Echo was no longer the spectral figure wasting away in the shadowed four-poster bed. The terrifying, vacant gray that had consumed his hair had receded, replaced now by a volatile, shifting canvas of color dominated by a deep, furious scarlet and a frantic, active yellow. He was up, walking the mostly empty castle halls, his movements jerky and aggressive. He ate, though usually alone and quickly, his meals little more than fuel. He performed basic self-hygiene, but his demeanor remained hostile, his eyes constantly narrowed in an assumption of offense.
The one constant, the irrefutable anchor of his grief, was the small, simple pine box. It was never more than an arm's length away. When he sat, it rested on his lap. When he walked, he clutched it in one hand, holding it not reverently, but possessively, like a shield or a weapon. The staff, along with Lily and Severus, found the sight profoundly unnerving. It wasn't just the box itself, but the way Echo held it—a perpetual, angry monument to his loss. Several times, well-meaning attempts were made to convince him to lay Sniffles to rest once and for all.
Professor Sprout suggested a planting ceremony, a final burial beneath a flourishing patch of Dittany. Echo's response was a loud, chilling scream that echoed through the otherwise silent common room, accusing her of trying to 'steal the last piece of the only thing I loved.' Even Pandora Lovegood, who alone seemed immune to the raw hostility, was unable to penetrate this final wall of denial.
"You know, Echo," Pandora mused one afternoon, her pale eyes fixed on the box as she shared a windowsill with him. "Sniffles misses the moon. He can't see the Nargles from inside there, and they might start stealing his memories."
Echo had turned on her, his face contorted in a silent snarl of pure rage. "Leave. Me. Alone. He's mine. No one is touching him." He then stomped off, his furious exit punctuated by the rhythmic thud of his feet and the dull weight of the pine box.
These encounters quickly devolved into screaming matches. Echo, fueled by his grief, would unleash a torrent of raw, cutting accusations—sometimes rooted in the person's actual past offenses, other times manufactured from the dark tapestry of his paranoid mind. He would rage, scream, and then storm off, clutching the box tighter, the other person left trembling and defeated. The core message was always the same: You don't understand, and you are trying to take something from me.
Minerva McGonagall, her face etched with exhaustion, emerged from the Slytherin Dormitory one late afternoon, pulling the heavy door closed behind her. She leaned her shoulder against the cool stone, sighing deeply, and rubbed the bridge of her nose with a weary hand. Severus, who had been waiting patiently across the corridor, stood up from the settee where he had been reading.
"How did it go, Professor?" Severus asked, his voice low and cautious.
Minerva dropped her hand, her expression grim. "Terrible, Severus. Absolutely terrible. He's still not ready to let the creature go. The minute I suggested a small, private ceremony, he became utterly unhinged. You'd think I'd threatened to dismantle his heart, not bury a small animal." She paused, a flicker of professional curiosity cutting through her despair. "The only positive I've seen in his grief is that the Niffler's body hadn't begun to stink of rot. I daresay he's used preservation charms to keep it intact."
Severus gave a curt nod. "Knowing Echo, he would have preserved the body just for that reason. A final, physical act of defiance against loss. He'd never allow the shame of decomposition to touch Sniffles."
"Regardless of whether he taxidermied or preserved the body, no matter how small, staying in such close proximity to a corpse is not good for his mental or physical health, Severus. It's a focus, an unhealthy obsession." Minerva pushed off the wall, pacing slightly. "I know you and Lily are trying your best, but Echo is like a bomb with a short fuse. Even a mention of the body being buried or an insinuation makes him go off. We can't get close to him, and he's driving every well-meaning person away with a viciousness that rivals the most malicious dark wizard."
"We know that, Minerva," Severus replied, his voice flat. "But what else are we to do? We can't force him to relinquish it. The moment we try, we risk a catastrophic reaction. His power is still volatile, even if he is no longer actively suicidal."
Minerva stopped pacing, running a hand through her short hair. "I know. I wish we could figure out a way for Echo to let Sniffles go finally. This isn't a healthy coping mechanism. He's stuck. He's moved past the desire to end his life, yes, but he's traded catatonia for a raw, aggressive grief. We need to find the key to that box, Severus, before he completely destroys every relationship he has left."
With a final, weary sigh, Minerva turned and headed up the stairs toward the faculty wing. Severus watched her go, a thoughtful, worried expression on his face. He didn't have to wait long. Lily appeared a moment later, walking briskly toward the dormitory. She stopped when she saw Severus.
Severus met her gaze and shook his head slowly. "Well, out of the frying pan and into the fire, I suppose."
Lily frowned, her emerald eyes flashing with annoyance. "That's a terrible analogy, Severus. You honestly can't compare the two situations. At least he's actually active and not wasting away. The gray is gone. He's functional."
"True, but that's what worries me," Severus said, his expression hardening with concern.
"What do you mean?" Lily asked, stepping closer.
"You know as well as I do that Echo is a magnet for chaos, whether he does it by his own volition or not. Chaos is not a force of good or evil; it simply is. It acts for the most complex of reasons or no reason at all. It just exists."
Lily frowned, shaking her head slightly. "I don't understand what you're getting at, Severus."
"Echo is like chaos," Severus explained, his voice low and intense. "And chaos is vast, encompassing many extremes. Right now, his suicidal scare was only one extreme."
Lily's eyes widened slightly. "So, you think all this anger is another extreme?"
"Not an extreme," Severus corrected, leaning closer. "More like the calm before the storm. He's building up to something, Lily. The anger is a volatile shield, keeping the pain out and everyone else away. But if he channels that chaotic energy into a new extreme—something truly destructive—it will be far worse than the self-destructive act we stopped on the tower. He has the power to do it, and he has the righteous, terrifying anger of a betrayed god right now. And I, for one, do not want to see him get to that point to satiate my curiosity."
Lily shivered, the cold realization hitting her. "Yeah, I see your point now. We gotta do something before Echo goes down the wrong path and hurts himself. He'll end up hurting someone else."
Severus pulled her by the arm, drawing her further away from the Slytherin door and around the corner into an empty alcove, his voice dropping to a conspiratorial whisper. "We can't just talk to him, Lily. You saw what happened with Minerva. He needs a reason to let go of that box, a purpose that is stronger than his grief."
Inside the mostly empty Slytherin Dormitory, a curtain-filtered gloom hung over the four-poster beds. Echo sat on his mattress, his legs swinging, the heels of his bare feet hovering an inch above the cold, damp stone floor. The small pine box was resting beside him, a silent sentinel. The deep scarlet and frantic yellow in his hair pulsed with residual energy, a storm of fury and anxiety that had just expended itself in yet another fruitless screaming match. He leaned his head back against the carved post, his breath coming in ragged, shallow gasps. The grief was a hollow ache, the anger a sharp, burning fuel, and the exhaustion an overwhelming weight.
I am a raw nerve, he thought, the bitterness a familiar taste on his tongue. And every single person who tries to touch me gets burned.
A soft, almost imperceptible plink interrupted the silence. Echo's eyes snapped open. The light-headedness from the rage-induced adrenaline instantly vanished. Hovering a foot from his face, grinning with malicious, unbridled glee, was a figure he hadn't seen in months. It was Peeves, the poltergeist, his wide, toothy grin splitting his head, his tiny hat perched precariously on his head, and his eyes gleaming with mischief.
"Well, looky here, looky here!" Peeves shrieked, flipping upside down to dangle from an invisible point in the air. "If it isn't little Echo, looking all glum and gloomy! It's been too long since Peeves last had a good, proper play!"
Echo blinked, surprised enough to forget his crushing despair momentarily. "Peeves?" he rasped, his voice rough. "You're right. It has been too long. Where the heck have you been all year?"
Peeves swooped down, narrowly missing the top of Echo's head, before circling the bed. "Peeves thought it best to stick back and wait things out, he did! You were so busy trying to get out of that stupid, serious tournament, and then you were almost making yourself into a proper ghost—and not a funny, screaming one, either! Peeves thought you needed time to get better, so he waited! And now, you look better!"
Echo looked down at the pine box, his face hardening, the fury instantly returning to the set of his jaw. "Better? No, Peeves. Different. Not better."
Peeves, oblivious to the shift in mood, followed his gaze to the box. "Ooh! What's this? A new joke? A new Gaga? A prank? Is it a present for old Peeves?" The poltergeist swooped down again, his spectral hands reaching out.
"Let Peeves see!" he chirped, and with a focused burst of poltergeist energy, he tried to lift the box.
In a move fueled by pure, desperate instinct, Echo roared. He didn't use a verbal spell; he let the raw, primal chaos within him manifest. He grab-tackled the box, rolling off the bed and landing on the floor with a heavy thud. As he rolled away, the shadows in the corner of the room surged. The air turned instantly cold and heavy, and a massive, terrifying ROAR—a sound that echoed the dragon's grief and the Beast's malice—tore through the small room.
The Dark Beast had momentarily manifested, its terrifying shadow engulfing the space. Peeves froze, his manic grin slipping off his face. His eyes, usually bright with mischief, widened into discs of pure, unadulterated fear. The roar wasn't loud, but it was wrong—a violation of the very principles of fun and chaos that Peeves understood.
The poltergeist, for the first time in his centuries of existence, was truly terrified. He sank backward, pressing himself into the corner of the room, his small hat falling from his head and clutched in his trembling hands. The spectral form of the castle menace wavered, his laughter utterly gone. Echo, breathing hard, pulled the Dark Beast back, the menacing shadow instantly dissipating. The black pool that had momentarily swallowed his irises faded back to its chaotic violet. He slowly got to his feet, holding the box to his chest, and turned his back on the cowering poltergeist.
"Look, Peeves," Echo said, his voice flat and weary, all the energy drained out of him. "A lot has happened to me. And I really don't want to play at all right now. Go wait for the Marauders to come back at the beginning of the year. Or go bother someone else. My threshold for chaotic laughs is officially fried."
Peeves, still visibly shaken, slowly pushed himself off the wall, his spectral voice wavering. "That's a shame, that is. Because the Restricted Section has some new books. They'll drive the old bat of a librarian cuckoo if they go missing, they will."
Echo, who genuinely cared little for books, was about to dismiss the comment, but something in the back of his chaotic, grieving mind—a faint, desperate flicker of his analytical self—made him pause. He turned his head slightly, just enough to show he was listening.
"What kind of books?" he asked, the question barely a whisper.
Peeves clapped his hands, a spark of his old mischief returning. "I knew I could get little Echo to have some fun!"
"The books, Peeves. What are they?" Echo insisted, a sudden, cold urgency in his voice.
Peeves waved a dismissive hand. "Oh, some dusty old tomes about dark magic. Apparently, they're being held for the Ministry to come collect and lock them away. One of them is even on raising the dead!" Peeves snorted, a rattling sound of derision. "But Peeves knows you can't do that. Only a desperate fool would believe that."
Echo's back remained firmly toward the poltergeist. He didn't move, yet the deep scarlet and frantic yellow in his hair slowly, unnervingly, began to be swallowed by the spreading, chaotic, blinding white of absolute shock and raw, volatile magic. The suggestion—the simple, derisive mention of raising the dead—had landed on the raw nerve of his grief and despair, sparking a terrifying, singular obsession.
He looked down at the pine box in his hands, clutching it so tightly the soft wood groaned. He wasn't thinking of Sniffles's comfort or his rest; he was thinking of his return. A desperate, cold, and utterly self-destructive idea, one that contradicted every known law of life and death, took root in his fractured mind. The Dark Beast's insidious influence, which had retreated after the failed suicide attempt, now surged back, whispering not of ending pain, but of overcoming it through ultimate transgression.
A slow, unsettling smile—a grotesque mimicry of chaotic glee—crept onto Echo's face, twisting his features into a mask of crazed, desperate resolve. The smile wasn't for fun or mischief; it was the look of a soul who had finally found a new, impossible purpose that justified his own continued existence.
Without turning, his voice flat and eerily calm, Echo accepted. "You know what, Peeves? Let's go and do that. Let's have some fun."
Peeves clapped his hands, a sound like two wet sponges hitting together. "I knew it! Old Peeves knew little Echo would come around!" The poltergeist, completely unaware of the terrifying intent or the chilling facade of the boy he was addressing, shrieked with delight. "Peeves will meet you by the Restricted Section door! Five minutes, little Echo! Don't be late for the fun!"
With a final, maniacal cackle, Peeves shot forward, phasing directly through the thick stone wall of the dormitory. His laughter—a high-pitched, echoing sound of pure, unbridled mischief—trailed behind him, bouncing off the silent dungeon corridors. Echo remained on the bed, the crazed and desperate smile fixed on his face, the small pine box still clutched in his hands, now his most precious, critical tool. The blinding white in his hair pulsed, a terrifying beacon of the magic he was about to unleash in a final, insane attempt to undo the trauma that had broken him.