Kingdom of isolation - you can't hide

Twenty Four ~ Aurora

Aurora

Age 20

I didn't get a tattoo nor that special water to get me drunk enough to forget every single mistake I've ever made. Life in Canada hasn't gone the way I hoped it would, minus the stunning view from time to time. I had to lay low for a while, jumping from one motel to another like Super Mario and eating processed food guaranteed to give me food poisoning at some point. Basically, I was living like a hermit with zero contact from the outside world. Even though Uncle Noah promised he'd follow me here, he didn't. Freaking liar! Not for another 6 months, and even then he disappeared on me saying something urgent had come up. I'd felt relief like no other when those familiar nocturnal eyes sparkled under the fluorescent lights of some sleazy motel I was staying in, but it dwindled down just as fast when he left a week later after finding me a proper apartment to live in. That was a lonely Christmas despite the cosy apartment, but I guess I deserved it since I did the same thing to him not too long ago. I've been alone before but they were still nearby, like in a neighbouring city or town. Especially Aunt Clara, she was like the human equivalent of an emergency button to me. I was heavily dependent on them when it came to stuff like this and I didn't know how to handle anything without them. I still don't. The loneliness didn't just end there. Oh, no. I've also been dealing with recurring nightmares and memories I don't recall that wake me up in the middle of the night. I'll be turning 21 soon enough with nothing to my name except for a dozen aliases and half a degree from an online university. I hate this. I hate living like this without knowing the truth. Or at least the context of my entire existence.

Perhaps that's why I've been on a mission to unravel everything there is to know about me like a ball of yarn. I blink at the screen in front of me. Curiosity has always been a major temptation for me but I've always kept it under lock and key. But over the last two years, I've come to a daunting realisation that I can't stop my curiosity, it's become an epicentre of intrusive thoughts and actions beyond my control. I think it all started when I was looking for a university to study in and coincidentally found the one my uncle went to. House of Royals University. That should have been my first red flag—nothing good comes out of mingling with aristocrats. Yet, I did just that and bore the consequences. I watch the news articles on my laptop with keen interest. So far, I have gathered little pieces of information pertaining to my past. Namely, my first name. And that's pretty much it. So really, I've found nothing that could tell me who the fuck I am. And believe me, I've exhausted every single option short of entering the dark web and still came up empty. Aurora who? I don't fucking know! Every time I think I'm getting somewhere, the servers crash or some kind of a glitch happens and I'm left scrambling for answers. The only major clue of sorts has been, ironically, HRU and the shit that went down on my final night. I just feel like they're all connected somehow. I don't know why, but I think I might have been royalty too.

I snort, nearly spilling my peach iced tea onto the keyboard like an uncouth individual. Get it together, Aurora. You are not fucking royalty by any stretch of imagination. People in HRU were royalty. You were probably a peasant who committed treason or something and they had to hide you before the king sent you to the gallows! Maybe that's why you don't even exist. I frown, maybe it's not that far-fetched of an idea. Someone did call me a princess. Whether that was figuratively spoken, I won't know if i'm just sitting here like a waiting duck. Becoming a recluse has been amazing but it hasn't done me any favours.

Instead, I began to research the people in HRU to figure out what their lineage was and so on. The first surname I looked into, one I was so familiar with, was Whitlock because I knew Mia came from a line of royalty. The only thing I could find was Whitlock Technology and that did nothing to ease my curiosity and only twisted my gut, further reminding me of my lost friendship with that stunning girl. I tried every surname and came up with similar results. Interestingly, they were once called royals but now they go by heirs and such so there wasn't much for me to find other than what they wanted me to find. It was like they lived a different life outside of the image they portrayed. It's a weird juxtaposition of old and new, that's what I'm starting to gather. A slow transitioning into the new world but the essence of what it was still lingers. Monarchs have existed for centuries, the ones that still stand today have a history of ruling over people—colonialism style. These "royals" on the other hand, seem to have transitioned into major companies but maintain a regal status in places like HRU and some online forums. And while many seem to enjoy that regal status, some are more interested in helping others with their disposable wealth. There's the Aurum and Diamas corporations that literally translate to gold and diamonds. They seem to be doing their fair share of work around the world but that's all I've managed to find.