Spirits

General information
The term 'spirit' and the term 'ghost' is often used pretty much interchangeably by the general populace. For those people really in the know, the difference between a spirit and a ghost is that a spirit always has some kind of autonomy (ie, spirits as a group do not include repeating phantasms), whereas 'ghost' is a general, catch-all term for anything that's dead and still hanging around in a (largely) non-corporeal form. Looking at it broadly, all spirits are ghosts, but not all ghosts are spirits. And getting right down to it, some spirits can be a little snobbish about terminology and get pissed when people call them ghosts. Others don't really give a damn actually.

Not all people who die become ghosts. The general lore out there is correct - ghosts are often created when someone died with unfinished business of some description. There's a lot of that out there - people who died before their time, or messily. People who didn't want to leave someone else behind. People who were angry at the world. It not always the case that their deaths had to be violent, or traumatic, but something ties them to the mortal realm, even if it's just that they happened to like their life, thank you very much, and were having too good a time to leave yet. Everyone else just merrily goes off to wherever the dead go off to. And no, sorry, spirits don't know where this is any better than the rest of us.

For years, centuries, millenia - forever, in fact, ghosts have only been able to be seen by specific people - mediums, spirit elementals, dreamwalkers etc. For the majority of the populace, ghosts didn't exist. They didn't really see them, hear them, rarely experienced them. Unless a spirit physically manifested in front of them, it was just a trick of the light, or a coincidence that plate fell off the wall at that very moment.

Since last Halloween, 'life' for a spirit has changed drastically. Somehow the veil between this world and the spirit world got drawn back, and it stayed drawn back. There was a shift in the amount of energy a ghost require to make themselves be seen. Formerly, it was that a ghost or spirit would be generally invisible to all but a few supernaturally gifted individuals, and they had to expend added energy to be visible to anyone else. But, last halloween, the spirit energy levels rose around the world - and the result was that all ghosts could be seen, all the time.

But the energy rise was only enough to allow ghosts to be seen by all, nothing more, and not completely at that.

Ghosts 'exist' permanently on the mortal plane. They don't know what's going on in the spirit realm - so no, the ghost you see in the graveyard cannot tell you about what Auntie Joan wanted you to know, or pass you on messages from the other side. Neither do spirits have the ability to travel to any other plane of existence - they cannot, for example, enter the dreaming, or the inbetween.

Appearance and Communication

Your average ghost will appear to most people to be 'ghostly' (for want of a better word) - ie, semi-transparent, see-through. In this state, they can walk through walls, fall through chairs rather than sit down etc. They are visible, they can see the world around them, but they have one hell of a time properly interacting with it.

Also, in this state, people can walk through them, and if someone walks through a ghost, or a ghost walks through them, or touches them? It's gonna be cold - icy cold. A brush-touch won't hurt, but if, for example, someone holds their hand 'in' a ghost for an extended period of time, they will run the risk of frostbite. And a ghost walking through a person will hurt that person. Ghosts make the immediate area around them cold as well, drawing energy in from heat to be seen. This is not something they can control or turn off.

A ghost's appearance is always semi-transparent at best (unless you're a dreamwalker, then you follow the dreamwalker rules for seeing spirits). Unless a spirit is manifested, they do not appear to be solid. Many ghosts also bear the injuries of their death, though not all of them do. Their look is very dependent on their own self image, however they feel they should look (though most spirits do not realize this, and therefore never change how they look accordingly. After all, it isn't as if they've seen themselves in mirrors to even know, now is it?).

Being able to be seen also doesn't mean that they can do nifty things like, say, be heard, or move things. To be able to do this kind of thing, a spirit needs more energy that what is baseline available throughout the world. This is the reason why some ghosts are spirits and able to communicate, whereas some ghosts never gain the ability to communicate with the world around them - these ghosts cannot tap into an additional energy source.

Energy Sources
There are various energy sources available to a spirit for use in communication and interaction. These can be broken down into the following categories:-

• Areas of supernatural significance - These are places such as graveyards, the area immediately surrounding a fae gate etc. The amount of energy available from places such as these is constant - which means that if there is more than one spirit in an area such as this, the amount of energy has to be shared between them.
• Areas of personal significance - These are places which are significant to the individual spirit (and must be detailed at character creation). Often these are areas such as the spirit's former home, place of work etc. Spirits gain more energy from areas of personal signifcance than they do from areas of supernatural significance.
• Significant energy sources - Spirits can use physical energy sources to temporarily increase their energy levels. They can most easily steal electricity, draining batteries, power supplies, etc. However the charge they draw in is not equal to what it gives them the ability to do. For instance, if they drain a fresh car battery, that's not going to keep them going like the energizer bunny. They may have time for a short conversation. If they're just draining little things, they can do small things, like expend enough energy to make a knocking sound when someone asks, or to draw attention to themselves.
• Natural energy sources - Spirits can draw energy from living things--but this is very not good for said living things. Draining a life force from someone or something weakens and brings it closer to death. Plants, for instance, often will die now in the presence of spirits, if they're around too long. They will gain some energy from it, but if it's just say, a small house plant, that isn't going to fuel them very much. If they draw from animals or people, that works much better, but still will not fuel them for long. Also, it will sicken those it takes from. Small amounts of life force drawn will make the subject light headed and woozy or dizzy. Greater amounts will cause longer term illness, and significant amounts can cause terminal illness and eventual death.

Note on natural and significant energy sources: In order to draw energy from anything, contact needs to be made with the subject, and any breaking off of that contact stops the transfer entirely and it needs to be re-connected to start up the drain again (note: to draw energy from the earth, the spirit only needs to be standing on it - that is the connection, however they can only draw energy around a radius of 5 ft from themselves at any one time). This could be where legends of spirits stealing children's lives when they sleep comes from, who knows, but where as one time it was an exceedingly rare thing--it's just kicked right back into gear with the veil drawn back.

Communication
To be able to make themselves heard and communicate to the world around them, a spirit only actually needs a small amount of additional energy. As such, spirits generally do not have a problem making themselves heard and talking to others within an area of supernatural or personal significance. Outside of these areas, a spirit can also communicate, but they will have to draw energy from energy sources. If a spirit does not have an active energy source, they will have to rely on stored energy. Now, this isn't to say that they have a neverending battery supply. Spirits only have so much of a charge they can hold at one time. This partially explains why they can be so erratic. They may run out of energy before they get their message across.

Interaction and Manifestation
In order for spirits to interact more with the world around them - for example moving objects, or manifesting, they must use significantly more energy than is needed for mere communication. As such, there must be more energy available, and the spirit will be unable to maintain anything for very long.

For example, a spirit in an area of personal significance may be able to expend enough energy to throw a ball, but they wouldn't be able to hold that ball for an extended period of time first.

Spirits with enough energy available to them can manifest, that is, they can appear as human for a period of time. Manifested spirits appear 'alive' - that is, they breathe, they have a heart beat, the whole thing. However, manifestation uses up a huge amount of energy and spirits cannot hold this for any more than a couple of minutes at a time. Also, if a spirit uses up all the available energy during a manifestation, they may have communication problems for some time afterwards.

Note: it is not necessary for a spirit to fully manifest to move objects, meaning that a spirit can interact in a limited way without manifestation. For example, a spirit could poke someone without manifesting, but if they wanted to give someone a hug? that would require manifestation.

Where are these spirits? How many of them are there?

The ratio between people and spirits is about 15 to 1. Where they are is all over, though there are places that they're more likely to be. There's actually quite a lot of them wandering the lakeshore, walking up and down the beaches or the road that lines the lake. They would be around cemeteries, and the orphanage. They would also be in rather cliche areas as well--crash sites, hotels, theaters, churches, murder sites, funeral homes, hospitals, houses where someone died, where bad things happened, etc--where you'd expect them to be.

Exorcism

It is possible to exorcise a ghost or spirit, though this can generally only be successfully done by an exorcist. There are various books available (if you know where to look) on exorcism, but unless you are trained in the rituals, these are unlikely to work for you. Most exorcists are specialist talisman practitioners.

A truly successful exorcism will force the ghost to 'move on' - though nobody (including the ghosts themselves) really knows where they are forced to move on to. this means that exorcism is a frightening possibility for most spirits, who often consider exorcism as 'the second death'.

Exorcisms done by any but a trained expert are unlikely to truly force a ghost to move on - usually they simply force a ghost to 'go away' - banishing them from the immediate vicinity for that time, though there's nothing to stop the ghost coming back again the next day.

Specific types of ghosts

Bound Spirits
Bound spirits are spirits that have been bound to something - either a person, an object, or a specific geographical area. Spirits can either be bound after death, or a person may end up as a bound spirit when they die. That said, a person cannot cast a spell upon themselves or another to ensure that when the subject dies, that subject will become a bound spirit. Bound spirits can also be bound and unbound by Spirit elementals.

Most people who become spirits after death simply become normal spirits, however there is a chance that some people will become automatically bound spirits. This is the result of the influence of magic. If the person dies a traumatic death in an area of high magic use, they are more likely to become a bound spirit. the more traumatic the death, and the more magic use in an area, the more likely it is that, should that person become a spirit, they will become a bound spirit. This likelihood increase yet again if the person is actually killed by magic.

Normal spirits can also be bound at any time, by the use of one of a variety of spells. There is not one single spell for binding spirits, but a handful of options available.

Bound spirits have an advantage over most spirits in that the magic which binds them to the area, object or person creates a specific and special connection. It makes the object of binding significant as an energy source, and the spirit is permanently connected to that energy source. As a result, a bound spirit never has communication problems, and finds it easier to manifest for long periods of time (but still never more than five minutes at a time). Bound spirits can also channel the energy available to them to call down lightning - though this is exhausting for them and cannot be done on a regular basis. Because of this, also, it is very dangerous (though the danger is not well known or researched) for a spirit to be bound to a person, as the spirit will, in essence, be permanently sapping that person's life force.

Bound spirits are tied to whatever they area bound to - not literally, of course, but they cannot stray far from it. So a spirit who is bound to, say, Marquette can only go as far as the city limits and can never leave. Likewise, a spirit who is bound to an item such as a cup, or a necklace, must stay within a short distance of that item, and a spirit that is bound to a person must stay within a similar distance of that person. (this varies from spirit to spirit, some being only a few yards, others being up to fifty feet but never over fifty feet)

Possession Spirits
Some of the spirits who are out there and who haven't moved on, for some reason or another cannot cope with having an existence, but not having a body. These spirits often become possessors, and have worked out ways to take over the living. They can only possess humans, and only those who aren't supernaturally inclined. For some reason, whatever makes a person 'special' blocks the spirits from entering in, no one's sure why. That doesn't stop them from trying, but so far, it's not been successful.

When a spirit possesses someone, generally it first takes a lot of work. The subject must be broken down, exhausted, emotionally drained for them to take hold. Before spirits were able to be seen, they often did this with poltergeist-type activity, causing the person to not sleep well, and to be 'seeing things' or dealing with their plates and other objects being thrown around the room. These days the task is harder, but it's still not only possible, but with the overall panic the world is gripped in, it's easier than it's ever been.

Once a spirit is in possession of someone else, whoever they used to be gets pushed back. They don't have control, and are trapped in their own body. Sometimes, if the personality is strong enough (though usually it's the weaker willed that get possessed in the first place), they may be a 'voice' in the back of the spirit's 'mind', but usually they lie quiet and terrified as they are helpless to stop what they're witnessing. Other people block it all out entirely, or try to.

Possession spirits rarely if ever give up a host. Getting in is a huge, involved process to begin with, it isn't like changing socks. So usually, once there, they're staying there until either the host dies, or they're exorcised. Some exorcism rituals merely expel the spirit from the host and they're free to go find themselves a new one, others not only expel the spirit but also push it 'forward' wherever the next life, realm, whatever has in store. Since there are more exorcists around these days, some of these spirits have taken to ejecting themselves during an exorcism rite, to avoid 'death'. Dime store exorcists who don't really know what they're doing will assume the spirit is gone, even if they're just free to take back over later. Experienced exorcists ensure the spirit is 'gone' and will often take steps to ensure the victim cannot be possessed again.

Possession spirits don't have any failsafe whatsoever against exorcism. They can be expelled, and if they are through any magical means, they're weakened for a time afterwards, even if they escape 'death'. They can't build up enough strength to possess a new host for at least a month after being exorcised.

Repeating Phantasms
Repeating phantasms do not have their own will. They do not interact with people, though people may experience the results of their actions. The actions of repeating phantasms vary - some simply stand in one spot, others appear to be stuck in a loop, repeating the same actions over and over and over again.

What repeating phantasms are are ghosts with only a small or no energy source to draw on. A spirit needs to draw on energy from the environment around them to interact properly with the world. The less energy available to a spirit, the less they are 'there'. A spirit with little or no energy available to them will fade and become, well, more ghostly. Eventually they will fade to such an extent that they can be overlooked by people, and even may start to flicker in and out of existence. A spirit at this level also loses their ability to think and reason - hence why they often simply stop, or get stuck in a repeating pattern.

Any repeating phantasm which is successfully interrupted from their actions and introduced to an energy source again can regain previous functionality.