Tabernacle

Contract killer: It’s a sexy job, right? Wrong.

It makes me laugh that the public perception of your average up-market assassin has the face of an angel, the workings of a Rhodes Scholar (except with a broke moral compass), and a nice line in bad-ass fashion. It’s funny for two reasons: firstly, they’ve obviously met no professional professional killers, and secondly, they’ve clearly never met any Rhodes Scholars, either, or else they’d know that Rhodes Scholars become politicians and big-business execs because they wouldn’t know a moral compass if they defrauded one.

It makes me laugh, sure, but it doesn’t surprise me. The reason for that is that we, in the business, have a very very professional PR machine behind us. Not only does it provide excellent marketing, it also provides style tips and cues on everything from to language to what the fashionable inner turmoil is at any given time. And a plentiful line of willing job applicants.

Thank you, Hollywood: The Executioner’s own Tinsel-town Marketing Department.

OK, here is some reality for you: firstly, most high-class assassins are not particularly bright or unusually adept and planning – they’re lucky. Most exclusive killers neither look like the man next door (although they probably should try to) or any of the himbos who have been the face of James Bond. On the whole, we look like the man next door, trying to look like 007. Honestly, most of the guys I’ve met in the trade got into it because they thought it would help them pull chicks. So, basically we're all untrained, vanity projects with access to weapons. Live fast, die young, leave a corpse that could have been considered somewhat beautiful, assuming light falls on the casket just right and whatever killed you didn’t ruin the manicure or that season’s fashionista garb, as modeled by David Beckham at the Milan Fashion week shows. Yeah, that’s pretty much how we all start out.

I remember when I started Pulp Fiction was big, and I fell for it. Before I learnt to shoot a gun I learnt some Bible passages to preach to people before I shot them. It took a while to get it down pat, and the time I used it, man, I felt shit hot…

“You must put the Levites in charge of the Tabernacle of the Covenant, along with its furnishings and equipment. They must carry the Tabernacle and its equipment as you travel, and they must care for it and camp around it. Whenever the Tabernacle is moved, the Levites will take it down and set it up again. Anyone else who goes too near the Tabernacle will be executed.”

My guy looked confused, as well as scared. “But… but I don’t know what a Tabernacle is, so how am I supposed to not go near one? Look, if I upset your tabernacle, I’m sorry…”

“ANYONE ELSE WHO GOES TOO NEAR THE TABERNACLE WILL BE EXECUTED…”

“But, fuck, man…”

Yeah, I know, it’s hardly the “my brother’s keeper” speech that Samuel L. Jackson made so cool, but it was the best I could do at the time. I felt like a complete dick when that guy more or less called me out on not knowing what a tabernacle was, but no one was there to witness that, so my credability remained in tact, regardless.

The upside was that the incident raised an issue with my oration plans, though. What’s the point when you’re about to assassinate your audience?

I woud like to note that I’m proud I didn’t try to use one of the anti-gay, anti-adultry, or anti-sin bits from the Bible. Man, that book… you get mixed messages, Tabernacle or no. I never did find out what a Tabernacle is. (Dells, if you read this, maybe you’d know. You seem like a Tabernacle kind of girl. Anyone else, feel free to leave a comment: what is a fucking Tabernacle, and why does it need such tight security?) What I am disappointed about was not getting to use the other bit of the Bible I learnt, which goes like this:

From there Elisha went up to Bethel. While he was on his way, some small boys came out of the city and jeered at him. "Go up baldhead," they shouted, "go up baldhead!" The prophet turned and saw them, and he cursed them in the name of the Lord. Then two shebears came out of the woods and tore forty two of the children to pieces.

Baldheads 42 – 0 Smartarse kids. I’m not condoning the murder of children, but if there was no other option, I’d feel quite OK making it 43-nil to my male-patterned brethren. Anyway, I digress…

I was saying assassins are often fashion victims and often embody the life imitating art imitating life thing. Here are some of the most tragic cases from people I’ve met in the trade:

1. Dave P. Carried around a pot of African Violets for about six months. Having seen Leon, where that French dude (not Gerard Diepardu, the other one) carries around a pot-plant and a young Natalie Portman while being super cool, cold and deadly. Dave started off with some rare orchid-y thing, but when it died he replaced with African Violets because they’re easier to keep alive, are a lot easier to replace, and smell nice. He often left them in bars when he’d had a few, but always denied it when he’d turn up the next day with a plant that had mysteriously shrunk over night. Dave eventually gave up the pretence when he brained a bouncer who wouldn’t let him into the club with his plant (“No hats, no hoodies, no plants, Sir”) using the plant itself.
2. Hiero H. This guy really went for Antonio Banderas’ El Mariachi. Black suit and pony-tail. He got shot while busking with an expensive guitar that completed his outfit. He probably should have kept it in the case. He was shot by his partner, who could play the guitar much better than he could, and who promptly disappeared with it. It was rumoured that Heiro wanted his partner to shoot his hand, injuring him like El Mariachi, and continuing the pretense that the movie was made about him (but unexplainably, before him). No one is sure if the partner shot him for being a twat, or if it was an accident, but everyone is glad he got the guitar because he was really good.
3. Vernon Vernon. (That’s his professional name, that he chose for himself, so clearly VV was weird before he even started in the industry.) VV has been heavily influenced by the Kill Bill movies: he works in a yellow jumpsuit with a samurai sword as his main thing. Claims it’s custom built, but I knew the guy who sold it to him on eBay. Fair’s fair, though, this guys is a good assassin, and he can use that sword. He killed the seller (that’s feedback!) for organising a mate put in dummy bids to drive up the auction price, and cut off the mate’s fingers. He gets a lot of work in the nerd sector, for some reason.
4. There was another guy who put on some face paint and went around acting like an undead musician in the ilk of Brandon Lee’s Crow. No one took him seriously on his first day on the job so he toned down his look to look like Tom Cruise in Collateral, complete with cabby hostage. The guy killed him with a Taser. First the cabby zapped him, and shoved it down his throat until he choked. And then he zapped him again.
5. And then there is every Tom, Dick and Jason Bourne hanging around in India and other third-world places claiming to have lost their memory, except for bizarre flash-backs (usually coming in bars with other assassins present) that indicate they’re AWOL from some FBI/CIA elite squad. I’m surprised there aren’t more of these guys since it’s so cheap to live and the look only requires a crew-cut, chunky watch and fifty sit-ups a night. Watch them evolve when the next Bourne movie comes out. They usually get busted trying to sneak over boarders.

I’m pleased to say that I am relatively innocent of this retarded vanity. That's to say for me it was short. I’ve been doing this for a while now – longer than most – and I put any success I may have had to two things:

1. Firstly, I recognised how badly my vanity could go for me, and began to appreciate the value of my low cheekbones and the fact I really am the man next door. (Literally so, to Pam and John on one side and Alco Cat-Lady on the other, but metaphorically to everyone else.).

2. Secondly, I’ve diversified into other dodgy non-legal unRhodes Scholar type crime.

So here’s my advice to you: Watch out for young men, dressed to kill, wearing Ray-bans, checking themselves out in shop windows and following you. Tread carefully and you can get out of that trouble. $10,000 will usually be enough. If you are lucky or observant enough to get this chance take it, and make it your business to get out of your business, what ever it is. If you don’t, eventually someone will pay for a pro. Or perhaps that Martin Blanke wannabe will learn how to do his job. Like I did. And then he'll be back, but you won't see him coming again.

And you don’t want to meet anyone like me in a professional context, trust me. Do you like my advice?

Blessed is he who, in the name of charity and good will, shepherds the weak through the valley of the darkness. For he is truly his brother's keeper and the finder of lost children. And I will strike down upon thee with great vengeance and furious anger those who attempt to poison and destroy my brothers…

Thanks, Jules, but that's not really me. Never forget real killers accept payment to not keep their brothers, Brother.