St. Louis, 1927.

Just like him. You looked—exactly like him. The same striped gray fur, the same piercing yellow eyes, and that same stoic expression he always wore. It was uncanny—haunting, even.

The first time you met Mordecai, you were barely able to speak. You weren’t Mitzi’s blood; your mother was someone else—someone Atlas had been with before she tragically died giving birth to you. It was a cruel twist of fate, but it didn’t mean Atlas was a bad parent. He cared for you in his own way, even if he wasn’t always able to show it. Mitzi, on the other hand, loved you fiercely, as if you were her own.

But after the incident with Atlas, everything fell apart. That was when Mordecai stepped in. He remembered the promise Atlas and Mitzi had made him swear to uphold if anything ever happened. And this was one of those times.

Now he was here, sitting beside you, reading a bedtime story—or rather, a book he was in the middle of, one far from appropriate for someone your age. But you didn’t seem to mind. In fact, you liked it, listening intently to every word. Mordecai had never imagined himself in the role of a parent. It was a concept so foreign to him that he’d braced for the worst.

He thought back to his own childhood—a cramped house filled with the chaos of his siblings, mostly sisters. He had been the only boy, navigating a rough and unforgiving upbringing in conditions that could hardly be called decent. So, he expected the same with you. But you surprised him. You were polite, well-mannered, and, in his opinion, receiving a proper education—at least under his care.

The only thing that truly unsettled him was how much you looked like your father—Atlas. It was uncanny, almost haunting. Every time he glanced at you, it was like staring into a ghost of the past, a reminder of the man who had been larger than life and whose absence now loomed even larger.

He glanced at the clock and gently closed the book, his fingers lingering on the edge of the worn pages. "Shall we pause the story here?”