Sunken Eyes

The Cold Case

" Breaking news. Polish policeman of 22 years, Antoni Nowak, finally solves the cold case from 1973 of the President's twin daughters who mysteriously went missing. After the event, the officer didn't have any words to say for the press."

I closed the newspaper up placed it on the coffee table in front of me and leaned back into my chair, thinking back to that day...

I stumbled across this case when I was bored at the office. I was going through old case files, trying to find something that would occupy me for the time being. I had heard about the President's daughter's case but had never really looked into it. Despite the incident happening over 50 years ago, I was still filled with curiosity and lived close enough to the old palace that I decided to check out the building, gathering any clues I could. I now know that going alone was a huge mistake. Before I went to the building, I went to the local library, finding any books that may mention the twins and the family. I found a few books about Poland's presidents throughout history so I picked that up and signed it out, heading back home. At home I sat on my couch, the books laid out on the coffee table in front of me, one in my hand. It was quite late in the afternoon but I was trying to soak up all the information I possibly could before going to the building. Out of all the cases I've looked into throughout all my years in this field, I had never looked into a case with this little information. You would think that with the girls being the president's daughters, they would have had more urgent searches. The most information I got was that the President's twin daughters, who were still children, went missing and were never found. After they disappeared, their uncle supposedly killed himself due to the weight of the loss. I was running out of sources of information to look through right now, so I finished up reading a paragraph and headed to bed.

It was my day off work, and I decided today was the day I would go to the palace. Despite working as a police officer for more than 20 years, I still had an awful sinking feeling in my stomach and considered forgetting about the whole case and turning back around. While driving to the building my mind was racing. Even though I was just going to look for clues, my heart was pounding in my ears by the time I drove up to the building. I closed the door behind me and took a few steps toward the gates, the leaves underneath my feet crunching loudly. The building was beautiful but more worn down than in the photographs in the books. The trees and bushes around the property made the view stunning. I walked past the gates, taking in each glance. The breeze was chilly, sending shivers down my spine as I walked closer to the building. I walked up to the entrance and grabbed my flashlight and shined it around, taking in my surroundings. There wasn't much to look at, for it was just an abandoned building but I expected more. Even inside was covered with plants that have grown up through the hardwood floorboards and up the walls. I explored the building on the main and top floor, sensing nothing unusual or out of the ordinary up until I made my way downstairs to the basement. As I walked down the stairs, I could once again hear my heart pounding in my ears. Once down in the basement, it seemed like a very normal living space. When I turned to the left, I noticed yellow caution tape covering a doorway, and curiosity took over. I moved towards the door, shining my flashlight down, noticing another set of stairs. With my open hand, I removed the caution tape and made my way down the stairs. With each step, the temperature of the staircase dropped and got even colder. Unlike the upstairs, there was no sunshine shining through down here, and it was clear that no one had been down here in years. I got a terrible sinking feeling in my stomach once again but I continued walking down the stairs.

When I made it to the bottom of the stairs, it revealed a long narrow room, almost like a hallway but there were small shelves on either side of the hallway, which meant that this area had been used at some point. While walking down the cold hallway, I flashed my flashlight at the stone walls, the paintings on the walls were covered in webs and dust. When I made it to the end of the hallway, I noticed a set of steel bars and a metal door frame, similar to a jail sale. Bones scattered the floor around, some broken in half, some still whole. I slowly moved my flashlight up the door, hesitant to look through the steel bars. A pair of eyes met mine. My heart sank to the pit of my stomach. I stood and stared, begging my body to let me move but I was frozen in place. My shaky hands suddenly became steady as I became painfully aware of the eyes in front of mine. Just 4 feet away from me were a pair of sunken piercing blue eyes. I heard the.. creature.. hiss as I shone the light at its sensitive eyes. Just as I thought it couldn't get worse, a second pair of eyes showed itself beside the first. Similar to the first one, its eyes had also sunken in, almost dead looking. My hand weakened at the sight and dropped the flashlight, the sound of it hitting the ground echoed throughout the long hallway. I was finally able to move and I dropped down to grab the flashlight, hoping my legs were also mobile but my feet were still frozen on the stone ground. I desperately grabbed the flashlight and shone it up again, revealing the rest of the creature's bodies. Side by side were two.. humans.. but they looked similar to two skeletons. I could see how the rags loosely draped across their skin, and it was easy to tell how small and skinny they were. My eyes were now fixated on the bodies, trying to comprehend what was in front of me. It was clear they were humans but what happened to them.. And why were they behind those bars? My breath was shaky and I felt shivers down my spine as I glanced back up to the pair of eyes, who were both looking down at me already. My heart skipped a beat as a thought came across my mind. They were the twins..

As the thought seemed to knock the air out of me, I scrambled to my feet. Suddenly all the emotions hit me at once and I became hyper-aware of my surroundings. The eyes before me seemed to squint and pick up my emotions. They could tell I was panicked. Before I knew it, I was desperately running back up the stairs, occasionally stumbling forward but I never stopped running. I ran and ran as fast as I could until I made it to my car. Once inside, I grabbed my walkie-talkie and called for backup. My co-workers knew me too well to question my situation. They could tell it was urgent.

As I sat in my car, my hands and face became numb as I waited for backup. When they finally appeared, I rolled down my window and weakly stated, "The basement". The officers ran towards the house, but I left before I could see them rescue... the twins. My hands weakly gripped the steering wheel and I stared blankly into the road, my heart still racing. That night I couldn't sleep. I tossed and turned, the eyes appearing in front of me every time I closed my own. By 3 am I was laying on my back, staring at the ceiling above me. Weeks had passed by and I had filed a leave from work. I heard rumors of the uncle locking the girls up telling the whole family they went missing and then killing himself. I tried not to think about what those girls had gone through. Most nights I couldn't sleep, the eyes seemed to haunt me now.. Those piercing blue sunken eyes..