CHAPTER TWO HUNDRED AND FIFTY – THE PHANTOM STRANGER

As they made their way back to the entrance, a flash of lightning illuminated the devastation around them. Tents lay in tattered ruins, supplies scattered across the beach. The carefully ordered camp they'd built over weeks had been reduced to chaos in a matter of hours. Inside the fuselage, Kayla was met with a sea of anxious faces. "The breach is sealed," she announced, her voice hoarse from shouting over the storm. "We should be safe in here until it passes." A collective sigh of relief swept through the group. Kayla felt a tugging at her sodden shirt and looked down to see Diego staring up at her with wide eyes. "You're a superhero, Ms. Kayla," he said solemnly. "You saved us." Kayla managed a weak smile, ruffling the boy's hair. "We all saved each other, Diego. That's what a team does." As the night wore on, the storm's fury gradually began to abate. By dawn, it had reduced to a steady drizzle, the earlier violence nothing but a memory. Emerging from the battered fuselage, t