Occultic;Nine: Volume 1

by Chiyomaru Shikura

  As long as it didn’t interfere with my real work as a college professor, I never turned them down. Part of me loved the attention. And so far, my personal theories had been quite well received on almost all of the programs. It felt good to be able to talk about whatever I wanted to such a large audience.

  But this program today was different.

  The topic was “A Heated Debate About Supernatural Phenomena,” but...

  “Dr. Isayuki Hashigami is a man motivated by only the highest of ideals!”

  The male announcer, a man famous for his stern and severe personality, glanced down at his script. “Dr. Hashigami, I’m told you’re the only official member of the SPR, or Society for Psychical Research, in Japan, yes?”

  “That’s correct.”

  “Can you tell us a little about the SPR?”

  “It’s an organization devoted to promoting scientific investigation into spiritual and supernatural phenomena, you see. It was founded in 1882, at Trinity College in the University of Cambridge, which makes it over a hundred years old. Several of its members are Nobel Prize winners. Jung, Freud, and Lewis Caroll were all members as well.”

  The guests gave a small gasp of amazement. It was understandable. The organization was completely unknown in Japan.

  “For example, they’re researching direct mind-to-mind communication. Some of you might know this by the name ‘telepathy.’ They also do research into hypnosis, spirit mediums, ghosts, spirit summoning, and the history of spiritual phenomena.”

  Mr. Sawazaki, who was sitting to my left side, interrupted me. “Any scientist will tell you that the SPR has a long and distinguished history in their field. However...”

  I’d been told about Mr. Sawazaki before the program aired. He was a scientific fundamentalist, you could say. He appeared on these programs often, just like I did. Today was my first time meeting him.

  “However, the SPR’s golden age was over a hundred years ago. Is it correct to say that in the scientifically advanced era of the 21st century, they’re now considered heretics?”

  I chuckled a little at his accusation.

  “You may be right. The stance of every member of the SPR, including myself, is that the occult can and should be proven by the scientific method. But what you have to understand is that many scientists outside Japan are seriously pursuing this research.”

  “That’s true, but it’s also a fact that there is not a single university in Japan that offers courses on parapsychology.”

  I nodded in agreement.

  “For example, the souls of the dead do not physically exist. Science has denied their existence for centuries. And this history of denial is what modern science is built on. Am I wrong, Dr. Hashigami?” He chuckled, as if he were mocking me.

  “Is that really true?” I decided to argue with him. The studio seemed to be expecting us both to lay out our positions.

  “There is no proof of the non-existence of the soul. Personally, I’m sick of science sweeping things it can’t explain under the rug.” I looked out over the rest of the panelists, and took special note of the position of the camera as I spoke.

  “Listen to me, everyone. The soul does exist.”

  A murmur went up within the studio. The off-camera staff were whispering in loud, deliberate tones.

  Very few shows these days were filmed in front of a studio audience. The only ones that did were in Kansai.

  “Mmmm... Spiritual!” One of the guests, a young celebrity named Mako Utsumi, whispered like she was drunk.

  The off-camera staff gave a loud burst of laughter.

  Utsumi was a popular talent on these sorts of programs lately. She had the composed looks of a model, but her comments were funnier than those of most comedians. TV stations loved her.

  The announcer decided to move the conversation to her.

  “Miss Utsumi, what’s your take on this?”

  “I don’t really know, but Dr. Hashigami sure is handsome, isn’t he? How do you take care of that long hair of yours? It goes all the way down to your waist. Most girls don’t even have hair that long. I’d love to hear how you take care of it. I can practically see your cuticles!”

  The staff burst out laughing again.

  “That’s Utsumi for you. She always has the most unique comments. Very unique. But we’re not really talking about cuticles right now, okay?” The announcer tried to bring things back on topic.

  Mr. Sawazaki leaned towards me to continue. “So you say the soul exists, Dr. Hashigami? So, what, do our souls leave our bodies after death? If you’re saying they do, then what you’re describing is no different than an old ghost story.”

  Mr. Sawazaki’s tone had become heated. He was much less calm than he’d been a moment ago.

  I tried to answer his question as calmly as I could. “The soul stays within the brain while a person is alive, but after their heart stops, it is ejected from the body.”

  “No, no, no. That’s not an answer. Let me guess. You have no scientific proof of this, do you? That’s how it always is with you parapsychology types. If you’re going to just make claims without evidence, then you should just start off by admitting you’re no different than a fortune-teller. And you know something, Dr. Hashigami? I’ve never liked the way you keep coming up with all these theories that have no scientific backing whatsoever.” He was spoiling for a fight.

  The other guests looked slightly confused. None of them were capable of intervening.

  “In the end, everything you’re saying only exists in your own head. If you keep this up, you’re liable to discredit the entire field of parapsychology, you know. Parapsychology is still a new field of study, and it’s trying its best to find scientific evidence for its claims, but it still hasn’t left the realm of the occult. Of course, I’ll admit there’s value in such research, but I think you need another half century of real, solid, experimentally proven results. And yet you, Dr. Hashigami, come on these TV shows and say things for which you have not the slightest evidence. It’s deplorable. Simply deplorable!” Mr. Sawazaki seemed to think he was lecturing me. “Or what, are you going to tell me you’ve found scientific evidence for these claims? Then I’ll ask why you haven’t submitted them to the rest of the scientific community. Your individual claim that the soul exists does not suffice as objective proof. That’s why I say you’re the same as a fortune-teller. What do you have to say to that?”

  For a moment, I thought about telling him everything. But I held back the urge.

  “Unfortunately, there are good reasons why I can’t publish yet. Scientifically speaking, however, ghosts do exist. What you and the others call the ‘occult’ is just a caricature.”

  “But that’s not an argument! You say you’ve got reasons? What are your reasons, then?”

  “...” Suddenly, I remembered something.

  My young son had once told me the same things that Sawazaki had just said.

  My son was a college student now. He was my only child, and I’d loved him as much as I loved myself. I loved him so much that I took him everywhere when he was young. Sometimes, I’d even bring him to academic conferences or lectures. I didn’t know if that was the reason, but from a young age, he’d been one of those rare boys to take an interest in science. But when I’d become an official member of the SPR— about five years ago— he’d asked me a question.

  “Dad, do you just want attention, or do you really want scientific proof that the spirit world is real?”

  That was when I’d realized that at some point, a deep rift had developed between me and my son.

  My son was a dedicated perfectionist, and a denier of the occult, just like Mr. Sawazaki.

  “There are no such things as souls, and the supernatural doesn’t exist. There certainly isn’t a spirit world. It’s impossible for the minds of the dead to float around in mid-air. It’s just animal instincts in the human mind that make you feel that way. The occult can easily be explained by modern science. And parapsychology is too clo
se to outright pseudoscience.”

  My son had been highly intelligent from a young age, and ironically, his talents had led him to develop the exact opposite stance from my own research.

  When he was young, though, he used to tell me all the time that he’d seen ghosts. When I pointed that out, he even analyzed his own memories as a combination of “childhood amnesia and false memories.”

  He really could be a stubborn brat sometimes.

  By the time I’d started to appear on TV, my relationship with my son had gone past the point of no return. I would see him occasionally, and I could literally feel the disgust in his eyes. I couldn’t help but notice. I was his father, after all. The son said that he could prove, scientifically, that the spirit world did not exist. And the father said that he could prove, scientifically, that it did.

  These two beliefs were the exact opposite of one another.

  Was there ever a father and son as ridiculous as we were? I chuckled to myself as I remembered his cold glare, despite the fact that I was on TV.

  “It’s the spirits of the dead! The suffering of the dead becomes a curse, and stalks the earth!” My debate with Mr. Sawazaki (or more precisely, Mr. Sawazaki’s one-sided berating of me) was suddenly interrupted by a strange yell to my right.

  It came from a woman in her early 50s, a self-proclaimed spiritualist named Shizuko Motomura.

  The announcer, however, pretended that he didn’t hear her.

  “Dr. Hashigami, you just said that after the heart stops, the soul is ejected from the body. Can you tell us more about what you meant? Do souls just float in the air, then?”

  Before I could answer, Mrs. Motomura screamed in a voice like nails on a chalkboard. “They’re wandering through this studio! Spirits bound to the earthly realm, unable to accept their deaths!”

  The announcer motioned for me to continue, completely ignoring her. He seemed to be urging me to answer as soon as possible. I nodded.

  “Yes, that’s right. But to use more scientific terminology, they’re not ghosts so much as they are electromagnetic fields.”

  “I’m sorry? Electromagnetic fields?”

  “Grrckk... ahem!”

  Mrs. Motomura cleared her throat, loudly, but the announcer leaned forward towards me instead.

  “Can you tell us more?”

  “They’re thought patterns that are saved in a magnetic field and protected by an electric one.”

  “Hmm... I see. That’s quite an interesting theory. Well, I’ll be honest. I’m having a little trouble keeping up with this. So this electromagnetic field is similar to a storage device? Like you’d find on a computer?”

  “That’s correct. The information is stored magnetically and protected electrically. This is the same method used in both digital and analog media.” I took out a chart that I’d had the staff prepare for me in advance. It displayed a diagram of the soul according to my theory.

  “After death, the information recorded in the human brain leaves the body as magnetic field data with a will of its own. This, primarily, is what is indicated with the word ‘ghost.’”

  “Wow, really?” Miss Utsumi’s wide eyes went even wider as she gasped in surprise.

  “Most all examples of spiritual phenomena can be explained by use of this electromagnetic field theory.”

  “It sounds kind of like plasma.” Mr. Sawazaki muttered to himself. He sounded like he was sulking.

  The announcer ignored him, too, as he continued to question me.

  “If the occult could, in fact, be explained via the scientific method, wouldn’t it cease to be occult at all?”

  “No, that’s not correct. As I’ve said in my books, we’ll soon be able to completely explain spiritual phenomena with science in the near future. But that’s just the beginning. That will be the first time that the occult is, in the true sense, recognized scientifically.”

  “Mm... You kind of sound like you’re talking about a religion, Dr. Hashigami. I’ll admit it makes for a compelling story, though.” At this point I’d just stopped paying attention to Mr. Sawazaki altogether.

  “You heard Dr. Sawazaki a moment ago, yes? Parapsychology is still a young field. I’m well aware that we have a long way to go. You’ll remember that they mocked Copernicus’s heliocentrism at first, too. So I don’t think it’s appropriate for Dr. Sawazaki to be so dismissive of the occult, or my own theories. Humanity should be less aggressive, and more humble, about its own ignorance. The newest discoveries await us not in space, but very close to us. And I’m sure those discoveries will bring us all a great deal of joy.”

  “That’s what I mean when I say it sounds like a religion. Explain to me what separates you from that crazy old fraud of a spiritualist over the—” He cut off mid-sentence.

  Miss Utsumi had suddenly put her hands to her chest and doubled over in pain.

  “Aah... ahh...” She was moaning as if she was in agony, and her face looked extremely pale. There were beads of sweat forming on her forehead.

  “Miss Utsumi? What’s wrong?” The announcer sounded worried.

  Was she sick?

  It felt like someone should go over to help her, but since this was a live broadcast, no one was sure what to do.

  I could see the staff starting to panic in the background. But the man who seemed to be the director was just waving his arms around instead of giving clear orders.

  “Begone!” Amidst the chaos, there was one person that stayed calm.

  Mrs. Motomura shouted, spittle flicking from her mouth, as she looked around the studio.

  Shrine priestesses dressed in white ceremonial clothing ran onto the stage. The camera was still running, but they didn’t care. There was no explanation as to who they were.

  “This room is filled with the spirits of evil! And this girl, too!” Mrs. Motomura pointed at Miss Utsumi, who still seemed to be in pain.

  “She is being possessed by evil, earthbound spirits!” One of the priestesses took an onusa, a wooden wand used in Shinto rituals, and handed it to Mrs. Motomura.

  She and the others must have been Mrs. Motomura’s students or something.

  She brought down the onusa again and again on top of Miss Utsumi.

  “Uweh! Keih! Sweyh!”

  No one else could do anything but look on in shock. For some reason, despite all this, the cameras were still rolling.

  “Evil spirits, begone from this mortal vessel! Keih!”

  “Gwa... gwaaaaahhh!” Miss Utsumi screamed in a voice that didn’t sound anything like what I’d heard from her earlier. Drool was dripping from her mouth and her eyes had rolled back in her head.

  Only then did one of the staff members come out with instructions written on a whiteboard.

  “Cut to commercial!” it said. The announcer nodded.

  “I’m sorry. We’ll be back after these messages.”

  After a few seconds, someone in the back yelled “Commercials are rolling!” Then several of the staff carried Miss Utsumi out of the studio.

  Mrs. Motomura gave a sigh of satisfaction and went back to her seat.

  “That was a close call,” was all she whispered before she sent her students out of the room.

  “...” It felt like everything I’d just seen had happened in some faraway world. It didn’t seem like there’d be any way we could hold a real debate now.

  When the commercials ended, the program continued without Utsumi.

  The announcer spoke to Mrs. Motomura.

  “So Mrs. Motomura, is Miss Utsumi going to be all right?”

  “The spirits have left. She’ll be fine. You should know that your words have angered the spirits, and brought this upon her.” Evidently she was trying to say that it was Mr. Sawazaki’s and my fault.

  I didn’t really care, but Mr. Sawazaki overreacted.

  “That’s stupid. It’s simply ridiculous. I’ve seen plenty of fake spiritualists like you, who want to make a business out of the occult.” Just like before, he was making no attempt
to hide his irritation. But now his anger was directed at Mrs. Motomura, not me.

  Mrs. Motomura’s eyes went wide as she shouted back. “Fools like you are the first to die, and you’ll die quaking in fear!” There was no way to recover from that.

  I couldn’t believe they were getting so excited over a debate on a TV program.

  Didn’t they realize how many millions of people were watching? They were essentially embarrassing themselves in front of every single one of them. If you were incapable of debating in a calm, controlled manner, you had no business being on TV in the first place. But what I really couldn’t believe was that neither the announcer nor the staff were trying to stop this. It was like they’d given up on any attempt at making this program work.

  And what was most unbelievable of all was that the announcer calmly brought the program to its end.

  “I’m sure we all have a lot more to talk about, but unfortunately, we’re all out of time. This concludes this evening’s episode of Psychic Research Lab: Special Edition. Thanks for tuning in.”

  Since it was a live broadcast, when the time slot was over, they had to end it. Still, I’d never heard of a program ending like this. They were going to be swamped with complaints from listeners, right?

  “Dr. Hashigami, do you have any last words for us?”

  And now they were coming to me to end it. I could still see Mr. Sawazaki and Mrs. Motomura glaring at each other on either side of me.

  I sighed. “I’ll pass on saying anything about that little fracas back there, but I do want to say something about Dr. Sawazaki’s comments. Dr. Sawazaki believes that a scientist should refuse to accept the existence of anything beyond the physical. I disagree. The reason that Japan lags behind so much in parapsychology research is that our scientists, and Japanese people in particular, all seem to share in this sort of one-sided belief.” Mr. Sawazaki was so busy glaring at Mrs. Motomura that he didn’t even seem to notice what I’d said.

  “I’d like to thank all of our panelists for coming.” The announcer bowed and the program ended.