The daughter of silence

It all started when Echo was five. She kept having these nightmares where she would fall into a dark pit screaming, yet no one, not even her parents would hear her. It was terrifying. But the most horrible part was that when she'd wake up panting, her parents were nowhere to be found, just like in her dream. She'd always cry herself to sleep alone.

As Echo grew older, her life began to get harder and harder.

A few years later, when she went to school, she noticed that her friends kept ignoring her, just like her parents had back then.

Once, when her teacher wasn't able to look at her after long minutes of loud shouting, the girl got so angry that she left the class crying.

Echo ran home heartbroken. However when she entered the house, she found no one, just a little note taped to the fridge:

"Dear Echo,

if you're reading this, we probably haven't seen you in a while. That's why we're writing this letter.

We hope you're okay and we're sorry that we haven't told you about this before.

Since you were a baby, you were fading in front of our eyes. We've been to so many doctors, but no one knew how to cure you. So we decided to live with this special power of yours.

But soon it got worse and we knew that the time to say goodbye would eventually come.

We don't know if your power can be controlled. We'll need you to find this out.

But until then we want you to help others in need in the best way you can, using this amazing gift!

We're proud of you, even if we cannot see you. Take care until we talk next!

We love you,

Mom, Dad, and Sis"