Ninja's Creed: Awakening

Chapter Eight: Hell No's and Headshots

Tony Lacaranzi was a (surprisingly) good-looking young man.

  He was about twenty-two years old, with blond hair like Niall Horan's and a face like Tom Holland's. In fact, the only thing missing was that he was probably not English or Irish. He wore a black biker's jacket over an old Guns n' Roses T-shirt, and carried a black briefcase with him, which he set on the table in the center of the room as he turned to face his security detail. Lloyd discreetly took out the iPhone from his hoodie's pocket and tried his best to look like he was checking emails or texts, but went to the app marked "X-Ray Scanner" and aimed at the briefcase.

Inside of it was a glowing orb marked with strange hieroglyphics and symbols.

  "Jay, you getting this?" Lloyd whispered as quietly as he could. "Affirmative", the shy blue-eyed boy replied, obviously in awe. "After losing three of them...and to think that we're so close to it..." "Keep it in your robes, Jay", Lloyd told the shy Assassin, watching Lacaranzi's every move. "We still need to save Andrea Boccitellia from mini-Vito Corleone!"

  "Hey, buddy?" a Bronx accent said to him. Lloyd looked up to see Lacaranzi standing in front of him, a mildly displeasured look on his face. "Can your Story wait for a few minutes?"

  Lloyd cleared his throat and looked down to give the impression that he was being apologetic and noticed several scars on Lacaranzi's hands. "Sorry, sir", he apologized, equally matching Lacaranzi's accent. "My Sweetcakes ain't answerin' the phone, and she usually waits for me." Lacaranzi grinned at the lie. "Your girl waits this late and isn't answering? Either she's asleep or has someone over for 'dinner'!" Lloyd looked up and raised an eyebrow. "Wouldn't be the first time", he joked, plastering a fake smile onto his face.

  So this guy is a criminal and a sexist? he mentally mused as Lacaranzi walked away. What a f**king shame that I'm not supposed to but a bullet him...

  Lacaranzi laughed, then promptly stopped and looked at Lloyd in earnest. "But seriously, you need to put that up. Everything has to be perfect if we're gonna convince that Boccitellia chick to fork over the Apple. Capisce?" Lloyd nodded, putting the phone back inside the hoodie's hidden pocket. "Thank you", the Cosa Nostra leader told him, walking away to talk to another security guard.

  "That's Tony Lacaranzi?!" Kai asked in disbelief over the earpiece. "He's not some old Italian guy who took the cannoli and left the gun?" "The better question is, who the hell puts a college kid in charge of the entire Italian mafia?" Lloyd chimed in, still keeping his voice as low as possible. "Are they trying to get the organization to fall to its knees?"

  "I've got some info on him", Jay announced. "He was born in Sicily to an Italian father—inexplicably named Vito—and an American mother named Eliza, and was raised in his ancestral family home until he was six, at which point Vito and Eliza started training him to be the next head of the Cosa Nostra. He quickly became skilled in political bribery and murder, and at twelve years old, he learned how to smuggle $34,000 worth of cocaine inside a teddy bear. By the time he was sixteen, he was one of the Cosa Nostra's deadliest hitmen, most of his targets being mafiosi who broke Omertà."

"Omertà?" Lloyd asked. "Like the code of silence?"

  "Yes", Zane spoke up for the first time that night. "The penalty for breaking Omertà is death, and they take it so seriously that relatives of the traitor might be murdered. Mafiosi also can't drink or get high, because they might blurt out sensitive information, and they can't write down anything about their activities because the police could use it against them."

  "Anyway, Lacaranzi wasn't even supposed to become the capofamiglia, or boss, of the Cosa Nostra family he was born into, but coincidentally and ironically, both of his parents were murdered by one of Lacaranzi's targets. Needless to say, he was initiated and sworn in as the head of his branch of the Cosa Nostra that night after finishing the target in the most brutal way he could."