Page 45 of Acting on Instinct
“No hookers even,” Jeopardy said, “so we have a bunch of guys with a bunch of pent-up testosterone.”
“Nah,” Nitro said, “they take care of that in the shower.”
“Okay, since this is a running theory, Iniquus has looked at the images that you have for the shirt and has said it’s plausible,” Ty said.
“Yes.”
“And one would assume that it would have GPS coordinates as well,” Ty looked at his boots as he thought this through. “The shirt should have heartbeat, respiration, possibly hydration levels, temperature, and place. So we have to have everything locked down before we move anyone.”
“I imagine so,” White said.
“Six different locations?” Ty asked.
“Five,” White answered. “The two new members live together. They’re brothers.”
“When do the targets shower?” Nitro asked.
“Before bed.”
Ty looked up to catch T-Rex’s gaze. “That works.”
“Why do you say that, Ty?” he asked.
“We know where the shirt is supposed to be. We divide and conquer. We go in, take out the guy in the shower, medicate them, stick the shirt back on, and put them in bed. We move on to the next. Rory does an apartment check for a surprise boom. Leaving the prisoner with an Echo teammate to monitor the situation, the rest of the team moves on to location two. Wait for everyone to get wrapped up. Does the phossy guy have a shirt?” Ty asked.
“No,” White said. “Not that I’ve seen. He might be the one who’s managing their system.”
“Take him out, and there is no system,” Havoc said.
“Or,” White said. “Do something unexpected and set off whatever he has going on.”
“Do they shower, then go to sleep?” T-Rex asked. “Does lying in bed with the shirt make sense?”
“Yes.”
“Do they all sleep at the same time?” Jeopardy asked.
“Yes.”
“Are these eight-hour sleep periods?” Nitro asked.
“More or less.”
“Lots of variables with that plan,” Ty said. “We won’t be able to pounce on all of them in the shower. That makes me nervous. But if they were asleep, we could crawl in with night-vision gear, put a hand over their mouth, and give them a quick night-night shot. It might look like a nightmare on a computer screen. It would only spike adrenaline for a minute.”
“True for one, but not a series as each one spikes, right?” Havoc looked over to White.
“There will be a random amount of time between. It might get attention, but it wouldn’t be meaningful. If we take their phones and have them in a Faraday bag, no one could call.”
“Or better,” T-Rex said. “We start by putting a jammer outside of Phossy Jaw’s apartment to mess up cell tower connections. No calls to emergency services.”
“How long?” Ty asked. “That could put civilians at risk.”
“I like the shower better, so there are no signs of distress,” White said. “But you’re right. That will be hard to synchronize. They’re all on the same basic schedule.”
“What if there are cameras and audio in the apartments?” Ty asked.
“There’s redundancy, and then there’s overkill. Right?” T-Rex said. “If you had the vital statistics shirts, would you need anything else?”
