Two

Saturdays were famous for being bubbly and lazy in the Police Department, Ingfalls. The days that fell into the the weekend section were considered half days by the PD and that was why Eallric Hancey's Peugeot 404 could be seen driving out of no. 3, Atholl Esplanade, in the Eleventh hour of the day to work, with his car's radio frequency on Vintage Inspiration (97.3 FM) blasting old Rock 'n' Roll music.

The enchanting sun's bright, pleasant rays had unfurled gently like a peacock's feathers will for admiration by hankering spectators and had extended itself to all of Ingfalls; and it's neighbouring provinces that made up Wabrook, with golden luminescence.

Eallric's 404 zoomed down a slanted, narrow-laned boulevard where he sped past a woman in an orange, flowered gown pushing a bassinet along with her, before his car spewed collected earth from the tarred road all over an old man with a tobacco pipe hanging between his lips.

As he turned into a busier lane, Coalrior Highway, the traffic light turned red. “Blow!” he managed to say before his dynamic mind wandered away to the intense game of chess he'd lost to his (unauthorized) adopted son, Gerey Wysalt, whom him and his wife had found on an inked, starless, winter night, when he was two, next to a sewer, (with his odd limbs and literally red hair which Brione Hancey called "special"), crying.

A shrill hoot honked from the car behind Eallric's (which startled a few birds) as the green colour on the traffic light lamppost became noticeable which refocused his bewildering mind on what was important at that moment - getting to work.

He slammed his feet on the gas pedal which induced the back tyres to spring into action as they fought against friction before stirring down the road at a crazed speed.

Eallric Hancey wasn't more than five hundred metres from the Police Department, Ingfalls, when a single jingle of a bell went off from his dusty dashboard. “Gas?! Again?” Eallric muttered resentfully as his brown eyes toured all of his surroundings for a place to refill.

Bright red, neon lights that had "JALOPY MOTOR MART" dancing to its left calmed Eallric as he drove his Peugeot 404 in.

“Full tank, please,” he grumbled as he reached into his pockets for coins.

“That'll be two Royal Grerode with an Earthian Grerode, too, sir.”

In no time, Eallric was on his way out of the filling station - he had about fifteen minutes before he was officially late to work and although he was pretty clumsy about getting to work, he didn't fail to notice an extremely tall, muscular man with every single part of his body hidden in a black hoodie and slacks, staring at him, with eery green eyes. Jeez!

**

If there was anywhere Eallric loved just as much as Atholl Esplanade, it was Mariners Spur; the abode for the beloved Command Post of the Police Department, Ingfalls, and white marble made, four-storeyed pacifier for panic-stricken citizens.

A quick glance at the leather watch that hung on Eallric's left hand revealed that he had five minutes more as he drove into the cramped parking lot.

He got out of his Peugeot 404 and made final adjustments - dusted his black boot of imaginary dusts, ran a white handkerchief over his fat face and raced a few fingers through his short, jet black, hair.

He stylishly swung his keys into his deep pocket and walked towards the polished, glossy white erection that was far whiter than the wool of his mother's lambs whilst growing up.

A woman with long, chestnut hair and snowy skin with her daughter, a (mini) clone of her whispered to each other as they walked in his opposite direction - none paying any attention to the swanky officer that scented like cold mountain air.

As Eallric walked into the cosy, luxurious, golden filtered levee, his guts told him something wasn't right and that was true.

He exchanged short pleasantries with the receptionist, collected his key and even grabbed a cup of coffee from the variegated counter before heading to the fourth storey - where his office was.

His office key was still fiddling in the keyhole of the mahogany door that had 'CHIEF INSPECTOR EALLRIC HANCEY' written in cerulean on a black plate that protracted out of the door when his best friend and ex partner, Inspector Bertio Holex, walked up to him.

“What's up mate?” Eallric called out cheerfully, looking up at the lean officer with a voice so deep it'd intimate a grinding engine. “I guess there's something you really have to talk to me about because - uhm - you hardly ever come up here,” Eallric's door gave a low yowl as he pushed it open.

Bertio Holex followed Eallric closely into the pale white, fancy room where a huge, elegant chandelier hung right in the heart of the room like the church bell of a tower, glossy and polished. Eallric walked to the other side of a leather black, urbane desk imported from Deham, and had his sit before pointing out his five fingers offering Bertio a sit.

“Yes sir, I was called, sir, from the Chamber of Duties,” Bertio started. Eallric sat upright as he heard 'Chamber of Duties', they never called except when Wabrook and perhaps, the rest of the world, was about to collapse. In other words, they hadn't contacted the Police Department, Ingfalls, in two hundred years!

“And, sir, they said that we should probe as much as we can,” Bertio leaned forward towards Eallric and whispered the next few word, “even if it means bending the law,” then resumed on his normal baritone, “into finding out what happened, sir, on the case reported yesterday.”

The aura in the room had become thrilling, stirring, stimulating and electrifying right from when 'Chamber of Duties' was mentioned.

There was utter silence as both men stared at one another apparently dumbfounded. Neither of them noticed the small, dotted birds that swayed graciously in the milky sky as though they were pageants for a flying contest nor did they heed the dins, hullabaloo, rackets and rows of various frequency that wafted up to them with the warm, soft wind as the sunlight bathe the crowded streets of Ingfalls.

“So - so, what do we do now?” Eallric asked, placing his chin on his hand.

“Well, sir, we don't have much - for now. I'll say we both go take a look at the crime scene. I have a feeling series of calls will be coming in soon from the Chamber.”

Eallric Hancey stood up - straight and taller than usual with his head held high as Bertio Holex was done talking. He was in cop mode.

“Meet me in my car in - ” he took a sharp glance at his watch, “fifteen minutes. I need to skim through some vital documents.”

With that, Bertio Holex left an Eallric who was gawkily running his hands over documents after documents - from warm, fresh, white, crisp reports to smeared brown, rumpled records.

**

“Where's Seargent Marger Whayte!?” Eallric boomed loudly as his dark boot hastily clapped against the red carpet in the exquisite reception.

“She's not on sit, sir.” the plump receptionist answered, pushing her glasses up her sweaty nose, “Is there anything you'll like me tell her when she comes in, sir?”

“Yeah, yeah. Tell her to go through the forms I placed on her desk. They're all from applicants who want to join the Police College up at Seymour Point. She has to sort them out according to their certificates - and has to get that done before I'm back. There are a little over three hundred applications,” and with that, Eallric burst open into the mild, pleasant air.

The sun had ebbed into nothing more than an ethereal orange hue that boosted the fairness and charm of the gentle blue and white sky by the time Eallric got out of the unblemished building.

He jogged over to his Peugeot, his messy bunch of keys making a rattle as he moved. Inspector Bertio Holex was on the other side of the 404 already, waiting anxiously.

The engine of the shiny black Peugeot 404 came alive with a deep, unending rumble when the duo were settled in it.

“It's at Hunters Walk I guess,” Bertio said as Eallric drove the Peugeot out of the Police Department, Ingfalls, and out of the serene Mariners Spur.

“Yeah, that's where we are - Wait a minute! Isn't that where you met -”

“ - Aelieth? Yeah! We got married after a year. Now with two kids, Beornhelr and Aucieth.” Bertio's cheeks went bright rosy with blush.

“I dare say it was a splendid wedding. A pity I couldn't be there till the very end.”

The 404's engine roared louder as they climbed up a steeped, scabrous road, Cliff Beeches, which sent the two men into silence as they watched the 404 climb higher, and higher, slowly.

Bertio broke the silence this time around as they passed by a small store, “I wonder why anyone will decide to live here with its inhospitable conditions.”

Finally, they got to Hunters Walk. It was a ghetto with ramshackled buildings and decaying roofs enmeshed! It was almost as though all the buildings on each side of the terrible route were a bulky mass of filth.

“We'd have blended more if we weren't dressed in our uniforms,” Eallric said to Bertio as he opened the door of his black, Peugeot 404.

“Yeah, I smell petty criminals who will want nothing to do with us,” Bertio responded.

The two cops walked over a green-with-dirt gutter that had flies feasting in it and came to a house - not more than five steps from the trench. The house was bigger than an average building in the locale and slightly more descent.

After formal introductions, they walked into the house the couple owned and spoke with a few of the locales that were in there for about three hours straight, gathering every information they could about the deceased bride that had been found in Huntsman Pool - a small, dirty body of water not too far from where they'd parked the Peugeot, and her "husband."

Exhausted, hungry and more bewildered than before, the duo called it a day and stepped out of the cold, sullen room into the warm, open air that whipped across their uniform and hair and faint orangish gold disk that retreated lazily into the clouds - sunset.

Still within their auditory range, a short, fat woman sat on a long, brown, termite infested log of wood, telling a young girl not more than five who stood at her front, facing her and backing the cops, a myth about Hunters Walk, how long after preying on games was forbidden in the area, gunshots were heard at night and the body of animals, slit by their throats, left to die was seen every morning, messing farmlands, and houses, and highways that connected Hunters Walk to the rest of Ingfalls.

Eallric's brain started churning as wild thoughts about what he could hear found its way to him. The vile part of it was in the fact that the more he thought of what the woman was saying, the more he was certain that the myth was true. Besides, it sounded a lot like the nightmare his son, Gerey Wysalt, always had. Some might have called it his police guts (that had gotten him high ranked) but it was something deeper. He felt a connection between the death of the bride, her husband and the myth but there was no way of proving it and even if he did prove it, what next?

He felt the urge to question her and was about to take advantage of the situation when a large, white van well recognized all over Wabrook as the journalism bus came out of nowhere, sluggishly, and down a dusty path.

A childish tune played out of speakers as the bus passed by them but what really caught Chief Inspector Eallric Hancey's attention were the eyes of the driver!

They were green, greener than than the fields him and Bertio had passed on their way to Hunters Walk, and then he recognized the man!