No memory loss.

Just one terrible choice repeated until it became a life.

That was harder to accept than a dramatic explanation.

Also more human.

PART 53 — GABRIEL USES HIS REAL NAME AGAIN

Not everywhere immediately.

Legal corrections took time.

Eventually he restored Mercer in formal records while keeping Hart professionally in some contexts where legally permissible.

Identity after twenty-one years was complicated.

He was not simply the twenty-four-year-old brother returning.