Apocalyptic Rebirth: With a repairman system space, she rises again.-Chapter 524: The dead children.

Vicente cast a sidelong glance at Stefano, his right eye barely shifting. "What is she talking about?"

Stefano shook his head. "I did not get the details, boss."

Sunshine jumped in because she did not want to go round and round before they came to the major issue. "Fugitive Fifi Quinn escaped from Westbrook and she hid in this town. She killed some of the children she stole."

The name hit the Ferry Island group like a dead weight. Vicente let out a string of curses that would have made a pirate blush. Behind him, Stefano looked like he’d just been told his lottery ticket was a forgery. He was visibly distraught and Renzo was no better.

All their plans were crumbling right before their very eyes.

"We searched this whole section." A man’s voice trembled from the back. "We searched the entire town. There is no way we missed her."

"Fiona Quinn was not here, we turned this town upside down," Stefano hissed, his voice cracking. "We searched for her for months, since we heard about the bounty. We have eyes everywhere in the town. If she is here...."

"She was, but not anymore." Poncho shouted out as if he was glad to share the news. "She was turned in and the bounty was collected. Those eyes in your town must have been blind."

Vicente’s group was in shock. From his words, someone from their town had turned in Amber. When and how?

"Who collected it?" Vicente snapped, his tone darkening.

"Amber Carpenter Harrington," Sunshine replied, watching the reaction.

Renzo, leaned against the truck, letting out a sudden curse before laughing dryly. "So that’s why the Harringtons packed up and bolted in the middle of the night. They didn’t just get the bounty; they got the hell out of Ferry Island before you found out and stopped them boss."

The silence that followed was suffocating. Vicente chewed the inside of his cheek, his jaw working overtime. To Vicente, there were only two sins: betrayal and incompetence. The Harringtons had provided the first; his own men had provided the second.

"She was hiding here." Nimo pointed to the orphanage.

"Who?" Vicente asked, his voice deathly quiet. "Who was responsible for searching the orphanage perimeter?"

The men suddenly looked among themselves. One man in the back, a scrawny fellow with a nervous twitch, looked like he was contemplating a sudden ability change from crypto kinetic to super speed.

"It was you, Jaxta, wasn’t it?" Renzo asked, scratching his head with feigned innocence. "I seem to recall you saying the place was ’clear as a whistle.’"

"It was him," Stefano confirmed, happy to throw anyone under the bus to save his own skin.

"Jaxta," Vicente called out, almost sweetly. "Come here, son."

The man hesitated, his knees knocking together with an audible rhythm. He shuffled forward, hands trembling. He opened his mouth to explain_ maybe to say that he was sorry, or he’d assumed nobody would be stupid enough to live so close to the mist_ but he never got the chance.

Bang!

Vicente drew and fired in one fluid, bored motion.

Jaxta crumpled into the dust, the silence returning even heavier than before.

"Incompetent fool," Vicente sighed, tucking the gun away as if he’d just swatted a fly.

He looked back at Sunshine, a pleasant, terrifyingly calm smile spreading across his face as if he hadn’t just ended a life. "My apologies for the interruption. Please, go in. Get what you came for. Too bad I did not find Fiona first, otherwise I would have gouged her eyes out first before handing her over. I may not be the kindest man but even I draw the line at harming children."

Sunshine stared at the body, then at Vicente. She didn’t flinch, but her voice was cold enough to freeze the sun. "We will go in then." The affairs of Ferry Island were not yet her responsibility. How Vicente chose to deal with his men was his business.

Turning to her group, she jerked her head toward the building. "Move out. Let’s get our people."

Nimo leaned towards Sunshine and whispered. "You forgot to tell me that he was a maniac. I did not expect him to shoot his own man right there in front of us."

"He was making a point." Sunshine gave Vicente a quick glance. "He wants us to know that he is not afraid to kill if he needs to and he wants his men to remember what happens when they fail him. Two dogs, one bullet."

Nimo frowned. "Isn’t it two birds, one stone."

Sunshine raised her shoulders. "You got the point Nimo."

They entered the orphanage, careful not to step on rotting boards or exposed metals and nails. Dragonoids were raised, with practiced, lethal precision. If anything else was living in the orphanage, death would be its fate.

Oliver’s intel had been spot-on, but no amount of briefing could have prepared them for the sensory assault that awaited them.

The stench of decaying corpses hit them like a physical wall, sour and cloying. Behind her, O’Toole gagged, his gloved hand flying to his mask. Sunshine didn’t flinch, this was a smell that she had become accustomed to in her past life.

She reached into the space, and pulled out a handful of dried cider moss. She crushed the fibers between her palms and tossed them into the air.

As the moss particles caught the light, the atmosphere shifted. The oppressive stench of the rot evaporated, replaced by the warm, comforting aroma of spiced cinnamon.

They found them in the first room on the ground floor. The bodies were discarded. Piled atop one another like harvest potatoes, the small frames were tangled in a silent, horrific embrace. Some looked like two thousand year old mummies and others almost seemed fresh, like they had died only a few days ago.

But most were rotting and unrecognizable.

"Dear God," Nala whispered, her dragonoid slipping from her shoulder.

The team moved in a somber, rhythmic trance. The usual silly chatter of the squads gone, replaced by the heavy zip of body bags and the soft thud of knees hitting the dusty floor.

Tears tracked through Poncho’s eyes. A man who could shoot anything in a heart beat, he looked incredibly fragile as he tucked a small, cold hand of a three year old girl into a black body bag. "They were so young," Poncho choked out, his voice cracking as he closed the final bag.

Sunshine stepped over, her hand trembling slightly as she patted his broad shoulder. "I know, Poncho. At least we’re taking them home now. Carry them out. Gently."

When the team emerged, Vicente was waiting, leaning against his vehicle with a bored expression that shattered the moment he saw the bodies. His eyes drifted from the first bag to the tenth, then the twelfth. His gaze sharpened, focusing on the heart-wrenching dimensions of the bags.

"Were they all children?" he asked, the smoothness of his voice replaced by a jagged rasp.

Sunshine nodded, her jaw set like granite. "The ones Fifi didn’t have a use for, the ones that cried too much, the ones that got sick and did not get treatment. The ones that asked for food too often." Her voice choked. "There are adults too, but they were her accomplices and she poisoned them. Those ones, we are not taking back." She clenched her hand around a dragonoid. If they had been alive, they would have set them on fire in the orphanage.

Even prison was too good for them.