He knows what people think of him. He knows how they must feel about him. He just doesn’t care. Caring is for the weak. It’s for the confused and unmotivated. It’s for those who don’t know what they want and need others to be there for them when they don’t get it. Banks is not one of those people.
Banks walks toward the Legislative Assembly building of Costa Rica. Back in San José, the air is no longer clean, the sounds of the jungle are no longer there, and the smell of the ocean is long gone. He hates San José and as far as he’s concerned San José hates him right back. The city he is from, is the city he always dreads returning to.
As a man with a more than peculiar personality, his childhood was anything but normal. Public schools, especially in poorer neighborhoods like his, don’t handle children that don’t fit perfectly into the mold. Banks most definitely did not fit that mold. He was berated, punished, teased, and picked on. The teachers didn’t know how to handle him, and the other kids wanted nothing to do with him. He spent years unable to learn in class, unable to join the others in sports, and unable to live a life his parents saw fit for a child. Every day leaving his house meant an onslaught of torture. It began immediately with the bully next door, sitting on the fence, just waiting for the smaller Banks to step outside. From there, it continued through school and the rest of the day. Every moment of his childhood is a moment he would like to forget. Unfortunately, he knows he never will.
This is why Banks does not care what others think of him. It was ingrained years ago that no one understands him, and no one will ever care to. He is a man living on his own, surviving in his own head alone. He can’t be bothered by the closed minds of others who don’t accept him, simply because he doesn’t think the same way they do. He didn’t choose to be this way, but he damn sure wouldn’t choose to be anything else. The difference in his mind, what the doctors think needs to be medicated away, is what makes him so good at what he does. It’s what makes him exactly who he is…a killer.
With a jacket on and a tie back around his neck, he now fits the mold of the others going in and out of the government building. Standing tall and walking confidently gives him the air of a man who knows exactly what he’s doing and can’t be bothered with insignificant things like security. Not that he won’t remove his shoulder bag or go through the metal detector, but just that he won’t be bothered to slow his pace or deal with any bullshit.
He moves quickly through the first line of security with no problem. The second step is the authentication of his badge. A badge that only government employees have. A badge that he pulls from his jacket pocket and swipes through the machine, continuing past the second and final line of security. The assumption is that official government badges should be hard to come by, but money and the right contacts make even the most elusive things only a wire transfer away. In a time of almost total digitization, an expert with a computer is nearly god, and his services are for sale.
Despite having never set foot in the building before, he moves as if this is his daily routine. Down the hall, to the right, up the elevator to the twelfth floor, out the doors to the left, around the corner, and he’s there. Without knocking he turns the handle of the door and it’s unlocked. Stepping in and closing the door, he’s in, but it’s only the beginning. The office is small, neat, and empty, just as he knew it would be. A few picture frames and personal items on the desk are all that show the office is being used. A moment, that’s all Banks needs to memorize the exact layout. After locking the door and closing the blinds, he gets to work.
Building plans are pulled from his bag and laid out. A tape measure finds the exact point he’s looking for. The spot is just where he hoped. With repeated strain, the wide, solid desk that sits in the middle of the room, slides two feet further from the wall. No easy task, but that’s exactly why it needed to be done. Underneath, the wooden floorboards shine with the smooth glossiness of never having been stepped on. The desk has likely never been moved after its initial placement. Banks hopes once he replaces it, it will never be moved again. With the hands of a carpenter, and further tools from his bag, he neatly pries up the first of the sectioned floorboards and sets it aside. A second, third, and fourth are all pulled up as well, creating a small hole in the floor.
After referencing the building’s blueprints once again, he knows he’s found the right spot. His hole is directly over the space between the building’s concrete joists which hold its weight. The spot he’s chosen also contains no ventilation system to get in his way. Nothing but a clear path from his floor to the ceiling below. A clear path to the office of a man who likely doesn’t realize he’s on a list. A list no one walks away from.
From his first step into the building, to this point, only eighteen minutes have passed. He’s moving quick, but if he’s not gone, with the office put back the way it was, before the man whose office this is returns, he’s made. He has spoken to no one or had any contact of any kind. The cameras in the lobby, elevator, and halls have without a doubt captured his image. That was unavoidable, but they will only see a man walk straight to an office, remain in that office alone, then walk straight back out of the building. With no cameras in the offices, security will have no idea that he visited more than one floor today. Nor will they have any reason to believe he had anything to do with the murder on the eleventh floor.
The ceiling below provides a larger obstacle. If the man inside hears any noise or notices the hole above his head, he’s likely to run. At the very least, he’ll be able to get off a scream or yell for help. If someone comes running and finds the body, the building will go into lockdown. Banks knows, no matter how careful he’s been and even if they can’t prove it, the blame will fall to the man whose credentials are fake. In a country like this, that will likely be enough, so his plan has to work. He’s sure it can, but only if he’s perfect.
The mineral fiber ceiling tiles are simple to remove. Light and sectioned off into blocks, Banks easily lifts the one directly below him and slides it above the tile next to it. His view is clear. The man sits at his desk, unaware, typing away at his computer. Despite the kill being easy enough with a simple gunshot, that won’t work. Ballistic angles and blood splatter will show it came from above…unacceptable. Not to mention, silencers are actually anything but silent. Gas is unusable as well, as it could pass under the door and possibly affect others. Despite governments the world over being okay with it, collateral damage is not something Banks tolerates. No, the task will need to be done one way and one way only, by hand.
Unable to drop through the small space, he can’t simply strangle the man. At least not with his hands. Into his bag, Banks pulls out a bra. Not exactly the perfect weapon, but this bra isn’t off the rack. Ripped from its seams, he now holds the long wire he planted inside that no X-ray or metal detector would identify as anything more dangerous than the bra it came from. With a couple expert slipknots, the wire is quickly attached to two wooden handles, and Banks now stands with an extra-long garrote wire ready for action.
With a final glance at the door and into the room below, the job is underway. Silently the thin metal slices through the air, moving down from the ceiling above. Dangling inches over the unaware man’s head, Banks takes a final breath. The movement is fast, precise, and clean. Dropping below his chin, wrapping around his throat, and pulling, it’s over before the man knows what happened.
As the wire is removed, pulled up and away, the body remains in its chair, unmoving, and appearing undisturbed. In only a few minutes, the tile is replaced, the wood expertly laid, and the desk slid back to its normal position. With the acuity of a man far more noticing, the final touches are made of returning everything on the desk and in the room to its exact position before he came. No one, no matter how meticulous, no matter how anal, would be able to find even the slightest error in Banks’ calculated placement of each item. Even the dust is undisturbed as he exits the office and makes his way out of the building.