Rion's muteness absolutely isn't the same as a typical person's muteness. The closest it would be compared to a real life person is an extreme form of selective mutism - though I know 'selective' implies the capability to speak at some points and not at others, but it's a psychological issue rather than a physical issue.
The reason he can't speak is due to a use of those powers when he was small. He has no recollection of this - his brain has blocked it out, but a tiny (approximately 2 year old) Rion triggered his powers and took out a portion of the house of his birth parents, which has resulted in his brain essentially shutting everything related to that down. That happens to include his actual ability to speak. There's nothing physiologically wrong with him, and a side effect of his particular power being triggered from his voice is that realistically, his voice box *should* have probably atrophied from a lack of use at this point, but is prevented from doing so by his set of powers.
Even if he does get into a crisis situation though where he does use his powers, he's not going to go from "inability to talk" to "magically talking", though. He won't be able to use most of his power set because he still actually has to learn how to talk, which would be an ordeal all on its own since he doesn't actually have any recollection of talking.
You're right that his powers indicate he would be able to sing at some point - he wouldn't be capable of using them until he'd gotten past that point, which is an ordeal that would take a significant amount of time and in-game deveopment before he would be able to. The point is, however, that functionally, everything is fine and once he's able to get past that block, he would be able to speak... he would just still have to learn how to do so. At no point would it go from "mute" to "magically able to talk".
As for the test drive - I asked another player if they thought it would be possible for him to do that and was either misinformed, or misinterpreted them. I have no problem with him using a different 'voice', or just sounds or thinking text at people, or any other potential communication method.
Re: Revision
The reason he can't speak is due to a use of those powers when he was small. He has no recollection of this - his brain has blocked it out, but a tiny (approximately 2 year old) Rion triggered his powers and took out a portion of the house of his birth parents, which has resulted in his brain essentially shutting everything related to that down. That happens to include his actual ability to speak. There's nothing physiologically wrong with him, and a side effect of his particular power being triggered from his voice is that realistically, his voice box *should* have probably atrophied from a lack of use at this point, but is prevented from doing so by his set of powers.
Even if he does get into a crisis situation though where he does use his powers, he's not going to go from "inability to talk" to "magically talking", though. He won't be able to use most of his power set because he still actually has to learn how to talk, which would be an ordeal all on its own since he doesn't actually have any recollection of talking.
You're right that his powers indicate he would be able to sing at some point - he wouldn't be capable of using them until he'd gotten past that point, which is an ordeal that would take a significant amount of time and in-game deveopment before he would be able to. The point is, however, that functionally, everything is fine and once he's able to get past that block, he would be able to speak... he would just still have to learn how to do so. At no point would it go from "mute" to "magically able to talk".
As for the test drive - I asked another player if they thought it would be possible for him to do that and was either misinformed, or misinterpreted them. I have no problem with him using a different 'voice', or just sounds or thinking text at people, or any other potential communication method.