Story of Echo: Echo was a nymph who distracted Hera while Zeus was off with other women. Hera caught on and cursed Echo to repeat others. Echo later fell in love, the guy broke her heart, and so she ran off into the mountains and died. Aphrodite, who was kind of a friend to Echo, liked Echo's voice so much that she brought it back from the grave after Echo died. The end.
"Bring in the girl!" Zeus called out.
It was the Winter Solstice and all the gods and goddesses were gathered in the throne room of Olympus to go over the events of the last year. Most years nothing important happened and the meeting ended up more of a large family gathering with a party at the end. This year, however, there was a very important topic to discuss.
To understand the situation, one must first understand a little about Olympian history. For you see, years ago the Olympians were saved by a hero named Percy Jackson. In return for his deed one of the favors he asked was for all the gods and goddesses claim their children before the child's thirteenth birthday.
That vow had recently been broken and no one was stepping forward and admitting to being the oath breaker.
It was the hope of all the deities that having the child in their midst would allow them to more easily discern who the child's parent was so that they could punish the kid's parent before the river Styx punished them. So, as Zeus cried out for the child, the doors to the room opened and the unclaimed female entered.
She was a plain looking child with brown hair and average height with a skin tone that was neither overly tan nor overly pale. The only feature that stood out on the young woman was her eyes which changed color depending on what she was looking at. For example, as she glanced over each and every god and goddess in the room, her eyes changed from stormy gray to sea green then violent red followed by warm brown and so on and so forth until her eyes had changed to match each eye color in the room at least once.
Zeus banged his gravel self-importantly (though it was unnecessary) and called out for silence.
Many of the gathered gods and goddesses rolled their eyes at his dramatics.
"We are gathered here at this moment to discuss the parenting of this unclaimed demigoddess. Does the parent wish to step forth now and avoid further punishment? Or shall we continue this trial and weed out who the parent is as a council?"
The silence was so still that not even the wind dared to move lest it be accused of parenting the child.
*cough*
Zeus blinked. He was honestly not expecting the parent to confess. But as he and almost everyone else in the room attempted to find the source, it was brought to attention that it was not the child's parent who coughed, but the child themselves.
She smiled sheepishly. "Sorry for all the trouble. I guess I didn't really think this all through did I?"
Zeus frowned and opened his mouth to question what the child meant when she sighed.
"I really just wanted something normal you know? I mean, I've been wandering around for ages and been so many things, but I'd never been a demi-god before so I thought I would give it ago. Forgot about good old Percy's promise from you lot. Probably should have thought this through a bit more huh?"
Hera leaned forward and glared at the (might-not-be) demigoddess. "Are you telling us that you are not a demigoddess?"
The child dared to glare right back at the Queen of Olympus. "Do you have cotton in your ears or something your highness?" She sneered. "Of course I'm a demigoddess. And I will remain a demigoddess until I decide otherwise."
"I think you asked the wrong question Hera." Apollo interrupted before he turned to face the girl. "What are you?"
The girl's mood changed faster than the blink of an eye as she smiled back sweetly at Apollo. "A better question would be; what haven't I been? After all, when you can be anything, why would you not be everything?"
Confused looks overtook the room at the girl's reply.
The maybe-demigoddess sighed and rolled her eyes. "Look, it's not that difficult and it's all Hera's fault really-"
"MY FAULT?!" shouted Hera. "HOW IS ANY OF THIS MY FAULT?!"
"Simple" the child replied with a cold glare. "You're the one that cursed me."
Stunned silence.
"Cursed you? I remember each curse I've ever done; I would have remembered cursing you. Besides that, I haven't cursed anyone in years!" Hera vehemently denied.
The girl just smiled cruelly at Hera as she mimicked her, repeating the words using the goddesses' own voice. "Cursed you? I remember each curse I've created; I would have remembered cursing you. Besides that, I haven't cursed anyone in ages!"
"E-Echo?" The Queen stuttered.
"Echo." The girl nodded while still using the goddesses' own voice.
"But that's impossible! Echo is nothing but sound now!" Hera denied shaking her head.
"I was" agreed Echo as she ceased using the Queen's voice. "After you cursed me and I ran off into the mountains I died. But Aphrodite could not stand to have my beautiful voice gone and because of this she brought my voice back from the grave. This part you know. What you do not know is that by bringing back my voice she also brought back my soul. For centuries I was but a sound, mimicking others as they spoke. It was a lonely existence, doing nothing but saying back to others what they said to me. Eventually the day came when mankind forgot that I was once more than just sound. Oh, they remembered the story of Echo, but they forgot that it was true. That likely would have been the end of me, if it were not for human imagination."
"Did you know there are three ways to become immortal?" A small smile crossed Echo's face as she abruptly changed topics. "The first and most common one is to be born with two godly parents; The second is to be made a god by a counsel such as this one or the Fates; The third is to be believed in with such certainty you cannot help but to exist forever. Lucky for me, humans never did cease believing that when they shouted down an empty hall the hall would shout back. The human belief was, and still is, more than enough to sustain me. They believed I existed so therefore I did. They even did science experiments- it was very flattering having all those people fawning over me."
She frowned and paused for a moment in thought. "Except when they brought in the ducks. Stupid animals and their quacking are so horrid sounding that I just refuse to copy them." She huffed. "But now they won't stop bringing me ducks to mimic the sounds of. It's aggravating."
A blush came across her face when she saw the incredulous looks on the gods' faces. Before she could defend her stance on duck sounds not being pretty however, Zeus spoke.
"This is all well and good, but how did you get a body?"
Echo blinked, drawn out of her duck-hating rant. "Hera of course."
"Me." Hera said suspiciously. "How could I give you a body?"
"Simple" Echo said with a self-satisfied smile. "You worded the curse poorly."
"I do not word my curses poorly!" Hera snapped. "Each and every curse of mine is top notch and one of a kind! I do not repeat curses and the cursed person always gets their due!"
"I am not doubting your curses power your highness." Echo replied calmly. "Just informing you to watch how you word them. To, pardon the phrase, echo your words; 'Cursed are you Echo to never speak for yourself but instead mimic others and their sounds!'"
"I do not see the problem." Hera replied with a frown.
A small smile crossed the young girl's face. "Ah, but you gifted me with an ability beyond compare; Mimicry. If you had said 'mimic others sounds' then I would have been much more limited. But, wording the curse as you did, I can copy others faces, gate, talents, powers… the list goes on and on. In fact, there is nothing I can't copy. I can even copy non-sentient things such as grass and water. When I first realized this I started creating a body for myself. After a while I realized that I didn't have to be a nymph or even nymph looking because I could mimic anything. Skipping ahead a few centuries in time and I even got the hang of echoing sounds without the source there. I could have entire conversations without just echoing someone's last words! It was glorious. When I got the idea one day to have someone read me a few books out loud so I could copy every word they spoke, well, my conversation skills simply took off."
Silence overtook the throne room as the deities tried to take in what Echo was telling them.
"So, what you're saying is, as long as people believe in you, you will exist and you have the ability to be anyone or anything." Zeus stated after several long moments.
"Yep!" Echo chirped back. "I can even be multiple places at once because humans believe that 'echoes' happen all over the world all the time!"
"So, wait, because you can copy faces and powers, could you turn into one of us?" Apollo asked beginning to look excited.
"Sure." Echo shrugged.
"Sweet! From now on, you can drive the chariot while I hang out on earth for my long overdue vacation!" Apollo cheered.
"No! Not sweet!" Athena cried out fearfully as she interrupted Apollo's cheering. "She could kill any of us and take our place without anyone the wiser! She could transform into one of our enemies and mimic their powers to eliminate us! She's not your key to a vacation, she's our doom!"
The color drained from the gods' faces as they realized just how much power Echo had and just what she could do. But before any of the deities could start to figure out a way to eliminate the problem Echo spoke.
"Yeah, that probably would be bad news for you lot if it weren't for several facts. One; The King of Olympus owes me a favor for each and every time I distracted Hera when he was off with some other woman. Hint, the favors are in the double digits and have no limit on what I can demand from him. Two; I like the way you lot run things for the most part. Three; I'm lazy and it would be a lot of work to over throw you lot and run the world. As for your murder theory… I have so much blackmail on you lot from all my years of being nothing but sound waves that if I ever did want to kill you I would probably just embarrass you to the point where you force yourself to fade; it would be a lot more fun than committing murder but I wouldn't be able to take your place afterwards because your death would be very public and embarrassing."
"That," Hermes said into the stunned silence "actually makes you more terrifying."