[ENTRY 1 - ERWIN'S JOURNAL]
Date: 12 September 20XX 00:27
It’s my first week on the job at the Strangerville Research Facility.
And honestly? It’s nothing like I imagined.
It’s better.
The laboratories are pristine, outfitted with the most advanced technology I’ve ever worked with. Every hallway hums with innovation, every lab bench tells a story of progress. It’s like stepping into the future, a place where science isn’t just studied—it’s pushed beyond its limits! Every hallway hums with innovation, every lab bench tells a story of progress.
It’s like stepping into the future, a place where science isn’t just studied, it’s pushed beyond its limits.
The people here? They’re brilliant! My colleagues are some of the sharpest minds in the field, and yet, they’re very welcoming.
The specimens? God, It's the kind of things I used to dream about studying when I was just a kid reading science journals under my blankets late at night. Now, I get to be part of that.
I don’t know how to describe it, but for the first time in a long time… I feel like I truly belong somewhere.
This is it. The career I’ve wanted for as long as I can remember.
I’m finally, finally a scientist. Just like mom...
...
To be honest, i never really talk about it here. Maybe because I was too young to understand, or maybe because I was too afraid of the answer. But now, it’s gnawing at me.
Where are they?
My mother. My father. The two people who should’ve been there, who should’ve been somewhere—but instead, all I have are faded memories that feel more like dreams than reality. I don’t even know if they’re real memories at all.
Uncle Moore never talks about them. Not really. Whenever I try to ask, he changes the subject or tells me that “some things are better left in the past.” But what past? Mine? Theirs? What is he so afraid of me knowing?
The only thing he’s ever told me is that my mother was a renowned scientist, brilliant in ways I can only imagine. My father, on the other hand, was a journalist, but not the kind that wrote safe stories. He was the kind that dug too deep, the kind that made enemies in places most people don’t even know exist.
And then, one day… they were gone.
Uncle Moore says they brought me to him themselves. No warnings, no explanations. They handed me over, told him to take care of me, and then they disappeared.
No letters. No phone calls. No trace.
I tried looking through old records once, in the attic where he keeps everything locked away in dusty boxes. There were no photos of them. No birth certificates. No legal documents with their names.
As if they never existed at all.
But I know that’s not true.
I remember my mother’s soft voice and my father’s warm yet strong touch on my head. I remember shadows moving in the dark and whispers behind closed doors.
And I remember fear.
But one thing in my mind, ...did they love me?
Did they ever think about me after they left? Did they wonder if I was okay, if I was lonely, if I ever missed them? Or was I just another consequence of whatever life they were living, something to be set aside, forgotten?
I tell myself that if they truly cared, they would have come back. But they didn’t.
So I did the only thing I could. I made myself worthy of being remembered. I worked. I studied. I excelled. Straight A’s, top of my class, every honor, every award. I pushed myself harder and harder, convinced that if I was brilliant enough, if I became something great, then maybe, just maybe, wherever they were, they’d see me.
That they’d be proud.
I got into Foxbury Institute—one of the most prestigious schools in the country. I majored in biology, then pushed forward into botanical bioengineering. A PhD by my mid-twenties. A rising name in the field. A scientist, just like my mother.
But does any of it matter?
I chased their legacy, their ghosts, their shadows, but I don’t even know if they wanted me to.
Would they look at everything I’ve done and be proud?
…Or would they just look at me like i'm nothing but a stranger?