Let's go to see the stars and the moon

★ Luyao "Echo" Zhou ★
Played by: Heretic
Faceclaim: Bilan Hangxian, Kaga

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Age: Nineteen

Gender: Female

Orientation: Asexual

Weight and Height: 4' 10" ; 93 lbs

Nationality: Chinese

Occupation: Cadet; Student and Musician

I'll fly far into space as long as I am with you

Appearance: Luyao’s quick to notice details is the thick silvery-white hair that she keeps cut at a bob length. This smooth cut frames large, bright blue eyes that carry small brows above them, often carrying soft or worried expressions most of the time. Being as she’s easily swayed from emotion to emotion, there really too much of a constant state of expression beyond those as it’s one of the ways she communicates. Her nose is small with a slightly upturned tip accompanied by a small mouth; her lips slightly plump. Echo is of a small, petite build. Over the years, she’s gained a little bit of a lean muscle mass with the healthier lifestyle she lives now. Beyond that though, some of the points of her joints still stick out boney-like and she lacks a lot of curves. She only has a few fading scars from her childhood and pierced ears, not having a lot of interest in body modification or body art for herself. Clothing wise, she’s often seen in a variety of tank tops, halter tops, or open-back tops with shorts and tights; preferring casual wear to formal. She wears oversized sweaters and leggings when it’s colder. Often, she pairs these with heeled oxfords, flats, or a chunky soled sneakers.

Personality:

✦ Benevolent ✦ Caring ✦ Curious ✦ Good-natured ✦ Gracious ✦ Patient ✦ Playful ✦ Sentimental ✦ Studious ✦ Sweet ✦ Trusting

✧ Cautious ✧ Delicate ✧ Dependent ✧ Distractible ✧ Emotional ✧ Fearful ✧ Hesitant ✧ Naive ✧ Pacifist ✧ Passive ✧ Timid

The light in my bright eyes when you're near

Background: The life Luyao was born into was was a strict one. She was born into a small town in central China with parents that were often busy working to support themselves and they daughter they had been given. From the get go, Echo wasn’t given a relaxed sense at home. Her parents were only pressuring her to be their image of success. One could say that they wanted the best for her, but the people that were her parents felt that their future depended on her’s. They didn’t care what she wanted, they just wanted her future for themselves. While the home they had was fine, they made plenty of money to get by and get what they needed. They had very little struggle, it wasn’t enough to satiate the greed of her parents. They needed her to be smart and get a job they saw her getting the most out of for them.

And she committed to it. She didn’t know better. Lu was only doing what she was told. It was all she knew. Her early life was mostly stuck in books and worksheets and brain exercises. It’s what pleased her parents. It was when gave her praising, as back hand as they were about it. She was use to hearing the maybe you’ll be smart enough to be successful. It was the only time they gave her their attention, even making her take care of herself the moment she could. And if she did act like that was an issue in their actions, well… They gave her plenty to remind her why she was to fear them. From yelling to swinging at her, she was eventually too scared to test them. Even with her trying to not upset them and do her best, there wasn’t nothing she did that was quite good enough.

She grew up in that fear because she had to depend on the people that brought her into the world. Luyao knew very little of how to cope with the tempers of her parents or the outside world that they refused to let her experience. They couldn’t let her get ideas of how to escape or to choose a different route than they intentioned for her. Yet, she found solace in something that they couldn’t prevent her from picking up on. Music. In particular, singing. When ever she has the free time, such as he parents being away at their own jobs and she was home alone, she find herself humming and singing to herself as she did things. Especially with reading stories of fiction or cooking for herself that gave her some sense of freedom. It was something she took peace of mind and joy in. In fact, Luyao enjoyed it so much she found herself wanting to do more with it.

But she couldn’t let her family know. Being a singer wasn’t in their their agenda for her. They saw no merit in such thing when the work was unstable for the same amount of work they could see her having as a business woman.And there was no guarantee that she’d make it big in such a field. The young girl kept her dream to herself, knowing it would bring no good to her. It would simply be an escape. But there was times the girl couldn’t help but dream about leaving and being free from everything. She’d indulge the idea of being a singer. A childish dream, but it was enough for her after a while to make her want to go for it in secret despite her fear of her parents.

But that only made things worse when her parents kept finding little things about that didn’t fit their child’s work. They’d find her small dabbles of songs she’s tried to write and sheets for songs she’s heard and liked. Enraged by theses, they’d take them from her, dispose of them, and scold and punish her for thinking of such a silly idea for ‘fun’ or ‘relaxation’. The world wasn’t made for fun or relaxation. Unless you want to be a delinquent and be in prison, useless to society. She wouldn’t touch music again for a little bit before dipping back for it because her stress was too high. Addicted to the freedom it gave. She just learned to hide things better each time it was discovered. But the last straw for her parents was the day they came home early and could hear their daughter singing as she did her work. A distraction. There was no other word for it. A distraction. A temptation away from their plan. An escape. This was exactly what they didn’t want.

That day would end it all for all of them. Her father stormed into the house, too carelessly pissed. If their veiled threats weren’t enough to get through to her to stop, then he’ll be sure to put an end to now. Luyao was at the table with her homework, choking to a stop with her singing as her father voice raised at her. She instantly responded by running from him, but running in a closed space did a lot of good if there was no escape and she quickly found herself cornered by him. The chase she gave just made things worse and as she froze, her father was berserked in rage and grabbed her up by her throat. She tried to struggle away as her mind began to panic about dying with the lost of air to her lungs, but she was too weak to defend herself. She could only take it as her throat was being crushed.

There was finally a point where the pain was agonizingly painful then there was suddenly nothing. But that moment, she couldn’t even choke out a noise. Her panic rose even more and she found herself surely scared for death. But somethings started to happen in her silence. Something she wasn’t in control of. She was screaming in her own head but no sound was coming from her. But both her parents were flinching in pain, looking around. The hold on her throat release enough for a little gasp of air. She just wanted to be let go. She was too scared to know what she was doing to them as her gifts awoke, her mind attacking back until her father was a writhing mess on the floor, dropping her in the process. She could breathe, shakily gasping and collapsing to the ground with him. Her mind refused to let up, though. Not until she was too exhausted and passed out from the drain of everything.

This left her parents, still suffering from the side effects of the attacks, looking at their daughter. No. This wasn’t a daughter. It wasn’t human to them anymore. Or theirs. They had a monster in their home. And to them, the very thing they tried to raise tried to kill them, even if Luyao was only defending herself. They couldn’t have this thing in their home anymore. They couldn’t depend on it. It would never be successful, especially if they knew the damage that had been wrought on it. They called the police, claiming in hysterics about the very creature in their home that needed to be taken away from there before it wakes, in case it attacked again.

When she awoke, it was to the beeping of machines and muffled voices, slow shuffled movements. For a moment she only blinked before her mind began to race again, panicked about where she was. The last thing she could remember was the hand around her throat, the yelling, the agonizing pain she was in then the numbness, the painful groans and flinching that was from her parents. As she panicked, her gifts reacted again, her telepathy attacking the people, the doctors in the room that she didn’t know, unable to reign it in. Little did she know that she was removed from her home and was in a hospital in Melbourne, geared for treating and work with the newly gifted. It was a while to coax her to calm down to explain her new situation. Even when nurses did calm her down, she was still full of fear and unable to control her telepathy. She especially began to panic again over the loss of her voice. While her body was able to heal itself from most the injuries from her family’s abuses on it’s own in a matter of hours, her larynx was crushed enough to kill the nerves that she needed to make herself to speak. And her healing was unable to make herself recover from the damage done. It caused her to develop aphonia, a total loss of her voice.

With all this on her at once, she was crushed. She was finally free from her home, but without her gift being in some semblance of control, she wasn’t going to have a life of her own. And she was never going to speak, or sing, again. For months, she remained in the hospital with a fear of recovering because of the ordeal she’s been through. But with some coaxing and the fear becoming meaningless, she found herself wanting to gain control of herself, wanting to have something of a life now that she wasn’t her family’s puppet anymore. She even found herself finding a new way to express herself in music as she reined in her gifts and learned new ways to communicate beyond her lost voice.

So share this precious life with me

Skills and Weaknesses:

✦ Energetic ✦ High pain tolerance ✦ Book smart ✦ Mediator mindset ✦ Speed/flexible ✦ Observant

✧ Mute/not good at being social ✧ Skittish ✧ Refuses to fight ✧ Unconfident/clumsy ✧ Empathic ✧ Mood swings

Gifts:
Telepathy-- As a telepath, she's pretty average if anything untrained. She's not particularly odd, beyond the fact that she is mute. She's able to create the illusion of auditory noises in someone head to distract them. She's only capable to replicate what she can actually hear. She can play a song she's head, a crowd of voices that can be overwhelming, among other things, so long as she's heard it. With her being mute she's no longer able to implant her own 'voice' in someone's head. Instead, can sometimes share the image of her thoughts in someone's mind, but that takes concentration on a target nearby or insight and they may not comprehend that the image is from her; it's indiscernible from person's own thoughts. Using her power intentionally can make her exhausted from being used too much/concentrating too hard. She occasionally can pick up on hints and pieces of others thoughts and feelings, but this can overwhelm her if she's in a place full of people. Echo's ability to handle her telepathy isn't something she fully understands or knows how to utilize yet. Much of her use of it stems from fear reflexes and stress responses, an accidental use that is various psychic attacks and defensives. These uses are a more instantaneous reaction, not on a direct target (can affect several people in a small area), and she can't control when it starts or ends while she's stressed.

Energy Healing-- This gift of hers awakened around the same time her telepathy came about, but it seems to be slightly more stable one for her. She's capable of healing wounds that are superficial, like cuts, bruises, and burns to a degree. She can slow blood loss, but her ability to save someone's life at this time is low and could kill her from the extent of energy she has to expend for that level of healing. She can't save dismembered parts or regenerate a new body part, same with severed nerves. She can heal herself a little more consistently, but for others, she needs to be able to touch them and able to focus her energy to them.

Statistics:
STR: D
AGI: A
END: B
PER: A

Just take my hand and let's enjoy the things that we'll see