𝐃𝐄𝐋𝐈𝐂𝐀𝐓𝐄 . . . 𝗏𝗈𝗅𝗎𝗆𝖾 𝗍𝗐𝗈.
chapter twenty-one / are they going to kiss or kill each other?
𝗇𝖺𝗋𝗋𝖺𝗍𝗂𝗏𝖾
AT LAST, after all the events they had experienced that night, it was finally time for their investigation. They had barely just started and Charlotte was already itching to leave.
Charlotte stands beside Colby, still holding his hand, while Sam holds the camera pointing them, holding it just high enough as to remove it from view.
The group is now back downstairs, getting ready to move into the investigation part of the video. Jordan and Olivia are beside Charlotte and Kat stands beside Colby. "All right, guys. It's time to start the investigation. Are you ready?" he looks between the four girls.
"No." Charlotte tells him blankly, pulling her sweatshirt's hood over her head. After the events from upstairs, she was more than ready to get the hell out, but she told Sam and Colby she'd finish the rest of the video.
After all, it was Hell Week. She should have expected a terrifying experience, especially after the Mizpah.
You never could be a guest on the Sam and Colby channel without pissing your pants in fear.
"We decided to do this investigation where we start at the first floor, first. Then, go to the second, work our way to the most haunted, which is the third floor," Colby explains to the camera. "First floor being the saloon, and there's a ghost called the Prospector and apparently this was a drunk, kind of thin looking guy that would come here every single night and basically try to get some alcohol. So, we thought what better trigger object to buy than some..." Colby turns around, grabbing the bottle of Jack Daniel's the group had bought earlier in the night.
Sam lets out a small cheer, the other's following in suit. "Drink responsibly, guys."
"We bought this for the ghost. I swear we're not drinking it afterwards."
"Yeah," Jordan looks winks at the camera. "Definitely not drinking it afterward."
Colby continues to fill up each of the glasses with an unrolling amount of whiskey for the ghosts before they begin to start the investigation. Colby starts to attempt to communicate to the spirits before they decide to take a seat in the seats and see if they get a better answer. Although, they get nothing. So, they move onto a different piece of equipment--the onvoy.
"Is there any spirit, any person here that want to talk to us tonight? In the saloon. Let us know if you're here," Colby begins by asking.
The onvoy beeps, indicating an answer before everyone leans over to reveal the word YES. "Are you the prospector? Are you somebody who likes to drink here regularly?" Once again, it's silent.
"I wonder if it's somebody that followed us from upstairs?" Kat asks. Colby agrees, saying it's a good question and the onvoy beeps. YES.
"Are you the person that scratched my sister, Charlotte?" Olivia asks.
Charlotte awaits the answer with slightly wide eyes, praying that it didn't say yes. It didn't, in fact, it didn't give them a single answer. "No answer. That's not a yes or a no, though. That's kinda freaky."
"Do you like that we're here?" Sam asks. The onvoy says yes.
"Is there something more negative upstairs we should be worried about?" A little bit of time goes by before the onvoy says no. "That's good."
"Is that because it's here with us, right now?" Charlotte immediately groans, hunching down in her seat as she waits in suspense. Then, it says yes.
"Oh, my God." Charlotte groans, running her hands over her head. She can feel her eyes stinging with tears again. "I actually hate this so much." Colby reaches over, grabbing her leg gently to comfort her.
"Do you want us to go upstairs and keep talking to you?" The onvoy immediately says yes, which is when the decide to continue on through the investigation.
They clean up the equipment and the glasses before moving on to staircase. "Second investigation, here. We're gonna explore the ladies bathroom." Everyone looks over to the door beside them.
"It's actually extremely haunted, he just said," Colby says.
Sam shakes his head. "Just kidding. We are gonna be looking for a lady, though. A lady in blue. Apparently, she was a prostitute who died and is most commonly sighted on the staircase behind us. So, we decided to break out one of your guys' favorite pieces of equipment ever, the SLS camera."
"SOS please, someone help me," Colby starts singing off-key.
"This can basically detect when there is a human form we can't see with our own eyes."
The camera cuts to Katrina moving in front of the SLScamera to test it out when Olivia speaks up. "I actually have a quick question..." Colby moves to camera to point at her. "Why are we always looking for dead prostitutes? Because there was a dead prostitute at the Mizpah, too. And she did not like us very much."
Jordan looks between Sam and Colby. "Do you guys just have a thing for ghost prostitutes?"
Sam and Colby look at each other awkwardly, before quickly changing the subject. The camera cuts again and Katrina is dancing in front of the SLS. "Dude, this ghost's got some moves!" Charlotte says as she looks at Kat's dancing figure on the screen.
The group moves on to continue the investigation and Sam begins scanning the staircase with the camera. They catch nothing until they switch sides and a figure appears to be on the back wall. "Oh bappidy bopp!" Colby shouts, pointing to the screen.
"Wait, wait, wait, wait. Where is that? Underneath. It's halfway up. There's something halfway up the stairs." Charlotte and Jordan peak their heads around to see if they can see anything out of place.
"Wait, what? It's like it's on the wall or something, right? Now it's gone."
"Actually, it would have been on this side because this is reversed," Sam says, pointing to the wall in front of him. "It would've been right in front of Char, or something."
Charlotte immediately hurries to get away from it, standing beside Kat and Olivia while everyone laughs. "I'm not taking any more chances, guys."
Sam moves a big closer to the staircase, attempting to get any other sort of image on the stairs when they appear to get a smaller one between the banisters. "Wait, you just got something."
"Where?"
"On the staircase. It's standing on the step." Charlotte leans over, attempting to get a better look. Her eyes go wide and she looks at her friends in disbelief.
"That's a really small human. That's like a--"
"Wait, is it raising it's hand?" Kat asks as she see's the arm of the figure raise into the air.
"It's raising it's hand!" Jordan exclaims.
"It's a little girl," Sam says before it disappears. "What the fuck was that?"
"Did it not do this...?" Kat raises her arm. "And the it disappeared."
Olivia nods. "Yeah, no, it definitely did."
Sam moves to the front of the staircase and steps closer to it. "That must've been, like, literally this tall." He holds his hand out below the stair's railing.
Colby moves off to the side. "I mean, the mirror is right here. Was it one of us?"
Charlotte immediately shakes her head. "No, there's no way."
"It was below the mirror," Sam explains.
Kat leans forward, pointing between the banisters. "It looked like it was in this."
"Oh, my God! Like a little kid peaking out between the banisters."
Sam moves back and scans the area again, attempting to get another look. Although, they can't seem to get anything else. "I feel like if you can't get it again, that proves that it was, like, a little kid or something."
Kat nods, pointing at her. "Yeah, that proves it."
"Wait, yeah. We're trying to recreate this right now and we can't."
"Lift it up a little, to like debunk that." Sam lifts up the camera to view the mirror, and they see nothing. "There's the mirror. Okay. Damn!"
"To your point, Liv, like, us not being able to recreate it... that proves it more."
Jordan nods. "Yeah. Especially since we're all in the same spot... it just like it kinda ran away."
Everyone nods along, agreeing with their theory before they decide to move on, not getting anything else on the camera. "Okay, well, if that was a little kid, one that haunts this Washoe Club, you're welcome to stay with us tonight. Come upstairs and talk to us, communicate a little more." Kat starts laughing slightly. "Not anything past tonight! Just tonight."
"While we're here."
THE CRYPT
The group stands outside the Crypt, ready the begin the next part of their investigation while Sam holds the camera. "There were 77 bodies rumored to be stacked up right behind me when it was, like, winter. And a lot of them were little kids, so it has some dark energy in here. You know, what's interesting too... I'll tell you when we go inside." Colby says, turning around to push the door. "It's a pull door, not a push."
"It literally says pull," Charlotte says, pointing to the paper.
"Shh," Colby says, draping an arm around her shoulders. "No one saw that."
"Yeah," Jordan nods. "It's not like it's on camera or anything."
"The spirits are messing with you brain, I swear."
Charlotte nods, joking around that the ghosts were in fact messing with Colby's brain before she and Kat hear a loud thump. Sam and Colby, like the true paranormal investigators they were, decide to check it out, although they don't really get much of an answer for anything. So, they push past it and start their next investigation.
"One time there was an exorcism that was trying to perform here to make sure that it was less haunted, or whatever, get rid of all the negative energy and int he dust, the word stop appeared. So, obviously it didn't really work and that negative energy is still around."
Sam continues on with Colby's story. "The guide said, when we were in the first room, the saloon, he said 'I heard voices from the Crypt.'"
"And while we were unpacking and stuff, in this room, we heard something shaking." Charlotte and the girls nod along, but they hadn't heard anything at all.
"You guys always just hit me with some new, crazy info and it's like 'wow, that's crazy!'" Kat laughs awkwardly.
Charlotte nods. "Yeah, you little bastards."
The group continues on with their investigation and Charlotte watches as Colby pulls something out of Sam's backpack, which appeared to be a spirit box. As Sam starts rolling the camera, Charlotte steps over next to him, preparing for the next investigation. "Okay, guys, so the next part of the investigation is going to be in here, the Crypt. So, Char is going to do the Estes method in here and--"
Charlotte's eyes go wide almost immediately and she turns to look at him. "Wait, I'm sorry, hold on... Char is going to do what now?"
"The Estes Method," Colby shrugs shamelessly.
Charlotte blinks. "In here? Blindfolded? With the ghosts? After I just got scratched?"
He nods. "Yeah, exactly."
"You must be high as a freaking kite it you think I'm letting a ghost use me as a communication vessel," Charlotte says sternly.
Colby looks at her for a moment before shaking his head. "No, I'm just kidding, but we are going to talk with the spirits with the spirit box."
Charlotte clutches her chest, letting out a sigh of relief. "Oh, Jesus. I thought you were serious for a second."
Colby laughs, draping his arm around her shoulders and pulling her in. "No, we wouldn't do that to you. Not after what happened tonight."
Charlotte smiles at him gratefully before they actually begin the investigation. The camera cuts and Charlotte is back, standing beside Jordan while Colby holds the spirit box in his hand. "Here we go."
Immediately after the spirit box is turned on, it says something, causing the girls to freak out (especially Charlotte). They attempt to get a few more answers but don't really get any distinct ones.
Colby asked about how many bodies were stored inside the Crypt, and it says five. Next, Sam moved on to ask about the third floor and if there's anything that they were scared of. They didn't receive an answer, but the spirit box did let them know they wanted the group to stay. Oh, and that someone or something had been following them, to which the group learned was the figure on the stairs. Everyone jumped immediately, Charlotte and Jordan clutching onto each other while everyone takes a moment to freak out.
Then, Sam says they have a "game" for the group to play.
Charlotte's eyes go wide. "Game? What game? I don't want to play a game."
Colby shakes his head. "No. No, it's for Sam and I, not you guys."
Charlotte lets out a heavy breathe, pretending to wipe the sweat from her forehead. "Oh, thank God."
The camera cuts and the four girls are standing beside Sam as he holds a couple flashlight. Colby is behind the camera. "Now, we're going to be doing another trigger event. If this really was used as a Crypt, why not stay here in a burlap sack, just as they would have done back in the day."
Jordan's eyes go wide and she looked in between the two boys before her finger slowly creeps to her nose. The other girls realize quickly and follow along. Then, Colby does as well. Sam takes a moment before he realizes. "I thought we'd let the spirits decide," he says, trying his best to get out of it.
In unison, all four girls say "oh." Jordan nods. "That's a good way to get out of that."
Everyone laughs before Sam moves on to explain how it would work. He explains that him and Colby will each set up a flashlight on either end and stand beside it. The first light that turns on is whom the spirits decide they want to stay with them. Or as Sam says, manipulate.
"Well, obviously the little girl spirits like you more, so..." Colby says, pointing to Sam.
Sam immediately shakes his head, motioning for him to cut it out. "You have connections with little girls, right?" Colby asks.
Olivia nods. "He just absolutely loves little girls."
Charlotte nods. "Lots of minors here, guys."
Sam simply gives up, shaking his head and telling Colby to cut the cameras. Everyone laughs and they move to set up the flashlights. Sam and Colby stand on either end of the room with their flashlights and the girls stand off the the side, waiting while Kat holds the camera in her hand.
"If there's any spirits in here, go tap that red flashlight over there," Colby says, pointing to Sam.
"Hey, what?" Sam asks. "All right, if there's any spirits here, decide who you want to stay with you alone. Just go on up and touch one of these flashlights next to us."
They wait for a moment and Colby looks at Sam's light. He begins to say something before the light beside him turns on. Sam shouts and Colby immediately groans loudly. Colby walks away and throws himself a pity party with his head in his hands. However, as he does, the girls notice the flashlight move and point over toward them. "It moved the flashlight!"
"Is it because I walked, thought?" Colby asks, walking near it to test the theory. It doesn't move.
"I don't like that it pointed to us," Olivia says.
"Shut up, it did!" Charlotte says, gasping.
"It actually wants us," Jordan says with wide eyes.
Charlotte shakes her head immediately and stands to her feet. "Uh-uh. Absolutely not. I'd rather jump off the third floor of this building."
"That's genuinely terrifying. We. just saw a little kid say 'yeah.'" Colby says. Meanwhile, Sam wastes no time in grabbing the sack for Colby. "Well, in that case, here's your burlap sack."
"Can you wrap me up, bruh?"
The Camera cuts once more to see Colby spinning in a circle while Sam holds the burlap, wrapping it around Colby as he spins. "You getting dizzy yet?" Charlotte asks.
"A little, but why am I the one doing all the work?" Colby asks as he gets wrapped.
Jordan suddenly starts singing the words to You Spin My Hear Right Round by Flo Rida, Olivia and Charlotte join in.
"I don't like that I actually can't move my arms right now." Charlotte laughs at Colby as he wiggles his arm around and suddenly his face goes completely blank. The two stare at each other for a moment while Jordan looked between them. "Are they going to kiss or kill each other. I can never tell."
"I'm gonna gut him like a fish." Charlotte tells the camera as Colby looks at her offended. "Hey!"
"Shut up and sit down, emo boy." Colby does as she says and attempts to sit down on the wooden platform. He fails and Charlotte comes to his rescue. Charlotte holds to sack in place and helps him lean on the wood. "Thanks for fixing my sack, Char."
Charlotte throws her arms in dramatics and shakes her head. "Oh, my God!"
Everyone laughs before they begin setting up the night vision camera and the REM Pod for Colby before leaving him in the dark for his seven minutes in Hell.
The group stands outside, listening closely in on Colby's conversations with the spirit while they try and make out what he was saying. Meanwhile, Charlotte is biting her nails in hopes that everything is okay inside and he wasn't getting possessed.
Olivia, Jordan, Kat and Sam get caught up in their own conversation before the group collectively hears Colby begin freaking out from inside. Everyone's head snaps over his way and Charlotte looks to her friends in urgency. "What's going on? Is he okay in there?"
Olivia nods, grabbing her sister's arm. "He's just fine, Char. everything is fine."
"How much longer does he have?" Charlotte asks.
Sam reaches for his phone and turns it on, only to realize he hadn't set a time. "I didn't set the timer."
Charlotte gapes at him. "Bro..."
Sam looks at the camera. "Sorry."
For the next few minutes, everything is quiet and they don't hear much from inside the Crypt while they wait for Sam's freshly set timer to tick down. When it does, they rush into the Crypt and attempt to scare Colby. He stands up, asking for help out of the sack as he explains what he experienced. He tells them the spirit will be with them for the rest of the night.
So, they make their way upstairs to the most haunted and most terrifying part of the building. The second floor and the Red Room.