Pieces of dead matter float in a viscuous blue liquid. Dead in the last stages before being set into molds for parts of artificial ghost limbs. Matter is sent through several sessions of purification before certification. The research facility concerning paranormal activity hardly recognizes this behavior. They are so busy chasing crop circles anything not manmade slips under the radar. The ghosts can get away with anything, including setting up an entire military-industrial complex.
Paranormal Researcher: "I pretend to be fascinated by the unknown, but it's really myself that fascinates me. I share my findings online with my research partners, but in reality I see them all as extensions of my own solipsistic world, a tidal pool with no end."
I don't want to die, but parts of me do.
In life, the real ghosts evade me. Searching for plateaus until the long slide downward, I install tiny receptors in my eyes to augment my vision. Overlay displays of deceased colonies, even the dead move on. Their populations are moving, leaving behind cities Youth catches up to me as ghosts from my past manufacture my own demise. It's inevitable that the research must end. The End approaches, beneath detection, not out of malice but to manufacture future haunting.
From: Greg Bear
Very cool, Addison! Now turn this into a story--or pitch it as a TV series...
Arthur C. Clarke postulated that there have been one hundred billion humans on this world since the beginning. Makes for a crowded planet if they don't move on!
Actually brings some death metal to mind. Maybe something in the vein of Nocturnus.
From: Mike Glosson
Location: San Diego, CA
I actually looked into recently Sir Arthur's estimate of the number of ghosts standing behind us. The actual figure is between 95 Billion and 145 Billion, with 120 Billion probably being closer to the mark.
Remember that he came up with that figure around '67 or '68, with fewer people on the planet than now, and maybe half a billion less dead historically.
I think it just fit in with that image of his that "Behind every man alive stands 100 ghosts"
From: Greg Bear
And with all those ghosts queued up, what are they waiting for? Did they take a number? And is the guy at the back last in line, or first? Questions to ponder as we approach that signpost up ahead...