The Murder of Vandwald Hotel

BY ALEX SELLIS AND MELROSE ODEM

Ruth
    I looked down at my body. I was dead. Gone forever. I didn't feel dead, but I knew somehow that I was. My body was glossy with blood. The stab wound in my stomach was small, but deadly. I knew it was a bad idea to come on this vacation. Everyone had said, “It would be fine, let's just go to this abandoned hotel for a few nights.” Next thing you know, the door shuts behind you, and now here we are, standing in front of my dead body.
 It was a hooded figure, wearing gloves, boots, and a dark cloak. It was dark in the room, I had come down to get a snack from the kitchen, and after a sharp pain, I blacked out. 
I did some looking around, and found that I cannot escape the room. Even as a ghost, I can't even go through walls. The really weird thing was, I can't fly. The only thing letting me know that I'm a ghost is the fact that I'm looking at my body. I sat for hours trying to figure out what I was going to do. I am dead. I am dead. I am dead. 
I heard the door creak open, and then a high pitched shriek. I knew that shriek. That was Bread´s shriek. My old friend just discovered my dead body.

Bread
I was the one who found it, the body. I was the one who read the note. I was the one who yelled. I was the one who called 911. I was the one who shut down the hotel. The hotel has many secrets and now we are stuck inside. 
 I called the police and the police won’t let us go. I wasn’t even supposed to be here. A kid from school bet me I couldn’t spend a night at the hotel. The hotel was supposed to be haunted and abandoned. 
When I got here, there were others here too. Ruth, Timmy, Kai, and Clay said that they were here for the risk and the danger. I guess Ruth got the danger. 
Others arrived after I got here. Taylor, Elliot, and Ellen say they are ghost hunters. I say they are 7th graders who got in too deep trying to be cool. 
I came here alone and this fact sets me apart. I found the body. I am the prime suspect. I knew Ruth before today. We didn’t talk much but we played on the same soccer team back in 5th grade. She lives on the other side of the city so I never saw her after that. 

Clay
1 Second! I step away to pee in the woods for one second and now someone’s dead. The police are here and that one kid, Bread, found the body. I find this very suspicious. Bread and Ruth have had a complicated history. Bread will deny all of it but Ruth was really important to them. 
Then they outgrew the little league soccer and lost contact. Ruth kept on playing soccer, winning many medals, in hope that Bread would come back. They never did. Now, 3 years later, Bread shows up alone on the same day we decide to visit a haunted hotel and now Ruth is dead. But if I know anyone, I know Bread. Bread is kind and caring and would never do any of this. 
The others I came with, Kai and Timmy, have spent all day together somewhere in the woods nearby. The only other people here are the twins, Elliot and Ellen, and Taylor. They were also together shooting a ghost film. 
No one else was here. A cop came up to me and started asking me questions. I was obviously mentioned by someone else as staying in this hotel also. He took me with him into a room with 5 other people and then left. 
I stared at the others. Bread sat facing the door and staring at nothing. Timmy and Kai sat next to each other and the twins were also here. The silence was deafening. A few moments later a cop came in with Taylor. They were arguing. “No, you may not have the camera.”
“C’mon, this is the perfect story for the school newspaper. Murder at Vandwald Hotel. Ghost stories proven true.”
“I said no.”
The cop shut the door and left us. “Is this how they usually deal with suspects?” Kai asked.
“I’ve never been accused of anything before,” Bread said, worried. “She’s dead. She’s dead. She’s dead and I’m sitting with the murderer. Oh god. Oh god. Oh god.”
Bread continued ranting about nonsense. I tuned them out and looked around at everyone else. Any one of them could have been the murderer, but everyone had an alibi. Ruth was my friend, no matter how many fights and hardships we had been through. I will avenge her murder.

Taylor
I sat in the room with everyone else. It was a small hotel room in the basement. There were no windows to climb out of which was probably why they chose it. I twisted the ring on my finger. I knew the kids around me whether they knew me or not. To them, I was probably just another face in the midst of 7 billion people.
 I knew these people because I was a reporter. I itch for my camera. This girl, Ruth, was probably just another dead body to the detectives and police but to me she was an untold story. She would be a nameless person only remembered as another ghost story of the Vandwald Hotel and nobody believes in ghost stories. At least, not without real actual footage. 
My real dream is to be a journalist or documentary director but no one else believes in me. If I can film an actually good story, maybe it will convince my parents that being a journalist is not overrated. If I just had my camera. 
I looked around at everyone in the room around me and pulled out a notebook. Inside it, I write down everything I know about these suspects and their relationship with Ruth. 

Bread: Was Ruth's best friend. Mysteriously left her. Found her body. Played soccer.
Ellen: I came here with her. Fellow ghost hunter. Did not know Ruth.
Elliot: Ellen’s twin. Fellow ghost hunter. Did not know Ruth. I came here with him.
Timmy: Came here with Ruth. He is “secretly” in love with Kai. 
Kai: Same as Timmy. Neighbors with Ruth. Some sort of competition between them.
Clay: Ruth’s friend. Was suspiciously missing during murder. Hung out with Ruth before murder
Ruth: Rude. Soccer player. Dead.

I finished up my notes. I wondered if I should add myself to the list then decided that it would be kinda stupid. Why would I investigate myself? I know exactly what I did and where I was. Bread suddenly stopped talking and the muttering that I tuned out suddenly was noticed when it stopped.
“There was a note,” Bread said.
“Well, what did it say?” Kai asked.
“There’s more going on than you think. You must find the truth or else you will end up like Ruth.”
“Well that’s helpful,” Ellen said.
“What's the truth? Does anyone have any secrets?” I asked, eagerly.
Before anyone could confess, a police officer walked into the room. “Come with me,” he said, pointing to Bread.

Kai
One less person in the room meant more chances for the murderer to get all of us, unless Bread is the murderer? This makes a little too much sense. They did find the body. I looked around at everyone in the room. Elliot and Ellen, the twins, didn’t know Ruth at all before this. That could mean that one of them was the murderer with no sense of remorse or neither of them was the murderer. 
So really there’s no clue there. I have not left Timmy’s side for the whole trip except to go to the bathroom. A few minutes later the cop came back with Bread, and I, being the closest to the door, went back out with him. He took me to another room where there was a table and 2 chairs. I sat in one and he sat in the other. The interrogation went something like this: 
Cop: Where were you at the time of the murder?
Me: The woods.
Cop: Did you know Ruth?
Me: Yes
Cop: How did you know her?
Me: We went to the same school and she was friends with Clay and I am also friends with Clay.
Cop: Why do you both happen to be here?
Me: We came here together with Clay and Timmy.

The conversation droned on like that and finally the Cop led me back to the first room. One by one everyone else was questioned. Finally they let us go on the condition that we stayed in the hotel. 
Timmy and I traveled up onto the roof. I had found a secret ladder the day before. “How about we stick together?” Timmy asked. “We both know we didn’t do it and the murderer can’t kill two of us,”
I agreed. Timmy went down to get our sleeping bags and I worked on fortifying the roof. We didn’t need heat as it was the middle of summer and nights were perfect for sleeping.
 I started to look for alternate routes down if we couldn’t get to the ladder when suddenly something hit me from behind. I was falling through the air as the ground got closer and closer and closer. The ground was 20 feet then 10 then 5 then right in front of my face and everything went black.

Timmy
Why did it have to be Kai?! It couldn’t have been me? Or someone else? Besides, I never even got to tell Kai. I didn’t get to let him know that I love him one last time. 
Whoever killed him is going to pay. I needed to find out who it was first. I was immediately suspicious of Bread. They had found the body. They could be the killer. Taylor was innocent. She’d been with me the whole time. She couldn't have done anything. I saw her while coming down and she looked scared so I said she could walk with me. 
Ellen and Elliot were hard to tell, because they didn’t know Ruth.  They couldn’t have just had no remorse, because the killer must have killed both the victims, and Elliot and Ellen had known Kai. Clay was a bit suspicious, because I hadn’t really seen him much. 
That left us with Bread and Clay, and I didn’t think it was the twins. Now, I just needed to figure out which one did it, and find out why.

Elliot
The next day, we were led back into the interrogation room. Apparently, after searching the whole hotel, no clues were found. We were told to stay on the 3rd floor only. In the small room in the basement, sat me, my twin sister Ellen, Clay, Timmy, Bread, and Taylor, along with two cops. The cops set their water bottles on the small coffee table in the center of the room. 
“We have news,” the one on the left said. His voice was deep, almost like Batman. “Kai was found dead this morning. The investigators believe that he was pushed off of the roof last night.” 
All eyes immediately darted to Timmy. He seemed to already know this information. Everybody knew that Timmy had been deeply in love with Kai. Timmy wouldn’t have killed him, unless he had a reason. The right cop grabbed his water, and took Ellen out of the room. She had a nervous look on her face. Ellen has an intense fear of violence so, she couldn’t have done it. 
Once the door had been shut again, I heard a loud shriek. It was Ellen. The other cop rushed out. The man with Ellen was on the ground, with his water bottle in his hand. He had been poisoned. The remaining cop tried to help him but knew that it was too late for his friend.


Ellen
The cop laid on the floor with a peaceful look on his face. His eyes were unfocused and his skin had lost its life. I slowly backed away. I wanted no part in this murder. No sooner had I made my way to the back of the group of people who were looking at the dead body when another crash sounded from across the hall. 
Everyone turned in my direction and I turned in the direction of the second cop. He was also on the floor, dead. Just then more cops showed up. I turned and ran from the hallway. I didn’t care that running could be considered a crime. I was out of here. Down the stairs, through the halls and finally I was out in the fresh air. 
I looked back and the cops were chasing me. I didn’t think, I just ran. I couldn’t go back to that hotel. They’d find out my secret. I ran and ran and ran. I was on the cross country team. I found a tree and climbed it. The cops ran below me. I let out a sigh of relief.
If they brought me back, I would be the main suspect. They’d do a little digging around and find out my secret, that would be catastrophic. Straight to jail with me. No questions asked. In case you’re wondering, no I did not murder Ruth or Timmy or the Cops. This was something that happened long before all of this and would definetly make them think I murdered Ruth and Kai. I couldn’t risk that. I stayed in a tree for hours. The cops were searching and searching. I could hear them through the leaves. My hands were shaking and I tried to move in a way that would make my legs not fall asleep. I should really--


Clay 
I trekked through the woods and called Ellen’s name. The leaves were damp and my legs were soaked through. “Ellen! Ellen!” I called.
She might be gone for good. Ellen was on the cross country team. She was the best runner. I walked and walked for what seemed like ages, when I heard someone darting through the woods. “Help! Help! Help!” called a frantic voice. I ran forward and saw two kids standing by Ellen. “She’s dead,” one of them said.
I ran over to Ellen. I could still feel a pulse. “Run that way and get help, she’s still alive,” I told the kids, pointing at the hotel. Ellen’s eyes rolled back into her head.  
    Help arrived but it was too late. Ellen was dead. The question was, how did she die? She was out here all alone. Was it the kids? Did the murderer find her out here? I am left with endless questions.

Axel
    I ran as fast as I could, My breathing growing heavier. Orion was beside me and he looked like he could run another mile. I stopped and Orion kept going. Behind me was a dying girl and we couldn't stop. I mustered up the breath I could and continued running. We ran in the direction the boy told us to and found lots of cop cars. The old hotel was surrounded by police. When one of them saw us, they ran over. “What are you kids doing here?” he asked.
“There’s a girl, she’s hurt,” Orion said, pointing in the direction we came. Orion and a couple cops ran back to the girl and I was left by the hotel. The hotel was old and crumbling. The worn sign said, va  w l  h te but I knew the stories. Legend has it that someone was brutally murdered here hundreds of years ago and goes around killing people who come near so that they won’t be alone for all of eternity. It was just a story but from the cop cars out front, it didn’t seem like one. I walked up to the closest cop. “What’s going on?” I asked.
“You should be inside with the others,” he said.
I am very confused. What others? Who else is here? What’s going on? But that stayed in my head. The cop led me to a room where there were three other people. He shoved me in and locked the door behind me. “Who’re you?” one of them asked.
The asker had long red hair and was carrying a notebook. She looked kind of familiar but not enough for a name to come to my head. The other two people are total strangers. Why were they here? Why were there police? I sat down in the chair closest to the door. “You haven’t answered my question,” the girl said.
“Oh, uh, I’m Axel,” I said.
“And he can talk,” the girl responded.
I didn’t think I liked her. “What was going on?” I asked.
No one answered. Maybe they thought it was obvious. Maybe it was obvious and I couldn’t see the truth. I looked out the window and saw Orion along with the boy and someone else walking back to the hotel. I didn’t think the girl made it. “She’s gone,” I whispered, my breath fogging up the window. 
I wanted to scream or shout or beg for answers, but I didn't. “Why’re you here?” someone asked. I shrugged. The cop didn’t give me an explanation. “I’m Bread,” the person answered.
Bread seemed nice enough. “What happened? Why are there cops? Who are you?” The questions came flooding out. 
“Someone died, then someone else died, then some cops died, then a girl ran into the woods,” the mean girl said. 
“Oh,” I replied. 
No wonder they didn’t want to talk about it. I turned back to the window. No cops were leading Orion inside. 

Elliot
“Help, Help!” I heard from somewhere in the woods. It’s not my sister’s voice. I should’ve been looking for her. The yelling stopped. I hear footsteps. Then it was Clay’s voice yelling. I ran over to him and found Ellen on the ground. She looked dead. Soon after, the police came and took her back to the hotel. A new kid was wandering around. He looked very confused. A cop walked up to me. I looked at him hopefully. He shook his head.
 I thought back to the note left on Ruth’s body. It had to mean something, but why Ellen? I knew she was murdered. Ellen doesn’t fall off trees, she falls on trees. The note had been ignored this whole time but we needed to figure it out. I thought this was a one and done thing. There is more going on than you think. You must find the truth or else you will end up like Ruth. What’s going on? I came here to hunt ghosts not murderers.


Bread
    It seemed the police’s answer to everything was to shove us in a room and hope no one else dies. So far there had been 5 deaths. Two new kids had found their way into the hotel and I don’t think they are leaving anytime soon. I really wanted to go home. I spent my night here and 2 people have died. Now, at the start of my 2nd night here, the death count was 5. I should’ve ran away like Ellen but we all saw what happened to her. “Can I see the note?” Elliot asked me.
I jumped a little, “Sure.”
I’ve memorized the note and looked it over thousands of times. I thought everyone forgot about it. The words ran through my head. What truth? Is it about me and Ruth’s history? But what about everyone else who died? I never knew Kai or Ellen before this and certainly not the cops. Sometimes I blamed myself. What if this is about me and Ruth? I know I was a bad friend. I felt guilty about it everyday but I didn’t know if Ruth would ever forgive me or want to hear an apology. I haven’t spoken to her since 5th grade soccer. We were close friends and then our parents got into a fight. Her parents said that they wouldn’t want her around people like me and I got mad. Who were they to judge? I took out my anger on Ruth and then I felt so guilty I quit soccer. I didn’t know my last conversation with her would be a fight. Now she’s dead and I will forever feel guilty. There was the truth right out in my mind but it didn't solve anything. There were the new kids also and I wasn’t sure how they fit in. One of them sat in the corner and didn't talk. I’m not sure if he really knows how. The other is the polar opposite. He was talking his head off. Taylor liked him. I wondered how people could be happy. Next to me Timmy sat silently with tears streaming down his face. He only lost Kai last night. Everyone was again stuffed into a room until the cops figured out what to do. It’s getting annoying. Clay sat down next to me. “Any ideas?” He asked.
“I have no idea who did it. Everyone was accounted for each time and the note said something about a truth but what truth?! Nothing makes sense and I might be next,” I said to him, on the verge of tears.
“Well when Ellen died, which may or may not be the murderer, me, Elliot, Taylor, and some cops were out in the woods looking for Ellen. Oh, and the  2 kids also…”
“Wait no, Taylor was here,” I say confused.
Is this a clue? Taylor heard us and joined in, “I was in the woods but then I made a huge circle and the cops led me inside. Not sure what they were thinking. Maybe there were too many people unaccounted for?”
I was left with less and less answers, but Taylor ranted on, “Well what about you? It was only you and Elliot out there, Clay. Elliot would never kill his twin and you were mysteriously missing for each one of the murders.”
My eyes darted to Clay. Maybe… no he couldn’t. I kept telling myself that as I looked into his eyes. They were full of fear. Not the they found me out kind of fear but the Shoot I could be going to prison kind of fear. He didn’t do it, at least I think he didn’t, and now Taylor had the power to send him to jail.

Timmy
    It’s the second morning I wake up and Kai is not there by my side. It’s the second morning I get out of bed and I’m excited to see him, hear him laugh, kiss his cheek but then I remember he’s dead. I slept in the room beside where his body was found. I hope his ghost is out there somewhere near me. Last night Taylor was acting really excited. She thinks she’s found the murderer. I don’t know if she has but I haven’t seen Clay all morning. I sit up on the roof, wind whooshing past my face. I should be scared to come up here and dangle my legs over the edge but I’m not. So what if the murderer gets me. I’ll be with him anyway. No murderer comes. I am left alone with my thoughts and the wind. Tears fall down my face. I don’t know if I can get up and live a life without him. Would that even be a life? I don’t know. The hotel looks like a drafty, weak structure built from wood from before Christopher Columbus but it's actually pretty stable. I’m suddenly not as sad as I’m mad. I’m mad at everyone and everything. I’m mad at the hotel which took his life and the unknown person who did it too. They say people don’t think right in their grief and I think they're right. I find his old lantern. Supposedly it was from his grandfather. I light it. The fire inside grows and burns my hands. I drop it. The rug quickly catches fire. The only exit is blocked. I sit on the bed and cry as the wooden walls burn around me. The fire snakes its way onto the bed and then the sheets and mattress. I don’t even try to run. I don’t want to. Why live a life in this cruel world? No one accepts people like me. That’s why I let the fire consume me and I go down crying. I cry for Kai. I cry for me. I don’t even notice the pain of burning. I don’t care anymore. This life isn’t worth it.

Orion
    I grabbed Axel by his hand and started running. The third floor was the wrong place to be. The hall was filled with smoke but I couldn’t let that slow me down. Fire burned behind me. I couldn’t find the stairs. Axel kept running behind me. I can’t let him down. Finally I came to the staircase. I heard sirens from outside. A firetruck must have come. “Good,” I shouted, “Then let's sprint. Try not to breathe.”
He went ahead of me and we ran. Smoke clouded the ceiling, getting thinner as we go down. We reach the door outside. I shove the handle. It’s locked. Someone didn’t want us getting out. I bang on the door. The fire’s on the third floor but fire spreads. Fear pulses through me. We’re gonna die. We’re gonna die cause some dumb police officer locked us inside a buring building. My fear is so intense, I don’t see Axel running at the door, breaking the rusty hinges and pulling me outside. It’s at least 15 minutes until I can think clearly again. The fire is almost out and everyone is out. Everyone except Timmy, that boy that found us in the woods, Clay, and the police officer guarding him. Firemen are spraying the hotel. I don’t know if it’s worth saving. I mean, yeah sure it's savable- at least the first 2 floors, but why not let it burn. It did kill 5 now 8 people. I look around me. I am sitting on a bench outside the hotel with a very worried Axel sitting next to me. This was not the right time to zone out. “You okay?” I hear Axel say.
“Yeah,” I answer, “But the hotel’s not.”

Taylor
     I do feel kind of guilty. I did say Clay was the murderer and now he’s a murdered. Well, not really. The story is that Timmy actually set the hotel on fire and we all know he didn’t kill Kai. Maybe it was revenge? I think it was suicide. I’m now glad I slept outside in the woods. I was worried the cops wouldn’t let me but they let it slide when I told them I didn’t want to get murdered. I guess they understand the feeling. I go back to my habit of twisting the ring on my finger. My skin was rubbed raw. I should take it off but I think it’s stuck there. It was from my grandma as a last gift before she died. I made the mistake of putting it on. I tug on it again but this time it pulls free. My skin is red where the ring sat and I am glad it’s gone. I swing my hand back and chuck it into the woods. I want nothing to do with my grandma. I don’t miss her. She didn’t die of sickness or old age. She died of something else. She died on death row.

Axel
    The police don’t know where to put us. We obviously can’t go back into the hotel and they can’t take us to the police station for some reason. Orion sits beside me. He seems to have zoned out. He does that sometimes. It happens when he gets really scared and he just freezes up. This time was the worst. I overhear the police and fireman talking. “The hotel…” “Fires out” “Safe…”
I don’t want to go back in there. The police man comes to take us back to the room. I don’t like the room but I follow him anyway. Policemen are scary. Everyone is scary. I don’t want to sit in a room with strangers who are mourning. I don’t know anyone who died and I can’t be the one who leads any sort of conversation but I don’t want to sit in silence either. I want to talk and comfort them but the thing is, when I try to talk to anyone but Orion, I can’t think of what to say. Even when I do I’m worried it's the wrong thing. It’s like everyone else can think of the right thing to say while I’m left in the dark on how to do it. Because of this, I’ve resorted to not talking- it works, sort of. In the room there is an unspoken silence. 5 of their friends have died so I get it but the silence is deafening. Since the main suspect of the murder is now dead, we are allowed to roam the hotel and nothing is stopping us from heading outside. I want to be outside. I’m not claustrophobic but the hotel walls seem to be closing in around me. “Orion, let's run,” I say.
“We can't, we'll be fugitives.”
“But everyone knows it wasn’t us. We weren’t here before the girl died.”
“We can get charged for running I think. I don’t want to risk it.”
I couldn’t convince him. Alone, I’m not the best runner but alone and running from cops, I wouldn’t stand a chance. The thing is, they’re all in the front of the hotel and no one locked the windows. We are in a room on the first floor so I could survive the fall. “What are you doing?” Orion asks.
“Running,” I say.
I open the window and dart into the woods. No one saw me leave. It’s not like they’ll miss me anyways. 

Elliot
I don’t know what to do. My sister is dead and I’m stuck in a dumb hotel with 4 other people. I just wanna go home. I need to find out the murderer. I head into the basement. There is no fingerprint, no hair, no Ruth- just a tiny blood stain. Me, Ellen, Taylor, Ruth, and Bread were the only ones in the building. The three of us were ghost hunting and Bread was doing who knows what. She came from the kitchen and said Ruth was in there. She was going to get something. Me and Ellen said hi and where was Taylor- oh the bathroom. Bread got something, came back, and Ruth was dead. Oh, god I know who the murderer was.

Clay
It’s kinda boring being a ghost. I can’t even walk through walls. I can however follow Orion around after he let Axel run away. I can’t say I don’t blame him for what happened to Ellen. Orion leads me into the kitchen. He must be hungry. Elliot’s in the kitchen also. I look around and spot Ruth’s ghost. She’s really here. I get excited and run over to her, but that’s when I see her eyes light up. I look behind me. Elliot is there, but as a ghost. I see Bread run in and scream, “It’s you.”
I expect to see Orion but he’s also dead. I turn toward the murderer and as I see her pull her hood off, I hear her words, “It’s me.”


Taylor
“I had to kill him. He had me all figured out. I wouldn’t want to get arrested.”
“Well, you’re going anyway.”
“I’m not, but you are.”
I laugh. I had them all fooled. Not even the ghosts knew it. If ghosts are even real anyways. I had to do it. The ring on my finger, from my grandma, had a curse. Passed down through generations. It would continue to get tighter and tighter until I killed 5 people. I killed 5 people, Ruth, Kai, Ellen, and 2 cops. The curse was gone and I chucked it into the woods. Ruth was easy, I just had to “go to the bathroom” and boom, she’s dead. Kai, ha, it’s like he wanted to die. Ellen was not as easy, but I still pulled it off. The cops blindly left their waters in front of me. It's not that hard to pour some stuff in. I was going to be done murdering after them but Elliot got too close to the truth and Orion just had to go. You don’t get to just show up on my murdering spree.” Bread stands before me, flabbergasted. “How, when, Why? What’s the truth you were talking about?” She asks.
“There was no truth, it was all a distraction.”
“Well now I know it was you. You’ve given yourself away.”
“Bread how could you,” I shriek throwing the knife in their direction. 
“What?” They sound confused.
“It all makes sense now, you and Ruth rivals and alone, one dead one alive. You were supposedly wandering the hotel all alone when Kai died but I did see you on the third floor. When the first cop died you were the last one away from the 2nd cop’s water. You did take an extremely long time in the bathroom before Ellen died. I’m beginning to wonder if you snuck out.”
“No, you’re the one who did all of that!”
“My word against yours,” I say, a smile creeping up on my face. 
They pick up the knife. Perfect, now their fingerprints are all over it. Just then a cop comes in. I see the look on his face. He sees Bread with a knife and me, cowering in a corner. I look at him and force an expression of relief. “They’re trying to kill me, help!” I shout.
The cop believes it and handcuffs Bread. As he leads them out of the kitchen, I flash them a smile. I suddenly hear a quiet beeping. It’s coming from Elliot’s backpack. I sort through it and find one of the devices we used for ghost hunting. It’s the one that beeps when ghosts are near. I hear the only door to exit slam closed. I think some dead are out for revenge.

Ruth
I materialize in front of Taylor. She looks as if  she is about to pass out. The others do the same. “YOU’RE DEAD!” She shouts. 
“You can't hurt me.” I  shriek. 
Taylor runs to the door. Clay throws a frying pan that just misses her head. “It’s locked you little witch.” He said. “It’s time for you to die.”
    Kai and Timmy walk over to her calmly, and together, pick up the frying pan, and whack her in the face. “Thanks for ruining our only lives.”
Taylor ran to the counter and frantically looked through all the drawers for a weapon. Luckily, she manages to find a large chef's knife. Taylor was about to rush out of the room, but just in time, Ellen hurtled a stand mixer in her direction. It smacked Taylor to the ground and allowed just enough time to surround her. Kai and Timmy took the knife from her hand, and stabbed her in the chest. We saw her ghost float up from her body. But she wasnt glowing purple, she was glowing green. Just as her ghost opened its eyes, The walls started to rattle. The hotel fell to dust before my eyes. And for the first time in 3 days, I stepped into the light, and floated up, into the sun. My friends followed. Timmy and Kai, holding hands, the sun on Clay's face, Bread’s huge smile. I looked down and saw a green glowing figure, sinking into the ground, and yelling at me. It was Taylor.