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Phone-Trace Race May or may not require actual racing.  A horror
and police procedural trope where the police set up a phone
trace to catch a criminal but they need them to stay on the line
for a certain amount of time. The amount of time will vary, yet
somehow the criminal will know the exact amount of time and
purposely hang up just before the police can get a trace. If
it's a particularly high-tech setup, expect to see a computer
generated map showing the tracing process.  Even if the person
on the other line is encouraged to keep the other person
talking, it never seems to work. The criminal will say
everything they want and still always hang up a few seconds shy
of the minimum time to trace the number. In some cases, the
criminal will say they're aware of the phone trace or say how
many seconds the call took. This trope is often used by serial
killers or any particularly clever character. A common
subversion is to stay on the line just long e