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help at all in isolating the cause. The effects would be invisible, something you
couldn't quantify. We finally understood why we had been called here by the
military to consult.
We interviewed every child involved in the incident, as well as the homeroom
teacher and attending physician. Major Toyama also participated. But these
interviews yielded almost nothing new--we merely confirmed what the major had
already told us. The children had no memory whatsoever of the event. They saw what
looked like a plane glinting high up in the sky, climbed up Owan yama, and began
hunting mushrooms. Then there's a gap in time and the next thing they recall is
lying on the ground, surrounded by a group of worried-looking teachers and
policemen. They felt fine, without any pain, discomfort, or nausea. Their minds
just felt a bit blank, as you do when you first wake up in the morning. That was
all. Each child gave the same exact response.
After conducting these interviews we concluded that this was a case of mass
hypnosis. From the symptoms the homeroom teacher and school doctor observed at the
scene, this hypothesis made the most sense. The regular movement of the eyes, the
slight lowering of respiration, heartbeat, and temperature, the lack of memory--it
all fit. The teacher alone didn't lose consciousness because for whatever reason
what produced this mass hypnosis didn't affect adults.
We weren't able to pinpoint the cause, however. Generally speaking, though,
mass hypnotism requires two elements. First, the group must be close-knit and
homogeneous, and placed in restricted circumstances. Secondly, something has to
trigger the reaction, something that acts simultaneously on everyone. In this case
it might have been the glint of that airplane they saw. This is just a hypothesis,
mind you--we weren't able to find any other candidates--and there may very well
have been some other trigger that set it off. I broached the idea of it being a
case of mass hypnosis with Major Toyama, making it clear this was merely a
conjecture. My two colleagues generally concurred. Coincidentally, this also
happened to be indirectly related to a research topic we were investigating
ourselves.
"That does seem to fit the evidence," Major Toyama said after giving it some
thought. "This is not my field, but it would appear to be the likeliest
explanation. But there's one thing I don't understand--what made them snap out of
this mass hypnosis? There'd have to be some sort of reverse triggering mechanism."
I really don't know, I admitted. All I could do was speculate. My hypothesis
was this: There is a system in place which, after a certain amount of time passes,
automatically breaks the spell. Our bodies have strong defense mechanisms in
place, and if an outside system takes over momentarily, once a certain amount of
time has passed it's like an alarm bell goes off, activating an emergency system
that deprograms this foreign object that blocks our built-in defenses--in this
case the effects of mass hypnosis--and eliminates it.
Unfortunately, I don't have the materials in front of me, so I can't quote
the exact figures, but as I told Major Toyama, there have been reports of similar
incidents occurring abroad. All of them are considered mysteries with no logical
explanation. A large number of children lose consciousness at the same time, and
several hours later wake up without any memory of what happened.
This incident is quite unusual, in other words, but not without precedent.
One strange instance took place around 1930, in the outskirts of a small village
in Devonshire, England. For no apparent reason, a group of thirty junior high
students walking down a country path fell to the ground, one after the other, and
lost consciousness. Several hours later, as if nothing had happened, they regained
consciousness and walked back to school under their own steam. A physician
examined them right away but could find nothing medically wrong. Not one of them
could recall what had taken place.
At the end of the last century, a similar incident occurred in Australia.
Outside of Adelaide fifteen teenage girls from a private girls school were on an
outing when all of them lost consciousness, and then regained it. Again there were
no injuries, no aftereffects. It ended up classified as a case of heatstroke, but