End 7

Liz woke early, smiling to see holographic morning sunlight streaming in through the curtains. Slipping out from the hand that coiled around her waist she stood and stretched, watching as Sarah rolled onto her side and pulled the cover tighter around her to compensate for Liz's disappearance.

They had learned to sleep together in one single bed when Sarah had confessed to preferring staying over at Liz's and suffering the single bed to sleeping in her queen bed in the austere and faintly suffocating surroundings of her own home.

Watching her sleeping girlfriend Liz was filled with a great sense of uplifting and, changing quickly she headed outside, leaving a note to say where she was going.

She ran for as long as she felt she could, rejoicing in the feel of the wind in her face and the freshness of the air around her. She ran until her lungs strained for breath, remembering the times her mother and sister had run with her down these paths. Finally tiring she turned and began a slow jog back, taking her time on the route and watching in the trees and fields around her. Listening to the noise of the startled crickets as she walked though the wild flowers and seeing the goat scramble up to higher ground as she passed it by. A bird leapt out of it's nest in the ground cover and threw itself into the air, flapping. She tracked it across the sky as it skidded through the clouds and into the trees and continued on her way.

Liz stepped aside in the driveway of the hotel, hearing a car behind her. She smiled as she realised that it was Kelly driving and chased them into the garage to take charge of her niece as the adults picked up Daniel's bags and made their way inside. Adrian met them in the hall and took Shazné from Liz as she headed down to her room for a shower.

They were sat in the Breakfast room, Daniel recounting all of his tales of adventure from the last few months that he had spent away from his wife and daughter. He sat with them both close, his wife at his side and his daughter on his lap. They made quite the picture, Sandra thought, all together like that.

"You OK Mum?" Kelly asked, and she realised that she'd been drifting in the warm contentment of the moment.

"Yes, sorry. I'm somewhere else at the moment." Adrian jostled her.

"You're always somewhere else, Sand." He laughed. The breakfast room was beginning to fill as the hour grew later and together they stood and walked out into the main hall. The group were back on the platform, meditating once again and Adrian stood and watched them for a moment before he led them all into one of the living rooms.

"They're brave, showing such obvious difference." Sandra mentioned.

"Megan, the woman who leads them, she's one of our unpaid guests." Sandra shot him a sharp glance, motioning to Kelly and Daniel. "They know about our guests, Sand. Kelly's been working here, she's been helping some of them during their illnesses. There aren't any here now who aren't ill." Adrian sighed and met Sandra's gaze. 'I only told her what I had to.' His gaze said. She simply shook her head and looked away as Adrian continued telling them about the woman. "She used to meditate alone and then someone joined her one day. Now she does classes. People come back just to see her. She's getting very ill now, though. She won't survive much longer. She's very strong, but she's been fighting with it for a very long time. She was one of the first ones to start getting ill."

"Have you had many die?"

"Some. There are only ten here now, before there were almost forty. Some went home to try and find their families. Some were caught outside when they first started to loose control through the illness. We've had two reported by other guests. They sent soldiers down and There was nothing I could do" A moment's pain crossed his face and Daniel looked away, knowing he was a part of this pain. Knowing that he was part of the army that was responding to these kind of reports and 'taking care of the problem'. Adrian saw this and sighed. "I'm sorry Daniel, I know it's not your fault. You guys have to do what you're told otherwise it's just as dangerous for you."

"It shouldn't be this way." He stated firmly, and Sandra and Adrian shared a smile.

The door labelled E1 was hidden in the corner of a corridor that was cordoned off from the rest of the hotel. This was the private area, where Adrian's room could be found along with all of the security equipment for the hotel. This was also the place that all of the bits and pieces from the previous uses of the hotel had been hidden away. Behind the door Sarah expected to find a tiny room with perhaps a few boxes of photographs in it. What she didn't expect was a fair sized room wall to wall with boxes. A vague path meandered through the towers of boxes and she had to wander to the other end to see how many boxes there really were, some of the piles reached to the roof.

"They're not all photos." Liz laughed. "There are disks in some, and files in others." She pulled one box down from the top of a pile and found a space to put it down in and sit beside it. "Kelly and I used to explore these when I was really little. This was always my favourite box, maybe because I don't know any of the people in the photos." She pulled out the top photo. There was an older man and a younger man, both with black hair and wide grins. Behind them a blurred young woman with red hair was running towards the camera, seemingly chasing them.

"Did you ever ask Adrian who they were?" Sarah asked.

"No, I don't think I want to either. It's a mystery. I don't want to spoil it! Besides, they were photos that were here when Ade took over. He might not know who they were. I doubt they had anything to do with us." Pulling out another, clearer photo she found five faces staring out at her, all four in the process of stepping towards the photographer, the picture obviously staged. She smiled at the jostling going on between them as they stood in the line. Comradeship caught on camera.

"Hey, is this your Grandmother?" Sarah said, holding out the picture and pointing to the blond stood next to the tall dark haired young man from the other photo.

"I doubt it. Why do you ask?"

"She looks like your Mum, and like you too." Liz looked again.

"Really?" Liz asked, squinting at the photo and trying to see what Sarah saw.

"Definitely."

"Could be then. Do you think the guy next to her is my Grandpa?" She laughed.

"No, he doesn't look like you at all." Sarah replied seriously.

"Look, here's another picture of her." Liz pulled out a small picture of the blond in black and white. It was clipped to five other pictures, the other people all in black and white.

"Can I borrow these? Just for a little while." Sarah asked. "I want to try something."