A/N

I'll specify ahead of time that this is based on Ekko's animated trailer.

Echoes

Pain is real. Pain is the proof of my existence. Pain is the only proof I have that past events were not a dream.

I look at my foe. A thug in steam-powered armour. Nothing out of place in the streets of Zaun, really. Nothing that Noxious could not create if they truly wished to wage war, even risking the wrath of the League. Nothing that oh-so-pious Demarcia could not justify if it could bring 'justice' to Runeterra.

I wince, and not just because of my broken arm. Pain is real. Platitudes are not.

My foe comes at me again, and I am left to wonder – how much is real. Seconds ago, or seconds from now, depending on how you look at it, I was fighting for my life. Seconds ago, or from now, I had realized that cutting his cooling tube was the key to defeating this brute. Seconds ago, or from now, I will have won. Or lost. But do I lose when I can try again? Or will I die, so that this finally ends?

I do my dance, as time has taught me. Time…I have so much of it. Time…I have so little of it. Time…does time move with me, carry me in its flow? Or do I swim against its current? Is the river real? Or am I dying on the banks, imagining that I have passage to cross?

It doesn't matter. The pain is still real. I like to think that the zero-drive makes me invincible. But it doesn't. I could be killed on the spot, and I would never be able to rewind. The zero-drive could be broken, or just shut down. I could…I wince, as my muscles scream…I could just…let it end.

But the dance continues. I duck, I dodge, I weave, I dream. I do the dance that I could spend an entire life mastering, whereas to my audience, no life is led at all. Some live in the past. Some live for the future. Some manage to live in the moment. Where, I wonder, do I live? And am I even living?

My pain, at least, indicates that I'm still alive. And still living, as the bastard finally gets what's coming to him, smashing through a wall. Destroying what little art is found on the streets of Zaun.

Damn.

I could correct this. I could start the dance again. I could get it absolutely perfect. I could even learn a new dance. Take him out in one blow. I could embrace the moment. Extend the moment to past, joining it to the future in majesty. I could do all this. Could kill my foe, and watch as life and time leaves his eyes.

But I can't. Because the pain reminds me that this is real. The pain tells me that my body cannot do this again. That I must rest, in the present, so I am not felled by what the future holds. That I must wait, before the past can offer me refuge again.

The pain is real. This timeline, at least, is real. So I am left in the present. And left to wonder about all the things I did, and did not do. Time? Reality? What is real?

Are they just…echoes?