Echo arrived at Dumbledore's office, his chest heaving, his usually composed demeanor utterly shattered. His black hair, still dull with exhaustion, clung to his forehead, and his face was pale. He stumbled through the doorway, leaning heavily against the frame. Dumbledore, seated at his desk, his eyes twinkling, opened his mouth to speak, but Echo, with a shaky hand, cut him off.
He stood there for a long moment, gasping for breath, each inhale a painful effort. Finally, when his lungs had somewhat recalibrated, he managed to speak, his voice raspy. "My apologies, Headmaster. I… I underestimated the sheer, illogical quantity of staircases in this establishment. And I am, to a statistically significant degree, exhausted." He straightened slightly, running a hand through his damp hair. "Do you, perchance, possess any form of liquid refreshment? My internal hydration levels are critically low."
Dumbledore's eyes twinkled brighter, and with a flick of his wand, a goblet of clear, sparkling water appeared on the desk. Echo snatched it, downing the contents in a single, desperate gulp. He held out the goblet again, and Dumbledore refilled it. After a second, equally swift draught, Echo let out a profound sigh of satisfaction.
"Thank you," Echo stated, his voice still flat but now with a restored clarity. "Much improved. Now, Headmaster, I require your immediate assistance with an extremely urgent matter. One that, I fear, may necessitate a complete re-evaluation of my current communicative parameters."
Dumbledore's eyes, still twinkling, softened with an amused curiosity. "And what, precisely, are these 'communicative parameters' that require such an urgent re-evaluation, Mr. Echo?"
Echo ran a hand through his hair, a faint, troubled violet pulsing through the grey. "It has been brought to my attention, Headmaster, by multiple, albeit logically flawed, sources, that my current vocalization patterns and lexical choices present as those of a 'literary professor with no soul.' And while one of those factual assertions holds a modicum of truth, the other is a profound misinterpretation of my internal emotional state."
Dumbledore chuckled, a soft, rumbling sound. "And what, pray tell, is so inherently problematic with a robust vocabulary, Mr. Echo? A precise command of language is, in my experience, a most valuable asset."
Echo looked Dumbledore dead in the eyes, his own hollow gaze unwavering, the violet in his hair deepening with a raw earnestness. "Before ascending to this office, Headmaster, I took the illogical detour to the Black Lake. I posed the query directly to Skate: 'Have my verbalizations truly devolved into such a… pedantic and lifeless cadence?'" He paused, a challenge in his eyes. "Do you comprehend her response, Headmaster?"
Dumbledore said nothing, his gaze unreadable, though a flicker of something like understanding crossed his face.
"Skate," Echo continued, his voice flat but with an underlying current of profound concern, "stated that she had, in fact, noticed a significant alteration in my communication methodology. She found it, she admitted, 'somewhat amusing,' but recognized that it was not, in her words, my 'true nature.' She refrained from comment, anticipating that I was, as she logically deduced, 'working on myself.'" Echo leaned forward, his voice dropping to a low, intense hum, his violet hair blazing with a fierce, almost desperate indigo. "Headmaster, if a mermaid, a creature renowned for its intuitive ability to perceive genuine intent and the subtle nuances of emotional truth, can discern the inauthenticity of my communication without direct input from me, then this is not merely a 'problem.' This is a significant, potentially catastrophic, logical flaw in my self-governing mechanisms. How, Headmaster, can I remediate this communicative anomaly before my linguistic patterns regress to the monotonous drone of Professor Link until the inevitable cessation of my existence?"
Dumbledore leaned back in his chair; his fingers steepled, his eyes thoughtful. "Indeed, Mr. Echo," he mused, his voice soft, "your linguistic shifts have been… noteworthy. After the regrettable incident with the Dementor's Kiss, you became quite… laconic. For a significant period, you barely spoke, and when you did, your utterances were stark, almost skeletal in their construction. It was only much later that your current elaborate lexicon and precise verbalizations began to emerge. They did, as you so aptly put it, appear to come 'out of left field.'"
He paused, his gaze fixed on Echo. "It is almost as if," Dumbledore continued, a flicker of concern in his eyes, "the rudimentary effects of the Kiss still linger, not quite draining your emotions, as is its primary function, but rather subtly influencing the very simplicity of your mind and words. A curious side effect, if it is indeed one." He leaned forward slightly. "Do you, Mr. Echo, recall anything that might have been a trigger for this particular communicative anomaly? Any specific event or instance that coincided with this shift in your speech patterns?"
Echo frowned, his indigo hair dimming as he accessed his mental archives. He ran through countless data points, cross-referencing linguistic patterns with emotional states and external stimuli. "No, Headmaster," he stated, his voice flat. "My memory banks indicate no such correlative event. The transition was… gradual, a subtle recalibration of internal parameters over time. There was no single, definitive trigger."
Liar. The thought, sharp and clear, sliced through Echo's mind, utterly unbidden. He froze, his indigo hair flaring with a sudden, panicked white. He did remember. The memory, a jagged shard of darkness, erupted from the suppressed corners of his consciousness.
The biting wind, high above the Quidditch pitch. The fake Dementor, James Potter, in that dumb but convincing disguise, yet terrifyingly real in its malevolent intent. He had sought the void, dipped into it, embraced the utter nothingness, all so he could inflict harm upon a non-being, a hollow mockery of life that clung to the edges of his vision. He needed to feel nothing, to be nothing, to be the emptiness itself, so that he could break the illusion and destroy the shadow.
And then… he had dipped. And he had never quite pulled out.
He was still there. A part of him, a significant, logical part, still lingered in that absolute void, a constant drain on the simplicity of his thoughts, on the effortless flow of his words. The pedantry, the elaborate vocabulary, the detached cadence—it wasn't a defense mechanism, not entirely. It was a conscious effort to rebuild, to fill the gaping, illogical hole that the Kiss had carved into his mind, to find words, any words, to compensate for the profound, terrifying silence that threatened to consume him.
"Headmaster," Echo stated, his voice a low, raw rasp, the brilliant white in his hair flaring, a painful contrast to his pale face. "There was. There was a moment. A… deliberate immersion. I… I allowed myself to reach for the void. To experience it. To… understand the emptiness. It was during the encounter with the… simulated Dementor. I desired… absolute clarity of focus. A purity of destructive intent against a… non-being." He paused, his gaze dropping, a flicker of something dangerously close to shame crossing his features. "And in that moment, I… I reached for a specific form of magic. A tool for… precise, absolute cessation of illusory existence. It required… a profound detachment. A severing of all… frivolous connections. And I… I used the Cruciatus Curse. On myself. To achieve that state." He finally looked up, his hollow eyes meeting Dumbledore's, the white in his hair now tinged with a deep, unsettling crimson. "I chose to feel nothing, Headmaster. And in doing so, I chose to speak of nothing, with nothing. It was… a miscalculation."
Dumbledore listened, his expression grave, the twinkle in his eyes momentarily extinguished. He leaned forward, his voice remarkably gentle. "And can you, Mr. Echo, pull yourself out of it? Out of that… deliberate immersion? Can you sever that lingering connection to the void, or to the… linguistic detachment you have fostered?"
Echo frowned, his crimson hair flickering. "I… I do not possess sufficient data to ascertain the probability of success, Headmaster. It is an internal parameter, subject to… unpredictable variables." He clenched his fists, then released them. "However, I am logically compelled to attempt it. The current communicative parameters are… inefficient. And frankly, quite tiresome." He took a deep breath, his eyes closing, his crimson hair beginning to swirl, the colors bleeding into a chaotic, dark vortex. "I will try."
A profound silence fell over the office. Echo stood motionless, his entire being focused inward. His hair pulsed, shifting from black to deep indigo, then to a turbulent, agitated violet. He swayed slightly, a faint tremor running through his body. Dumbledore watched, unmoving, his gaze unwavering. The air in the room grew heavy, charged with unspoken effort. Then, with a sudden, sharp intake of breath, Echo's eyes snapped open. The turbulent colors in his hair coalesced, settling into a calm, clear sapphire. A subtle, almost imperceptible shift occurred in his posture, a loosening of tension. He looked at Dumbledore with a faint, weary satisfaction in his gaze.
"It is done," Echo stated, his voice still flat, but with a new, underlying resonance.
Dumbledore smiled, a warm, knowing smile. "Indeed. And now, Mr. Echo, if I may, could you perhaps tell me… anything at all? Explain the weather, perhaps? Or describe the exact shade of the Fwooper's feathers you saw this morning?"
Echo blinked, then glanced out the window, a small, almost curious frown on his face. "Well," he began, his voice surprisingly natural, the flatness replaced by a distinct, pleasant timbre. "It's a bit chilly out there, isn't it? The sky's that sort of pale, washed-out blue, like a faded old photograph, and there are these thin, wispy clouds, stretched out like lazy fingers. You can see the light filtering through the trees, making everything look kind of stark and crisp. Feels like autumn's really settling in, even though it's still technically summer. And as for the Fwoopers…" He paused, a faint, almost imperceptible smile touching his lips, and his sapphire hair shimmered with a hint of genuine amusement. "They were that obnoxious, bright pink, you know? The kind that makes your eyes water. And they were squawking like banshees."
He stopped, his eyes widening, a stunned, delighted gasp escaping him. His sapphire hair flared, a brilliant, pure white, pulsing with unbridled excitement. "Headmaster!" he exclaimed, his voice ringing with genuine, raw emotion, devoid of any analytical detachment. "I… I spoke naturally! I didn't sound like a textbook! And my voice… it actually had feeling! I'm… I'm not stuck sounding like that anymore!" He laughed, a short, surprising burst of pure joy. "Thank you! Thank you so much, Headmaster! You… you really helped me!"
Dumbledore chuckled, his eyes twinkling. "My dear Mr. Echo, I did nothing but offer a guiding hand, a simple suggestion. The true effort, the profound accomplishment, was entirely your own. You, and you alone, pulled yourself from that particular abyss. It was your strength, your will, your magic."
Echo grinned, a wide, genuine smile that transformed his usually impassive face. His white hair shimmered with delight. "But you pointed me in the right direction! You always do! And now… now I can talk like a normal person again! This is… this is fantastic! No more sounding like a dusty old scroll! No more pedantic pronouncements!" He laughed again, the sound light and free. "I can finally have a proper conversation without making everyone cringe!" Echo then looked into a mirror nearby and saw his unmoving expression. He quickly came to realize that even though he could feel and emote emotion in his voice, he still couldn't project it on his face. He was still a work in progress. Though he had to try and be quick, having a cheery voice come out of a face like this would be unnerving, even more so to himself.