Nightmare

As they returned to the island, the staff encircled Lucia, their worried faces a blur of questions and concerns.

But she dismissed their inquiries with a flick of her hand, forcing a bright smile onto her lips. "I'm fine, really," she assured them, her voice steady despite the turmoil churning inside. Yet, her eyes betrayed her, revealing the depth of her fear and anxiety.

Longing to escape the suffocating attention, Lucia made her excuses and hastened towards the familiar haven of her bed. Her feet carried her with a sense of urgency, as if seeking refuge from the world.

As she collapsed onto the soft mattress, her eyelids drooped, and she surrendered to the all-consuming darkness of sleep.

But her slumber was short-lived, her mind conjuring a vivid dreamscape that seemed all too real. She saw the world through a stranger's eyes, her vision limited to a narrow field of view.

The shady man once again appeared before her.He loomed ahead, his gun trained on a face she couldn't see. But she felt the fear, the adrenaline and the desperation in the air as she spotted dead bodies lying all over.They each had bullet wounds which made it easy to assume that the shady man armed with the gun killed them all.

"This is where it ends, Mara. Just die already," the shady man sneered, his voice dripping with malice.

The name "Mara" resonated in Lucia's mind, and she realized whose eyes she was seeing through. Mara, a man, stood facing the shady man, his defiance clear as day.

"Go to hell," Mara spat, his voice steady.

The shady man's reply was a cold, mirthless laugh. "You first."

Lucia felt Mara's body tense, his muscles coiled with tension. With a fierce cry, he launched himself at the gunman, knocking the weapon from his grasp. Lucia's heart raced as Mara sprinted away, freedom seemingly within reach.

But the sound of a gunshot shattered the illusion, the bullet slamming into Mara's back with a sickening thud.

Lucia's eyes snapped open, her body trembling as she lay on the cold floor, her bed sheets tangled around her. The scream still echoed in her mind, a haunting sound that sent shivers down her spine.

And then, like a punch to the gut, she realized why - it was awfully similar to Chuck's voice, his anguished cry still resonating in her mind.

With shaking hands, she reached for her phone, her heart pounding in her chest. She had to know he was safe, had to confirm that the nightmare was just that - a dream.

Lucia's fingers trembled as she dialed Chuck's number, her anxiety spiking with each passing moment. The phone rang, but instead of Chuck's warm voice, a robotic tone declared him unreachable. Panic set in, propelling her out of the house and into the resort's bustling atmosphere. She beseeched the staff for information, but they remained tight-lipped, their evasive answers only fueling her worry.

"Chuck's gone on a business trip, Lucia. That's all we can say," they chimed in unison, their faces expressionless.

Lucia's mind raced as she stormed back to her flat, her feet pounding the pavement in frustration. She tried calling Chuck again, but his phone was now switched off, plunging her into darkness. Desperate to distract herself, she sought solace in a long, scalding shower. The water cascaded down her body, washing away the sweat and fear, but her anxiety remained, festering like an open wound.

Just as she was toweling off, her phone shatters the silence, its ringtone piercing the air. Lucia's heart skips a beat as she rushes to answer it, her voice trembling with anticipation.

"Chuck?" she exhales, relief washing over her.

"Lucia, listen to me," Chuck's voice is laced with urgency, his words spilling out in a frantic torrent. "There's a man after you, a psychotic man who'll stop at nothing to get to you. He might be on the island right now. I'm coming to get you, but if he reaches you first, run. Don't listen to him, just run like your life depends on it."

Lucia's mind reels, her questions multiplying like wildfire, but the line goes dead, leaving her with only silence and terror.

As Lucia's mind struggled to comprehend the ominous warning Chuck had just delivered, a chill ran down her spine, alerting her to the presence of someone in her room. She spun around, her eyes locking onto the shady man, resplendent in his all-black attire, lounging on her couch with an air of sinister confidence. The fear that coursed through her veins was palpable, threatening to overwhelm her.

"Well, I can assume that you might be someone special to Mara," Mark, the shady man, drawled, his voice dripping with malice. "You're probably not like him, or I would have known. My name is Mark, and what do they call you?" His words were laced with a calculating curiosity, his gaze piercing through Lucia like a cold blade.

Lucia's heart raced like a wild animal, threatening to burst free from her chest. Her eyes darted to the gun in Mark's hand, the same weapon she had seen in her dream, and her mind raced back to Chuck's urgent warning. With a surge of adrenaline, she turned to flee, abandoning all caution as she sprinted towards the door with a desperate burst of strength.

Her feet pounded the floor, the sound echoing through the room like a death knell. Lucia's breath came in short gasps, her vision blurring at the edges as she strained to escape the clutches of the sinister stranger. The world around her narrowed to a single focus – survival.

As Lucia's attempted to flee in her desperate bid for freedom, Mark's voice echoed through the room, his words dripping with sinister intent. "There's no use running, my dear. My men have this island surrounded. You have a higher chance of surviving with me than going out there." The sentence hung in the air like a guillotine, ready to drop and snuff out her escape.

Just as Mark's words trailed off, the outside world erupted into chaos. Gunshots rang out, their sharp cracks piercing the air like shattering glass. Screams followed, shrill and terrified, as if the very souls of the island's inhabitants were being torn apart. And then, a deafening explosion shook the room, its shockwave rattling the windows and sending Lucia's heart into a frantic tailspin.

The cacophony of sounds was like a sledgehammer, bludgeoning her senses and leaving her reeling. The room seemed to spin around her, Mark's face blurring into a malevolent haze as her vision began to tunnel. The air was heavy with the acrid smell of smoke and fear, making her lungs constrict and her breath come in short gasps. Lucia's mind raced, her thoughts splintering into a thousand fragments as she stumbled, her legs threatening to buckle beneath her.