For my dear Aunt Sonia. Thank you for everything we accomplished together. May your legacy live on.
My name is T.G.G. Ketchum, and for as long as I can remember, there have been all kinds of tales about the sinking of the Titanic. Indeed, by the time I was in elementary school, the event was told in social studies class. The Macro Cosmos Herløv Titanic, better known as the MCH Titanic, was the largest ship in the world. It was on its maiden voyage to Wyndon in the Galar region from Olivine City in the Johto region with 2,200 people on board. Halfway through the journey on April 14th, 1912, it hit an iceberg and sank, resulting in the deaths of more than two-thirds of the people on board.
But even before learning about it in school, my family had their own stories about the Titanic. For better and for worse, it was a significant part of our history. As I got older, I developed a passion for writing stories unrelated to Titanic, but it has always been in the back of my mind to write this book. And so, Aunt Sonia and I spent several years researching on the Titanic, and combining our family stories with other people's stories, both told and untold, to give our own version of what happened.
Now, there are three problems why we aren't only telling my family's stories: the first is that many people have focused on their own stories in interviews, autobiographies, and the occasional documentary. So, it would be difficult for this book to stand out. The second is that much of Titanic's history is either commonly known or rarely mentioned, and as a survivor, Aunt Sonia wanted it all to be told.
Third and most importantly, just saying who the people on the ship are and what their fates are would dishonor them. The people on the ship were not simply historical figures of the event or contributions to the number of deaths or survivors. These were real people with dreams, goals, friends, and loved ones who lost so much. Instead, I want to tell their stories narratively. Nothing I say will be completely accurate word for word, leastways when the people Aunt Sonia and I interviewed can only recollect so much. Still, I will do my best to capture, if nothing else, the spirits of who these people were and what they experienced on that fateful voyage.
And so, dear reader, I hope you will put what you've heard about the Titanic to the back of your mind as I tell these stories. Stories of wonder, idolatry, friendship, discrimination, joy, fear, unity, and broken pride. But above all else, the story is about two particular passengers on board the Titanic named Ash Ketchum and Serena Yvonne.
