Killer Instinct (Instinct #2)(14)
Inside the truck was a command central that looked to Elizabeth like some Hollywood take on what the future of law enforcement might one day be. Some of the things she could take a stab at based on her training—like what appeared to be an electromagnetic-pulse gun for tripping IEDs from a safe distance. With some of the other items, she had no clue. What the hell is that neon-green goo that guy is mixing?
Screw Hollywood. The future is now.
Elizabeth was one of only two women among the two dozen or so agents, a mixture of the JTTF’s federal, state, and local law enforcement officers, the FBI SWAT team, and the additional FBI agents who had just arrived from the Operational Technology Division at Quantico. A few times she was tempted to lean forward and ask Pritchard what the plan was, and each time she held back. He was sitting in the row of seats on the opposite side of the truck, heavily engaged in conversation with a square-jawed agent in full tactical armor named Munez, presumably the SWAT team leader.
Pritchard’s body language could be summed up in three words: do not disturb.
All Elizabeth knew so far was what the agent in Pritchard’s office had explained. Whoever placed those bombs in the first-wave attack on Times Square didn’t do so randomly. They did their homework to ensure that none of the street-level surveillance cameras would spot anything suspicious beforehand. There were no knapsacks left unattended. No sudden appearance of workmen who couldn’t be accounted for by either the city or any business. Ironically, the one thing the terrorists didn’t account for, especially in light of their second-wave attack, was the mother of all drones: a satellite.
Then again, you can’t really plan for something you don’t even know exists.
“One of the keyholes from NROL-71 picked up a guy wearing a coat into the Lyric Theatre and leaving minutes later without it,” the agent had told Pritchard. “We tagged him returning to a house in Jersey City. Unless he left without his phone, he’s still there.”
“NROL?” Elizabeth had asked, not waiting for an introduction.
“National Reconnaissance Office Launch,” said the agent. Otherwise known as a secret satellite.
Elizabeth could tell the agent had been up working all night. Beneath the stubble and wrinkled mess of a suit, though, was a good-looking guy. If Ryan Gosling had a brother, perhaps.
“Needham, meet Sullivan. Sullivan, meet Needham,” said Pritchard, doing the honors. “Needham just joined the unit.”
“And not a minute too soon,” said Sullivan. “Nice tackle yesterday.”
He had clearly seen the video, too.
What he wasn’t getting to see, however, were the fruits of his labor. Sullivan wasn’t in the truck, probably because he was running on fumes. Dead tired is no way to be when raiding the home of a terrorist. Especially since terrorists tend to have a very strong aversion to being taken alive.
Hence, all the toys in the truck.
“Two minutes!” barked the agent sitting by a GPS display mounted on the wall behind the driver. He smiled wide. He lived for this shit; they all did. And thanks to her new boss, Elizabeth was along for the ride.
For the first time, Pritchard looked over at her and caught her eye.
How’s your first week on the Task Force going, Needham? Having fun yet?
CHAPTER 18
WHEN THE truck stopped, things really got moving. One after another, all the toys were put into play.
Elizabeth tried her best to watch and learn. If there had been a ticket for her seat, it would’ve read obstructed view, but she could see just enough of one of the myriad surveillance screens toward the front of the truck to get a sense of what was happening, and what she couldn’t see was filled in by what she could hear.
“Jesus, we might as well be back in Baghdad,” muttered one of the agents at the console while shaking his head. He was looking at an external camera feed of the neighborhood.
Jersey City was never going to land on anyone’s top ten list of places to live, and the house that matched the address was a sorry reminder of that. It was a run-down 1950s split-ranch with aluminum siding that had turned a shade of puke green. Four windows in the front, two on either side of the front door. All curtains drawn closed.
“Give me thermal …”
The screen changed to an overhead shot of the house using an infrared camera, which was too detailed to be from a satellite. No one commented on the irony, but it certainly wasn’t lost on Elizabeth. Drones.
That explained the launch van remark she’d overheard Pritchard make to someone before they boarded the truck. Apparently there was a sister vehicle in the vicinity that had released the drone. Make that drones, plural, after the thermal imaging revealed no movement inside the house.
“Send in Santa Claus …”
Down the chimney went another drone as the monitor switched to a split screen. The infrared feed showed this second drone to be no bigger than a bumblebee.
What had to be one of the world’s tiniest lenses was providing crystal-clear images, room by room. At least the rooms the drone could get into. Some of the doors were closed.
“Switch to Doppler, twenty kilohertz …”
What the drone couldn’t see, the drone could feel. Sound waves. And when there was still no motion detected, the drone could smell. A built-in filter could test the air for trace explosives, the readings streaming straight back to the truck.