The Black Eyed Children

Chapter 2 - A Distant Distraction

"Antonio, Graham and I will inspect his car - see what we can find. Richard, shadow Holly and take notes as and when asked to do so. If you see anything yourself, tell her. Otherwise, try soaking in as much as you can from this," Rishi said looking at those he was addressing before pausing for a microsecond, looking at Holly, smiling widely and saying, "because she's got a lot of experience."

Holly smiled back. A couple of seconds morphed into what felt like an eternity as an awkward silence filled the squad car with no one knowing how to proceed from Rishi's cumbersome use of flirtation. It wasn't so much what he said, but the eye contact and smile that lingered for half a second too long which made these five seconds into five years.

Antonio looked out his window, the material of his police collar squeaking against his dry cheeks. Graham sniffed, the air moving through every sinew being heard a thousand times more than it should be in this pin-drop silence. All the while, Rishi's smile loitered on a face too handsome to be making such.

It was the subject of Rishi's clumsy compliment that finally broke the tension, "Thanks, yeah, Richard, let's get going, shall we?"

As if suddenly being released from a stupefy spell, everyone said some monosyllabic word like "okay" or "amazing" and simultaneously got out of the car and into the cold and dreary air of the howling M6 motorway.

Richard instantly noticed the blue BMW saloon, cordoned off by red and white police tape. Richard knew cars and it was a nice car. Blue matte finish, 3-Series. He couldn't see the number plate from his angle, but it was most likely a 2018 or 2019 reg. A nice car indeed, Andrew must have had a good job. Hopefully, he can go back to it if they... when they find him.

Richard looked at the dark tinted windows. It was slightly chilly outside but they looked completely frosted over as if the cold had been burnt directly onto the windows - sealing in whatever was inside from whatever was outside.

He stepped forward slightly and squinted, trying to get a better look inside. His eyes moved through the icy patterns covering the windows, following them from the edges to the centre, where they congregated in a fractaled mass. The light refracted in uncanny ways as Richard adjusted the angle from where he gazed. The longer he looked the more he saw unfamiliar shapes, unusual colours and even strange figures that appeared in the moments of darkness that interspaced the light refraction. They moved in and out of focus simply trying to escape the distorted light and catch a glimpse of him, forcing him to stay in the dance of colours otherwise they might seize a window of opportunity, reach out and grab -

"Come on Richard," Holly called back to Richard, tearing him out of his trance, "let's check out the hard-shoulder then come back around." She was already on the hilly side of the motorway.

What had he been doing?!

Richard looked back at the window. They were frosted but the strange shapes and frightening forms he saw were gone, replaced by a normal sheet of frosted ice - still unusual for the temperature outside, but not entrancing as before. The light bounced off the window in an expected way now boring him the longer he stared.

Richard blinked and turned away to catch up to Holly as she paced the hard shoulder.

"You alright Richard? Haven't even found a body yet and seems like you've got a bit of stage fright."

Richard laughed. Holly was right, he was acting a bit weird, "I'm fine, just... just glad that Boss let me come on this."

"Benson. You don't need to call him boss here, we all know he's a bit of a hard-arse. And you can loosen up a bit, do your job but I'm not going to snap at you if you ask me questions or haven't shined my shoes in the last five minutes," Holly said reassuringly.