In Between The Lines Of Vice

Prologue: A Fight For Falling

His feet dangled over the edge of the building, swaying back and forth in the wind. The ground was so far away, so blurry. The Manhattan residents all scurrying along 5th and 34th like their all the most important thing in the world. From up here, they looked like ants, bacteria fighting to conquer the host.

The wind bit against his skin harshly, cold rips that made him shiver the slightest amount. He didn't really care though. For the first time in his life, he felt like he didn't care about the wind or who owned it. For so long he had been afraid of the air because of who he was. To him, the sky had meant danger, death even.

Sitting on top of the gate on the observation deck of the Empire State Building, didn't have fear of death. No, death and him had made a friendship. He would dance along the edge of the endless abyss and listen to the songs played by the heroes before him, but death hadn't pushed him off yet. So no, he didn't fear death, he welcomed him with open arms.

It got worse as it started to rain. Sheets of brisk water broke through the darkening Manhattan sky line, soaking him in the cold. He still didn't care though. Gazing upon the streets below as the torrential downpour blasted through the city that never sleeps, his mind was to occupied to think about the freezing rain.

He wanted to believe deep inside that he wasn't thinking about it, it would be so simple. The ground was so far away, the downpour was so thick he couldn't even see it. Quick and painless unlike the rest of his life which was full of sacrifices and pain. He wanted to believe that the idea of slipping of the top of the railing wasn't at all appealing and the ground wasn't drawing him in like he was made of death mist, still in the depths of tartarus.

He would be lying to himself.

He didn't want it anymore, the life.

He didn't want the nightmares that riddled his mind every night, turning his own mind against him. He still saw the faces of all the monsters he had killed, the faces of his friends as they met their end on the tip of a celestial bronze blade. They haunted his vision every night along with the acidic air from the pit of hell. The pain of his past wasn't something he liked to remember, but it was all he could remember.

The misery from the glass shores of the river Cocytus still lingered, the voices of desperation telling him to give in. He remembered the fiery burn as the blistering water moved down his throat from the shore of the river Phlegethon. Still felt the raw burning of his skin as all her was and ever would be was being stripped away in the depths of the river Styx.

So many scars littered across his skin, hidden by an old, worn orange t-shirt. Claw marks, knife wounds and burns took up most of the space along his torso and arms, whitened lines showed the old wounds, then there was the new ones. The once toned and smooth skin was unnaturally pale under the blue hoodie. The scars were reminders of the pain he never chose to feel, but then again he never really had a choice.

The consequences were always to high for him to ignore the responsibility. It was always the choice to fade into the darkness of the deep ocean and let the world burn, or fight through all the pain and death to save a place doesn't deserve to be saved. Sure, there was innocence in the world, but there was also evil. They were always at war, fighting for dominance without any care for the casualties. There was innocence in his eyes once, he wasn't very sure if it was still there behind the witness of war, the slaughter of good and evil.

What was good and evil? He had killed, the countless monsters and even some demigods in the name of Olympus. Was that considered good? Were the sons and daughters of Olympus that chose, or were forced to, fight in the name of the opposition really evil. The heroes were always bathed in a golden light, but not all heroes were good and not all antagonist were evil. So where did he lay?