Chapter 6
There was a brief silence on the other end.
"Yes, is there something you need?" Samuel asked.
"Mr. Thorn, we'd like to confirm some details regarding your daughter, Anna Thorn," Quentin said.
Samuel's breathing suddenly grew heavier on the other end.
Quentin's voice remained calm.
"But before that, I need you to answer a question for me," he said.
"Mr. Thorn, where is your daughter, Anna, right now?" Quentin asked.
That question felt weird.
Samuel hesitated for a second.
He answered like it was the most obvious thing in the world.
"Anna? Of course, she's at home," Samuel replied.
"She's asleep in her room," he added.
Quentin's eyes narrowed suddenly.
The air in the room seemed to freeze for a moment.
"You said...she's at home?" Quentin asked, emphasizing each word.
"Of course," Samuel replied, sounding a bit puzzled.
"Officer, are you sure you haven't made a mistake?" he said.
"My daughter did go missing three years ago, and we filed a report back then.
"But she came back herself six months ago.
"She's perfectly fine, right here at home," Samuel said.
"She's perfectly fine, right here at home," he said again.
That sentence was like a bomb going off in the room.
The words blew up the silence in the room.
Quentin and the female officer locked eyes, both stunned.
Quentin and the officer exchanged a look, both visibly shaken.
Quentin spoke up, "Mr. Thorn."
Quentin's tone grew unusually grave.
"Are you certain the girl in your home right now is really your daughter, Anna?" he pressed.
"Of course I'm sure!" Samuel replied, sounding a bit annoyed.
"She's my daughter. How could I possibly mistake her?" he retorted, incredulous.
"Officer, what are you really getting at?" Samuel asked, frustration creeping into his voice.
Quentin went quiet.
He gripped the phone so tightly his knuckles turned white.
He looked at me.
His eyes were icy, as deep and cold as a frozen lake.
If the girl in the photo—the one called Anna—was really at home, sleeping...
Then who was I?
The thought pierced my mind like an icy needle.
I felt a panic I'd never known before.
It was worse than hunger.
It was more chilling than the cold itself.
If I wasn't really Anna...then whose name was sewn into my collar?
Why did my brother tell me my name was Luna?
It felt like my whole world was falling apart all over again.
"Mr. Thorn, sorry to disturb you at this hour," Quentin said, his voice calm and composed again.
"We might need you to bring your daughter to the local police station tomorrow for an identity verification," he continued.
"It's just standard procedure, and we hope you can cooperate," Quentin added.
"What? We have to go to the police station?" Samuel sounded pretty reluctant.
"Alright, alright... I get it," he muttered, not hiding his reluctance.
He mumbled under his breath and hung up.
The room fell into a deathly silence.
I hugged my knees and buried my head in my knees.
I didn't want to think anymore.
Anna, Samuel Thorn, whatever.
None of it had anything to do with me.
My name was Luna.
I was waiting for my brother to come.
Once I counted ten thousand people, that would be enough.
Yeah.
That's how it should be.
The woman officer came over.
She gently patted my back.
"Don't be afraid. We'll get to the bottom of this," she reassured me.
Her voice was soft and comforting.
But I knew she didn't have the answer either.
No one did.
Maybe even my brother didn't know.
Quentin stood up.
He paced back and forth in the room.
He was lost in thought.
Like a restless lion trapped in a cage.
After a while, he stopped pacing.
"Has FTU finished running the numbers yet?" he asked the female officer.
He turned to the female officer.
"Not yet," she replied, shaking her head.
"Most of those hundred number combinations were either invalid numbers or nobody picked up when we called," she explained.
"The rest have all been checked, and none of them correspond to any missing kids," she added.
The clues, once again, hit a dead end.
Every lead pointed straight to a girl named Anna Thorn.
But now, Anna herself was the biggest mystery of all.
Time ticked by, second after second.
The heater was running full blast in the room.
I still felt no warmth.
Sleepiness and exhaustion washed over me again.
This time, they came with a surge of overwhelming confusion and fear.
I didn't even know when I finally drifted off to sleep.
I had a dream.
In my dream, I found myself back at that subway station again.
The same light, always burning, never going out.
That same cold, unyielding chair.
I sat there, just kept counting people, one after another.
One.
Two.
Three.
I kept counting and counting, for what felt like forever.
I counted until my throat was raw and my voice was gone.
I kept going until everyone else had vanished.
In the end, I was the only one left in the whole subway station.
But my brother still didn't come back.
I broke down in tears.
I was crying my eyes out in my dream, sobbing out loud.
I woke up suddenly.
I woke up with a start.
I found myself lying on the couch, wrapped up in that soft blanket.
The room was dark, with only a small lamp casting a dim glow.
Quentin was sitting behind the desk.
He was still awake.