So Hatchet set to unraveling the circuit the money traveled from the hands of the churchgoers to the three Suburbans materializing from the bowels of the keep. Woody spilled floods of privileged information across Hatchet’s battle plans drawn on lined legal pads of yellow paper. He estimated the distances of hallways by drawing maps complete with penciled-in doors and vents, estimated the numbers of men working the corridors during those crucial moments, tallied the sum total of cameras and their locations and the number of Guardians manning the video surveillance control booth above the stage. If anything attenuated Hatchet’s focus, it was the cameras. He had done enough peripheral research on security cameras to know they could present monumental challenges. With stealthy photos Woody snapped on his phone, they machined the map of the hallway and the counting room to perfection. Hatchet had him trace with different colored pencils where the Guardians and the collections went once they exited the sanctuary. Woody showed him how the staff emptied the contents of the plates into large red bags just inside the brief set of tunnels entered through the initial set of Staff Only doors. Then the bags were taken by specific elders down the corridor to the counting room. The entire trek may have consisted of fifty-some-odd feet, every one of which monitored by Guardians at both ends of the hall and two cameras housed in tinted domes on the ten foot ceiling. All the cameras are face capture set ups. Are these cameras hardwired to the booth or are they remote? he asked as much to gauge Woody’s forthrightness as to gain any real knowledge. They’re IP cameras; everything having to do with that booth is on its own circuit and its own isolated network, all of it backed up by a UPS. Hatchet knew this and he knew that each of those cameras had on-board redundant solid-state storage. If the electricity in that building went out, the cameras would still record everything they saw. What goes on in the counting room? is it like a casino? Just like a casino; they have all those machines. How many people are involved in that job? Like five. Just staff or do the Guardians do any of the counting? No, just staff. The elders dump the bags on this table, Woody scribbled a rectangle and made a circle to indicate exactly where the goods were shoveled, and this, he drew an “I” shape on one wall of the room, this is the vault; it’s not very big, just big enough for two people to stand inside it. Hatchet asked him what they stored in the vault. Woody told him that it held important documents, there were rumors of gold and silver. But this was certainly where they stored the locked bag of cash during the other services. Two dome cameras monitored the room and there were several panic alarms hidden in it. Have you ever seen the inside of that surveillance booth? Hatchet asked. Yes, a few times. How many screens are in there? how many monitors? Woody thought for a moment, There’s just a table that sits in front of these windows and there are three monitors but I think there’s only one person in that room. Are the security servers in that room? I think so. So they separate the cash from the checks and little electronic permission slips here? Woody showed him where each of the piles was divvied and labored over by pairs of elders. The checks went to a separate room, connected to the counting room by a simple dead-bolted solid core door just like the rest. This was where Woody scanned the checks into a computer and prepared a large electronic deposit. The machines counted the cash and the banded stacks went into one large lockable bank deposit bag. Do they use tracking devices or dye packs? Not that I know of. You know what I mean by dye packs? Yeah, I know what they are but I’ve never seen one at work. We need to find out. So once the filled deposit bag is passed through this chute, the escort team grabs it via this small sally port in the garage; once the last service is through, it takes about fifteen minutes for that bag to be dropped into the chute. Wait, Hatchet stopped him, are you telling me this is like a laundry chute? Yeah, just like one. How deep is it? It’s a full two floors. Do they lock those doors on the chute? No, but they seal them with these little plastic thingies. Like a zip tie? with a date stamped into it? Exactly like that. I’ll need a picture of the roll of seals they’re using; and they only make the one deposit run? Yeah, the Guardians stay posted at the exits to the counting room all day as the money comes in and then it’s all just shoved down that chute and taken away. How secure is this room? with locks I mean? Just deadbolts; nothing fancy. And what about that garage door? It’s just a garage door but the sally port is extremely secure; it requires a card key to get in but there’s a service entrance door just to the right of that garage door. I didn’t see that when I cased it, Woody. It’s kind of hidden behind a juniper tree, right here, he shaped the tree on to the paper. Is this garage used for any other purpose? Well, there’s a jumbo service elevator in there at the back—right here—and I’ve seen trucks deliver big crates, there’s some random janitorial shit in there. Like what? some mops, trash cans... a dolly? I think so, actually.
Holyshit. What’s wrong, Hatchet? Nothing, he gave Woody a huge grin, I just wanna shake the hand of the idiot who designed this system; Hell, I wanna kiss the mongoloid son-of-a-bitch. Woody blushed.
Hatchet would analyze the map and notes in the mornings with coffee and cold cereal until he couldn’t think clearly. So he would drive out of the city to chase the blank country periphery in his bare feet with his face in the wind. He would bend heaving with exhaustion in some overgrown ditch until finally he would grab his phone and dial Delilah. Let me take you to dinner. Can’t. Why? I have things. It’s nearly noon, let me take you to lunch. Nope. Why? She told him she was making some dessert. What kind of dessert? The kind you wear. He couldn’t help but consider this an insulting little challenge but he declined.
Have they ever had to use a different room for the counting? he asked Woody over the phone. Once there was a plumbing issue in the restroom down the hall that flooded that room and they used my office instead. And they still used the chute? Yeah. Do those counters stay in the room after they drop the cash? Not really, if they do, it’s not for long; administration doesn’t really like folks hanging around the vault. And you’re sure you’ve never heard of them storing the cash in the vault over night instead of making a deposit? It’s never happened since I’ve been there. That sally port in the garage, you said it takes a card key to get in. Yeah. But it doesn’t take one to get out, does it? No, it just opens if you’re inside. How many cameras did we decide focused on the sally port? I thought maybe two but I was wrong, it’s just one, right above the elevator door. So am I right, Hatchet rendered a perspective drawing if the garage on the tablet, to assume this is basically the POV of that camera? Yeah. So if one were inside the sally port, it’s reasonable to assume that on screen it could appear as if one were outside the port on the far side of it? I guess it would. I need pictures of that garage and I need to know how many of those deposit bags there are, got it? Got it.
Holyshit. What’s wrong, Hatchet? Nothing, he gave Woody a huge grin, I just wanna shake the hand of the idiot who designed this system; Hell, I wanna kiss the mongoloid son-of-a-bitch. Woody blushed.
Hatchet would analyze the map and notes in the mornings with coffee and cold cereal until he couldn’t think clearly. So he would drive out of the city to chase the blank country periphery in his bare feet with his face in the wind. He would bend heaving with exhaustion in some overgrown ditch until finally he would grab his phone and dial Delilah. Let me take you to dinner. Can’t. Why? I have things. It’s nearly noon, let me take you to lunch. Nope. Why? She told him she was making some dessert. What kind of dessert? The kind you wear. He couldn’t help but consider this an insulting little challenge but he declined.
Have they ever had to use a different room for the counting? he asked Woody over the phone. Once there was a plumbing issue in the restroom down the hall that flooded that room and they used my office instead. And they still used the chute? Yeah. Do those counters stay in the room after they drop the cash? Not really, if they do, it’s not for long; administration doesn’t really like folks hanging around the vault. And you’re sure you’ve never heard of them storing the cash in the vault over night instead of making a deposit? It’s never happened since I’ve been there. That sally port in the garage, you said it takes a card key to get in. Yeah. But it doesn’t take one to get out, does it? No, it just opens if you’re inside. How many cameras did we decide focused on the sally port? I thought maybe two but I was wrong, it’s just one, right above the elevator door. So am I right, Hatchet rendered a perspective drawing if the garage on the tablet, to assume this is basically the POV of that camera? Yeah. So if one were inside the sally port, it’s reasonable to assume that on screen it could appear as if one were outside the port on the far side of it? I guess it would. I need pictures of that garage and I need to know how many of those deposit bags there are, got it? Got it.
Edit 11.10.2018