[Initializing.SongofAmeliafile-T067 download]

[Download complete. Press E to play]

At its roots, ghosts are supposed to be the dead who have come back. 

But not all ghosts should come back. 

I realized this the hard way. 

Hi. My name is Thorne Amelia Rosewood, otherwise known as Amelia, Amy, or Thorne. This is a set of pre-recorded audio logs on one of those voice-recording boxes. Whatever they're called. Sorry about all that whimsical nonsense about ghosts, but I wasn't exactly wrong, just...well, you'll figure it out, or you probably already know, seeing as you're hearing this tape and have for SOME REASON come back to the quaint little planet you abandoned: Earth. Here's the story: At the kind age of 17, I have been left to start my life while a strange event took hold around the world. People would mysteriously disappear, or find strange occurrences: floating objects, warped or distorted patches of space, rooms that seem to have mundane qualities coming into existence in places there should be a different, or even multiple rooms instead, but unsettling in that they feel unnatural regardless, and claims of inhuman sightings, often dismissed as hallucinations...at least at first. Over the next few years, it happened more and more, until there was one video that changed these allegations. Someone managed to trap one of these creatures, and sent out a clear picture of it onto an open platform online: a singular image of a dark-furred shape with long limbs, strange, oily black vines with silver-tipped thorns and serrated-edge leaves wrapping around its arms and tail, a pure, obsidian black eye staring balefully out at them. Of course, it swept the world so fast (thanks, Reddit) that there was no hope for shutting it out and keeping it under wraps. It remains unclear what they are or where they're from, but it is clear they aren't friendly. There are extensive YouTube videos, Tumblr and Reddit blogs, even Facebook pages and other websites wholly dedicated to the understanding of these beasts, and how to survive them. 

And then there was a breakthrough.

These beasts were once human.

Sensitive to fire and the common objects used to kill organic beings, they were not so hard to subdue, if you knew what you were doing. A research team killed one, did some forensic, cool science-y nerd stuff, and discovered it's a mutated DNA strain, almost like a venom that changes the affected's physical structure and appearance. They don't realize what they're doing. In their minds, they're still human, and everything else are the monsters. They match up commonly with the missing people, too. 

That's when they decided to abandon the planet. 

They just neglected to bring everyone along.