Authors: Tatsuaki Ishiguro
The official I spoke with at the town hall wasn’t even aware that the radium springs existed. Searching the archives, however, he managed to ferret out a mountainous stack of papers for me. Sitting on one of the hard benches I skimmed through the documents. Half lost amidst the papers was a 1954 government survey report, part of a search for uranium that had begun directly after the establishment of a budget for nuclear power. Massive equipment had been loaded onto jeeps and used to prospect over half of Japan’s landmass. While it was nothing in comparison to the amounts found in the Ningyotoge Pass, according to the report, small amounts of both uranium and radium were found in the soil around Tomarinai. According to the report’s conclusion, however, “The concentration of elements is too low to consider mining, nor is it strong enough to have any effect on the human body.” The only result of the survey: the hot springs, which had already existed for some time, were able to add the words “Radium Spring” to their sign. Attached to the report was the official distribution map, its paper yellowing and old. The numbers listed on the map were all within standard environmental values. As the amount was so low, it seemed that most residents of Tomarinai were completely unaware that any radioactive matter lay buried in the town’s soil whatsoever. While the levels of uranium around the hot springs and the common cemetery
were slightly higher than elsewhere, they were still nowhere as high as that of the midwinter weed. The radiation distribution map and the midwinter weed’s distribution map were arrayed too similarly, however, to be mere coincidence. The midwinter weed seemed to prefer soil higher in uranium ore.
As I was preparing to leave, I thought to ask about the forced labor gangs in the area. The official at the desk knew little about them. When I asked why there was no record of Harimoto at the town hall, however, he did tell me that certificates of residence are usually disposed of five years after a person moves from the area.
Before leaving for Tokyo, I visited Harimoto in order to say my farewells. Considering his age, it was likely the last time I would ever see him.
“The weather’s beautiful, isn’t it?”
“Mm.”
“You can see the mountains so clearly today.”
“I can’t.”
“Lots of birds in the air.”
“Are there?”
“How was your lunch? Did you enjoy it?”
“Everything tastes good to me.”
Our conversation was rambling and inane, and I received only curt answers in reply. Finally, I told Harimoto that I was returning to Tokyo. When I took his hand to shake it farewell, he wouldn’t release his grip.
“The pillar … The human sacrifice … They buried him in concrete …” Harimoto burst suddenly in tears. “Don’t leave me here,” he cried. “Help me.” His voice resounded through the hospital, his crying wretched and intense. A cry more intense than I knew a human could emit. One of the nurses rushed into the room in panic.
“Not that story again,” she said. “Hush now, it’s time to sleep.” She gave him a shot of sedatives to his shoulder, and immediately he grew
slack.
“Snapped clean,” mumbled Harimoto. With eyes still half-open, his breathing settled into the steady rhythm of sleep. Fixed in Harimoto’s half-lidded, almost contemptuous glare, I listened to the echo of my own footsteps as they retreated down the hospital corridors and away from the hospital.
I drove along the dark streets to the airport, handing in my rental car key at the counter. Two-and-a-half hours later I was landing in Tokyo amidst a miraculous shower of light. I boarded the monorail, traveling through a warehouse district illuminated by orange light. My time in dark northern Hokkaido already seemed a distant memory. For the first time in days I returned to the Center for Molecular Cell Biology. Alone in my laboratory, with the strong smell of chemicals, I set my mind to the problem before me. By what mechanism had the midwinter weed managed to concentrate trace amounts of uranium to such a high level? During my flight I had toyed with the idea of bioaccumulation. But, as we know from pollution-related diseases, bioaccumulation only occurs when creatures higher on the food chain eat other creatures with radioactive materials in their bodies. Plant life is found at the bottom of the food chain, meaning that bioaccumulation shouldn’t be possible.
I ceased all other experiments and focused my concentration on tape recordings from Hokkaido, turning the wheels in my brain as I listened to the recorded voice of Harimoto. An image of the old man, sipping his porridge in the dark corner of his hospital room, floated before my eyes and his final words, “Snapped clean,” rang in my ears. Lost in thought, I stared out the window at the flickering lights of the buildings.
“The leaves shone brighter than the stems, and the flower brighter still.”
I stopped the tape. If radiation was causing the midwinter weed to glow by exciting its matter, then the difference in the light emitted
might be proof that the uranium was being concentrated via the leaves and flowers of the plant. If the execratory system of the plant’s cells failed to operate properly, it’s possible that the level of heavy metals within the cells would increase, leading to a higher concentration. I had carried back some of the soil from Tomarinai. If the composition of the uranium in the soil and in the midwinter weed matched, then it would be indirect proof of bioaccumulation.
Carrying the shielded box containing the midwinter weed, as well as the plastic bag full of Tomarinai soil, I immediately went to see Dr. Narumi at his radiation laboratory. I quickly thanked him for his earlier work before eagerly explaining my theory of bioaccumulation to him.
“It doesn’t sound very realistic, does it?” replied Narumi, calmly. He was shaking one of his test tubes as he spoke. He was right, of course. It sounded almost like a story from some narcotic dream.
Several days later, Dr. Narumi showed up at my laboratory without warning. He had mapped the plant’s radioactivity. Surprisingly, it was just as I had thought. The radiation was stronger in the leaves and the flowers than it was in the root or the stem. He apologized for scoffing at my ideas earlier.
“Usually, uranium is composed of two isotopes, with a ratio of 99.3 percent Uranium-238 and 0.7 percent Uranium-235. Uranium-235 is used as an ingredient in nuclear fission. Now, I can’t say why,” he continued excitedly, “but while the composition is normal for the uranium in the soil, the ratio of Uranium-235 in the midwinter weed is significantly higher.”
When Narumi saw the blank look on my face, he reminded me that nuclear fission occurs when a neutron collides with an atomic nucleus, producing two nuclei and two neutrons and resulting in an exponential elementary chain reaction. But in order to achieve fission, a suitable amount of Uranium-235 had to be enclosed in a limited space.
“The grass family of flora will sometimes amass a large amount of
silicic acid, which accumulates on the cell walls. Once the plant dies, even after organic matter decomposes a portion of the accumulated silicic acid will remain in the soil. A similar phenomenon could be possible with uranium. Even if the DME in the plant prevents local overpopulation, over time the constant cycle of growth and accumulation must have led to a concentrated critical mass.”
Absorbed from the ground and refined by the midwinter weed, it followed that once the Uranium-235 reached a certain level nuclear fission would occur automatically. If so, not only was Nakarai’s idea of using the plant as fuel, which he invented as an expedient to further his research, correct, but given time the midwinter weed may have resulted in a naturally occurring “nuclear reactor,” or even resulted in a nuclear explosion in Tomarinai.
All along, it seems that nuclear research had been carried out in the northernmost region of Japan, and not even those involved had known. But for the midwinter weed to grow and proliferate enough to reach critical mass in the first place, a significant amount of blood would have been necessary. Feeding just a few plants had cost Nakarai his life. Even the blood of everyone in Japan may not have been enough to produce a reaction. Narumi stressed the importance of investigating whether any plant life growing in uranium mines had developed similar qualities. I immediately wrote a notice for the
Japan Newspaper of Science
, describing the situation.
Despite all the lives sacrificed in building it, the Meiwa train line was soon to be discontinued for being unprofitable. Before that happened I made my way to Tomarinai one last time, distribution map in hand, to search areas where the midwinter weed was likely to grow. Unable to accept the plant’s extinction, I continued to hold on to the idea that at least one midwinter weed continued to grow, somewhere, in hiding.
Visible through the treetops, a light mist was skimming across the lake. The withered tree, which poked out sharply from the surface, remained as always, dead but refusing to decay. Covered with their
own mottling of lichen, each tree looked distinct from the others. Nevertheless, as I wandered from the faint footpath in order to trample through the woods, I soon lost my way. Every inch of the scenery before me filled with a sense of déjà vu, and I realized that the complexity of the forest was made from a repetition of simple patterns. The wind rustling in the leaves sounded like the call of the ocean, and I was overcome by the delusion that I had sunk to the depths of a dark emerald sea. The forest was covered in a canopy of leaves, and the light was soft and mist-laden. Over and over again I thought that I had spotted the elusive midwinter weed, but drawing closer I found only local snow rhododendrons and
kobaboshi
hostas. The white flowers I thought I had seen had been only an illusion.
Wondering if some seeds might have gotten attached to Nakarai’s logbook, I did a file search in the American National Archives. While a portion of the documents related to the Imperial Japanese Army had been made public, I found no mention of Nakarai’s logbook. I knew that the majority of reports from Unit 731 remained top-secret and unavailable because of their connection to research into biological weaponry. It was possible, then, that Nakarai’s confiscated journal, and any attached seeds, would be treated in the same manner. Unit 731 escaped all wartime accountability, and that might have some bearing on Nakarai’s existence remaining lost to history for so long. Currently, I am using cloning technology in an attempt to reproduce the midwinter weed from surviving DNA. In theory, reproducing an organism from a single set of DNA should be much simpler for plants than for animals, but after such extended irradiation, damage to the midwinter weed’s DNA is just too severe. I regret to admit that the task is impossible at the current stage.
Is it so far out of the realm of possibility to think that an ordinary person, neither doctor nor scientist, might discover a new cure for a dangerous disease? It was over twenty years ago that a certain father asked himself this very question as he watched over his young daughter in the throes of pediatric cancer. That father’s name was Dan Olson, and he was a lawyer who had been leading a peaceful existence in the American countryside.
It was an inauspicious winter morning when misfortune reared its head in the Olson household. The three members of the Olson family were eating breakfast when Dan’s seven-year-old daughter, Linda, suddenly complained that her back hurt. Her cheeks were puffed out with chocolate corn flakes as she spoke.
“It hurts here,” she said, tracing a line from her back to her right side with her tiny hand. “It’s like I’m being squeezed.”
“Did you do something funny?” asked Linda’s mother, Mary. The unusual specificity of the complaint left her feeling worried, and she began to fuss over her daughter.
“It’s probably just growing pains,” said Dan, without looking up from the documents he was perusing. Dan was in the middle of handling a malpractice lawsuit that was beginning to go south, and the case demanded all of his attention. As if to prove Dan right, Linda was her usual, energetic self as she left for school. She had just entered the first grade. All in all, it was a typical morning.
But the next morning Linda complained of pain in the same spot. And the morning after that. A squeezing pain. Soon even Dan grew alarmed. He asked Mary to take her to the nearby hospital.
The hospital was located approximately thirty minutes away by car. There they were seen by a young pediatrician. He pressed gingerly on the area that Linda said hurt, then told Mary that he wanted to do an ultrasound. Only after the results of a urine test came back did he give Mary his diagnosis. Neuroblastoma. Mary was unfamiliar with the word. At first she was relieved, thinking that, although it was a tumor, at least it wasn’t cancer. The doctor’s ensuing explanation, however, left her speechless.
“Think of neuroblastoma as a type of cancer. It can be treated if it’s detected early, but in Linda’s case the tumor has already begun to spread. It may be possible to hospitalize your daughter and treat her with drugs, but the chances aren’t good. I’ll need to know how you want to proceed.”
Mary felt hollow and feverish as they left the building. Linda ran ahead, skipping and jumping, happy to finally be set free from the hospital. Her mother, still struggling to process the doctor’s news, watched her run. How could a little girl, so full of life, have only a year to live? The tears welled up in Mary’s eyes. Confused, Linda drew her tiny body close as if to comfort her mother.
When Dan arrived home he was in high spirits. The jury on the case had decided in his favor. The color drained from his face almost instantly when Mary gave him the bad news. Hospital outpatient hours were nearly closed for the day, but Dan drove off in a rush to speak to Linda’s pediatrician. The explanation he received was almost exactly the same as the one the doctor had given Mary only hours before. As proof of his diagnosis, the doctor pointed out the location of the tumor on the CT scan and handed over the urinalysis results. But Dan refused to accept the diagnosis, asking over and over again if it wasn’t some mistake, until finally the young doctor finally lost patience with Dan.