Raven

**Raven** is a side character in the visual novel Echo. He is a high school friend of Carl and Chase.

## Appearance

Raven is a husky with green eyes and a bluish nose. He wears a black vest over a white t-shirt, with brown pants.

## Personality

Raven is cheerful, excitable, and friendly. He’s also ditzy and distractible and sometimes makes inane or insensitive statements, but shows a remarkable ability to remain optimistic in adverse circumstances.

## Story

#### Prior to 2015

Raven was born in an unspecified foreign country and retains a slightly detectable accent.

Raven currently lives in Payton, and attended Payton high school with the main cast. At some point before the events of Echo he and his family moved away from the area so his father could take on a new job, but then moved back after his father was fired.

Raven works at a store called Game Central in the Payton mall.

#### Carl's Route

Raven reconnects with Carl and Chase on Thursday when they come to shop at the mall where he works. Raven is thrilled to hear about Chase’s class project and offers to help him look through the historical records in Carl’s basement. He comes the next day to assist, but is easily distracted.

On Saturday morning, Raven reassures Carl and helps him get ready for his job interview. When the Hysteria breaks out in Echo, Raven is swept into the hallucinatory version of the Hendricks Mansion along with Carl, Chase, and later Jenna. He wakes up trapped in a kitchen that appears to be on fire and is stalked by a shadowy creature until Carl breaks through the door to rescue him.

Raven suggests finding some food as the group struggles to understand their situation. At Carl’s urging, Raven arms himself with a kitchen knife, though he is clearly uncomfortable with wielding it. Raven is delighted when Chase finds what looks like bread and cheese, and incuriously cooks and eats what is later revealed to be bits of drywall.

On Sunday, Carl begins to display unusual behavior as a result of his possession by James Hendricks and directs the group to search for hidden documents that will allow them to progress through the hallucination. When Jenna appears and hits Carl with a stool, Raven is confused by the immediate animosity that flares up between the two of them.

After the group is transported to what looks like a log cabin, Raven is able to find the document that can help them escape but it catches fire in his hands. Later, Raven sleeps downstairs near Jenna and pulls her off of Carl and out of the room when he wakes up to them fighting. As the conflict between Jenna and Carl escalates as a result of their respective possessions, Raven and Chase attempt to keep them separate. Raven is the first to express the idea that the ghosts of James and John Begay are trying to use documents from the past to say something about their history, and that both are trying to stop the other from saying it first.

Raven maintains his cheerful demeanor until the group sees a body hanging from a tree outside Carl’s house. He seems badly distressed by the corpse, and stays far back while the others inspect it. Afterward, Chase remarks that he sounds nothing like his usual self.

In Carl’s bad ending, Raven is stabbed to death along with Jenna by Carl, who has been fully overtaken by James Hendricks’ baleful influence.

In Carl’s good ending, Raven restrains Jenna after she attacks Carl with the kitchen knife, allowing Carl and Chase to get away. They return to find Raven tied up in the basement of Carl’s house and are able to free him from the hallucination, before ultimately dispelling Jenna’s possession by uncovering the truth about James.

In the epilogue, it is mentioned that the ordeal the four of them went through together brought Raven, Jenna, Chase, and Carl closer together.

## Relationships

### Carl

Raven is very supportive of Carl, and readily offers encouragement to ease Carl’s insecurities. Carl is happy to see Raven again and seems to enjoy the husky’s gregarious nature.

### Chase

Raven and Chase were only acquaintances in high school, but get along well enough. Chase is occasionally exasperated by Raven’s behavior but describes his outgoing personality as infectious.

### Jenna

Raven immediately recognizes Jenna when she appears in Carl’s mansion, but Jenna shows no recollection of him. Raven only interacts with Jenna after she has fallen under the influence of John Begay, so the nature of their relationship under normal circumstances is unknown. In the context of Carl’s route, Jenna seems utterly uninterested in Raven and Raven is mostly concerned with keeping the peace between her and Carl.

## Trivia

* Raven is a backer character added to Echo as a result of his creator's support toward the Echo Project. He shares this distinction with Daxton, Julian, Kudzu, and Micha.
* Raven has a tendency to pull on his ears when he gets distressed or overwhelmed.
* According to Chase, dogs like Raven are a rare sight in the part of the world where Echo is located.

## Gallery

### Sprites

DefaultAnnoyedConfusedHappyUpsetSadSheepishWryAn early version of Raven's sprite