Excerpt from S’s files—About the Stone 3:
Man: Some of my questions might make you uncomfortable, but I’d like you to tell me everything you know.
Woman: I told the police and the reporters everything I can, so there’s not much else to say. I heard the place was already shut down.
Man: I’m here to talk about more than just the incident. I’m an editor at this magazine.
Woman: Huh? Um… What do you want…?
Man: As you can see, my magazine covers the paranormal. Please don’t get offended. It’s just that I heard a strange rumor about the retirement home you used to work at.
Woman: Strange, like something supernatural?
Man: Yes. But I’m not covering the deaths just for entertainment. I want to show my readers the truth.
Woman: Oh, I knew it. I knew what happened wasn’t normal.
Man: Did anything strike you as odd?
Woman: Yes. But I didn’t think anyone would listen to me. And I don’t believe in ghosts, either, so I never said anything.
Man: I see. Naturally, I will keep your name and information confidential, so would you tell me what you noticed and how you felt about it?
Woman: Okay… Where should I start? How much do you know about the incident?
Man: Just what the media reported. That some Alzheimer’s patients and a staff member from the retirement home were involved in a mass suicide.
Woman: That’s right. First, though, I need to correct you on something. The patients who died didn’t have Alzheimer’s. The news called it a retirement home, but Tokoshie Space was classified as a general care home.
Man: I see. My apologies. What is a general care home?
Woman: Essentially, it’s a facility for elderly people who are still healthy and active. The residents there didn’t have Alzheimer’s or any other major issues. Some people worry about living by themselves at that age, even without any heath conditions. So places like that simply offer support services to help them live their lives.
Man: I see. That’s good to know.
Woman: I only worked there for three months or so, though.
Man: Why did you choose to work at Tokoshie Space?
Woman: My husband was transferred to Kanagawa. I decided to get a part-time job, and one day I saw a Help Wanted ad. The facility had just been built, so they were probably looking to expand their staff. My mother is also getting older, so I applied thinking the job might help me care for her one day. And you don’t need a nursing certificate to work at a general care home.
Man: How did you like it there?
Woman: It was a really nice environment. Nursing facilities are extremely physically and mentally demanding, but the residents at a general care home more or less take care of themselves. So it was fine. Well, there were a few things I had to get used to, but the other staff taught me everything I needed to know.
Man: How could a mass suicide happen in a place like that?
Woman: I think it had something to do with that thing.
Man: That thing…? Are you talking about a stone, by any chance?
Woman: Yes, that’s right… I knew it.
Man: Would you tell me more?
Woman: That…stone…sat in Tokoshie Space’s recreation room. There was a TV, so people would hang out there. Sometimes they used the space to hold events. It was a weird stone. It was big, black, and rough, and it was set on top of a platform.
Man: Did it look like some kind of religious object?
Woman: No, nothing like that. It was like a piece of art or some kind of ore. We had some landscape paintings in the reception lounge, so I figured the director liked art. And none of the residents’ family members seemed bothered by it.
Man: But it looked strange to you?
Woman: Yes. Because having it there was kind of dangerous. It’s heavy. We were supposed to avoid anything that could hurt residents if they fell, so it didn’t make sense to me.
Man: That sounds like a very reasonable concern.
Woman: I hesitated to say anything because I was new, so I didn’t do anything about it. But other strange things happened.
Man: Like what?
Woman: Some of the residents would face the stone and engage in odd behavior.
Man: What sort of odd behavior?
Woman: All kinds of stuff. My job included planning and holding recreational activities during the daytime. Things like group origami events and light exercises like ring toss. None of the activities were required, but some residents never signed up for anything and focused all their attention on the stone. They stared at it with their mouths hanging wide open, or walked up to it and bowed, or surrounded it and raised their hands in the air. Some of them even jumped up and down.
Man: That didn’t worry the other staff?
Woman: No. And that’s strange, too, right? But it was a busy place, so they might not have had the time to worry about it. And even though none of the residents had Alzheimer’s, the mind still starts deteriorating with age, so I tried to not let it bother me too much.
Man: Was there anything else?
Woman: I once saw another staff member jumping in front of the stone with the residents. Even if they were just playing along, I thought that was going a little too far. That was when I finally asked a coworker about the stone.
Man: Did they know anything?
Woman: It’s hard to say. They said that the facility director had placed it there. I asked where it came from, and they said it was a special wishing stone that had been enshrined on a mountain in . That sounded really creepy to me—like some kind of cult thing. I wondered if they were trying to prey on a susceptible elderly population to gain followers.
Man: It certainly is an unnerving story. Did anyone ever ask you to join a group?
Woman: No. Nothing. But I never brought up the stone again after that.
Man: Was there anything aside from the stone?
Woman: Yes. When we had art sessions for recreation time, we’d always choose a theme. It was supposed to help prevent dementia. But some residents completely ignored the theme and drew a weird image.
Man: What did they draw?
Woman: They filled page after page with the same drawing of a torii.
Man: Did they ever say anything about it?
Woman: Yes. They all said the same thing. That they were looking for the person who would stand underneath it…
Man: That’s creepy, all right.
Woman: There were other things. I heard this from someone who started working there right around the same time I did. We didn’t talk much because I worked the morning shift and she worked evenings. But one day between shifts she told me something really bizarre.
Man: What was it?
Woman: At night most people are asleep. But she said she heard some weird voices coming from a few of the rooms. Actually, they were more like screams—high-pitched shrieks and low moans. She hurried over, but they stopped when she opened the door, and she found the residents sitting up, staring ahead blankly. Another time, she heard people chanting something like a Buddhist invocation.
Man: Which invocation?
Woman: I don’t know. I only heard about it secondhand. But she said the voices were crisp and clear, not mumbled like people usually do when they pray.
Man: She didn’t go to a supervisor?
Woman: Of course she did. But the director just said that some people moan or get confused in their sleep, and not to worry about it. That sounded dubious to her, and what with the stone and all, I found it downright spooky.
Man: Pardon me for being blunt, but did anyone ever die outside of that incident?
Woman: Yes. Three people passed while I was working there. I heard they all died peacefully from old age, without any other possible cause. I don’t know if three is a lot—it is a facility for the elderly, after all—but what really unnerved me was that all three of them were obsessed with that stone. I made the connection after the third person died, so I cut back on my hours and started looking for another job.
Man: Were you still working there when the incident happened?
Woman: Technically. I hardly spent any time there by then. And it happened during the night.
Man: Would you mind telling me anything you know about it?
Woman: I wasn’t there, so this is all hearsay. Someone on the night shift discovered four residents and a staff member lying spread out on the floor in front of the stone.
Man: How did they describe it to you?
Woman: The media called it a mass suicide, but I heard the whole thing was really bizarre. They all voluntarily hit their head on the stone and died with their head covered in blood.
Man: That’s…
Woman: I said a staff member was involved, but they didn’t commit suicide. Apparently, the four residents grabbed them and smashed their head against the stone before taking turns bashing their own skulls and killing themselves.
Man: No one else working that night saw or heard them?
Woman: The other employees said they didn’t notice a thing. They went looking for the staff member when they didn’t come back from their rounds, and they found all five of them lying on the floor.
Man: That’s pretty hard to believe.
Woman: Right? Could four elderly people really overpower someone like that? And why do it to begin with? The only thing I can think of is all of them were obsessed with that stone. The staff member they murdered was the same one who jumped in front of it.
Man: Did you mention that to the police?
Woman: No. I didn’t want to get involved. But as I’m sure you know, the police run thorough investigations with strange incidents like this one. In the end, they labeled it a mass suicide resulting in a murder, then declared the matter closed. And they don’t release details of sensitive cases like this to the media. The daytime talk shows seized on it as a springboard to focus on issues involving elderly care, but they only talked about it in light of greater social issues and didn’t cover the actual incident itself.
Man: As a reporter, I’m afraid I know how that goes… By the way, because I approached you for an interview, I feel obligated to tell you how I got this information on the stone. Would you like to hear it?
Woman: No, thank you. I don’t want anything more to do with this. Let sleeping dogs lie and all.
Man: That’s understandable. Thank you for your time today.