to be exceedingly cautious around the control room. Golding will be within reach of an emergency alarm that can instantly deactivate every door in the prison, even for those with swipe cards.
Lhen you get out of the cellblock and reach the staff lounge, youte unlikely to bump into a member of staff. It led to believe that the conditions are rather insalubrious. Ite not the kind of place where yout want to spend time hanging around after your shift.
Ipart from Warren, the only other person who will be on duty inside the prison and who knows about the escape attempt is a man named Shorter. He works inside the central prison control room and operates the staff exit door. As you know, Dave has certain physical similarities to Scott Warren and the original plan was for him to show his face to the security camera when you passed through the main gate. Unfortunately, neither yourself nor Curtis are big enough to easily pass as an adult male, so wete brought in Shorter as an insurance policy. Hee been an employee of the Arizona Prison Department for nearly forty years, and we expect the inquiry into your escape to make him the scapegoat. Shorter understands this, but the FBI has agreed to offer to pay for his early retirement, in return for cooperation.?
To that should get us out of the front door,?James said. Lhat next??
Hou meet up with Lauren, as per the plan. It is of considerable importance that you move quickly. Arizona is sparsely populated and there are not many roads in and out of the state. You can expect police roadblocks to be set up on all the major roads near to the prison within half an hour of the escape being detected.?
ite already tuned the car radio to a local news station,?Lauren said. To we?? know as soon as the alert goes out.?
Issuming you make it away from the prison, wete then relying on Curtis to find the way back to his mother,?Theo explained. Le recorded the conversation during Curtis?visit on Saturday and he made no mention of the escape. Do you have any idea where you?? be going??
i told Curtis we should go into a heavily populated area to minimise our chances of being recaptured,?James said. Curtis says he knows people who used to work for his mum in Los Angeles, so thate where wete heading. He didnt mention the escape to his visitors because he knows this room is bugged. Dont forget, Curtis has spent his whole life on the run. He might only be fourteen, but he probably knows more about police and FBI operations than most major criminals.?
Thate a valid point,?Theo nodded. To is his plan clear? Has Curtis mentioned where any of these connections live, or how they came to do business with his mother??
i get the impression theyte bikers,?James said. Or ex-bikers. The idea is that we get out of Arizona as fast as we can. When we reach LA, we find a phone booth and start making calls.?
They spoke for a few more minutes about the finer points of the escape plan, before the FBI man wished James luck and headed for the door. James gave Lauren another hug.
Dlay it safe,?Lauren said. Cont go getting yourself killed tonight.?
22. DOORS
Scott Warren took the 2:30 a.m. count. Unlike a standing count, when inmates stood to attention at the end of their beds, this one only required Scott to lean over the gantry and count heads. Het only wake the inmates up if he couldnt see someone.
When he was done, Scott clanked along the metal gantry to the control room. If things went as planned, the escape wouldnt be noticed until the next count was due in four hours.
Scott reached the control room at the centre of the H-shaped cellblock and tore a form off his clipboard. He handed it to the chunky figure of Golding, who sat at a three-metre-long console covered in switches, surveillance monitors and lights.
Golding stared at the sheet as Amanda Voss came towards him and handed him another.
Ro escapes, boss,?the petite twenty-three-year-old grinned.
Golding picked up a telephone and called the central control room. Ney Keith, this is cellblock T for trouble. It calling in a count of two-fifty-seven inmates at two-thirty-seven in the a.m. Situation here is all normal.?
Warren rolled his chair back so he could put his feet up on the console and picked up a newspaper. As he did this, a buzzer sounded, accompanied by a flashing