Like a line of ants they marched down the 17th Avenue sidewalk Saturday night, turned left at Queensway and broke off to their predetermined positions.
Some held machine guns, some carried shotguns, all had various side-arms and body armour and all were clad in black with the word "Police" boldly emblazoned in reflective paint on their back.
They moved with the purpose and precision of their years of training and many experiences in other towns around the province wearing the badge of the Combined Forces Special Enforcement Unit. They were the uniformed branch - the Anti-Gang Task Force (AGTF) - of that specialized team made up of elite members from all police departments in B.C. They are the province's gang busters, and they go where they are needed and this past week it was Prince George.
For almost an hour they huddled together with Prince George Mounties around the hood of an unmarked police car under a random store's awning for some scant protection from the downpour, more than 15 of them at once, going through diagrams and dialogue about an apartment building they were about to visit - the one they were marching too now, hoping to get inside and engage their suspects before the moment was lost.
The police radio crackled with domestic disputes and robberies, but this troop stayed quiet. Other police members would take care of the regular tasks of a Prince George Saturday night.
It seemed like forever but was only about 10 minutes their radio silence prevailed.
"They are just getting into position," said Cpl. Craig Douglass, one of the local Mounties accompanying the AGTF on their visit to B.C.'s northern capital. "These guys will follow shortly once we gain entry to the building."
It was not disclosed how the forward team got inside, but hand signals told the black-clad followers to make their move. Up the stairs some went, while others took positions at windows, doors and perimeter locations on the street.
The local RCMP's Downtown Enforcement Unit and General Duty Section were on alert in the area. An RCMP canine unit growled nearby, should a dog be needed.
It wasn't, this time. The two inhabitants of the apartment let the AGTF in so effortlessly, all the planning and equipment became almost comical but also chilling that such mundane little operations are so pregnant with potential danger.
This police unit has seen that bar raised a number of times.
"Information was brought to us in the interest of public safety that led us to this address," said Douglass. "This was not a general operation, this was targeted to that place in particular."
They were correct. Inside this apartment was a quantity of heroin, an amount of cocaine, and a big box of handgun ammunition, all found right away. The whereabouts of the counterpart gun was still a matter of investigation when the sun came up on Sunday morning, but at least those bullets would never be fired in anger.
Moments ago they were soldiers, but once the room was secured and the suspects - a man and a woman in their late 20s - were in handcuffs, the AGTF switched modes and became investigators.
They located and identified the drugs, they located a safe and began the tedious task of opening it up with the voices of the suspects over their shoulders telling them "there's nothing even in there" to motivate their efforts.
Both suspects were taken out into the hallway and members of the police team stood with them. A couple of residents poked their heads out of adjacent doors. Police members chatted with them, apologized for the late-night disturbance.
The voices replied they were glad to see the police taking care of things, and retired back inside their rooms.
"Hey, I've been trying to find old-school shoes like that forever, where did you get those?," one cop asked the male suspect during a dull moment.
"I bought them a long time ago," he replied. "I got them when I was in my early 20s, but I went to jail for five years so they just sat in storage that whole time so they are still in good condition."
"What? In your early 20s you did something that got you five years in jail?," the cop said.
"It wasn't one thing, it was a bunch of stuff. It all added up," the suspect said. He smiled and exchanged hellos with a Prince George Mountie who happened past, both knowing each other from some of those prior encounters.
"It's OK, you can sit if it makes you more comfortable," said another AGTF cop to the female suspect.
"No, I don't want to sit, I'll stand, this place has bedbugs," she said squirming. All eyes involuntarily scanned the decrepit carpet. If you couldn't see bedbugs, you could certainly feel squeamish from the grunge and stains that ran the length of the hallway.
The building manager also offered a warning to the clatch of cops that human feces and other delights were not uncommon, lately, in the once respectable complex so they should wear gloves.
The male kept shrugging mightily and twisting his shoulders. When asked if everything was OK he mumbled that his jacket kept sliding down. One of the officers took hold of his hoodie and hiked it into position for him, with the suspect's thanks.
"This isn't even about me, this is my friend's place," said the female talking about being in the wrong place at the wrong time and being accepted into a two-year program she wanted at CNC, and how her life was just getting on-track.
"I don't mean to be facetious," said a cop standing with her.
"Good word," she said.
"Thanks," said the cop. "But I have heard that same line a thousand times from people standing in the same position you're in right now. I hope, I really do hope, that you take that program and it leads to something better."
She was young. She was pretty. She was pleasant to talk to. The male suspect across the hall was handsome. He was affable.
It was hard to believe they were the ones who, moments ago, shared space with drugs and ammo, and who knows what else remained to be found.
As the rain filled the gutters and amplified the cycling flashes of red and blue below, it was easy to look up and down the streets and see other apartment buildings, other similar figures on the sidewalks, vehicles passing suspiciously often in front of this one, and wonder how futile tonight's police efforts might be; but also to contemplate how salvageable these two particular people were once the handcuffs were undone.
Not the police cuffs, they were there for public protection, but the shackles of addiction, social distrust, lack of education and bad choices.
Those could be left behind by either one or both of these suspects. Or not.
The path could change for the next set of suspects, too, that this team of soldier-investigators would encounter after they scarffed down a few pieces of pizza that arrived in a pile of boxes as this situation closed down and their next operation got set to launch.
It was only midnight in Prince George.
There were a lot more doors to knock on before daylight.
