[hr][hr][center][h3][color=#97e300]Miguel de la Cruz[/color] [img]https://i.imgur.com/7jufPG7.png[/img] [color=#97e300]ǝʇɹǝnW ɐl ǝp lǝnƃᴉW[/color][/h3][hr][color=#97e300]Location:[/color] Château de La Lune: Azalea [color=#97e300]Skills:[/color] N/A[/center][hr][hr] Miguel shut off the spirit box, groaning a bit as he set the device down on the bed - he'd been tempted to throw it, as he had been tempted a thousand times before, but it was different now that it was his own money paying for the tech. He couldn't afford to abuse his equipment. He didn't have a big corporate bank account to fall back on - not that trashing equipment on purpose had been acceptable back then anyways. It was small, at least - small enough to fit into his backpack, where he'd stashed more of his ghost hunting equipment he'd need. The family didn't want him poking around the paranormal here, so he wasn't going to leave this sort of stuff in his suitcase. He took another moment to look around the overly pink room, before something caught his eye that he hadn't noticed before - some papers left on the desk. Wifi information, a schedule of everything that was going to happen, dinner options, and an info-sheet about the château. Miguel picked up the papers, his stomach growling a bit as those dinner options looked more and more appealing, before he spotted something horrifying. He gasped, his hands going cold as he dropped the papers, everything completely forgotten, even his hunger. It was a photo of a gravestone. [i]Bruno de la Cruz.[/i] Miguel stared at the photo for a long while, before he snatched it up, the nausea skyrocketing as the world looked a little blurry, as it swayed around him, and for a moment, he was sure that he was going to faint - that any attempts at clinging to consciousness were futile. On the back of the photo, written in neat, precise handwriting: [i]"How does an ofrenda work?” [/i] What the actual [i]fuck[/i] was going on here? Did they know? Could they know? Miguel turned the photograph over again, and again, and again. It was the same every time. He didn't know what to do about it. He didn't know what to think. What sort of sick joke was this??? He felt trapped, like a cornered animal - caged in on an island with people he didn't know, people who were trying to play some sort of game with him. If they knew, he'd rather they just say it with their fucking chest, he'd rather - [i]Jeanne.[/i] She might know something. Her text from earlier had said she'd be in the solarium. Without another thought, Miguel was out in the hallway, his gaze a bit crazed as he closed the door behind him, and gave an awkward smile to the employees with the bags. [color=#97e300]"Gracias!"[/color] He saw they had his bag. He wanted to go find Jeanne. But he hated to be rude. [color=#97e300]"I can take that,"[/color] he added, before grabbing his suitcase. He turned around, reopened the door to his room, and practically chucked the suitcase inside, before locking the door again behind him. [color=#97e300]"Mondays, am I right?"[/color] [hr][center][color=#97e300]Location:[/color] Château de La Lune: Solarium [color=#97e300]Skills:[/color] Acting [/center][hr] By the time Miguel found Jeanne in the solarium, his nerves had not yet abated. Any attempts to keep the photograph from becoming a crumpled, crinkled mess were in vain. He alternated between holding it out in front of him, staring in a mixture of horror and disbelief, and shoving it into his pocket, so no one else could see. There wasn’t a day that went by that he didn’t think about his brother - that he didn’t think about Bruno. He didn’t smoke, but he would have killed for a cigarette. [color=#97e300]“Hey,”[/color] Miguel said, forcing a smile onto his face that didn’t meet his eyes. [color=#97e300]“What the fuck is going on?”[/color] He held out the photograph to her - not accusing her, but rather, accusing this place, this family. If she’d been following his content for as long as she said, then she’d know about Bruno. Jeanne's face lit up when Miguel came into the solarium. “Hey,” she frowned and looked at the photo he held out. Her face fell the rest of the way. “Oh. God. Wait, what do you mean?” She looked up at Miguel with pure confusion on her face. [color=#97e300]“I found this in my room,”[/color] he explained, starting to pace back and forth, the photo still held out in front of him as if it was an active hazard - as if its toxins would adsorb to his skin if he let it come too close. “A photo of my dead brother’s grave. Asking how to get in touch with his ghost - as if I hadn’t tried to talk to Bruno a thousand times before.” Jeanne was the only one in her family with any interest in the occult. Her cousins didn't care. Her aunts and uncles didn't care. None of them gave one single iota of care toward the magnificence that was the home they lived in. Sure Jeanne wanted to move to Paris but who wouldn't want to move from their isolated home to the best city in the world? She didn't even think any of her family would have a clue who Miguel was. His referral for the award hadn't been from any of them. The staff were all old, well except for the two maids who were barely competent. She started chewing on her nails. “I don't know who could have left it. Who would even know.” She shook her head. “No one here even knows you. The awards are nominated from the community and the family. I know no one in the family nominated you. So they couldn't know,” she told him. Her voice was raising with worry. He stopped in his pacing for a moment, as relief flooded him. No one in the family nominated him? They didn’t know who he was? As soon as the tension faded though, he couldn’t help but be frustrated with himself. Had Jeanne done this, then? Was she an obsessed fan he had made the mistake of trusting? Miguel stared at her for a moment. His gut instinct told him to trust her - that she was genuine - that this wasn’t her. So it was someone else, then. Someone who took the time to learn enough about him to know about Bruno. He didn’t talk about his brother very much - just one or two mentions over years of content. It was painful to think about what had happened. [color=#97e300]“Okay,”[/color] he said finally. [color=#97e300]“Okay. Who nominated me? And who has access to my room?”[/color] Jeanne opened her mouth to say something then snapped it shut. She looked down at the ground. Her cheeks and ears turned red. “I nominated you. Anyone in the whole house has access to your room. But I nominated you. I didn't think it would work. I didn't think you'd reach out to me. I didn't even know for sure you'd get shortlisted. But you did.” She looks back up at him, chewing on her lip. “I promise I didn't plan anything. I just wanted to give you a chance to win and if you did it'd be so good for you. And I didn't think I'd ever tell you. No one is supposed to know who nominated them.” Miguel nodded, reaching out and putting a gentle hand on her arm. [color=#97e300]“I believe you,”[/color] he reassured her, even as his mind was turning. [color=#97e300]“But now I need you to be my man - my [i]woman[/i] on the inside. Can you figure out who’s handwriting this is? Do some snooping where I can’t?”[/color] Jeanne smiled brightly, and nodded. She took the photo and looked at the writing. “I don’t recognize it. But I’ll poke around.” She had access to the private areas of the house. [color=#97e300]“Sick,”[/color] Miguel forced another smile. He hated this. He hated all of this. It was supposed to be an interesting video topic, a guaranteed million views. It wasn’t - it wasn’t supposed to dig up the literal skeleton in his closet. [color=#97e300]“You’re a real one, J.”[/color] Some tension left Jeanne’s shoulders. It had been there when she confessed to having nominated Miguel but it left now. The nervousness in her was the thrill of mystery. Who was behind this photo? “Thank you,” she said. “I’ll see you at dinner. We might have better luck pretending to not know each other during dinner. That way no one thinks you have someone on the inside. Right?” [color=#97e300]“Oh shit, yeah, good idea,”[/color] he agreed, a bit embarrassed for a moment it hadn’t even occurred to him yet. [color=#97e300]“Let’s meet back here tonight - around midnight? If you want, I can even bring the spirit box, and we can take it for a whirl in the foyer.”[/color] “C'est génial.”