Ludwik had left Chicago at the age of sixteen to work first at Menlo Park in New Jersey and then at the Tesla Electric Light Company. He did not return to his hometown until he was 25.

Orphaned at a tender age by the mysterious death of both parents, Ludwik had been raised and cared for by his Aunt Ida. Returning to Chicago, he found her house on the South Side back streets just as he had left it, but his beloved aunt was no longer there. To Ludwik's bitter regret, she had passed away six months earlier.

The house had begun to smell faintly of mold after standing vacant for so long. Ludwik stepped inside to find the dusty furniture scattered about the rooms indifferently.
Noticing one chair covered with a tatty cloth,Ludwik drew off its covering, rolling it up in one hand as he did. Here was his aunt's favorite high-backed chair.

Memories came flooding back. How often his aunt had sat here knitting or reading! For a fleeting moment, he almost imagined he felt the warmth of her presence again in the silent room.

Ludwik sat down carefully in the chair.Closing his eyes, he recalled the room as it had been when he was a child. The distant din of the factories, the aroma of honey from the tea his aunt always made...

But what was this? Something was poking him in the seat. He turned to see something half-tucked away in the chair's cushion, which proved on closer inspection to be an envelope wrapped in a thin cloth.

To Ida, read the envelope, in ink so faded that it must have been written some time ago. The hand was both weak and hurried, giving an overall ragged impression. Sensing the importance of what he had discovered, Ludwik withdrew the letter from within. His face was a mask of apprehension.

The letter was from Ludwik's mother. He had never heard his mother's voice, never even seen a photo, but here now was her handwriting.

Ludwik's hands soon began to tremble as he read. The letter revealed the secrets of Ludwik's birth and his father Moise's death — secrets that Ludwik thought his mother had taken to her grave. She must have known that the end was near as she wrote. A burning spread within Ludwik. He had been confused and misled for so long about his parents' mysterious deaths. Now those mysteries were solved, and his uncertainty turned to rage that pulsed hot and violent in his veins. He felt pained, about to burst, yet frozen to the spot.

They had done it. The wolves.

That was the moment he first saw his destiny:to become the Mad Man.

Four years later, the South Side was transformed for the coming Columbian Exposition. Ludwik's aunt's old house was no exception, and before long it too had fallen into the hands of the wolves...