City Spies Oneshot Collection

Family

Five years ago, everything Mother had known in his life had come crumbling apart. While Mother had mostly moved on from that, there was a small part of him still wishing things could go back to the way they used to be. That wasn't going to happen, though, and he knew it, but...

Things had moved forward, and it had begun to feel like things were going well. That things were stable. However, Mother knew that things were not stable.

He hated what Clementine had done to him before, and he hated what she was doing now. Playing with everyone's emotions but her own. To Mother, it felt as though Clementine was trying to act as though nothing had changed when everything had. When everything had changed because of her. He didn't think he would ever be able to trust her again.

Above all, Mother's top priority remained his children. Losing Robert and Annie had been the most devastating part of Clementine's betrayal for Mother. This whole time, Mother had remained desperate to get them back. And now that one of them was back, Mother wasn't so sure he was doing things right. He was having to re-get to know his son after five years apart, and there's not exactly a playbook for that.

Mother loved being a father, and he wanted to protect his kids no matter what. He just wasn't sure he had. He didn't want the City Spies to think that they had just been replacement kids, because they weren't. Mother may have found most of them looking for Robert and Annie, but they weren't Robert and Annie. They were each their own person, and Mother loved them all equally as his children. The circumstances that had brought them all together weren't going to forever define them. Because they were family.

They were going through an adjustment period, all of them. That had been bound to happen. But while adjustment periods don't last forever, family, and the love that comes from family, does.

So, yes, things were all still a bit of a mess, but they would work through it, just like any other family would.