Chuckles

Part II

Halstead's woeful chortles to her chill welcome stuck with Trudy Platt. So much so that in her head she started to refer to him as Chuckles, for she witnessed and was on the receiving end of many of those vulnerably bashful sniggers. Though it took a good three weeks into his stint up in Intelligence for her to outright call him by this freshly awarded moniker for the first time.

It was a Saturday, the little and big hand of the clock on the wall soon to align and ring in the beginning of Sunday. The seconds ticked by mockingly as she let her eyes roam around the foyer from behind her desk. Despite the late hour, the twenty-first district was buzzing with noise and a vast number of patrol officers who were forced into overtime as per Hank Voight's request and her execution of said directive. All of them were tired, but nevertheless dedicated to help with the investigation of the precinct's flagship division.

They were working a time-sensitive case, which they had initially believed to be a kidnapping of two young children – siblings, two boys, aged eight and ten. The assumption made sense at first. As the sons of the CEO of a multi-million-dollar tech company they were easy targets to be held hostage in exchange for money. But for reasons that were beyond his coworkers, Halstead wasn't so convinced about it being an abduction. He had voiced his doubts from the minute they had taken on this case. However, he hadn't been able to explain his qualms other than his instincts telling him so, which was why Voight had smothered his plea to explore a different angle. On the surface, Jay had surrendered, but in his head the wheels had already been in overdrive, hypothesizing.

As the investigation progressed it became more and more apparent that this wasn't an attempt to take the millionaire to the cleaners after all. Two hours after the children had seemingly dropped off the face of the earth a ransom demand had yet to be made. That alone should have been a giveaway. And yet, it took finding the dead body of the businessman's wife for them to look at the case from a fresh perspective and listen to Halstead's suspicions. Jay's theory: the kids might have seen their mother's murder and ran away in a panic, the killer, or killers, likely already on their tails with pure intent to silence the unexpected witnesses. Evidence pointed in the same direction, causing Hank to begrudgingly admit – and maybe be a tad impressed as well – that the newest member of his unit might be onto something.

Searching for the kids had become an even higher priority then, the race against the clock really picking up speed and all available officers were called in to assist, their only gain in the pursuit to be had by Jay connecting the dots before anyone else had even given the alternative a thought.

Unfortunately, thirty hours into the search, there was still no trace of the siblings. Intelligence was growing restless, so was the precinct, all of them aware how dire the situation was. All of them knowing that with every passing minute finding the children alive was less and less likely. Voight's unit worked tirelessly, none of them willing to go home until the kids were safely reunited with their father. Dawson and Willhite, both having young children of their own, pushed especially hard to solve the case. But their relentlessness was no match for the feverish determination of the youngest detective. The brunette was beavering away with a grit that didn't go by unnoticed by anyone, not by Trudy either since every time new hints drizzled in about possible sightings of the boys, Jay Halstead was the first to breeze past her desk and out the door to follow up on them.

Platt was on the phone when the man in question, along with Antonio, returned from scouting out one of such auspicious locations. From the frustrated scowls on both their faces, the desk sergeant could easily tell that it had been yet another unsuccessful hunt. However, with a rather disgruntled and, from the sounds of it, possibly inebriated male bellowing down the landline, impatiently demanding to speak to no other than the young detective who had just walked through the door, she had no time to dwell on it. She was more than ready to pass the receiver off. Less than a minute of talking to the man and she already felt the strong desire to crawl through the phone and strangle him with the cord for his disrespectful tone. If she had to listen to him a minute longer, she might just end up the first person on earth to execute this impossible deed.