Synarchy Book 1: The Awakening by DCS (some good books to read TXT) 📕

were handed to him and the doctors attempted to consol the grieving new father. He could not save his own father, the rock that had kept him from collapsing under the weight of emotion his entire life. He was empathic without a shield; for whatever reason he was never able to form a protective one.
He looked so much older than his years. Older than his father at times. The wrinkled face was weathered by life, not time. He sat in a chair next to the burning fireplace, his elbows resting on his knees, hands clasped together and pressed tightly against his mouth. Broken gray eyes watched his sleeping father with such intensity, as if by his mere will he could keep the dying man in this plane of existence a little longer.
"If we could hold each other here by thought alone this family would have been saved so much grief." Marcello mumbled the words, gradually opening his eyes to focus them on his son’s face.
What did it say about a man that thirty years later it still hurt him to think of the wife he had lost? Agony streaked briefly across his eyes and Demetrius drew in a long breath, shaking his head and replying quietly, "Including Amanda."
Amanda his twin sister. She died at twenty through no fault of her own. Sadness clouded Marcello's eyes and he reached out for his son's hand, waiting until it was accepted before he spoke. "It was not your job to keep her safe, it was mine. I failed, not you." Amanda, who would have been more than a suitable heir, took two bullets. One was meant for her, the other for her brother. Lots of people had a vendetta against Terenzio; it was the nature of the business. But the men who had murdered his daughter hadn't been part of anything 'meaningful.' They were mere thugs, pissed off that a backroom deal hadn't netted them as much money as they wanted. Four lines of coke and too much alcohol later, getting back at Terenzio sounded like a great idea. The thugs had assumed that Amanda and Demetrius were either Liliana’s or Julian’s.
The way life worked was both strange, and cruel. The twins always had bodyguards but this one time, Mari had been in the states on business and Marcello had allowed brother and sister to have a night out without a 'babysitter.' He had thought, perhaps too arrogantly, that they would be safe on their own island.
Guilt was not a color a Terenzio wore, Demetrius the exception, but Marcello had nearly come apart at the seams for good that day. In his darkest moments he wondered if Mari blamed him for it, because he did so himself. She would not have allowed their children to go out that night un-guarded and Amanda might still be with them today if her mother’s logical, ironclad sense of duty to her children had won out over a father's tendency to spoil and give in to mundane requests.
Demetrius squeezed his father’s hand tightly, watching the far away look seep into his eyes. "Don't, Dad. Not now."
Marcello snapped back to the present, smiling slightly at his son. "You care too much. That has always been your strength, Demetrius, regardless of what others have said."
Demetrius opened his mouth to respond, but was interrupted by the loud musical ring of his fat-her's cell phone. Demetrius looked surprised; Marcello did not, nodding at his son to indicate that he should answer it. Demetrius pulled the tiny thing to him, flipping it open. "Demetrius Terenzio."
"Demetrius? I’m sorry for calling at such an early hour, but is Marcello there? I’ve got to talk to him." Derek said in a rush.
Demetrius's brows shot up, ready to reprimand Vaughn for his cavalier attitude while his father was dying, but realized that because they hadn't been able to reach him, Derek didn't know. "Derek, now is not a good time. We've got bad news here…"
"I’ll speak to him." Marcello struggled, pushing himself into an upright position, and held his hand out for the phone, cutting off his son's words.
Demetrius’s expression turned curious. "Hang on, Derek, here he is." He handed the phone to his father, looking at him in question as to whether he should stay or go.
Marcello motioned for him to stay. "What did you find, Derek?"
"Sir, I don't know if you would believe me if I told you. Do you have access to your computer? You're going to want to see him."

§

June 7th, 2012
Delgado Apartment
Bronx, NY 12:15 AM

The cold metallic black Cadillac did not fit in with the rotting neighborhood. It was grossly out of place parked in front of the dirty brick, rat infested apartment building in a block too small for the structures crammed onto it.
The three that rose out of the tinted window luxury car were as out of place as the vehicle that brought them. Annoyance twisted the only female’s features as the trio entered the building and were forced to take the stairs to the fifth floor because once again the elevators were out.
New York was not Terenzio territory. Only one piece of Terenzio control sat here (aside from Loyalty Airlines having terminals at JFK and LaGuardia) and that was S.V.T. Securities. One of the first subsidiaries of the Dion Corporation, S.V.T. Securities had been the best idea Stefano Terenzio ever had. The corporate security company had bloomed in the lawless years of the twenties under the clever guise of protection. While not nearly the largest one of its kind, it was one of the most successful.
Senior Vice President Olivia Terenzio was in charge of all the S.V.T.S. offices along the eastern coast of the United States. On the side, discreetly, for her own amusement and profit, she ran a tiny loan sharking business on the NY city streets. It was something to do to pass the time, but on occasion it assisted in recruiting new faces into the company. After all, you never knew who you were going to meet, and who you could end up learning how to use.
Collecting money owed was the reason for her visit to this shitty part of town tonight.
When they reached their floor she motioned to one of the men behind her, a broad shouldered brute with a nasty scar born at the corner of his eye that curved down the side of his face. A knife had barely missed taking his vision from him three years ago, all in a day’s work. He walked up to the apartment door and with a strong kick tore it from its poor excuse of a lock, sending it swinging wildly open.
The three stepped inside just as a woman went sprawling to the floor, sent there by the vicious slap of her husband. Hector Delgado jerked red-rimmed drunken brown eyes from the collapsed form of his wife to the sudden intrusion. His anger was quick to abate to fear when he saw who it was.
It made Olivia smile.
Her eyes flicked over the interior, past a roach crawling up a dirty beige wall to the woman on the floor with a hand against her face struggling not to cry. In the archway fearful, tear filled eyes peeked around the corner. A child no more than seven watched helplessly as her mother was once again victim to her husband's drunken anger. Innocence corrupted with every cruel blow. Olivia was told the little girl was extremely bright, a math whiz. When she grew up she would be useful. Right now the woman and child were not her concern.
He was.
"Miss Terenzio, I was gonna call you."
She ignored him while he spoke, cruel eyes wandering aimlessly over the apartment. Finally her hand extended to the right, and Scar face placed the butt of the gun in her palm.
The fear became more pronounced at the sight. "Now Miss Terenzio, I swear I was gonna -"
She silenced him when she backhanded him with the hard metal of the gun. Hector twisted vio-lently to the side, grunting out in a high pitched whine of pain. She followed his stumble, hit him again with a bored expression on her face as he crumpled to the floor.
He started begging now. Rather, he tried.
Standing over him, Olivia set the ball of her high heeled foot against the back of his neck, pus-hing his throbbing face into the dirty carpet. "Shut it, Delgado." The sharp echo of the gun cocking caused Delgado to start a fit of trembling. She thought it was amusing that his wife never made a sound of protest. The woman probably hoped her husband might be taken off her hands.
"If you're late with my money again…." When she pulled the trigger the bullet ripped into the floor right above his head. Both child and mother jumped but bravely watched on. Hector pissed himself.
Olivia smiled. "You understand now. Go get it."
She stepped back, laughter in her eyes at the obvious stain on the front of his pants. He stumbled into the kitchen, knocking things off the counter as he attempted to bend down and reach underneath the sink. He came back with a thick stack of bills, messily rubber banded together.
She passed the gun back to Scar face. "Every dollar, Delgado."
Delgado was quiet. Sweating, bleeding from the double strike to his face, his hands visibly shook as he watched Olivia slowly count the hundred dollar bills.
A cell phone interrupted the tense silence; the man standing next to Scar face, thinner and not as rough looking, pulled the phone from the inside of his suit jacket. He answered without speaking, listened for a moment then held the phone in Olivia's direction. "Ma'am, General Terenzio on the line."
She made him wait, finished counting then traded money for phone. "On time next week, Delgado." Turning away from the scene, Olivia put the phone against her ear. "What's the crisis now, cousin?"

 
Chapter 5
“What good fortune for governments that the people do not think.”
-Adolf Hitler


June 7th, 2012
The Vasco Resort Hotel
Alcyone Island 12:22 AM

Xavier was an Indigo child. Part of a generation of highly sensitive, physic children who began entering the world in the 1970s with a shared, voluntary purpose: tearing down every old system and paradigm that no longer served humanity. Their warrior spirits and inability to conform made them quite the headache for their parents growing up. Frowned at for having a rebellious, “arrogant” nature, they were also frequently mislabeled with ADD and ADHD. Regardless, they kicked past the barriers put in front of them, and as adults they were infiltrating the system to rip it apart from the inside out, or working on the outside, brandishing machetes and cutting away the mess.
Xavier had been aware of his soul's voluntary mission on Earth since his birth to the son of Kyle and Liliana Terenzio-Zhane, Christopher. While his father had never really understood him, Christopher had seen the potential in his son and focused on that, not his often times erratic, baffling nature. Xavier was thankful the upbringing he’d received had been exactly what he needed to prepare him for his role as an adult. That, too, was no coincidence; much like the face on 15” flat screen TV hanging from the roof in the back of the car. Picking up the remote, Xavier turned up the volume, brief amusement settling across his face as he listened.
Jim was at it again. A rogue investigative journalist who had gotten his own hour of nightly talk time on one of the Satellite Cable Stations (SCS for short) was exposing secrets that had cleverly been kept away from the general populace for centuries. Five