"Wait!" Kris called out from inside the bathroom, but it was too late. Ashley already left the room, jogging down the hallway. She just needed to be sure that no one was in danger.

When she reached the lobby, Justin was wearing casual clothing and leaning against the counter, and there was another woman on the other side of it. They had been talking and laughing but looked up as soon as Ashley came down the stairs.

"Hello," the woman said, smiling politely. "Can I help you?"

"Sorry to disturb you but I, uh..." She hesitated, not knowing how she should ask it. "Didn't you just see the person who ran outside like five minutes ago?"

The woman frowned and Ashley glanced at the name pinned to her chest. Nora. "No, I'm sorry," she said. "No one has left this hotel since I started my shift..." She looked at Justin.

"I didn't see anyone either and I've been here for the past five hours. You guys were the only ones walking in or out, the other guests have stayed in their rooms," he confirmed.

"Are you sure? Shouldn't we, like, search them? The snowstorm's almost here," Ashley insisted, but both just shook their heads.

"No one has left this hotel recently. You must've seen something else and mistaken it for a person," Justin explained. "It's late, not to be rude, but maybe you should go to sleep soon."

"Ashley!" Kris shouted from behind, running down the stairs. "What the fuck?"

Both Sam and Colby were following her, the blond holding up the camera once again. Ashley quickly smiled at the two workers and turned around to walk back to the other three. She tried to calm her rapidly beating heart down and take even breaths.

"Ashley, what are you doing?" Colby hissed, quickly catching up with her.

"I just saw something and thought it was a person even though it wasn't," she said, shrugging it off. Colby waved Sam and the camera closer.

"Wha- when?"

"Well, I was standing at the window and looked out and there was this person running out of the front door, so I wanted to make sure no one was in danger," she quickly explained.

"Wait, come on. Show us what you saw at the window," Sam said, hurrying to get back to the girls' room.

Back at the window, she hesitantly positioned herself in front of the window.

"I don't think..." she began, but Sam interrupted her.

"Just explain it." He held the camera closer so the audience would see what she pointed at.

"So, I pulled the curtains to the side to see if I had dropped my ring here. But then I saw this person just bolting out of the hotel, running across the street. And then they disappeared in the darkness." She pointed at the entrance of the hotel, which was directly below them, and raised her hand to point to the forest across the street. "I obviously thought it was someone and got worried, so I walked down to talk to Justin. But he and Nora said they had seen no one. And they're sitting right in front of the entrance."

"What were they wearing?" Colby asked. As Ashley looked back at him, she saw him and Sam exchange a meaningful glance.

"I didn't see it that well," she answered hesitantly. "Some kind of coat, I think. Wait, no, now that I think of it, it could've been a dress as well..."

"Okay, that's crazy. Just for the viewers – Ashley and Kris don't know a lot about this place or the haunting. We usually film the explanatory part with the guests in the background, but they stayed here, in their room, while we were in the other room," Colby started. Ashley frowned, where was he going with this?

"So, obviously, as you guys know, the most known part of the haunting is the piano that starts playing randomly. But another thing people see often is..." He looked at Ashley. Her eyes widened.

"Don't tell me..."

"Yeah, people staying in this room have reported seeing a person running out of the hotel in a coat or dress. Repeatedly. Always the same motion."

"No. Way." Ashley raised her hands to her head, brushing through her hair and staring at him in shock. "Like a residual energy?"

"Yes. But the best part is, you genuinely couldn't know it," Colby said. He was grinning now too, pure happiness over what had been happening the entire evening.

"This is so crazy. I don't even want to go to sleep, so much is happening!" Ashley was laughing, throwing herself on the couch. "I feel like we only have to take a step and we see or feel so much!"

"Me neither. I think we need to do something more, we can't just leave this," Sam agreed. "Colby?"

"Yeah?"

"I have an idea." They all looked at him, waiting for him to explain. "You remember the Cosmo hotel? And the Black Swan estate?"

The brunette stared at him for a second before his eyes lit up and he started grinning. "You mean the..."

"Yeah, exactly."

"Is this some kind of best friend telepathy?" Kris asked, saying exactly what Ashley had been thinking. "The hell are you guys talking about?"

"Have you heard of this thing called a Psychomanteum?" Colby asked, wiggling his eyebrows.

"That sounds... I don't know. What is it?" Ashley asked.

"It's a small, enclosed area with a chair, dim lighting like candles, and two mirrors facing each other," Colby explained.

"Oh, a vortex. Nice," she said, lowering her hands to her hips.

"Exactly. The idea is doing the Estes method while only staring at yourself or the darkness in the mirror."

"That sounds scary as fuck. But I'm in," the redhead grinned. "How do we set that up?"

"Kris, what do you say? Sounds good?" Sam asked. Kris nodded, clapping her hands together.

"Absolutely. I've never done anything like that, let's do it."

While Sam took the camera to quickly explain what it was about and how it worked, the other three started setting it up. They used the corner where between the bedroom and the living room to hang up two of the girls' bedsheets and put the rocking chair in the space. Then they got two mirrors, one from the boys' and one from the girls' bathroom, and positioned them to face each other. There weren't any candles in the room, so Kris and Sam decided to go and get some from Justin or Nora. They returned quickly, placing the candle on the small table next to the mirror.

"We're all set up," Colby then stated. He took the camera and quickly filmed the insides of the psychomanteum for the viewers. "Looks cozy in there."

"Just so you guys know, I'm not doing it first," Ashley said, laughing nervously. "That looks too sketchy."

"Alright, should I begin?" Colby offered. Sam nodded and handed him the spirit box and noise-cancelling headphones. Then they positioned a night vision camera right next to the mirror on the table with a perfect view of Colby's face.

They closed the curtain and Colby put on the headphones. Absentmindedly, Ashley looked down at the watch on her wrist and gasped.

"Sam, Kris! It's 3:03 in the morning!"

"Perfect timing," the blonde guy said. "Ilse Hoffman, are you here with us?"

"Ring."

"No way. There's absolutely no way that's a coincidence. Ashley, you haven't found your ring yet?" Sam's voice was high-pitched, and they all could sense his excitement.

"Nope, it's still gone," she answered, holding up her hand as proof. She was wearing two rings on her index and little finger, but her middle finger was just as empty as before.

"Ilse, why did you take her ring? What do you want with it?" Kris asked.

The room was silent, three young adults waiting for an answer in anticipation, the fourth sitting behind a wall of bedsheets, wearing headphones and staring into a mirror.

"Name."

"Um, I'm Ashley, this is Kris, and he is Sam," Ashley said. "Do you want to tell us your name?"

"I."

Ashley slowly turned around to stare at Sam and Kris. "There's no way," she whispered. "He said, I. Like Ilse."

The other two looked just as shocked as she.

"Are there any other spirits or ghosts here? Or are you alone?" Kris asked. She was clutching her fingers nervously, her eyes darting back and forth between the psychomanteum and Ashley.

"Just."

"Just you? Okay, that's good," Ashley said. She was back to playing with her bracelets, rubbing them up and down her wrist. "Do you want to tell us how you died? Did you... did you fall into the river?"

It was silent for at least a minute. The three on the outside looked at each other. "Don't you want us to talk about your death?" Sam finally spoke up.

No answer, the room stayed eerily quiet.

"Ilse, are you still here with us?" Kris asked. "Just give us a sign that you're here and we'll continue talking to you."

"Mirror."

"Colby's looking into a mirror, yes," Sam said. "Are you going to show yourself to him? In the mirror?"

Ashley's eyes widened as he asked that. "Why would you say that?" she hissed. "He's going to get a heart attack when there's suddenly a head popping up from behind him."

Before Sam could answer, Colby talked again. "Shower."

"Are you in the shower?" Kris asked, frowning again.

"Wait, mirror and shower? Maybe the mirror in the bathroom?" Sam suggested, turning the camera to the bathroom door only a few feet away from them.

"I'm going to check," Ashley said. "I kinda want to see her peeking from behind me."

"And you said I shouldn't have told her about the mirror in front of Colby," Sam chuckled. "Alright, tell us if you see something."

Ashley nodded and walked across the room, turning on the lights in the bathroom and cautiously looking around. "Uh- guys?" she then said, staring at the bathroom mirror.