Story ideas at various levels of development. Some may or may not be allegories. Some may also be fanfiction but not marked as such.
9.
In the year 1910, when Estonia was still under the Russian Empire, a group of idealistic people from various backgrounds, nationalities and origins set sail from Tallinn, united in a single goal: the search for legendary Atlantis.
Their ship is huge and equipped to allow them to stay on sea for years on end, with room for over 150 people, steam-powered hydroponic systems and a library filled with relevant books and early music records. And so after picking up a number of other people on the way to the Atlantic Ocean they cross the seas for 20 years, during which they try to avoid contact with other people so no one could interfering with their goal, mostly only having the sea and its inhabitants as friends.
Along the way, 9-10 years in, a new generation of sailors is born which has never known anything else, and so only has a vague connection to their parents' homeland, with their ship, the Mesopelagic, being their true home. A unique culture has formed on it, originating from the preparatory meetings of their parents and other crew members on land, with new holidays and other traditions passing on the stories of Atlantis and the meaning of their continuous journey.
Then, on one day, they come across a giant whirlpool that swallows their ship whole, and takes everyone down into a huge underwater cavern, smashing their ship, but letting the crew survive. And almost immediately these children, that are now about 10 years old, recognize the place as the legendary location of Atlantis, the city of their myths, that all their efforts had been directed to!
Soon they find shrines and libraries that appear to have been abandoned for thousands of years, each designated to a different entity, maybe a deity, maybe a spirit, maybe something else entirely, named only after the profession they were associated with: The Farmer, The Scientist, The Poet, The Physician, The Magician, The Athlete, The Warrior, The Explorer, The Diplomat, The Caregiver.
All of them quickly get drawn into the one that most matches their outlook and what they have been doing on the ship or dreaming of doing
Someone who helped maintain the steam-powered hydroponic system takes to the Farmer, the one who was always invested in the scientific books of the library and live experiments gets interested in the Scientist, the one who had spent much time helping care for people with illness and injury the Physician, etc. Only three remain unattended by the end, The Poet, The Magician, The Warrior.
After they have gathered their supplies and taken residence in and around the old buildings of Atlantis, some of the adults begin venturing out to survey their surroundings and find a remarkably different kind of ecosystem unlike anything on the surface, with utterly alien animals, plants and fungi that have adapted to the unusual environment.
But soon they realize that the place is much more hostile than they realize, even as adults try to keep that a secret from the children, who either figure it out themselves, or are finally confronted with it when after a year their community suffers a series of horrible attacks by the endemic animals, and that's only the start of their troubles.
8.
Ethan believed he wasn't really human. Kris believed he must have been subject to cruel human experimentation.
She wanted to help him, because he had been the only one to help her when she, not knowing the local language, had gotten lost. But he only had an eye for the animals, plants and fungi he was encountering on his journey across the country. And the ghosts. So many ghosts.
7.
At 16, you have had nightmares that feel like premonitions alongside terrible moments of deja-vu all your life. It's like you're just going through endless reruns of your childhood, gardening together with your best friend Cal eking out a living on this distant, seemingly increasingly hostile alien world, the only one you know.
In one future life, you manage to save your best friend's Cal's other best friend Tammy from a lethal accident when all of you were just ten. But this leads to Cal eventually becoming her partner, not yours as now. He would never grow as close to you to end up as your not-so-secret admirer pulling you out of your grief when your father dies not two years after your mother had in this harsh world. When that inevitably happens again in your next life, you'd just be alone, your friends distant.
A bad part of your mind wonders about simply not saving Cal's friend next time just so you can still have him to yourself, but you'd never do that, right? And then, an accident at work seems to cut your life short instead, leaving a distraught Cal behind.
6.
Imagine investigating a gruesome murder as a detective with amnesia and as you collect evidence and slowly regain your memories it dawns on you what really happened... you were the murderer all along, but while fleeing the scene you had an accident on the road that took your memory.
5.
You live a good, normal life with friends and family, but something feels increasingly off. Shadows of objects seem impossible, colors bleeding out, people talking about things to you that make no sense for them to say or that they have no way of knowing and you feel as if you slowly lose touch with reality... until you wake up in a hospital where you realize that not just everything and everyone you knew were just in your head, even your own shape and very identity was entirely imaginary, a result of trying to cope with a traumatic experience that you suppressed but subconsciously blamed yourself for the entire time
(inspired by that one Reddit post and also many similar “waking up in an asylum” fanfictions.
4.
Imagine, you wake up in an your bedroom as a complete stranger to yourself, but everyone at home treats you as if nothing weird has happened.
The same is true on the street. As normal, weird machines can be seen everywhere, people offering them to perform services that promise you to become more focused and productive, regain lost memories or help with anger. The kingdom has a long history of financing such "mental engineering" and the royal court has even made many inventions of their own.
However, it somehow disturbs you today. As you try to go to a thrift store to distract yourself from your issues, you came across some old clothes that you feel yourself weirdly drawn to, as if they were your old favorites that were thrown out by your parents long ago.
You also find, hidden in a box in a dark corner with an unassuming protective cover, a book that divulges a big secret of the world to you that seems to contradict what the royal court of your homeland claims. You get them both for yourself, put the clothes on, and carry the book visibly on your way outside. As you go outside and back home to read, you walk through a number of backalleys to avoid the gaze of people that feels weirdly piercing.
At one point, someone jumps on you, screaming "Duck!" and just in that moment you hear a gunshot and see a shadowy figure had in fact a gun pointed at you and is now running away.
"The kingdom's secret police doesn't take kindly to people who could be exposing secrets that they see as threatening their power. What were you thinking walking like this with that kind of book in the open?"
After walking to a secluded cafe together, and talking for a while, you realize that the person who saved your life has experienced something similar and you become friends and decide to figure out what happened, despite the dangers.
It turns out that both of you, and several other people, accidentally exposed the kingdom's current queen's central claim to legitimacy as fake when you were small children participating in a royal ceremony who had wandered off at one point.
You ended up being kidnapped and were only allowed to return to your families after you had your memories supplanted with those of a completely different person with one of their inventions, and your parents and relatives coerced into going along with the sham. Books on the subject were banned.
Only now, a decade later, the effect had worn off, leaving you very confused and somehow Public Enemy No. 1. But together you manage to get enough people on your side and during a big diplomatic summit the fake queen is exposed as the secret is revealed and the real one is for the first time shown publicly.
3.
"One morning, you wake up in the arms of a man who addresses you as a royal princess. There's just one problem: You have no idea how you ended up there. The last thing you remember is being a merchant at the border crossing, leaving, with no more business in the country. And being a man."
2.
One day, you, a previously middle-aged scientist, find yourself in the body of a young teenager again. You keep trying to explain the situations to your peers and boast about your discoveries and inventions but they all laugh at you. You are determined to prove them wrong only to over the course of your investigations meet someone who is clearly yourself, but at the proper age!
They take flight once you have finished explaining. In their lab you find out that you were the unsuspecting victim of a nightly abduction and an unethical experiment where that scientist tried to make themselves younger by copying their memories into a young teenager. However, they didn't manage to transfer their consciousness, so there were now two people believing themselves to be the same person. The professor tried to cover up their mistake by simply returning you to your home after the failed experiment.
(Directly inspired by Professor Layton and the Eternal Diva)
1.
Ju Te had always loved hilly Point 10 with its jolly, jittery jungle. […] Emma gazed with the affection of 9657 cute lonely lizards. She said, in hushed tones, "I love you and I want thick pancakes." Ju looked back, even more active and still fingering the crumpled hawk. "Emma, pancakes are flat and thin," he replied. They looked at each other with ashamed feelings, like two friendly, fair foxes diving at a very controlling Meetup at Point 10, which had drum and bass music playing in the background and two creepy uncles dating to the beat.
(Website-assisted ad-libbing)