“There have always been ghosts,” I say. “Even when there’s no one around to see.”

“Yeah, but now there’re cameras and CGI to monetize the shit out of them. You’re in luck, kid. Hemslock’s the best screamer in the business. Made ghost reality shows cool again. He had a couple of setbacks the last few years, but they’re throwing big money behind him this time.”

I know little of Hollywood, but I know directors are usually involved and hear no mention of one for this production.

“That’s not uncommon with these types of shows. Hemslock made his name with the solo survivalist format—you know, the ones where you do all your own filming on a handheld camera, pretending you’re the only one there? That’s his brand—him versus the world—so it’s par for the course. Twenty years ago, he would go this solo. But he’s a big name nowadays, so we’re here taking the risks for him first.”

“You’re friends with him?”

“Dunno if friend is the right word. Colleague, drinking partner. Know some of his family. Southern boy. His ma’s big on church. Dad served in ’Nam. Joe—that’s his younger brother—died in a car accident. Some uncles and aunts he likes to talk about—an Aunt Elle who was arrested for fraud and an Uncle Mal who was in the Irish mob or something. He always said he got his bravado from his uncle.”

Goatee looks around at the crew working. “That group’s gonna check the caves, figure out which caverns we can film. Then there are the cameramen for interviews, for following Hemslock, and for whatever B-roll footage we haven’t gotten already. Light and sound guys to make everything watchable. Editors to make sure shit makes sense, figure out if we need more footage. Most are gonna head back to the mainland before filming begins. Hemslock wants as few people around for that as possible.”

Some of the crew members are watching videos of Hemslock on his previous shows in the mess hall when I enter. Hemslock is a large man with a head of yellow hair and pale skin tanned from the sun. In one video, his hair is long and disheveled, and his beard is full, as he screams inside a temple in Cambodia for Khmer Rouge spirits to come and assault him. In another he is clean shaven with a crew cut, sitting in darkness inside a castle while making demands for unseen things to curse him. In one more he is being forced out of a shrine by several irate priests. Hemslock is shouting, accusing the priests of harassment.

“Kinda ironic,” says one of the show’s editors, a dark-skinned man who wears a wide-brimmed straw hat. “Considering all that shit that went down with him after this aired.”

“He doesn’t respect sacred places,” I say from behind them.

The two crew members jump, their fear melting into relief when they see me.

“Don’t sneak up on us like that!” a redheaded woman gasps.

“Causing outrage in sacred places is what made him popular,” Straw Hat explains. “People eat this up.”