A peaceful world AU for Echo: What if there was no town curse? - don't attempt to figure out the events during 1915 - let's just say that, even without a town curse, the future of the mine was very unstable due to forces of upper management, and eventually the operation collapsed under its own weight, and the town deteriorated with it - Echo is still a very small town in the early 2000s - Chase and his friends are together, only thing that changes is the events in 2003 - Sydney's dad never takes his life, Sydney barely dodges getting sent to the ranch during that hunting trip - when Sydney harasses TJ on the beach that fateful day, Chase attacks him back in the water and both get sent to the hospital - Sydney survives, his dad is furious and they move out of town in wake of the events (not even to Payton, further out) - characterization of each of the friends is roughly the same - Carl is nervous, but not traumatized, over losing his friend - Chase feels spiteful at Sydney, he remembers almost drowning in years to come even if it's not as bad as Sam's influence - TJ feels full responsibility over the rift created in the new friendgroup - Flynn is furious at everyone else for treating Sydney like shit, though due to Sydney living he has closure - Leo feels protective of TJ and Chase, and resents Sydney and Flynn for blaming the rest of the group - Jasmynn (Jenna) still rationalizes that Sydney was a bad kid - Flynn still visits Sydney from time to time, enjoys it more than when he hangs out with the rest of the kids - Chase is found out by his parents the same way he was in route 65 - Leo starts his relationship with Chase after what happens - Jenna still escapes town, Chase still breaks up with Leo, the two and Carl still go to Pueblo U together - TJ still goes to CCU, two years after the other three friends - Chase meets Cameron and Devon at college, builds a friendship with them - Devon is mildly interested in Echo as a "haunted" site, this encourages Chase to look into the mine - Carl still drops out of PoU after a year, his motivation at the time is just not strong enough - does weed to compensate, as he did before - doesn't go any further on drugs - Flynn is still friends with him for now - Sydney grows up to be a professional wrestler just as in the hypothetical version in Flynn's route - moves back to Payton to be closer to Flynn, who helps him out at his worst - develops a drinking problem & heroin addiction as he did in hypothetical - Carl hangs with him again; he's anxious but loosens up when Sydney's not mad at him - "Syd" becomes his nickname others use, to his betterment - Leo still stays in Echo, working for family - attends community college and later quits - gets a smoking habit and a gun - still pines heavily for Chase, fucks Flynn on occasion, and when he finds out about Syd, fucks him too - attempts a relationship with Syd, which ends when Syd gets tired of Leo mistaking him for Chase - Syd grows a new reason to resent Chase, even after the lake fight in 2003 - Chase decides to base his project still on the fallout reputation of his town, Leo finds it a get-together opportunity - Most of everyone's reactions are the same about getting together - Flynn decides to bring Sydney along without telling anyone, because nobody else would be willing otherwise - the get-together happens mostly the same way the first two days - when they go out to the river Monday, Flynn is late then appears with Sydney - There's an argument which breaks out - Flynn is mad at Leo for leaving out Sydney - Leo is mad at Flynn for bringing back "bad memories" - this is hypocritical, because he wanted Chase himself - Jenna is furious at Flynn and hasn't forgiven Sydney yet - feels like Flynn is dreging up feelings from the past unnecessarily - perceives Sydney's strength might be used as leverage to justify his own being there - Syd is angry at Leo for continuing to brush him aside in favor of Chase - also hates Jenna for continuing to see him as a bully - it was CHASE who almost killed him, and TEEJAY who framed him as a bully - Carl doesn't really know what to make of everything - Chase doesn't either, but learns that Leo had a relationship with Sydney - Rather than everyone splitting off, TJ is the one to stop it all - TJ is tired of being treated like a kid even if he's relatively the most naive - he also doesn't want what happened to him years ago to still be causing tension - TJ makes an ultimatum to let Sydney stay, and encourage everyone to work their feelings out, or he leaves - Jenna suggests everyone takes time to think this over - Syd agrees, without getting heated - Tuesday, Chase needs access to City Hall files to really find the meat of what he's looking for, he has to confront Flynn - He decides to make things up with Flynn first, he goes to his house - Syd is at the house, which makes Chase nervous, but Carl is there, and Dax - Chase wonders if he should apologize to Sydney - Syd does first, TJ's outburst made him realize he shouldn't be holding onto shit if TJ isn't - Chase & Syd ask eachother about the relationship Leo had with both of them - Chase reveals that Leo was wanting a future he didn't share, Syd reveals that Leo just wanted Chase again - Syd shows off his wrestling achievements, Chase shows his journalistic work & videography, the two bond - After hiking with Jenna, TJ reconnects with Julian on Tuesday - the two talk things over about what happened - they agree that Grace is what's required even if the others don't believe in Christ's Grace - despite wanting to make things better, TJ can't quite bring himself to try to hang out with Sydney yet - Leo is alone for most of Tuesday, but then comes up with the idea of celebrating Carl's birthday party early - Wednesday, everyone shows up for the party, including Sydney - Leo and Jenna are nervous, but Chase successfully calms them down - Sydney is glad to see Chase and TJ again - Carl is missing - Chase, Syd, Flynn last saw him sometime at Flynn's house, they don't know exactly when he left - Nobody had gotten a text from him - everyone agrees to help search, it's fairly amicable unlike in Jenna's route - Chase pairs with Jenna & Leo, Syd pairs with TJ, Flynn goes it alone to all look together - Chase talks with Jenna & Leo over Syd, lets them know that Syd has changed genuinely - Jenna is still insistent that Syd chose a horrible way to handle things - Chase points out how the source of the strife is mostly in the past, where it should belong - Jenna concedes, realizes she's conflating Syd with Echo, when he's not even part of Echo anymore - Leo mentions that Syd is addicted to substances - Chase again points out how hypocritical that take was (Leo smokes), and that Syd is trying to get better - Leo disagrees again, before bringing up their relationship - communication deteriorates between Chase & Leo after this, Chase leaves with Jenna - Thursday, Chase asks Flynn to look at the city archives to think about something else other than his friends - Chase is given permission again by the mayor to look at all inventory, provided he make a good presentation of Echo - he looks more into the history of the mine - learns about the unionization of the mine and the fallout between the union and the Hendricks/Briggs - finds a resource that talks about the layout of the mines - screenshots everything he comes across before leaving - The kids don't have much success finding Carl - an incident happens involving Micha/Jeremy/Clint and Jenna/Leo - before things get worse, Syd is there to keep Leo and Clint from hurting eachother - Leo feels abrasive, but TJ talks to him afterward about how nice Syd has been - Leo calms down but still feels on edge - Chase meets Flynn, who notices that some people were acting very strange around the mine - Friday, the crew learn that a ransom demand was given to the Hendricks for their son - Flynn implies Duke and Brian as suspects for who he saw the other day - Sydney and Leo want to rescue Carl against all odds, everyone BEGS them not to - Syd:"If not us, who the fuck is gonna rescue him?" - the crew attempts to have fun together to take their minds off of the situation - Leo and Syd secretly plot to go to the mine and find Carl - Micha meets with Chase in secret and confirms that Duke and Brian are indeed involved in the kidnapping, but they're not alone: Clint & Jeremy are in on it too, as well as several other adults he doesn't know AFTER THE WEEK OF SPRING BREAK - Chase doesn't prosper well in his journalism after his piece on Echo - he starts a job working in AV, and eventually meets Samuel, whom he forms a great friendship with - In this timeline, Sam is in a Poly relationship with William, Nikolai, Cliff, and Murdoch - Leo initially has a hard time getting over Chase and Syd, but eventually does - after 2 years, he starts a new relationship with someone in Echo - this ends up being a good idea because Echo starts to prosper after being given a government grant - Leo finally overcomes his insecurities and starts a family with his partner - they have adopted 2 kids so far - Jenna continues studying at college and is on her way to becoming a professional psychologist - she meets Arturo while working as a TA, you could imagine your own plot with these two - Perhaps she can help his girlfriend to cope with what she feels? - Carl gains his confidence again and goes back to college - TJ has his strength in himself emboldened, which helps his pursuit in Christ deepen - Flynn learns to take his job as clerk more seriously as the town prospers - starts to work on his attitude, talks to his friends (esp Jenna) more seriously for insight - considers attending college to become more skilled at his job - Julian takes over the Diner from Janice, and refurbishes it when the town gets more attention - the food actually starts tasting good to Flynn's standards - Carl works here during his off semesters of college - Micha tries the diner as a part time job