather, saving Soap from being drenched in the way Ghost is. It’s one of those little gestures that Soap can’t quite place as being something Alphas simply do, or if it is just something Ghost does for him. But he enjoys it anyway. The feeling of being cared for, even if that weight of discomfort hasn’t left him since it nestled in his lower abdomen.

Ghost remains close, especially as Soap unlocks the door, and they usher inside. The automatic entryway light flickers on the moment they’re both in and out of the foul weather. It’s just them, the sound of the rainfall hitting the closed door behind them, shucking off their jackets before they begin making their ascent up the stairs to Soap’s flat. The Alpha takes Soap’s dripping coat and grips it in the same hand as his own jacket, leaving both of Soap’s free — one to have the key ready for his flat and the other, evidently, for Ghost to hold.

They don’t share warmth holding hands like this, their fingers too cold and sodden to generate anything in the way of body heat. Not even with Ghost’s large hand consuming his. Instead, it keeps them both twined together. Soap can’t hare off as he usually does, when he takes three to four steps at a time to launch himself up the stairway, as Ghost treads evenly and swiftly behind him. 

Water drips from their hair and their clothes, soaked through, leaving trails in their wake for the path they take up the steps. But neither of them are in any great haste to move through the warmly lit walkway.

This time, it’s slow and purposeful, with Ghost glancing towards him.

Soap can feel between them some kind of unknown energy crackling, and he’s well aware that Ghost must sense it, too. 

Usually he’s the one to broach a topic first and draw out of Ghost what he thinks and feels. It’s how they work; Soap ready to burst and explode to face things head on, and for Ghost to consider things more meaningfully. To be a fraction slower and infinitely more meticulous. 

But it’s Ghost that is easing their pace, taking each stair one at a time, and drawing Soap into slowing down. Into thinking. As if he knows, by some magical notion, that Soap doesn’t know what he wants to say. That he doesn’t know how to start this conversation, but that having it will help him.

So, Ghost starts out quietly, an easy question for Soap to respond to, “You were bothered by it, weren’t you?”

“Not because I was jealous,” he declares; it isn’t defensive or meant to hide anything deep down. Yet, Ghost glances at him quickly, eyebrow raised, as if calling Soap’s bluff, which he ends up not being able to help a snarky smile at. “Okay. Maybe, for a moment, when I didn’t know what was going on, I was a little jealous that your attention was elsewhere. But, not after then. Not when I understood.”

Ghost doesn’t stop looking at him as they curl around the staircase to take the next flight up towards the second floor. 

“And what did you understand?”

Soap licks his lips, mouth dry, as he looks at the soft line of Ghost’s brow beneath his balaclava. The Alpha isn’t interrogating him. He’s just giving him the time to comb through his thoughts and try to articulate them, because Soap wants to try and be delicate with this. He doesn’t want to crash through this conversation and rely on the assumption that Ghost will be able to parse his meaning. Because something about this feels different. 

If this was someone else — anyone else — Soap knows this would feel like the end of something good. That this conversation, the one they’re having in the damp-smelling stairway of his building, would be the fork in the road that would send them on two different trajectories. 

But with Ghost — with his palm clasped around his as an olive branch — it’s something wholly separate from that. To Soap, in ways he cannot seem to wrap his head around yet, it feels like they could connect. As if this could bind them ever closer.

“That what you had with them is different to what you have with me,” is what he decides to voice, earning him a soft, pleased growl from his Alpha.

“Everything is different with you,” Ghost confirms in a voice that’s so unbearably reverent that Soap knows it’s a kind of confession of love. Especially when, in the next moment, Ghost is lifting their hands up to kiss the join where both their index fingers meet, his mouth warm against the cold skin. 

“Aye, I know,” Soap smiles, his un-held hand coming to wrap around the bend in Ghost’s elbow, a light purr in the back of his own throat that can barely be heard over the jingling of his keys. “But it was a different kind of…”

“Dynamic?” Ghost suggests, when Soap doesn’t find the word to express it himself. 

“Exactly,” he confirms, before he lets them be quiet, treading their way up to the fourth floor, where Soap tugs Ghost towards his front door, sitting there with the silver ‘23’ hanging proudly. 

He pulls Ghost in as he uses his key to unlock and open it, pressing his own back against the white wood of the doorway, until his hips press into the firm muscle of Ghost’s thighs and curl his own fingers into Ghost’s waist. He peers up at his Alpha, becoming molten inside as Ghost bears down on him.

He flexes his grip before he speaks again, “Would you ever want that with me? Whatever you had with them, to be combined with this?”

He accents the last word he says with a tilt of his neck - not submissive in the way he knows those Betas must have been with Ghost. But in the manner an Omega would, back in those old poems and stories, with the Alpha they’re mated to. As if that one action could symbolise their entire relationship.

Ghost stares at him, eyes assessing before they sharpen to gauge Soap’s meaning.

“You don’t even know exactly what I had with them,” Ghost reminds but Soap shakes his head, immediately halting whatever other thoughts may interrupt Ghost from catching his true meaning. 

Soap doesn’t need to know what Ghost had with them. He doesn’t particularly care, either; as sure as the religious believe in something more, he is certain that he could easily love whatever Ghost does. Especially if it’s being done to him. “No, I don’t. But, I want to know, do you want that with me? Whatever you did with them, do you want to do that with me?”

“Of course I do,” Ghost presses his nose into the dripping wet tendrils of Soap’s hair, his teeth sharpened so much that they’ve begun to pierce through his balaclava. “But if I start, I don’t think I’d ever be able to stop.”

Soap whispers, suddenly breathless by the way Ghost crowds him against the door jamb, “Why?”

“Because the things I want to do to you, I didn’t ever want with them,” Ghost starts, eyes blinking, pupils darkening for that expression, the one that’s been needling away at Soap’s sanity for months, to expand within them, letting himself be pulled over Soap’s threshold. “I want to hurt you. Even beyond what you’ve seen me do to anyone else, when the world turns a blind eye. I want to tear you open and… I want your pain to be mine.”

And if Soap had thought what Ghost had said on the stairs was a love confession, it pales in comparison to being cornered in his own home — his own territory — by a predator he knows wants to consume him. He knows that this is Ghost’s love for him, this is his true expression of that. Not being told that he’s different from the others Ghost has had in his life, but knowing that Ghost wants to grasp him in his hands and own every inch of him.

Instead of running, and instead of thoughts of God and guilt, Soap draws Ghost further in, whispering, “I trust you.”

Blindly, Soap longs to add, but doesn’t, as Ghost tugs off his sodden balaclava to kiss him then drop to his knees, to worship at Soap’s body against the wall.

╋ ╋ ╋

Soap wakes in the morning to soft kisses being trailed up and down his spine, a rough hand warming the tender skin of his side, and a beautiful ache all over his body. He hadn’t expected Ghost to dive straight into whatever he’d shared with those Betas, but he had expected something a little more than a rough, kiss-filled fuck with his legs slung over Ghost’s shoulders, before he was cleaned up and urged to go to sleep. 

In hindsight, as he slowly rouses, he knows Ghost made the right call. His head is aching and his tongue is tacky with the clear signs of a mild hangover, and his body is strung out after weeks of being on an operation and entertaining a gaggle of Marines they may never see again. 

So, in the warm comfort of his nest, Soap lets the morning drag on with Ghost adoring his body, especially when Ghost crawls beneath the duvet to alternate between sucking on his little cocklet and licking into the wet hole of his cunt. He doesn’t have much mind to ask Ghost exactly how he fantasises about hurting him, not when his fingers and toes curl with the aching pulses of multiple orgasms. 

But he does notice that Ghost is more forthcoming with nuzzling into and worshipping every bite mark and bruise he’d left on Soap’s skin the night before. Even kissing down to Soap’s ankle, to kiss and lick at the pale, risen scar Ghost had left there, cutting out that burrowing insect in Brunei. He growls, all predatory and wanting, when Soap purrs and moans at the attention.

And it’s coming up close to lunchtime, both of them still in bed, when Ghost rumbles into his ear. “Want to try something for me?”

Soap knows he must have looked delighted and needy as he’d nodded, letting Ghost pull him up onto his knees to kneel on the bed, because Ghost smiles at him. Just before he hooks a finger beneath Soap’s chin, tilting his head to force their eyes to meet. 

“You need to listen to me and do as I say,” Ghost warns, pupils focused and predatory, and Soap can see himself in the reflection of them. Wide-eyed and docile, his appearance visibly fucked out by his favourite Alpha’s adoring tongue. “Will you do that for me, pretty Omega?”

All he can do is nod and try to follow after his lover as Ghost pushes himself off the bed to stand at its edge.

“Stay still,” Ghost orders and Soap rests back on his heels, an involuntary whine piercing through his vocal cords. And he feels something akin to joy flit through his stomach as Ghost hums, “Good boy.”

He sits there and waits, excited and expectant, aware that Ghost must be able to smell the spike in his arousal, even as he walks out of the door to make his way out into the corridor. 

From down the hallway of his flat, Soap can hear Ghost boiling the kettle and clinking around with plates and cutlery. He can hear the unmistakable pop of the toaster and the way everything falls quiet after that handful of minutes. Until Ghost appears in the doorway moments later.

He’s holding a mug in one hand, with the steam still billowing from it, and then a large plate with toast on one side and a pile of fruits on the other.

Ghost sets the cup onto the bedside table and the plate down onto the bed near where Soap kneels; he steps close until his shins are almost touching the bed frame. He beckons Soap forward with a crooking of his finger and Soap crawls as close to the edge as he can get without it displacing his balance.

“We’ll talk more about what we want later, once you’ve got a full stomach and we’re dressed.”

A piece of cut apple is held in front of him, and he bows his head forward to take it between his teeth to bring it into his mouth whole. The sugary flavour of it has his mouth flooding with saliva almost painfully as he takes his first bite. It takes him only a second to recover from that before he’s happily eating it up.. 

He grinds it down into a paste in his mouth with such haste when Ghost reaches for a clementine segment, that his Alpha slows for a moment.

“Chew it slowly, sweet boy,” Ghost hums, caressing his cheek with the thumb of the hand that had been reaching for the bowl. “It’s not going anywhere. It’s just for you to eat.”

He does wait patiently, resting back on his heels, as Ghost picks up each individual piece to hand-feed him an array of fresh fruits. The juices of raspberries staining Ghost’s fingertips very much in the same way that Soap knows his lips and tongue must as well.

They fall into a pattern, of Soap obediently taking the fruit with happy bites and Ghost knowing exactly the right way to give him each piece. Even as the shapes and textures change. And Soap tries not to rankle over the notion that this is another thing that Ghost has grown adept at. 

He can almost see the Beta they’d seen in the pub in the same position as he is now, being adored and waited on by Soap’s Alpha. It’s irrational, like most things are when they occupy Soap endlessly, for him to think that Ghost would have never been with someone else.

That he would have remained chaste and tamed until the moment he met Soap.

But imagining the relaxed curve of Ghost’s body— alongside those happy little grumbles of pleasure that he can feel Ghost repressing — being seen by someone else. That Ghost’s eyes would be molten and adoring, just as they are in the late morning light, with someone else. That there would be someone else, kneeling in submission for this beautiful beast to adorn them with these light, knowing touches. It’s an upset that he loathes.

It jars him when Ghost places the bowl down on the bedside table, jolting his muscles in fright beneath his skin. So he blinks slowly, recalibrating, as Ghost lifts a slice of the toast off the plate and presses the cut corner of it to his mouth. There’s the deliciously greasy feeling of melted butter that paints his lips as he parts them for Ghost, taking his first bite.

The next time, however, he fills his mouth to the brim with two bites in one go, chewing on it quickly to be able to take a third.

Each bite is larger than the last, with him greedily chomping through the two halved slices of toast in only a few goes. Ghost pulls the toast back a handful of times before he relents and lets Soap gorge himself to sate his hunger. 

When the last butter topped piece is in Soap’s mouth, Ghost wipes the grease from his lips with his thumb as he chews. His eyes are soft and pleased as he looks down at Soap from where he stands, even despite his next words. 

“You don’t do well with instructions, do you, Johnny?”

The Alpha doesn’t sound aggrieved; his tone mirthful enough that Soap lets himself grin with his mouth full.

“I wouldn’t have joined the military if I couldn’t follow orders,” Soap huffs the moment his mouth is empty, focusing on kissing the butter from Ghost’s thumb instead.

Ghost suppresses a laugh, and Soap adores seeing his lover’s face so unguarded,  “There’s a file, as thick as the bible, in Price’s office, with your name on it, that’s littered with reports of insubordination.”

Unable to deny it, Soap closes his eyes and tilts his head back in that submissive way he had the night before. “But none are written by you.”

“I must be being too lenient with you, then.” Ghost lets the tip of his thumb breach the line of Soap’s teeth for Soap to lick up the remnants of his breakfast.

Soap moves his head back even further, forcing Ghost’s thumb from between his lips, letting it drag down to his chin, to grin and tell his lover, “Or maybe, I’m just an Omega who wants to obey his favourite Alpha.”

The satisfied rumble in Ghost’s chest is something the man can’t hide. He doesn’t seem to try to, either. Soap guesses the verbal confession of his submission to Ghost, whilst he kneels in their nest to be hand fed and guided by his Alpha, sates that hungry part of Ghost. 

Because his eyes remain dark. They keep that all-consuming look to them, staring down at Soap as if he’s a lamb waiting for slaughter.

“We’ll see how well you can obey,” Ghost promises, and Soap longs to have something smart to retort with, but Ghost’s hand begins to grip at his jaw — painfully so — until Soap’s body gives in to the pressure. 

His mouth widens, like a serpent working to consume something whole, a small whimper escaping from his throat.

But even with the aching pain, he doesn’t wriggle free. He relaxes into it, keeping himself steady, and letting Ghost’s harsh hold be the thing to keep his head upright.

Things don’t go quiet in Soap’s head. At least, not in the way he’s read online about this kind of submission before. His thoughts still rattle, still keep him feeling a little too alert, but there’s one resounding thread to all of them: that he would do anything Ghost asked of him.

He would follow any command and whim, like a disciple blindly following their messiah. Even if it hurt him.

Even if it killed him.

╋ ╋ ╋

Part of Soap thinks, once he’s been fed his breakfast, that they’ll dive straight into their conversation about what this revelation about Ghost will mean for their relationship. For their future bond. 

Yet, Ghost simply goes about with the rest of his day. Puttering about the flat, cleaning and scrubbing things clean, like he always does a few days into staying with Soap. He’s more concerned with wiping the dust from the baseboards and tops of doors than sitting down to talk Soap through his every want and desire. 

Soap, with a half distracted mind, tries his best to do the same. 

He sets himself the task of washing their bedsheets and cleaning up the bathroom, leaving everything fresh and clean smelling before he decides to construct a new nest for them to sleep in.

They cook and eat their dinner once they’re done, having omitted lunch from their day entirely, and spend their evening watching a football match with Soap’s feet resting on Ghost’s leg. His Alpha’s fingers massage his ankles and the heels of his feet, sometimes pulling upwards to run his thumb over the bump of the scar left from when Ghost cut the insect from his leg.

The Alpha chuffs contentedly every so often, especially when Soap begins to purr, overwhelmed by the comfort of the evening. 

Even with the conversation Soap knows they need to have dangling over their heads, he’s still able to melt and relax into the sofa cushions. All because Ghost is there. He’s not being left to spiral on his own, not left to plead with a God and saints, because Ghost hasn’t volunteered anything up since being in the stairwell.

So, instead, when the game reaches halftime, Soap reluctantly pulls himself from Ghost’s hands to set his feet on the floor, muting the television pundits. Leaving the room so quiet, Soap can feel his breaths deepening to prepare himself.

“Don’t you think we should talk about it?” Soap asks, glancing at Ghost to try to read his facial expression and posture. 

The Alpha’s hands rest limply in his own lap as he looks at Soap head on, before he nods his head once and hums deeply in assent. 

Soap knows he should be concerned by the notion of his lover confessing his wish — his deepest desire — is to hurt him. But when Ghost is so calm, so gentle with him whenever they touch, whenever they kiss, he knows that longing isn’t malevolent. 

It doesn’t consume him in the way Soap has seen too many Alphas long for violence and control. He’s tried to hide it and to keep it at bay — not through shame, Soap hopes — in such a valiant effort to deny himself. 

But Soap suggesting this conversation needs to happen does something to Ghost.

He can see it in the line of his shoulders, in how he forces them to slope down in that way they get trained to be in interrogations. To not raise their hackles in defence when pressed into corners and give a clear tell to how close the bone things are cutting.

Ghost is neutral and placid to such a forced degree that it feels mechanical — a clear cut away from the tender beast who’d doted on Soap upon their nest just hours before.

Knowing Ghost won’t be the first to speak, lest he reveal too much, Soap is well aware that he will have to take the first step. 

He asks, licking his lips to wet them first, “When you’ve been with others before, what did you do with them?”

Soap assumes that recounting the past may be safer territory for Ghost; to recall what has been rather than the desires Ghost has for their future.

“Whipping,” Ghost says plainly, in much the same way Soap has heard him give intel in briefings. “Bondage. Knives.”

It’s a neat little list, spoken as if those three words carry all the weight of what Soap wants to know, and they do. To an extent. 

They make the skin over his gland prickle, his interest drawn to the images his brain puzzles together. Of the Beta, the one they’d seen in the bar the night previous, bound, with their skin hot where it stretches over welts given by a rough leather belt. Of Ghost, with his eyes wild as he fixates on the prey at his feet — how beautiful Soap imagines he’d be. 

Perspiration covering every peak and trough of his body, dripping in neat, pheromone riddled droplets, with his chest heaving beneath a thin, khaki t-shirt.

He thinks of feeling small, despite how much space he takes up, beneath Ghost’s erotically oppressive gaze. How the muscles beneath his skin quiver with the oxymoronic urge to diminish his size, so that he can open himself up to this beast he adores.

“I’ve never…” Soap begins, tongue slipping out to run over his lips again, hoping it will help his mouth feel less dry as he reveals part of himself, too. Wanting to give to his lover, just as much as he’s taking. “It’s not something I’ve done before.”

“I know,” Ghost continues to look at him, lifting his hand upwards to cup his cheek, giving them both a connection to ground themselves on. “I wouldn’t ask that of you.”

“But, what if that’s something I did want to do, with you?” Soap can feel an irrational, anxious weight mounting in the pit of his stomach, as if either of them could resist the idea of Ghost leading him by the wrist into the darkest of temptations. He takes in a breath, closing his eyes for a moment, before he manages to speak again. “Would you like me to do that for you?”

There’s a deep, wanting rumble from somewhere primal and ancient within Ghost, “You know I do.”

“Then tell me what to do.” Soap twists his body slightly, tilting more towards Ghost, ducking his head down, just so he can look up at his Alpha through his eyelashes. His own hand keeping Ghost’s to his cheek, “Because I’ll do it. Whatever you want from me, you can have it. Because I want that part of you to be mine, too.”

“I told you,” Ghost warns, “that once I start with you, I’d never be able to stop.”

Soap lets himself grin, that nervousness in his belly bubbling up into excitement as Ghost’s chest vibrates with one of his constant, pleased growls of possessing what he wants. “You know me, Sir, I’d never want you to stop.”

“Fuck,” Ghost hisses, eyes darkening as his pupils widen, his lips indenting as his fangs extend down to press into the flesh. A dull spike of arousal dancing beneath Soap’s nose as he slowly realises how to tempt out this darker side of his Alpha.

That the way to have Ghost lose control is to give him all control. To let him possess everything about Soap’s being and the way he lives in this little life they’ve forged in the cramped rooms of Soap’s flat.

He leans in close and places a sweet kiss to the point of one of Ghost’s canines. “I’ll do anything you ask.”

“Kneel on the floor,” Ghost commands, voice so close to Soap’s ear that it feels like it could be one of his own thoughts. 

Soap does as he’s asked, calves tucked beneath his thighs in a way he knows will ache after a few minutes, and he entwines the fingers of both his hands where they sit relaxed in his lap. 

He tucks his chin downwards slightly, not quite sure if he could handle looking up at Ghost and seeing the confident spread of his shoulders. Lest he confess to the fact he thinks this could drive his love deeper into his heart. As if this moment, where he thinks he may finally be giving himself over to his lover in a way no one else has ever had him before, is what will truly seal his devotion to this bond they share.

“You going to pray for me, Omega?” Ghost must lean down to ask, voice thick and almost raspy where his teeth, sharp and feral, must have extended over his bottom lip. 

It takes Soap a moment to register what he means, until he registers his own pose. An inverted mimesis of the images painted on walls and canvas, tempered and crafted as stained glass, and even his own memories of his mother, all as they bow to speak to their God.

All sat as he does now at their own altars. And he pictures this, momentarily, as his own retable. Where the image of his lover – his own God – looks down at him, spread out wide, in some revelation of dark, uncovered desires.

In a reply, as quiet as he can muster, Soap’s heart begins to thump in sharp clenches as it beats in his chest, “If you want me to, Sir.”

And unlike the many others Soap has known to pray to some higher being, his God speaks back to him. 

“Then pray, Johnny.”

As those words are spoken, one of Ghost’s large hands comes to rest at his chin, his thumb pressing between the soft, small parting of his mouth. His nail presses Soap’s top lip into his two front teeth, pinching it there until it’s painful, and Soap thinks Ghost will keep digging in until the flesh breaks and he bleeds.

Instead, his Alpha relinquishes from the pressure he’s applying, and slips his thumb between the gap of Soap’s top teeth where they don’t meet his bottom ones. His jaw widens to accommodate the invasion and he laps his tongue invitingly against the pad of Ghost’s thumb.

“Sweet Omega,” Ghost croons, sending the warm, honeyed sensation of praise down Soap’s spine.

Ghost stays there, with his thumb making its home in Soap’s mouth, so Soap lets himself relax slightly. The burn in his thighs is familiar as it creeps in, numbing his feet and pulsing in his knees.

It barely takes him a moment to be back in his Selection process. Of being blindfolded in a water-dampened, cold room surrounded by his fellow Special Forces hopefuls, placed into stress positions whilst they listened to pained screams and cries played through speakers on a loop. He remembers how disoriented he’d felt. How he’d jolted when he was touched by one of the staff acting as their captors. 

He recalls how he knew it was a simulation, but that his body still groaned and strained under the stress of it, as if it was real. Because that ache in his limbs at maintaining poses for hours had worn him so thin, he’d considered throwing the towel in, and passing up on his wish to become something more than he was before. 

But this is unlike that.

Instead of unforgiving concrete beneath his body is the soft, cushioned material of his rug; instead of the cold chill blowing in through an unclosed door, there’s the constant warmth from the central heating. Instead of the calls of civilians begging to be saved, there’s the comforting hum of his Alpha’s low growls and the noise of his own breathing. 

There is no wish for it to end, just the regret of not beginning it sooner. Especially when Ghost’s other hand comes to stroke at his uncovered mating gland, like a reward, once he begins lightly suckling on Ghost’s thumb.

It’s quiet. 

It’s a peace that Soap hasn’t known since childhood, to kneel in some image of prayer at this altar his Alpha has formed for him. And he thinks he may wish to stay there forever.

╋ ╋ ╋

Soap partially expects them to descend into a debauched life of pleasured pain after he knelt for Ghost at first night. But, begrudgingly, Soap gets placed on overnight duty for a week, when another team goes out on their rotation, leaving only a few hours of overlap between their working days. 

It has him itching beneath his skin to be with Ghost; praying for the weekend to come so that he can crawl into bed with his Alpha and douse him in his scent. He knows Ghost is much the same, with him switching his schedule to exercise in the evenings, so he has some excuse to still be on base for the first few hours of Soap’s watch shift.

They eat together, sitting opposite each other in the cookhouse, with their forks prodding at plates of food where half the vegetables have been over-boiled and the meat has been overcooked until it’s tough and chewy. And whilst they can’t do something as simple as kneeling, Ghost finds some new way of letting Soap see this newfound side of him. 

He wonders if it should frighten him, how easily he gives himself up to Ghost to follow his commands and whims, even outside of their official working hours. 

Ghost selects the food Soap eats, the way he works out, and what books he reads whilst he’s waiting for emails to drop into the restricted inbox he’s supposed to be overseeing. He chooses which of the standard issue bite guards Soap will wear each day – leaving it on the office desk for Soap when he comes in whilst Ghost is in the gym. 

He enjoys it. He takes pleasure in Ghost picking up these small decisions for him; enjoys the tender rub to his mating gland when Ghost thinks he’s done well enough at whatever little task has been set for him. 

But, he wonders when the pain will start. 

He’s curious to know what it would feel like. If it would hollow him out to become a vessel for nothing but gratification, or if it would consume him until it feels like he’s surrounded by everything Ghost wants from him.

When he crawls into his bed, the nest devoid of his working lover, he thinks of that vision he had of Ghost when he’d told him his little list of activities. 

Of him holding that leather belt his mind paired with his Alpha, and Soap touches himself, face nuzzled deep into the pillow Ghost uses when he stays over to pick up those faint hints of his lover. He tries to consider what it would feel like – would Ghost hit hard enough to bruise and welt his skin? Would he kiss the marks he leaves there? Would he ignore Soap as he calls and cries out for his mercy?

Soap cums with Ghost’s side of the bed sodden and rich with the smell of his slick. The thought of his Alpha’s violence displayed so beautifully for him too much for him to fight the pulsing orgasm that pumps through him. He calls Ghost’s name out, but it isn’t a cry for his lover to join him. 

It’s one to show his devotion. That even in those moments of heightened pleasure, it is still Ghost that he thinks of in singularity. 

╋ ╋ ╋

When Saturday morning beckons, harkening the end of Soap’s week and delivering the time he can spend with Ghost, Soap thrums with excitement the entire drive home. He eats and cleans during his wait for Ghost to arrive, skin tingling with the simmering adrenaline of his anticipation. 

He’s known to be foolhardy and hasty — fearless to a fault, and he is entirely prepared for whatever Ghost has planned for the two of them.

Even if it’s just kneeling. Since, discovering a part of himself that enjoys the stillness and finding solace in it — rather than seeking sound and touch to consume him whole — has done something to Soap.

But as he buzzes Ghost into the building and the Alpha strides into the flat, Soap knows they’re in for something entirely different to kneeling. 

Ghost holds a black, leather bag in one of his glove-covered hands, making his way directly into the kitchen once a firm, biting kiss is placed upon Soap’s lips.

The telltale rattle of the freezer draws being pulled open has Soap frowning and following his lover through the flat, to see him placing glass spheres into the drawer, resting upon a tub of leftovers. 

“What are they?” He queries, treading in closer to peek at what’s inside Ghost’s duffel.

“Something that’s going to make you feel good,” Ghost promises, with his hand clenching around the bag, hiding the contents from Soap’s prying eyes.

Soap wants to open his mouth to push further, to draw out exactly what meaning those words carry, but Ghost stands to his full height and leans towards Soap.

“Take this off,” he orders, voice soft and calm, fingers tapping on Soap’s bite prevention collar, and the omega readily busies himself with removing it. 

Freeing his gland from its confines and allowing the suppressant-dulled pheromones to escape from his body, coaxing Ghost in closer until he presses a closed mouth kiss to the spot.

It’s with his mouth against Soap’s skin that Ghost utters something that, despite all his training and disposition, disarms Soap entirely.

As he says, “I’m going to hurt you tonight, Johnny,” with his teeth grazing over the gland that’s slowly starting to throb beneath Ghost’s touch.

Aching and calling to be bitten by his favourite Alpha.

There is no smart quip on his tongue to retort with, so he settles for something simple. “I’d like that.”

Ghost chuffs once against his throat before he withdraws, hands settling on Soap’s hips, beneath his shirt, to warm them there against his skin. 

“When’s the last time you ate?”

Soap glances at his oven, where the time glows in a steady red, “Had lunch around forty-five minutes ago.”

Ghost nods his head, happy with the answer. Both of his thumbs strumming in time together on Soap’s waist, feeling the dips and swells of his muscles there.

“And the last time you drank?”

Soap doesn’t have to think of that, “Just before you got here.”

“Good Omega,” Ghost praises just as that glinting sadistic darkness overwhelms his pupils. 

It isn’t soon after that in which Soap finds himself kneeling, obediently bowed forward, upon his bed. His body is bare, with only a chill crawling up his spine, prickling the hairs on his skin. Ghost stands off to the side in the room and he has been for some time, with his gaze fixed and immovable from his prize.

From where Soap knows he must present like a torn open gift — his outer layers stripped off and scattered upon the floor, with only the prospect of being played with to come.

Without a word, Ghost leaves and Soap can hear rattling around in his kitchen before there’s complete silence. Ghost doesn’t hide his presence from Soap, so he can feel the foreboding chasm of his lover ambling through the flat until he’s stood behind Soap again, only closer this time.

There’s a large rough palm pressed against the curve of his hips, pulling him back until he’s sure he’s parallel to the mattress with only his hands, knees, shins, and the pads of his toes touching the duvet. 

“Do not move,” Ghost commands, the words a seductively growled order that Soap could never bear to betray.

So he does as his Alpha says, entire body humming with the anticipation of what is to come.

But nothing prepares him from the blissful pain of being struck. 

Not by Ghost’s hands, however. Not a belt, like he’d anticipated.

It’s from something that whistles through the air with the force in which Ghost wields it, and it snaps in a bone-chilling crack against the flesh at the back of his thighs. He jolts forward at the impact, earning him a hard pinch to the tender skin of his hip. 

He rights his posture and another of those bitter kisses singes the skin of his arse. He keeps himself as still as he can, but his muscles jump and quiver at the touch of whichever weapon Ghost has chosen for him. Each time, he’s silently scolded by his Alpha, with the clipped, blunt nails of a bear-paw of a hand digging into his waist.

Soap doesn’t know how many times he’s struck, but he knows he’s enamoured by the sensation when his mouth hangs agape, lips so numb that he barely registers the heat of his heaving breaths.

The pain it leaves is foreign yet exquisite — nothing like he’s ever felt from the hands of even their worst of enemies. They prefer hands and steel-toe boots. Not whichever heavenly tool Ghost wields.

Ghost’s presence feels like it has grown behind him. His Alpha no longer hidden away from him, no longer contained in the box he’d prepared to keep himself in to remain by Soap’s side. He’s unshackled and unbidden in his violent torture, but Soap can only think of how beautiful he must look.

How his impressive chest must heave. How his muscles must flex and tighten with each strike. How his eyes must be entirely dark, blackened as if his soul has been possessed by some demonic figure. 

It toes the line between rapture and bliss, and Soap truly mourns when Ghost seems to stop his litany of sadistic physicality.

He whimpers out some pathetic sound as Ghost presses the odd tip of his weapon right along Soap’s surely glistening, wet cunt — to use it to toy with Soap’s folds before he bestows a trio of rapid, harsh slaps against the dripping tip of his clit.

His cocklet gets the same treatment, splattering the slick across it, until it splashes with weak, impotent ejaculate down onto the bed sheet below.

He’s left to recover for a moment before his hips are held in a painful grasp, to be tugged back towards the edge of the bed. Right where he knows his cunt must be on display, with his hole so wet and inviting, just calling for his Alpha to ravage it.

“Squeal for me,” Ghost rumbles against his spine as he drags his lips down to where the sensation of burning flesh reigns supreme over all others.

Soap, in any other state, would ask for clarification of an order of that type, but he doesn’t get the chance to. Because those fangs, the ones he kisses and licks so affectionately, dig deeply into his abused flesh that he does exactly as Ghost asked of him. He wails out something he would be humiliated to admit to, but his Alpha is relentless as he sinks his teeth in deep enough to surely draw blood.

He does that, over and over, plunging into skin and muscle, as if he’s trying to stake his claim on these marks upon Soap’s body. Ghost rumbling appreciatively each time he pierces the flesh, even tugging lightly in some cases. As if he wants to tear parts of Soap away to swallow it down.

Once Ghost is happy, he speaks again, his hand running across the unmarred skin of Soap’s spine as he does so.

“Good boy,” comes the praise, followed by another command, “keep this form. Your reward is coming.”

Soap isn’t sure he could move from where he’s been positioned; the skin across the backs of his thighs and his arse feels tight as it swells and strains beneath the pressure of fresh welts. His wrists almost locked into place where he presses his weight down on him.

There’s a little more silence before Ghost is touching him, but not with his hands.

What meets Soap’s skin is a solid ball, beginning at the curve of Soap’s coccyx to go up and across the tundra of his waist and shoulders, rolling it down the sensitive skin by his ribs then back up again. It’s ice cold, as if it could be the round sphere of a whisky ball.

It makes Soap groan, the sensation so oppressive in its sharp contrast to the hot pain emanating from his thighs. Yet, he can feel his wires crossing as Ghost adds a second, frozen sphere, to this sensory game.

Over pristine skin, they feel as though they’re cold enough to burn a hole straight through him. Yet, when he rolls them down to the wounds he has left, it soothes Soap in a way that aches painfully. The heat tempers the cold in this otherworldly torture.

It is nothing like what he’s experienced before; never been taunted and abused in this way by anyone.

Yet, what brings the most bliss for him, is when Ghost leaves his welted and sore skin behind, and makes his way to the back of Soap’s neck. Those icy spheres press firm against his mating glands. They circle around them and press them back into his body. 

But Ghost does something that makes Soap gasp and shudder — every so often, he breathes a hot, dense breath against the cooled skin. It’s so warm, so unlike Ghost, to run at what feels like such a high temperature that Soap can only liken it to a rainforest. Moist and threatening in its heat.

The pheromones of Soap’s own blood are carried on his breath, like they’re returning home after quenching his lover’s animalistic thirsts. And he groans at the thought.

At the idea that a part of him emanates from his Alpha in an act as simple as breathing. 

Once his glands have been tortured until he can barely lift his head, Ghost lets the spheres drop onto the mattress. In the corner of his eye, Soap can see two glass balls that clink together as Ghost moves.

There’s the telltale sound of the buttoned fly of jeans being popped open, and Ghost’s groan at fishing his cock out of his underwear. The Alpha wastes no time in unsheathing the head of it to press into Soap, to move so gently and slowly that it doesn’t feel like it’s the same man who has spent their time lovingly abusing him.

Until the base meets the opening of Soap’s cunt. The pressure increases tenfold as Soap realises that Ghost is going to bully his knot into him. Forcing its way so painfully inside that Soap can only liken it to being violated. 

It’s so unlike Ghost to be so far along in his arousal that he does such an action outside of his rut. 

Soap expects it to hurt. Especially since he’s not being protected by the loosening scorch of his rut-triggered heat. 

Like this, so entirely unprepared to have a knot pressed into him, it feels like heaven. Only to be amplified when Ghost pulls his knot out again, just to shove it back in with a harsh snap of his hips. Fucking Soap’s hole with the ever-growing bulbous root of his cock.

From start to finish, there’s a cruelty to Ghost that Soap has only ever known to emerge in the most dire of situations. To be kept hidden behind doors of soundproofed rooms that only Ghost and Price are allowed in — Soap and Gaz left outside in silence, only to find someone bloodied and begging for death when the door reopens to let them in.

There’s a barbarism to Soap’s Alpha that very few possess anymore, and he feels molten inside at the thought. That this  beast craves for and can be satiated by him. That his Alpha has uncovered this unknown masochism deep within Soap himself. One he never even realised was there to be found.

He’s fucked hard and fast, the friction of Ghost’s skin rubbing on tender, raw spots, only makes Soap clench harder around him. Only makes Soap’s slick ebb out of him in a steady stream where even his cocklet smacks against his abdomen, uncaring of how abused it’s been.

Soap widens his knees, tilting his spine in just the right way, to have Ghost’s cock head catching and rubbing against the inner nerves of his clit as it moves in and out of him. Giving Ghost’s knot the opportunity to slide easily. Sloppily. Until it enlarges enough to catch on Soap’s rim once more, to keep them locked together and giving Ghost the only option to go deeper and deeper, rather than being able to retreat. 

The sound of it — the sopping wetness covering them both — is obscene and Soap can only close his eyes, lips still parted, as he feels as though his Alpha would fuck him right out of his skin.

And he doesn’t squirm or fight when Ghost holds him fast, the tip of his cock kissing gently against his cervix as he orgasms. Soap’s body quickly follows suit to milk the cum from his Alpha, to appease that primal, carnal part of his brain that has been set free by this beast of a man. The part of him that wants his belly to hang so large and low with a litter of pups that it would press into the mattress, even as he kneels on all fours like this.

It takes no time for Ghost to pull his knot out of Soap and place his feet back down on the ground, silently making his way around to stand in front of him.

When Ghost kneels, with his lips, chin, and jaw smeared with blood coming into view, he tugs at Soap’s wrists to hold them and pull Soap more upright to lean against his chest. The Omega obediently moves, happy to no longer be taking his full weight onto his joints.

Something runs down between Soap’s thighs at the movement, and the Omega cannot decipher whether it’s his blood, his arousal sweetened slick, his Alpha’s cum, or his own. He doesn’t look, but he can see how Ghost tilts his head when it catches his sight, and there’s a hungered look to his expression as he subconsciously licks his lips.

“You look like sin,” Ghost growls, low and husky, eyes still trained on that viscous trail. 

But Ghost’s hands reach to cup Soap’s chin, his thumbs caressing the skin beneath Soap’s lips, with an oddly smooth slide to the motions.

It’s only when Ghost puts a glistening thumb to his lips, to suck it, that Soap realises that his pleasure-pain numbed mouth had rivulets of spittle dripping from his chin. That he was dribbling, in all his bliss, not only from his cunt and cocklet, but from between his lips. 

He glances down to see the darkened patch of the duvet cover as it’s been stained with his saliva, but his head is pulled back up to look Ghost in the eye almost immediately.

His Alpha lifts something to Soap’s mouth and he almost expects food, only to be presented with the tongued tip of a jockey’s riding crop. Coated and glazed with the heady scent of his own ejaculate and slick just enough that Soap groans in delight as he laps at it.

Like a cub suckling from the teat of its mother. Wanting more. Wishing to drown in it until his own hunger is settled.

And he thinks this object, that he draws into his mouth to lick clean, may have become his new favourite possession of Ghost’s.

╋ ╋ ╋

The rest of their weekend isn’t spent in the throes of physical pain, but in what Ghost calls ‘discipline’ and ‘reward’. With Soap spending time on his knees between Ghost’s thighs as they watch television, being hand-fed by Ghost at mealtimes, and having his fading sores and bite marks tended to with gentle, considerate hands.

He sleeps upon Ghost’s chest, held in place by the man’s arms, to save him from the pain of rolling onto his back, and wakes with a content purr vibrating in his own throat. 

It’s a slow weekend that is halted by the coming week. One that seems to drag along at a snail's pace, even when Soap and Gaz join another team on one of their expedition exercises. Usually the physical and mental toll of an exercise is enough to have Soap’s hours flying by, especially when he’s camped up with people he knows relatively well in moderate weather.

But the absence of Ghost is all the more telling as he lays in a tent at night, Gaz sleeping soundly beside him, and he runs his fingers across the predominantly healed skin on the backs of his legs.

He feels how the crop marks cross over one another, picturing a crucifix in his mind. One that has a scabbed bite mark of a halo surrounding it. 

And he thinks over what Ghost had said to him, how he’d compared him to sin. That his wantonly abused body was a temptation for his Alpha; one for him to plunder and claim. 

The only thing Soap feels building up within himself is guilt. Layering itself in his stomach to clench and squeeze until he feels queasy in his unease. 

But it isn’t guilt for what he’s done that he feels — he isn’t pondering whether some God could accept repentance for savouring and delighting in his own pain. He doesn’t feel shame for his joy. 

It is because he hasn’t been led to this discovery earlier. 

In the months since Soap has been by Ghost’s side, his Alpha has kept himself locked away — unable to be the beast he was born to be. And Soap, as he touches that rougher skin that has become tight and soft where it has been welted raw, wonders what could have already been if he had known he could be so devoted to the pain his Alpha gives him.

It eats away at him throughout the entire exercise, not even slowing as he sets his sights on Ghost. 

It’s well past six in the evening but Ghost is still lingering around, standing in his fatigues by the Stores building Soap knows his team will be returning their kit to. 

But nothing about that guilt relaxes, even as he kneels — upright and uniform — on his living room floor, beside Ghost’s left leg almost the moment after they arrive there. It doesn’t ebb away like it usually does when Ghost takes him out of his clothing and makes him lay, face down, in the middle of the bed.

The weighted sense of remorse only hangs heavier on him when Ghost growls, approving and low, as he kisses each wound on Soap’s body. When playfully bites and nibbles at them, too, once his inspection is done. 

It has his fists clenching hard into the pillow that his head is buried in, as Ghost lifts his hips to reward him with a languid tongue fucking in praise. Especially when Ghost speaks out, rough and teasingly against his clit between hard bites on it, to praise him.

“Good little Omega,” is the phrase that Ghost lingers on the most, and it digs deep into the growing pit in Soap’s stomach.

As if it’s taunting him with the fact that he feels anything but good for his Alpha. That he’s kept Ghost from sinking his teeth deep enough to draw blood. That he hasn’t been able to be a vessel for Ghost to vent his desires.

But also that he hasn’t been able to recognise this want within himself, beyond the fascination with Ghost’s predatory gaze that is sometimes flashed in his direction. That he could possibly enjoy this pain, this hurt, that he welcomes between them. Enjoying each strike and painful pull at his body.

He sleeps lightly, waking often, occupied with the idea that he hasn’t truly known his Alpha for this long. But, to worsen that feeling further, he hasn’t known himself either.

And he refuses to let himself consider why.

╋ ╋ ╋

It’s that guilt that has Soap sitting in his kitchen, a cup of coffee steaming in his hands, as he waits for Ghost to arrive. Just eight days after he’d returned home from the exercise.

He’s left the front door of his building open and the one to his flat unlocked, knowing Ghost will take the hint and come straight in.

Opposite Soap, there’s a cup of tea waiting for the Alpha, made just the way he likes it and Soap can’t help but reach out to touch the handle, tilting it towards the empty seat. A nervous gesture to try and do something he feels could be marginally helpful.

“Johnny?” Ghost’s voice calls through as he opens the front door, sounding like he’s taking off his jacket and shoes to stow away in the cupboard there.

He withdraws his hand from Ghost’s mug. “In the kitchen.”

Ghost appears in the doorway barely a second later, face covered by a medical face mask that he slips off to lean down and kiss Soap’s temple.

“Was absolutely gasping for a brew,” he hums, picking up his tea and taking some long, drawn out sips from it whilst his other hand comes to stroke at Soap’s cheek affectionately. “Thanks.”

Soap smiles, tilting his head to kiss his lover’s gloved hand, and drawing in the faint smell of Ghost’s scent from beneath the scent blocker he surely sprayed on that morning. After a moment, Ghost withdraws to place his emptied mug downwards in the sink and tracks his way back over, comfortably placing himself in the seat opposite Soap.

“You all right?” Ghost questions, nudging their socked feet together in a soft kick. 

“Aye,” is Soap’s reflexive response but it seems to alert Ghost to something, as he straightens in his seat and leans forward. Shoulders broad in a way that would be imposing to anyone else. 

But, to Soap, it’s a comfort. 

Ghost is the one with his back to the door and the window in the room, and his instinctual and initial posture change is to widen himself. Not to intimidate. But to protect. 

To shield his Omega from the world that could intrude in the moment he feels any degree of concern for him. As always, however, his expression is blank enough to be unreadable, and it’s only his body that gives anything away.

“Why do you smell like that?” 

Soap tilts his head to the side, bringing his own wrist to his nose to draw the scent in, “Like what?”

Ghost takes Soap’s wrist into his hand and takes a couple of short sniffs, eyes just as indecipherable as the rest of him. “Dull.”

“Just tired,” he provides, not quite sure if he’s ready enough to ask Ghost outright what his desires are. 

But from those two words, it’s clear that Ghost doesn’t quite believe him, but lets it go with a firmly spoken, “Right.”

They both know, Soap speaks when he’s ready, that he’ll volunteer the reasons on his own in his own time. So Ghost shrugs it off, all without changing that protective stance he’s take up.

They make lunch together, toasting bread, cutting up some cheddar to make cheese on toast under the grill, and then watch a Rugby League match that Soap doesn’t have much care for.

Ghost idles as the game is on, his hand in Soap’s hair, only huffing out when the referee makes a decision he doesn’t quite agree with. It leaves Soap to scroll through his phone, trying to relax his body and quell that cramping guilt.

Every so often through the afternoon, Soap feels Ghost watching him, but the Alpha doesn’t once ask him to kneel. He doesn’t command Soap, or set rules for him to obey. It’s a recall to their life before Ghost revealed himself and uncovered this part of Soap. Of slow, calm days spent curled up together.

Kissing every so often and stumbling into bed with takeaway-filled stomachs, falling into sleep without any grand teasing or lust. Just Ghost pulling Soap to tuck his head into his throat, so he can smell the faintest flow of Ghost’s pheromones with each intake of breath.

It’s actually only when they wake, warm and slow in the Saturday rising morning sunlight, that Soap finally grasps for courage within himself to ask of Ghost what he truly wishes to know.

He stares at and kisses his Alpha first for a few moments, before he retreats down to look away from Ghost’s eyes. Fixes his gaze down their bodies, to watch where a coat hanger dangles from the wardrobe’s door.. Unsure if he wishes to see his own face reflected back in those pupils that will surely be darkened in these dawning hours.

Soap splays a hand across Ghost’s abdomen, playing with the pale, almost silvery hairs there. Self-soothing to dispel his anxiety.

“What do you want from me?” He asks. “And I mean really want.”

Ghost is silent for a moment before he clears his throat and sits up slightly in the bed, dislodging Soap’s head until it’s resting on his stomach instead of his chest. Soap half worries that Ghost will make some passing joke to deflect, but the Alpha answers in plain words.

“Whatever you’ll give me,” is what Soap hears and he twists his head, instantly meeting Ghost’s eyes as he stares at him. His large hand settles on Soap’s head, stroking Soap’s hairline, as if that answer could satisfy them both.

“But what is it that you’d want? What do you fantasise about when you stare at me like you want me to be your prey?” Soap doesn’t linger on his words when he speaks, growing tongue-tied as he keeps his gaze locked on Ghost. Not pleading yet, but almost insistent.. “What do you want from me?”

Ghost keeps staring at him, looking entirely too serious, as if Soap is treading towards a land mine that neither of them quite understand the consequences of. 

But Ghost must know that Soap won’t let this sleeping dog lie, because he grumbles low in his chest and his teeth protrude down to sink into his own bottom lip.

“In my house, there’s a St Andrew’s cross,” Ghost says, as if that’s enough. But, in the silence that falls between them, he seems to read that Soap wants more. No short answers. No ambiguity. The Alpha takes it upon himself to reveal more. “I bought it thinking of you trapped there for me to do whatever I want to. To whip you, to burn you, to hurt you in ways you should never want me to.”

The Alpha grows more intense as he speaks, that expression taking over entirely, until all that’s there is what Soap knows now to be erotic bloodlust.

“I want to cut you open. I want to take pieces of you, cut straight from your body, and eat them whole. I want to be trusted by you to not kill you; to know when to feast and when to stop.”

Soap opens his mouth and swiftly closes it again with a click of his teeth. Mind reeling as he tries to place exactly what Ghost means by what he says, since he isn’t entirely certain he follows. 

Yet, one thing is clear to him. He doesn’t think he could truly give Ghost what he wants. The images in his head, of himself flayed open like that fish Ghost had cut, had seemed tempting in their distance from reality. But with his lover — his Alpha — telling him that this isn’t a mere errant thought to be had in the throes of being enamoured by competency, he is far more hesitant.

Infinitely aware that this crosses a line most people don’t think of nearing.

That this is no longer an escalating fantasy of his own creation, that this could be something tangible that happens between them. That he could truly be consumed and eaten by Ghost, and not as a euphemism. Not some torn piece of bread or flat, round host that symbolises the flesh of the Redeemer. 

But true, honest cannibalism. Of his lover longing for his body in carnal ways he shouldn’t.

He furrows his eyebrows, shifting his entire body around so that he can stare up at Ghost. “What’s a St. Andrew’s cross?”

“I just said I wanted to eat your flesh, and that’s what you’re stuck on?” The tone of what he says isn’t a snarl, but Soap knows it would be if Soap was anyone else. Instead, it’s bitten out in a state of incredulousness.

That very same cadence Ghost uses when he’s certain Soap isn’t taking care of himself as well as he could be, or is placing himself in a needlessly reckless line of danger. He knows this is a way of gently scolding his lack of self-preservation, but they both know this is Soap’s way of moving through the information.

Starting from the very first word and discerning everything else that follows in sequence.

“Please, just answer the question.”

“You’re the Scottish one here,” Ghost seems to deflect almost, like he’s trying to lighten the mood. As if this is his attempt to preemptively comfort Soap for when he inevitably denies him. Despite Soap’s past promises of wishing to know the depths of Ghost’s being. “Don’t tell me you don’t know?”

“This isn’t the same,” Soap rebut, blinking slowly, not wanting to dive straight for anger or frustration as his first emotions.

He’s aware that it’s a selfish choice to ask Ghost to divulge more, when he already knows the answer he’s going to give. Hoping to delay that inevitability, or wish that Ghost finds some way of coaxing him around to the idea. 

But, the Alpha, as he always does, yields to Soap’s whims and questions.

“It’s a wooden frame in an ‘X’ shape” Ghost demonstrates with his fingers exactly what he means. “But there’s straps or rings to pin someone to it, so they can’t move away. Like a crucifix.”

“It’s a little on the nose, as a name, don’t you think?” Soap hums, trying to imagine himself restrained there, like the patron saint of his homeland. And he imagines the bliss of being at Ghost’s mercy, of how freeing it would be, but he stumbles over the newfound realities of that. “But the rest of it… I don’t know if I can… It’s just so… It’s not something I would… I can’t…”

He knows he isn’t saying anything much but the substance is there; Soap is entirely too afraid of whatever his mind is conjuring up.

Of Ghost, defiling him so thoroughly until he’s spent, bleeding and parched. Of a knife, pristine and sharp in a way Soap knows Ghost would keep his favourite weapon. Of flesh being cut, chewed, and swallowed. And his entire stomach rolls, the guilt draining away to be replaced by something he never anticipated Ghost to genuinely want. 

And he observes how nothing about Ghost changes in the face of this clear rejection. His eyes don’t cloud, his temper doesn’t flare, and even his teeth don’t bare into a pained grimace. He doesn’t wear his heart on his sleeve like Soap does, but that lack of change is enough for Soap to read.

Because Ghost is forcing himself to remain level. All for Soap’s sake. Still in that mode of protecting his Omega, even from himself and his own disappointment.

Soap, much in the same vein, starts to placate, to try and salvage the tender, vulnerable spot Ghost had revealed of himself before he shields it away again. Moving himself up to nuzzle at his Alpha’s throat. But, the Alpha doesn’t let him finish his sentence, leaving it at: “This doesn’t mean I don’t lo—”

“I know, Johnny,” he strokes his cheek, rubbing the muted scent from his wrist onto Soap’s skin, like he knows his pheromones will relax the Omega laid upon him but having nothing much to offer. “I know.”

╋ ╋ ╋

Soap fears that his hesitance with Ghost’s desires would dampen whatever they’d been nurturing between them. Yet, the next time he sees Ghost, he’s there with his riding crop in hand, ready to draw out of Soap that mindlessness he’d been given before. 

It doesn’t appear to affect Ghost in any specific way that Soap can note – not even his eyes seem duller in their ravenous darkness for him. But, it lingers in Soap’s mind.

It sticks to the back of his throat in an apology he can’t seem to dislodge downwards nor vomit out. It sits in his oesophagus as some emotional blockade, choking him until it numbs him over. Each time he sits at Ghost’s feet, the world quiet around them, he imagines whether he could ever give himself entirely over to this beastly creature. The one that wishes to consume his physical being, not just his heart and soul. 

It prickles all across his body as he reels from whip marks and bite wounds, dulling the ache until all he can imagine is Ghost tearing him apart with just his teeth. 

And he wonders, in some quiet way, if the thought is abiding, not out of guilt or actual hesitance, but of a forbidden longing. 

Like the meandering thoughts of a young Omega boy sat across creaking pews, wondering if this Christ that he’s pushed to love, cherish and worship truly died for his sins. A child too young and unblemished to be burdened by the notion that his mere, unwanted birth taints him with the brush of Original Sin. 

That he longed to escape his God more than he wished to fall prey to some elaborate fairy tales designed to give people some purpose for their self-loathing. 

That, somehow, coming to terms with the realisation that his simple wish that this God and this Son, tied in with their Holy Spirit, don’t actually exist, is somehow reminiscent of the denial of his lover. 

He ponders whether his refusal of the unknown as a boy is the same as this. As if his childish rejection of Saints and creeds, dispelling it as something make-believe, can be likened in some way.

But what echoes in his thoughts most of all is that his faith in Ghost has never wavered like it did in the church. That his wish to push all of that way has paved the path for him to crave to pull Ghost and his all-consuming wants ever closer. Since he still trusts this man to kill and fight for him.

And, it’s when he peers up his Alpha, his hair screwed up painfully tight in long fingers, he can only wonder if that violence would make him feel as loved as any other kind of pain from Ghost does.

╋ ╋ ╋

It’s in the ash and ruin of another chapel that Soap stumbles across his answer with genuine, honest certainty. 

The night hangs a full moon in the sky, illuminating his way through the winding hallways of some chapel complex, with the scent of death lingering at every turn. He wouldn’t be there, if it wasn’t for the fact he’s following the familiar prints of Ghost’s boots on the ground; the size and shape of them all too known by Soap after years of trailing in their wake. 

His rifle leads the way, poised for violence as he clears corners, his finger flexing behind the trigger. All too aware of the unsettling stillness surrounding him. His anxiety mounting as he tries to search out the menacing presence of his Alpha and fails to find him amongst the dust and rubble, silently casting his detestation of his lover’s meticulous use of scent blockers. 

But, the moment he stumbles across the man, he pauses at the sight of him. Struck by the hulking prowess that’s barely hidden by his kit; how abnormal his form is as he stands amongst the bodies of the slaughtered, both real and figurine. 

The starved, punctured body of Christ hangs high in the air, above the image of the Virgin Mother cradling him as a babe, healthy and infantile, all three of them staring down at his beastly Alpha. But, at his feet are the dismembered limbs of clergymen who’d placed all their faith and wish for freedom in a God that never came to rescue them.

At the vision of Ghost so unguarded, his own weapons still secured to his body or hanging so loosely in his grip that the muzzle of his gun brushes against his right calve. 

He takes a single step forward, only halting when Ghost’s voice breaks the silence to warn him, “Watch your feet.”

Soap’s gaze drops to the floor, his feet stumbling backwards when he registers the sight before him. 

The one of a small hand, severed entirely from the child’s body it once belonged to, clutching with all its might to a bloodstained rosary. The beautiful crystals and the delicate, glimmering cross, covered entirely with the death of the children that surround Soap. These bodies far smaller in comparison to the ones Ghost stands amongst. All charred and blistered where they’ve been burned. Too many of them for him to recognise which arm this hand may have come from. 

And he feels his rage mounting in a manner he has never known before, for men and children he doesn’t know. For those abandoned by their God when they had likely called out for him, wishing for him to save them from this unholy fate. This same God that has hung like a spectre over him, tearing him away from what the person he loves desires from him. 

All to lead him here. To watch a lifeless, still hand that fell with their prayers unanswered by a God that doesn’t seem to care for their innocence.

Soap doesn’t make another move, so it’s Ghost that treads his way to Soap’s side. Stepping over limbs and heads, into puddles of dried blood and tears, to where Soap stands, quaking in a distraught anger. Uncaring if he is seen so raw and sickened as he fixates on that tiny hand. 

Ghost’s feet come to a stop just beside his, standing upon the gilded cross of that held rosary hard enough for it to crack.

“You solid?” Ghost asks, standing so close that Soap is fully aware he’s hearing this question from his Alpha. Rather than his superior officer. 

He licks his lips, trying to swallow, and nod his head like he knows any other CO would want. Wanting Soap to be the good soldier he knows he should be.

Because scenes like this aren’t new to him. He’s seen multitudes of bodies dismembered and mutilated by war’s agents. He’s seen the youngest of souls disfigured beyond any recognition. But for some reason outside of his knowledge, these bodies have some more profound impact than usual.

He is often the one that is stuck on the loss of life as the others around him move on. 

But his wrath and his need to doubt doesn’t lie with orders or even Ghost’s presence as his senior officer.

It lays with those taunting eyes of the so-called saviour and his smiling mother.

“How could he do this?” He murmurs, all too loud in this sacred ground. 

Ghost doesn’t pull away, if anything he draws closer, “Who?”

“God,” Soap asks, finally able to lift his gaze from the rosary and those little knuckles he imagines were strained until they glowed white, instead of the dull, bloated purple they’ve become. “Christ… The whole lot of them.”

“I thought you didn’t believe in all of this?” Ghost hums, not prying or taunting, just soft and calming.

“I don’t.” He furrows his brow deeply enough that it becomes painful, screwing up all of his facial features as he tries to search for the words to say. His anger contorting him inside and out. “I did, maybe when I was a kid, but fuck… All of this, everything we’ve seen… How is anyone supposed to believe in anything, if this shit even happens in places like this?

“Who is anyone supposed to look for? If He will never come to save them.”

Ghost says nothing as Soap’s chest heaves, blood rushing through his ears, just standing there as a comfort for a while before everything settles and evens out. Waiting for calmness to take Soap as quickly as fury had, to tear Soap’s world open.

“I don’t know about anyone else,” Ghost whispers, mouth pressed to Soap’s ear, fingers curling in a harsh grip around his wrist, “but you look for me. Your God may never come for you, but I always will.”

╋ ╋ ╋

They don’t speak about what they saw outside of their written reports, where Soap is certain neither of them mention the words Ghost spoke to him, referring to himself as if he is some deity Soap should search for in his times of need. But that doesn’t mean those words haven’t carved themselves into his heart.

Spoken like a promise neither of them would ever think to undo. 

But mulling it over brings with it a cognizance for Soap, realising that in years gone by, he has always looked to Ghost to guide him. That the depths of those notions of saving him, killing for him, run far deeper than he could have imagined. Like his mere presence in Soap’s world can absolve any evil that stalks him, as if Ghost is not only some God but some holy pool of water that can wash away his sins. 

As if any kiss from his crop, or moment of prayer at his feet, is some step towards repentance. Yet, that doesn’t quite fit in Soap’s mind. Because, unlike all those dressed in coloured robes to speak sermons to the devout, Ghost has never spoken as if Soap’s sins are ones to shy from. 

He praises them as if they are his most reverent acts. As if Soap, to appear as and express himself as a sin, is something to be adored and cherished.

So he whispers, in the night, as he kneels at Ghost’s feet to speak a promise that’s wholly obeisant, finally voicing aloud what had plastered itself to his throat:

“I want to give you everything you want, even if it kills me.”

╋ ╋ ╋

Ghost’s home isn’t what Soap anticipated it to be, plotted in an estate twenty five minute’s from Soap’s flat. With pictureless walls and clean, dust free sides of bureaus and countertops. Ghost lets him idle around downstairs, giving him the chance to grow familiar with this territory he’s never been invited in before. 

But he settles quicker than he imagined he would, with thoughts that Ghost’s scent would be as clinically removed from the space, just as it is from his skin whenever they’re together. But in his home, Ghost’s scent imbued into everything. As if the house and all its furnishings have breathed Ghost in and kept him there, safely within its walls. 

Ghost lingers nearby constantly, watching as he meanders through and thumbs through papers, books, and any other effects he can find. The Alpha granting him permission to be in his territory, in a way Soap is almost certain no one else has since he bought the place. And they keep on like that until the sun begins its descent, then Ghost beckons him with a soft call of his name and an outstretched hand.

He’s led up the stairs, tracking behind his Alpha quietly and clutching to his hand, until they come to a room. There’s no pause when Ghost opens the door to let Soap in, but the form of the blackened wooden cross is unmissable against the moody grey of the walls where it rises from the dark oak stained flooring.

There are leather cuffs at the ends on all four corners, with two protruding hooks at the top, the only places for Soap to hold onto as Ghost defiles his caged body. However, a soft, leather board covers where the lines converge to make the ‘X’ shape, as if it is to provide the frame’s occupant with some kind of comfort. Like such an apparatus could have some tender note to it. 

That only draws his attention momentarily, because there is something else in the room that calls to him. A small table that bears only three things: a silken blindfold, the beautifully worn riding crop that drips with the scent of Soap’s bliss and arousal, and a pristinely polished and shined blade that curves next to it. 

He draws near to the knife, like a moth to flame, and lifts it to feel its weight and balance, and Ghost comes in close, as if his magnetism is attached to Soap’s being. He feels Ghost’s front skim against his back, his breath displacing strands of Soap’s hair as he lets the knife be handled in Soap’s grip. The Alpha lifts a large thumb and runs it down the sharp edge of the blade, slicing neatly through the top layer of his skin with the gentle touch.

Upon Soap’s neck, the hairs rise to stand on end, as he imagines the knife sinking into his flesh to part him like the sea at the hands of a prophet, for his blood to spill and drop down onto the floorboards below. 

In a smooth sequence of motions, Ghost takes the knife to place it back down and his fingers begin to slowly unpeel the clothes that cover Soap’s skin. His mouth kissing, licking, and biting each new inch of flesh that’s revealed. His fangs drag in a shuddering motion against Soap’s mating gland as his bite guard is removed. And that continues until Soap is bare, his feet curling on the cold wood beneath, his body tingling under the attention of his favourite Alpha. 

Ghost is gentle and tender as he guides Soap to stand in position, kneeling to bind Soap’s feet first and kiss up the soft, hair covered skin that rises up from Soap’s kneecap to the apex of his thighs. Once his ankles are encased in leather, Ghost stands to have Soap hold onto the metal hooks, so his wrists can be covered in much the same way. 

The pressure of his spine pressing back against the leather panel behind him makes his back arch away from the coldness of it, like a cat avoiding touch, until it quickly warms under the heat of his skin. 

Once Soap relaxes, Ghost cradles his cheeks with those large palms and kisses him solidly on the mouth, licking in between his lips and biting at them with a growing rumble of satisfaction building up in his throat and chest. 

The moment Soap’s eyes flitter closed, adoring the hungered claim of his mouth, Ghost withdraws and begins to wrap the blindfold across his eyes, darkening his world entirely to steal away his sight. Giving him no chance to see the light spill around his Alpha. 

But he can feel that presence that he’s sure only he can feel, the one that hangs heavy in the air around Ghost, and listens as his feet fall almost silently on the wood. Soap can sense Ghost drawing to the table and he clenches his hands at the idea that Ghost would opt for the knife first. 

To sate his craving to consume Soap as he bleeds upon this cross.

But his hands reflexively relax where he clings to the metal hooks in his hands when he hears the telltale whoosh of the crop tearing through the air to meet his skin. He knows he must whine out something pathetically wanting when it lands, but he cannot bring himself to care. 

Especially when he notes a pattern to it all, of one mark being left in one soft plane of flesh only for the following one to be laid perpendicularly to it. Adorning his body in welting crosses, as if it is some medieval temple to be covered with the image of crucifixion. Setting his entire body ablaze with each touch, with every time Ghost retraces the marks in a gentle brush of the crop’s leather tab end only growing the flames there. 

He feels himself shuddering, whimpering high in his throat, and straining against the restraints until Ghost has ravaged his body. Everywhere, from muscle to soft pockets of flesh, feels like it throbs with the pain of being cropped, even Ghost finishes.

The tool rattles as it hits the floor, like it’s forcefully been cast aside, and Ghost’s presence paces towards him until he must only be a hair’s breadth away. 

The Alpha whispers against his skin, “You’re so much more than I thought you’d be, sweet Omega,” like he’s a true sight to behold.

As if he’s enraptured, like Soap was, as a boy, caught in the spun tales of pain and forgiveness from the lips of a priest, robed in black and white, who stood before a cross bearing image of their so-called saviour’s body. Soap had heard their words so clearly, even above the noise of the creaking pews and the rain tip-tapping on the stained glass windows.  

Just as he, over the groaning leather and thrum of his own heartbeat, can hear Ghost step away back to that table only to return back just as closely.

He feels that energy from his Alpha, electric and alive with the invoked spirit of something far more holy than himself, far more holy than any new age mouthpiece of Christ. The first touch is gentle, jolting the muscles beneath his skin in fright, and it’s a whole, calloused palm brushing down his ribcage.

It’s a grounding press of fingers, to place Soap back into his body, and to soothe the jittery beating of his heart. The sensation of it pulls his thoughts back into his mind; refreshing his nervous system anew. 

And Ghost’s hands graze above Soap’s ears to pull the blindfold off, but not discarding it in the same way he did the crop. He keeps it clenched in his first.

Blinking at the warm light around them, Soap looks up at Ghost. Meeting the Alpha’s eyes, wondering if his own expression is a reflection of what he feels inside — complete and desperate admiration. 

Nothing about Ghost’s expression or body is a looking glass for Soap, but his next actions have Soap’s stomach dropping downwards. 

Ghost lifts the silk to his neck, where his own scent glands lay, and rubs it against them. Repeating the movements over and over until his scent begins to permeate in the air around them, overwhelming Soap’s senses with the all too intoxicating smell of his absolute desire. Of his worship and devotion of Soap, as if they’re mirrors of one another as they exist there. Just breathing in and relishing in this pain that’s been gifted to Soap. 

The blindfold is dropped, leaving Ghost holding the knife lightly in his dominant hand. He dips his head down to place a single kiss to Soap’s mating gland, lifting his head up slightly until his lips skim against the soft curve of Soap’s ear.

“Pray to your God,” Ghost whispers with his fangs scratching at the cartilage of his antihelix, deep and commanding, just as the knife begins to break through his skin.

The noise Soap makes is gutturally unintentional, feeling his flesh be pierced and torn open. The warmth of his blood spills out. He can feel it run down his body in rivulets, crimson drips racing to wet and stain the leather bound around his ankles. 

He feels the knife curve upwards, tracking it upwards until he’s sure it would trap between his ribs, until his quivering lips can barely form a single word as his eyes burn with newly forming tears. 

“Ghost.”

“More,” Ghost goads, voice unfathomably deep as his addiction darkened scent wraps itself up in Soap’s mouth. “Pray for me, Omega.”

The pain is unlike being stabbed in the throes of battle, too comfortable under the weight of feeling safe and secure in this Alpha’s hands, despite the violence tearing him open. So, he’s sobbing, breaths juddering and eyelashes wet, as he calls out, “Hail Mary, have mercy.”

Ghost whispers, soft in the haze of Soap’s tears as he drags the blade through flesh, “Louder.”

Soap suddenly thinks of that fish, the one that had struggled and gulped, as it was gutted. He imagines his own innards, bursting out and erupting across the floor, for his feet to skim through as he hangs limp. For Ghost to savour and cherish as some gruesome offering. 

Laying Soap bare for this Alpha to study and pick through this part of him that has never been touched, never been felt, by calloused, blood-soaked hands. 

He wonders if Ghost would praise him for its horrid beauty. If it would finally bless Soap with something that’s always felt far beyond his reach.

And he lets himself cry, his voice rasping with a hoarseness he can’t swallow down as he repeats it over and over. Chanting with unbidden desperation: “Hail Mary, have mercy.”

Then, it finally happens.

Ghost carves out what he wants of Soap. His knife is buried in Soap’s body one moment then it’s out of him, coated with the blood from its exploration of Soap’s flesh. Only, it holds a piece of him on the flat edge of the blade.

It’s no bigger than Ghost’s largest fingernail when it’s taken away. Dripping blood, on the tip of Ghost’s knife. He follows it as it leaves his body, expertly drawn up to Ghost’s mouth where he lays his tongue flat out over his bottom lip. With the care and delicate touch of a priest consuming the body of Christ, Ghost pulls the blade from his mouth and leaves the chunk of Soap’s flesh on his tongue.

The Alpha groans, scent heady with lust, as this part of Soap is enclosed in his mouth. He tastes it, mulling it over on his tongue, relishing in this piece of flesh from the Omega he’s strung up and whipped until they’ve bled and begged for mercy of a saint long-dead in their heart, right in his house. In the very centre of his territory. 

Soap watches as he suckles and chews on it, as it’s slowly swallowed down, savoured to the highest degree. It feels like sin to watch Ghost sate himself on his flesh, but he’s never seen a beast so beautiful.

Blood smears across his lips, it’s splattered over his sweat-soaked shirt, and drenched the cuffs crimson. His hands are darkened with so much blood that they could be gloved, covered in yet more droplets of blood from Soap’s body.

All he can do, hanging from that beautiful cross, is take the sight of Ghost in. How his eyes have darkened with hunger, like he’s itching to cut more away from Soap’s body. As if he’s aching to feel more of him on his tongue. Like something deep within had been unlocked; claiming an Omega in a way very few Alpha’s ever could imagine to.

To take part of his body and have it break down, until it’s flowing through his bloodstream and sustaining his very being. Soap wants to call for him to take more, to swallow him whole, and have them live entwined in a way no one could ever truly extract them from.

“Alpha,” he pleads, desiring even more of this adoring torture.

He knows his pheromones must be going haywire, broadcasting every way he wants Ghost to plunder him and draw him in even closer. 

He never knew it could be like this. 

To be so unbelievably out of control of himself, and to be entirely at the whim and under the utter domination of an Alpha like Ghost.

Who in turn, says, “I know. I know exactly what you need, sweetheart.” 

Despite Soap's trembling form, Ghost is calm and steady, reaching to touch Soap’s body to give them some continued connection.

He can barely lift his head, but he doesn’t need to. Not when this angle his neck is bent at gives him perfect sight of Ghost’s index and middle fingers delving, digging and prying, at the wound that’s slotted between his ribcage. Replacing the missing piece of Soap with his fingertips.

The touch drives agony, hot as a dragon’s breath, through him until it wanes; slain by the firm, decisive hand of a saint. Ghost’s fingers widen the wound, as if he’s tearing it, as if he’s delving in deeper to Soap’s body. 

But, after a few moments, Soap realises that this is something different.

Ghost is coating his fingers in the blood flowing from between Soap’s ribs. When they’re pulled out, coated and dripping afresh, Ghost contemplates them for a moment before he holds them up in front of his eyes, drawing the pure scent of Soap’s blood in through his nose.

Soap expects the blood to be driven deep into Ghost’s mouth, as if it is a nectar drawn from blossom.

He doesn’t anticipate for Ghost’s other hand to grapple gently with his chin, to hold Soap’s head up, and for those fingers to draw a dripping, bloodied cross upon his forehead. Soap can feel the blood moving as it runs down his nose, slipping down across his cheeks as it cools.

This gory chrism anoints him, body broken and spent, tied upon a wooden cross. Leather stained with sweat and blood wraps around his body, and Ghost draws close quietly and solemnly. 

And his touch returns to that stigmata, coating more of himself in Soap’s blood, to skim it down Soap’s body to slide his fingers beneath the base of Soap’s straining cocklet, and to slip two of his fingers between the folds of Soap’s cunt. Ghost’s blood drenched fingers fuck him open softly, too caring a slow after such loving brutality.

No part of Soap thinks he could cum like this, not with how his blood spills out of him and not with how he’s beginning to hang lax in his restraints. But his toes curl as the first pulse of an orgasm washes through him, finally chilling his skin with endorphin-filled adrenaline. He cries a dull whimper of Ghost’s name, the weight of it heavy as prayer on his tongue, as if it has truly replaced his call for a God that no longer exists for him.

Minutes tick by slowly by the time the floor beneath them both is a mess of ejaculate and blood, and Ghost finally undoes the shackles on his wrists. Leaving his limp hold on the hooks to be the only thing to keep him upright as Ghost bows to do the same with his ankles. 

Soap knows he can’t stand, ankles too weak to hold his body upright, but he isn’t abandoned to have his knees hit the floor as he buckles. Ghost is there, hands steady and firm around his body, clothes there for Soap to limply curl his fingers into, head pressed against the damp, pheromone drenched skin of Ghost’s throat. 

He can feel how his heart beats throughout his body, the adrenaline fading beneath his skin, and he lets Ghost manoeuvre him around until his arms dangle over his shoulders and Soap’s legs are wrapped limply around his waist. 

Soap can’t do much other than watch the room move and change in his peripheral vision, barely able to see beyond the solid line of Ghost’s neck. They leave the cross, heading down to the bright, blinding lights of a bathroom. He half expects to be laid out in the bathtub, especially when he catches sight of the red covering his body, of the avenues and rivers of blood that spill from where he’s been cut across his palms, and where the clean, pristine cut of meat has been taken from the juncture between his rib cage and chest on his right side.

Instead, Ghost props him up the toilet seat, leaning him gently to the left where he can press his head up against the wall, and let that take the weight of his body. The tap runs, just out of sight, and there’s the telltale sound of someone scrubbing their hands clean. 

He can hear the rustling of plastic, the telltale rubbing of medical gloves, and the minute tinkering sound of metal needle holders grappling with a swaged needle that’s made loud as it echoes off the tiles. 

“You with me, Johnny?” Ghost rumbles in his ear, and he nods, trying to turn his head to look over to the Alpha, but his muscles keep him limp. Stuck in place. “Good.”

Ghost’s gloved hand touches his skin gently before it disappears, only to be replaced by an alcohol-soaked cloth that’s wiping up the blood around the wound of his side. 

Then, just as quickly, Soap’s wounded by the point and hooked body of the needle, until he’s stitching up Soap’s skin. Threading through the flesh, tying it off, before moving onto the next one. Ghost isn’t as fast as the field medics Soap’s been hastily patched up by, but he’s efficient enough that Soap knows Ghost is well aware of exactly what he’s doing. It doesn’t help the burn of his flesh though, being pierced over and over, until all he wants to do is sleep, to ignore the searing sensation of the awareness of his body.

The Alpha must tie the last one off, since he’s dumping all of his tools into a yellow coloured bag before it gets dropped into Ghost’s bathroom bin. He washes his hands once more before he’s coating the stitched wound with iodine. 

Not long after, the sound of the bath’s taps run with their thunderous rush of water, and Ghost is gently wiping over the rest of his body with a soft towel, soaked in warm water and smelling of something soapy. He’s careful as each swipe and dab collects up the blood Soap knows is staining his skin, hands now bare and comforting where they skim over his flesh.

The quietly possessive nature of his Omega instincts have him lax at Ghost’s hands, enjoying that it’s his blood that is spilling and staining the white tiles of his favourite Alpha’s territory. That it’s his blood making its way into the crevices of Ghost’s fingernails. That it’s his scent that hangs heavy in its delight in the room, cared for by a man that can be so tantalisingly violent.

That his territory is breathing him in, too.

It’s in that quiet, where only the rustle of the towel and the electric hum of the light above fills the air, that Soap’s body slowly finds itself drawing energy out from somewhere unknown. Pitching himself forwards, trusting that he will be caught by sure hands.

When he is, he kisses Ghost. Breathing weakened as he pants into the Alpha’s mouth, and he’s rewarded with a heavy, rumbling noise in the back of Ghost’s throat. He lets his hands rest on Ghost’s shoulders, uncaring of how feeble he feels under the weight of his adrenaline comedown.

But this closeness, the passing of warmth from Ghost’s body, and the way he touches over Soap’s beautifully marked skin, it’s something Soap wants to bask in for all eternity.

Ghost pulls away once he’s done, though, moving to carefully soothe the tender, strained spots where Soap’s arms and ankles were bound, before he takes his time with that bloodied towel, warming Soap’s skin with the water across the pads of his aching feet and then his hook-dented palms. The Alpha takes his time with Soap’s fingers and toes, rubbing them, his expression almost studious in how he’s taking care of Soap. Of his submissive, devoted Omega. 

Washing him clean.

Once each inch of Soap’s skin is pink rather than blood-darkened, save for the iodine stained wounds and the blood that has christened him as a follower of this beast that tends to him, Ghost is careful as he lifts Soap’s weight into his hands. 

The moment he’s tucked into Ghost’s arms again, like Mary carrying the Child, Soap is carried to Ghost’s bed in the next room. Where soft, cool sheets are a balm for his gently stinging body, and he’s splayed out on them before Ghost is righting his posture and taking off his shirt and trousers, climbing into the bed at Soap’s side.

For what feels like hours, they lay entwined, skin to skin. Sharing warmth, as Ghost soothes Soap’s trembling body with murmured remarks of solemn, encrypted words of love. In what should be an unknown prayer from his new God.

But Soap hears them all, like they echo through all the newly hallowed crevices of his body, and he responds in kind.