1912, Germany

It was a mansion, made of mortar, bones, and blackened bricks, that sat surrounded by woods and trees so high, they covered the sky. The mansion was four stories tall, windows decorating the front, back, and sides. The woods were quiet, not even a cricket to ease the unsettled silence that seemed to hover in the air.

Inside the mansion, however, was a different story. Inside one of the rooms on the third floor in the back of the mansion, two figures were arguing. It was an office, with drapes and rugs and a hardwood desk in front of the window. No one sat in the chair behind the desk, though that didn't bother a young man with black hair and red eyes who refused to stop yelling.

The-young-man-with-black-hair-and-red-eyes-who-refused-to-stop-yelling had power wafting off of him as he spoke. He gestured with his hands and he paced the length of the floor, which he had done in a few short strides. The young man wore a long black coat with a cowl that was currently down, black jeans, boots, and a giant red scythe that hung upside down on his back.

"I can't just sit here like nothing is wrong!" The weapon carrier yelled. "I should be out there, not hiding in here like some kind of coward!"

"You are doing nothing of the sort, child," a voice said inside his head. From a darkened corner of the room, a figure walked out. He was easily nine feet tall with disproportionate appendages, had skin the tone of paper, wore a suit with a red tie, and had no face. Where his face should be was simply... nothing but paper-white skin.

"Explain to me why I'm here then!" The young man retorted. "Stuck in this house in the middle of nowhere and not out there doing what you taught me to! I'm supposed to keep the balance! I was brought here specifically for that! I was supposed to kill just as many bad as the others kill good! But now you've got me- and them- sitting here and going crazier than we already are!"

"There are forces beyond your control here, Reaper," the being said sternly. "You still have so much to learn. Not only when to kill but also when to stop."

"You can't condition me to kill everything in sight and then expect me to stop at a snap of your fingers!" Reaper shouted. "That's not who I am and you know that! You knew that from the day you took me in and I wouldn't follow orders! That's why you made me my own instead of a proxy! You gave me power and now you're trying to take it away!"

"I am not taking away anything!" The being suddenly shouted. He drifted over around to the other side of the desk where Reaper was, now looking down. A tentacle came out of the being's back and pulled Reaper's chin up to look at him. "The goings of the mortal world are out of our hands now. Powers that have not been awake in millennia are now being awoken and they do not like us for one reason or another. They hunt us. They must believe we are dead so that we may live." A hand came up and cupped the side of Reaper's cheek. "You have been like a child to me since the moment I accepted you into my fold and I cannot tell you how saddened I am to see you like this. Having to watch you die again is one of the hardest things I will ever have to experience and I will not take this lightly."

"Then do something," Reaper pleaded. Red tears welled up in the young man's eyes until they overflowed and streaked down his cheeks. "Please. Anything to make this pain, the hunger stop. I can hear them, calling out to me like cattle to slaughter and I'm stuck here in this infernal house. It hurts. Make it stop. Please, Slender."

Slenderman stroked Reaper's cheek softly. The world has not been kind to him and his kind. It has been even more cruel to his child, Red Reaper, who could feel the injustice in the air. Reaper was not at all righteous. He killed who he wanted and did the same. What made him different from the others was his sense of life. He took it, fed off of it, used it to make the bad pay as much as the good have. He became a balancer of sorts, keeping the scale from tipping too far. And now, due to powers beyond either of their control, he was being sucked dry.

"There is a way," Slenderman said quietly. "It is not an option I like, but it might be the only thing to save you as you are."

"What is it?" Reaper asked.

"Move on," Slenderman said sadly. "You must move on from this life if you wish to live. There is a place in America, Hades' Underworld, that take in souls and give them new lives so they wish. You must go and take a new life and never return."

"What?" Reaper asked. "What-no! I- I can't do that! I-I can't leave you!"

"You must," Slenderman said simply. "You are my son but your time has come to move on. I'm sorry, Reaper."

"Who... Who will I be if I'm not Reaper?" He asked desperately.

Slenderman only shook his head. "No one can tell you that but you. Go, my child, and find something better."

Percy Jackson woke up covered in sweat, his dream already fading into the background of his mind. Taking a deep breath, he lowered himself back down next to Annabeth, the dream he just had gone from his mind.