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Origin 3 : The Factory
🕑 Added 2025-06-16 19:19:56 +0000 UTCOrigin 3 : The Factory
*[FLASHBACK - 14 Years Ago, One Week After Police Station]*
The phone calls had started three days ago.
Alex pressed his ear to his bedroom door, listening to his parents' hushed voices in the kitchen. They thought he was asleep, but the fear in their whispers kept him awake. His father's voice was different now—hollow, defeated in a way Alex had never heard before.
"They know where I work, Sarah. They know Alex's school schedule. They know your shift rotations at the hospital."
"David, maybe we should—"
"What? Run? With what money? I can't get hired anywhere in the city. Palmer made sure of that. One phone call and suddenly I'm 'unreliable', have 'anger management issues.'"
Alex didn't understand all the words, but he understood the tone. They were trapped.
Earlier that day, walking home from school, Alex had noticed the same black car following him for three blocks. When he'd stopped to tie his shoe, the car stopped too. When he'd started walking faster, it had matched his pace. By the time he'd reached his street, his heart was pounding so hard he thought he might throw up.
At dinner, he'd tried to tell his parents about the car, but they'd just exchanged one of their looks—the kind that said Alex was probably imagining things again. He was always getting confused about details, mixing up faces, seeing patterns that weren't there. Maybe he had imagined it.
But then his father had double-checked all the locks after dinner. And his mother had moved the kitchen knives to a drawer closer to the table. And neither of them had slept, judging by the whispers that had continued past midnight.
Now it was morning, and his father was getting ready for another day of job hunting that everyone knew was pointless. David Thorne moved around the kitchen like a man walking to his execution, checking the windows, peering through the blinds.
"Maybe I should call in sick," his mother said, still in her nurse's uniform but making no move toward the door.
"We need the money," his father replied automatically. "And if you don't show up, they'll know we're scared."
"We are scared."
The simple admission hung in the air like smoke. Alex pressed harder against his door, wishing he could do something, anything, to help. But he was just a slow kid who couldn't even help with his own homework.
The phone rang.
All three Thornes froze. The phone rang again. And again.
"Let the machine get it," his mother whispered.
On the fourth ring, the answering machine clicked on. Alex's own voice played back—cheerful, innocent, recorded months ago when the world still made sense: "Hi! You've reached the Thorne family! We can't come to the phone right now, but—"
"We know you're there."
The voice was calm, professional, terrifyingly polite. Alex felt ice water run down his spine.
"Mr. Thorne, this is your final warning. Some problems resolve themselves naturally when left alone. Others require more... direct intervention. You have twenty-four hours to decide which category your problem falls into."
The line went dead.
In the kitchen, Alex heard his mother start to cry—not the frustrated tears from the police station, but deep, hopeless sobs that seemed to come from somewhere she couldn't control.
"I'm so sorry," his father whispered. "God, Sarah, I'm so sorry. I thought... I thought if we just followed the rules, told the truth, somebody would listen."
"I know. I know you did."
"What kind of man am I? I can't even protect my own family."
Through his bedroom door, Alex heard his father break down completely—harsh, choking sounds that no child should have to hear from their parent. His strong, hardworking father, reduced to this by people who hurt children for money and faced no consequences.
Alex slipped back to his bed and pulled the covers over his head, but he couldn't block out the sounds of his parents' world collapsing. Couldn't stop thinking about the black car, the phone calls, the way Detective Palmer had fed their evidence into a shredder like it was garbage.
Somewhere in the city, men in expensive suits were probably having breakfast, reading newspapers, kissing their wives goodbye before heading to offices where they made decisions about who lived and who died. They slept well at night because the system protected them. They never had to choose between their principles and their families' safety.
But his parents did. His family did.
That night, eleven-year-old Alex Thorne lay in his bed listening to his parents cry, and learned that sometimes the cruelest torture isn't what they do to you—it's what they make you watch them do to the people you love.
The phone rang again at 3 AM. This time, nobody answered. Nobody even moved. They just lay in their beds, listening to it ring and ring and ring, each tone a countdown to something none of them could imagine surviving.
But they would survive it. At least one of them would.
And that would turn out to be the most dangerous outcome of all.
