Every Beginning Requires an End.
All around me was death. The cacophony of voices screaming in terror, with the sounds of guts and innards spilling out from everywhere. To top it all off, my heart in the hands of this… being. In his other hand, the unmoving corpse of my adoptive father.
The sounds around me slowly started getting muffled and faint. This being, he tossed the body aside like it was nothing. It walked up to me and pulled my head up by the strands of my hair. With the heart in his other hand, he squeezed tighter and tighter, until it burst. Right in front of my eyes.
My vision started getting blurrier, and in my last moments, all I could think of was my past and how everything led to this point.
The date was the 13th of July in the year 2016. I was at home with the babysitter, playing around as any 4-year-old would. A frantic man entered my home, injured and distraught, mumbling in a frenzy. At that age, I wasn't able to comprehend what he was saying, but looking at the face of my babysitter, I realised that the news was dire.
The following day, I stood in front of 2 empty coffins.
Engraved on the coffins were 2 names, alongside a short inscriptions.
Jayce Wang and Reine Wang.
In life and in death, their contributions have changed the world.
2 of the world's best maritime researchers, presumed dead. An expedition gone wrong, bodies nowhere to be found. 4-year-old Hortus Wang was now an orphan.
Heading the procession was a family friend, Dr Gideon Roche, the same man who entered my home in a frenzy. The procession went by quickly, with relatives paying their respects and asking me how I was holding up.
All I felt at the time was confusion, as I wasn't sure what was going on myself. I kept myself to my babysitter, who also made sure to not leave my side. She looked at me often, mainly to check on how I was doing. I'd respond by smiling back at her and she'd look back with a soft smile.
But the situation clicked when Dr Roche came up to me and asked me a simple question.
"Hey kiddo, your mom and dad wanted me to take care of you in case anything happened to them. You okay with that?", he asked in a tender tone.
It was then I realised looking back at the coffins, that my parents wouldn't return.
For the first time since the news broke, tears rolled down my face as the gravity of the situation became clear.
I was soon embraced by Dr Roche as he whispered into my ears, "It'll be fine, Hortus. It'll be fine."
THe paperwork for adoption was quick and soon, he became my legal guardian. From the childcare books laid out across the floor and the shoddy yet effective childproofing measures, it was evident that Dr Roche did not have a child.
Yet, he tried his best. Sometimes at night, I would see him still working on his research and preparing our meals for the next day. He would be fatigued when I woke up but would still find a way to try to make me smile.
When he slept, he often kept apologising saying that it was his fault for suggesting it. At the time, I didn't know what he was talking about but often felt a sense of guilt emanating from him when such events occurred.
Over the years of our stay together, I developed an interest in the field of maritime archaeology, the same field as my parents. I then decided that I wanted to follow in their footsteps and become a naval archaeologist, going on expeditions as well to uncover ruins lost to time, old technology from previous civilisations and more.
The 2 of us stayed on an island off the shores of Singapore known as U56, an artificial island created to explore the hidden parts of the ocean. Maritime researchers and oceanologists around the world flocked to this island to work. The island was comprised of 5 main buildings.
The 1st building was the U56 Research and Development Facility. It was where most of the people worked, researching lost relics that were recovered from expeditions, and developing new technologies to make exploring the ocean easier. On the building was the quote, " To bring humanity higher, we must dive deeper." A motto which inspired me to take on the same field as my parents.
The second building was the Knowledge and Training Facility. It was a school and a physical training centre combined that provided an all-rounded education to those who attended. It was where I spent most of my time as an island resident.
After the age of 16, based on your merits, you could apply for the apprenticeship programme. In this programme, you worked for 2 years under the person of your choosing and learned skills related to your field of choice. I aimed to get into this programme and join the Expeditions Committee, where I would go on expeditions and hopefully, recover the bodies of my parents.
Dr Roche trained me in the same field as he and my parents. Despite his initial apprehension about my idea, he soon realised that my love for the ocean was no longer stopping. Any free time we had was spent at the beach, collecting seashells and watching nature documentaries.
Dr. Roche and my parents were the Co-Directors of Expeditions and would often go out to explore the ocean in an attempt to further the world's understanding of the past, often through artefacts and relics from lost civilisations that were rediscovered from said expeditions.
The 3rd building was known as the Expedition and Logistics Center. It was where we received supplies, sent our research findings to the mainland and also where the expeditions started and ended. It was where I wanted to work, as an aspiring Expedition Committee member. It was where my goal would lead me to end up.
The 4th building was the hospital. It was built and operated by the Ministry of Health and is a private facility for island inhabitants only. It boasts some of the best medical technology in the world, being run by some of the best doctors in the world.
The last area was the living quarters. It was a large area that housed 4 20-story buildings which had apartments on each floor. Each family on the island had a flat to themselves. The flats were spacious, being well-equipped with well-kept general-use facilities, good security and free feeder services across the island.
Overall, it was a really nice place to stay in. I stayed with Dr Roche for the past 12 years and was privately tutored by him. I ended up getting into the apprenticeship program and worked for him doing menial tasks such as scheduling, organising and writing up reports.
The tasks were simple and I felt that he was trying to bore me, to get me to quit and pursue a different course. He often dodged answering questions about certain topics, mainly the topics that related to the day my parents died. Often emanating from him when I asked those questions was a sense of remorse, regret and guilt. I soon stopped asking those questions as I realised that he still hadn't gotten over the events of that day.
Even then, I did my best to make him recognise my talents. I would constantly finish the work he gave and ask for more challenging work. Enough persistence on my end led to Dr Roche accepting my motivations and, a year later, giving me much more interesting work. This entailed transporting artefacts and relics found from expeditions and sending them to the Research and Development Facility, loading up supplies on the transports that would be used by the teams being sent out and more. The work was tough but enjoyable. It brought me closer to my aim of joining the Expeditions Committee.
The only reason I wasn't able to join right on was due to a minimum age requirement of 18. At 17, I was a year short of being able to join, but I made sure to contribute as much as I could despite my relatively minor roles compared to the rest of the staff.
A year passed by in the blink of an eye, and I soon saw myself joining the Expeditions Committee as a Junior Expeditioner. I would finally be able to join expeditions and explore the oceans and hopefully, find the bodies of my parents to give them a proper burial.
6 months after my official joining as an expeditioner, we received still images from a satellite that showed a large set of ruins, circular in nature, located underneath the Indian Ocean. As the largest maritime research and exploration facility, we decided to schedule an expedition to said ruins to explore them and see if any discoveries could be made. Little did I know that the expedition would change my life as I knew it, for better or for worse.