MrBallen Podcast: Strange, Dark & Mysterious Stories - Terror in Tokyo (PODCAST EXCLUSIVE EPISODE)

Episode Date: March 14, 2022

On March 20, 1995, a crumpled up newspaper was spotted lying on the floor of a Tokyo, Japan train car. In Japan, the subways are always immaculately clean, so this newspaper stood out like a sore thumb. As commuters stared at the trash, wondering who would be so inconsiderate to litter, a wet spot began to form at the center of the newspaper, like it was sitting on top of a liquid that was now starting to seep through. As soon as this began to happen, everyone in the train car started to cough. The cough was mild at first, but within minutes it progressed into a violent cough making it hard for people to catch their breath. By the time the train pulled into the Government Center station, the commuters on board the train were clawing at the doors of the car to get off...For 100s more stories like this one, check out my YouTube channel just called "MrBallen" -- https://www.youtube.com/c/MrBallenIf you want to reach out to me, contact me on Instagram, Twitter or any other major social media platform, my username on all of them is @mrballenSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Hey Prime members, you can binge eight new episodes of the Mr. Ballin podcast one month early and all episodes ad-free on Amazon Music. Download the Amazon Music app today. In the spring of 1995, something strange was spotted on the floor of a Tokyo subway car. At first, no one really paid much attention to it other than to just be annoyed someone had littered. But eventually, this object would change. And as it did, people around it began to change too. And before long, it was absolute pandemonium inside of the subway. But before we get into today's story, if you're a fan of the strange, dark, and mysterious Delivered in Story format, then you've come to the right podcast because that's all we do,

and we upload twice a week, once on Monday and once on Thursday. So if that's of interest to you, please take a picture of the five-star Review Button's lawn ornaments, and then post that picture along with their street address on Craigslist with the caption, free. Also, please subscribe to the Mr. Ballin podcast wherever you get your podcasts, so you don't miss any of our weekly uploads. Hello, I am Alice Levine, and I am one of the hosts of Wondery's podcast, British Scandal. On our latest series, The Race to Ruin, we tell the story of a British man who took part in the first ever round the world sailing race. Good on him, I hear you say.

But there is a problem, as there always is in this show. The man in question hadn't actually sailed before. Oh, and his boat wasn't't actually sailed before. Oh, and his boat wasn't seaworthy. Oh, and also tiny little detail, almost didn't mention it. He bet his family home on making it to the finish line. What ensued was one of the most complex cheating plots in British sporting history. To find out the full story, follow British Scandal wherever you listen to podcasts, or listen early and ad-free on Wondery Plus on Apple Podcasts or the Wondery app. I'm Peter Frank-O'Pern. And I'm Afua Hirsch. And we're here to tell you about our new season of Legacy,

covering the iconic, troubled musical genius that was Nina Simone. Full disclosure, this is a big one for me. Nina Simone one of my favourite artists of all time. Somebody who's had a huge impact on me who I think objectively stands apart for the level of her talent, the audacity of her message. If I was a first year at university the first time I sat down and really listened to her and engaged with her message, it totally floored me. And the truth and pain and messiness of her struggle, that's all captured in unforgettable music that has stood the test of time. Think that's fair, Peter? I mean, the way in which her music comes across

is so powerful, no matter what song it is. So join us on Legacy for Nina Simone. All right, let's get into today's story. It was Monday, March 20th, 1995, and Japan's capital city of Tokyo was waking up to a truly beautiful early spring day. By the end of the month, the city's famous cherry blossom trees would be in bloom, attracting thousands of visitors and residents to the cherry blossom festivals that would pop up in half a dozen places throughout what is the largest urban center in the world. But on that particular morning, many of those who worked in Tokyo,

like 26-year-old airline employee Kyoka Izumi, were not happy when they heard their alarms going off. The day before had been Sunday, so a day off, and the next day, Tuesday, was also a day off because it was the national holiday celebrating the spring equinox. But that day, Monday, was just a regular work day. And so when Kyoka rolled out of her bed at 6.15am, she felt super annoyed that her employer hadn't just given them the day off to make it a long weekend. To make matters worse, as soon as Kyoka actually got out of bed, she immediately felt sick. Nothing major, but she just felt groggy and a little out of it, and she briefly thought about calling out of work, and considering how uninspired she already felt about working that day, the option sounded

like a pretty good one, but ultimately she decided to suck it up and head in with the rest of her co-workers. After all, Kyoka did like her job. She found working for the airline industry was far more exciting than her previous job was, which had been working for one of Japan's major train companies, Japan Railway, and she figured getting up and moving around might actually make her feel better. So instead of going back to sleep, Kyoka headed for the shower, then she got dressed and downed her usual quick cup of coffee, then she headed out the door and began speed walking to the closest subway station. Once she got there, she would catch the first of three trains that would take her from her home in northwest Tokyo to her office in the southeastern part of Japan's capital. As Kyoka walked, the last of the light purple plum blossoms that always bloomed at the end of February reminded her again of

tomorrow's spring holiday. Her spirits lifting, she glanced at the time, and despite getting a slower than usual start that morning, she'd left the house at about 7.50 a.m., she still was on track to get to her office right before the day began at 8.30. A few minutes later, Kyoka got to the entrance of the local train station. She was lucky because the timing of her daily commute meant that she always missed the absolute height of Tokyo's morning rush hour, where the subways would get so crowded with people, subway attendants in uniforms and caps literally pushed people and their bags into the train cars just so the doors could close. But even at its most crowded, and the Tokyo subway carried more

than twice as many riders as the New York City subway, Tokyo actually has one of the safest, most efficient subway systems in the world. Walk into a Tokyo subway at any hour of the day, and you will not see people sleeping on benches or warming up on top of heating grates. You won't see trash, you won't see graffiti. It will be pristine. The same subway attendants who push people onto the trains also spend a large amount of their time patrolling the subway to pick up trash and make sure everything is always spotless. Kyoka turned off the sidewalk and headed down the stairs into the less-than-crowded subway station below. She swiped her train pass and then stepped through

the turnstile out onto the train platform. A few minutes later, the first train she would take arrived, and she stepped on board and she grabbed a seat near the doors. The doors shut a few moments later, and off the train went, rumbling into the dark tunnel ahead. Five stops later, Kyoka stepped off of that train and walked across to the other side of the station platform where she stood idly waiting to catch the next train. A few minutes later, that train would arrive. It was train A725K and it pulled into the station right in front of her. This train would take her all the way to Government Center, which is right in the center of Tokyo,

and is one of the busiest train stations in all of Japan. When the doors of train A725K opened, Kiyoka stepped aboard and once again felt lucky she was missing rush hour, because the train, it was crowded, but not so crowded that pushers would be required to get everyone on board. Most of the seats were taken, but Kiyoka could see a clearing towards the front of the car where she'd be able to stand, and so as she began walking in that direction, she nodded to a few familiar faces but didn't have any conversations with anyone. Tokyo subway etiquette included never littering, not making any commotion, and not talking too loudly or really at all and this morning that suited

kyoka just fine she really did not feel like talking anyway when she reached the clearing in the front of the car she grabbed onto a handrail above her head and she watched as the doors closed and then she felt the train begin to lurch forward when kyoka left that morning she had hoped her morning commute would wake her up and make her feel better, but as she stood there on this second train, A725K, she couldn't help but notice that she actually was starting to feel worse. As this train slowly rumbled on in the darkness, Kiyoka closed her eyes and took a deep breath in to try to reduce the nausea that was starting to come on.

But as her lungs filled, she suddenly felt this excruciating pain in her chest. It was so blindingly painful and so sudden that she instinctively let go of the handrail and grabbed at her chest with both of her hands, almost causing her to fall over given the fact that the train was moving. She breathed out forcibly and then gagged as if the air she had just inhaled was the source of the pain. But even with her lungs now empty, her chest still ached. But just as quickly as the pain had started, it stopped. And when it did, she fumbled again for the handrail above her head.

And once she had a firm grasp on it and she was steady on her feet, she told herself that, you know, that pain had probably just been connected to stress as her grandfather had passed away recently, and she was very upset about that, and so she was thinking, okay, that could be why, or maybe it was connected to her just not feeling very good that morning to begin with, you know, maybe this is just her being sick, but after she was able to kind of talk herself down and convince herself that this was not a big deal, something else registered to her, which was she had just grabbed at her chest and started gagging and very obviously it just kind of made this scene. You know, people are going to be staring at her and wondering now if she's okay. And so Kyoka starts to feel super embarrassed that

she's still kind of looking down and, you know, she's imagining that when she looks up, there's going to be all these commuters staring at her, you know, waiting to see, you know, is she okay or not? And so Kyoka eventually, she does look up and she's anticipating kind of like waving to people and kind of signaling that she was okay now. But when she looked up, she was kind of surprised at what she saw. Because when she looked around into the train car, no one was looking at her. And the reason was everyone in the train, everyone was coughing. No one was paying attention to her. All they were doing was trying to cover their mouths as they all cough.

So everyone's got their jackets over their faces and, you know, they have their elbows up over their mouths. And Kyoko's just kind of looking around wondering what the heck is going on. And then she felt her own throat start to tighten and she started to cough. And as Kyoko tried to shield her own mouth, she noticed the people around her had gone from a somewhat mild cough to a violent one. Some people were coughing so aggressively they could not catch their breath, and you could see panic on their faces as they don't know what to do, they're not able to breathe. But despite this totally insane coughing phenomenon that was taking place on board this train car, the train just rumbled on and continued making all of its scheduled stops. And as new commuters clamored on board, they too began to cough. By the time the train pulled into Government Center, Kyoka's stop, virtually everyone was now violently coughing and keeled over. People had given up trying to

shield their mouths at this point. It was just too out of control. And by now, basically everyone had decided they were just going to get off the train, whether government center was their stop or not. And so there was a throng of people that were kind of pressed up against the doors, waiting for the doors to open. And so when the train finally did come to a full stop and the doors opened up, a wave of coughing commuters rushed out onto the station platform, the sound of their hacking and gagging filling the air. And so Kyoka, she was towards the back of this group of people leaving the train. And as she was leaving, right as she's about to go out of the train doors, she glances down the length of the train car she is in, and she sees some of the passengers are pointing at something

on the ground while yelling for subway attendants to come have a look. But Kyoka, from where she was standing, she couldn't see what they were pointing at, and because she wanted fresh air so badly, she was not about to stay on the train to figure out what it is. And so Kyoka, she gets off of the train, and as soon as she does, even though she is still coughing as is everybody else around her, her mind is entirely focused on hustling over to the stairs that will bring her downstairs to the final train platform where she will catch the final third train that will bring her on her way to work. Because at this point, even though she has no idea why everybody is coughing, Kyoka is only viewing this coughing fit as a nuisance,

not as an emergency. But as Kiyoka moved towards these stairs, she suddenly felt extremely nauseous and she rushed into a nearby women's bathroom in case she needed to throw up. Once she was inside, she resisted the urge to vomit and then she splashed some water on her face and then after kind of composing herself, she headed back out onto the station platform and still her mind is focused on just getting to work and so she begins walking over to the stairs again but she'd only gone maybe a few steps before an alarm sounded inside of the subway and then a voice came over the subway intercom telling everyone to evacuate having worked for for Japan Railways previously, Kyoka had been educated about this particular alarm that she was hearing. She was told it was

never used for anything other than true emergencies, so she knew whatever was going on had to be bad. Right around the time that Kyoka was getting ready to leave for her daily commute to work, 48-year-old Ikuyo Hayashi was also getting ready for work. Hayashi was part of Japan's highly educated and financially successful super elite. He was a gifted and well-respected surgeon who was known for being extremely devoted to his patients. On that particular Monday, like Kyoka, Dr. Hayashi had gotten up early. But shortly after starting his typical morning routine, he noticed he was sweating a little bit and his heart rate was elevated.

For a second, he felt concerned, but he chalked it up to stress and kept getting ready. Just before 7.30am, he headed to the front door. Before stepping into the cold morning air, he padded his coat pockets to make sure he had everything. Then, despite the clear forecast for the rest of the day, he grabbed an umbrella leaning up against the front door, and then he stepped outside and made his way to the curb where a car was waiting for him. Dr. Hayashi climbed into the back seat, and then after exchanging hellos with the driver, a 31-year-old named Tomomitsu Nimi, the two men headed for the station where Dr. Hayashi would catch train A725K. But along the way, they made one stop at a local

convenience store. Dr. Hayashi and Nimi got out of the car and went inside. Hayashi put a few odds and ends that he needed on the counter, and Nimi put a couple of newspapers on the counter as well. After Dr Dr Hayashi had paid for it all the two men left the store together they got back into the car and by 7 48 a.m Dr Hayashi was stepping aboard the same compartment of train a725k as kyoka after dropping off the doctor and wishing him luck Nimi had pulled away from the station entrance and headed straight for the train station located just three stops further down the line. As soon as he stepped on board train A725K,

Dr. Hayashi reached up to adjust the gauze mask he was wearing over his nose and mouth. The mask was a fixture on the Tokyo subway, especially in the cold and flu season when passengers wore them to prevent the spread of germs in the crowded subway compartments. He moved over to an empty seat and before sitting down he patted his coat pockets again to make sure he had all of his things and then as he sat down he saw sitting across from him was a woman and what appeared to be her young daughter sitting next to her. The woman was looking down avoiding eye contact, but the young girl was looking up with a smile on her face. She was just too young to realize staring was rude. The doctor smiled back at her, but then quickly looked away. A few seconds later,

the doors of the train closed, and the car began rumbling down the tracks. Three stops later, Dr. Hayashi stood up, but before he got off, he paused for a moment in front of his seat. As he stood there, he noticed the girl was staring at him again. He looked at her, but only for a second. Then after patting his coat pockets for a third time, he quickly strode out of the train car and onto the station platform. He moved quickly to a nearby trash can and pulled the mask off of his face and disposed

of it. Then, forcing himself not to hurry, Dr. Hayashi climbed the steps to the street where Nimi, his driver, was waiting for him by the curb. Immediately after the doctor got off the train, the little girl who had been sitting in front of him noticed a pile of newspapers underneath the seat where the doctor had just been sitting. Even as a youngster, she knew littering was strictly forbidden, and she wondered if the doctor or someone else had left it there. As she stared at this newspaper, she noticed a wet spot starting to form in the center of it, like the paper was sitting on top of a liquid and it was starting to seep through.

As she stared, her eyes began to water and then she began to cough. Her mother turned to see if her daughter was okay, but before she could offer the child any help or comfort, she too began to cough. And then, just a few feet away from them at the front of the car, Kiyoka felt that sharp shooting pain in her chest and nearly fell over, and then she too started to cough. But despite all of the coughing, the train kept rumbling on, headed for Japan's government center, where three major subway lines all converged. And as commuters shuffled on and off of train A725K, they pushed the now soaking wet newspaper aside with the toes of their shoes.

They also stepped in what looked like an oily residue around the wet newspapers, tracking it up and down the compartment and out onto the train platforms. When the train finally reached the government center and Kyoka got off along with most of the others, some of the passengers stayed on board to point out the wet newspapers to subway attendants on the platform, hoping they could come clean them up. After getting off of the train, Kyoka felt nauseous and rushed to the bathroom. Right before she walked into the women's room, she passed by 24-year-old subway attendant Masura Yuasa, who had just finished a 24-hour shift and was getting ready

to go home. The pair didn't know each other and probably didn't even see each other when they passed. But before the day was over, they would be forever bound by tragedy. Hello, I'm Emily, and I'm one of the hosts of Terribly Famous, the show that takes you inside the lives of our biggest celebrities. And they don't get much bigger than the man who made badminton sexy. OK, maybe that's a stretch, but if I say pop star and shuttlecocks, you know who I'm talking about. No? Short shorts?

Free cocktails? Careless whispers? OK, last one. It's not Andrew Ridgely. Yep, that's right. It's stone-cold icon George Michael. From teen pop sensation to one of the biggest solo artists on the planet, join us for our new series,

George Michael's Fight for Freedom. From the outside, it looks like he has it all, but behind the trademark dark sunglasses is a man in turmoil. George is trapped in a lie of his own making, with a secret he feels would ruin him if the truth ever came out. Follow Terribly Famous wherever you listen to your podcasts, or listen early and ad-free on Wondery Plus on Apple Podcasts or the Wondery app.

If you're listening to this podcast, then chances are good you are a fan of The Strange, Dark, and Mysterious. And if that's the case, then I've got some good news. We just launched a brand new Strange, Dark, and Mysterious podcast called Mr. Ballin's Medical Mysteries. And as the name suggests, it's a show about medical mysteries, a genre that many fans have been asking us to dive into for years. And we finally decided to take the plunge, and the show is awesome. In this free weekly show, we explore bizarre unheard-of diseases, strange medical mishaps, unexplainable deaths, and everything in between. Each story is totally true and totally terrifying.

Go follow Mr. Ballin's Medical Mysteries wherever you get your podcasts, and if you're a Prime member, you can listen early and ad-free on Amazon Music. Masora really liked his job with the Tokyo Metro, and despite looking like he was still in high school, he actually had worked as a subway attendant for seven years. As he passed by Kyoka, he heard people coughing on the platform, but it wasn't something that really registered to him. He was only thinking about going home and going to bed because he was exhausted from his overnight shift. As he moved along the platform, he saw his chief suddenly coming out of an office with a mop in his hand.

And so intrigued, Masora asked him, you know, what's up with the mop? And his chief would tell him that there had been some sort of liquid spill on one of the trains, and whatever it was had apparently been tracked all over the train, and now it was out all over the station platform, and so he needed to go and clean it up. Masura didn't actually need to help him. His shift was over. But he told his chief that he'd go along and he'd help out. So Masura and his chief walked together down the platform, and as they walked, they both started to notice that just about every commuter they passed

was coughing. But neither Masura nor his chief addressed it, they just kept on walking. Eventually, they saw three of their fellow subway attendants straight ahead standing in the middle of the platform. Two of the men were holding in their hands the wet newspapers that had been inside train A725K, and a third man who was next to them was opening up a trash bag. And as the two men who were holding the newspaper were waiting for this bag to be opened, oily liquids seemed to be pouring off of the newspaper's edges onto the ground. And in fact, there was a long oily trail on the ground from wherever these papers had been carried from all the way to that platform.

And so as soon as Masura and the chief walked up in front of these three, the chief noticed the huge oily puddle right underneath them and he saw the trail and so he got to work trying to mop up this oil all over the ground. And Masura, he didn't really have a job to do. He didn't have a mop and he didn't have a bag or anything so he just stood there watching. And as he stood there, it really started to sink in that virtually everyone on the platform now was violently coughing. And some people were even leaned up against the wall, vomiting. And so Masura was so confused by what he was seeing, but before he could even ask his co-workers what was going on, his throat started to tighten up.

And then right as Masura began coughing, he saw one of his co-workers collapse. It was the older man named Mr. Takahashi. He was the one who had had the plastic bag, which was now full of the wet newspapers. And right as Mr. Takahashi fell, to Masura, it felt like all hell had suddenly broken loose. He and the others who were around Mr. Takahashi rushed over to him to see if they could help him and right as they're standing over him loosening his tie and asking him if he is okay the alarm goes off and the call over the intercom to evacuate comes out. Masuro was just in shock and for a second he just stood there frozen but then he shook himself out of it and he ran for a

phone on the wall that the subway staff would use. And he pushed the button that would call to the office that was upstairs. And when somebody picked up on the other line, Masura had to yell because of the alarm and all the coughing people and people screaming and panicking all around him. And so Masura was able to yell out into the phone that someone needed to bring a stretcher down to the platform he was on for Mr. Takahashi, who has collapsed, and someone needs to call an ambulance for Mr. Takahashi. And so after Masura communicates this over the phone, he hangs up and he runs back over to the crowd of his co-workers and Mr. Takahashi. And then just a minute later, a subway attendant comes charging down the stairs. He's got a stretcher in hand and he, along with Masura and the other co-workers, they put Mr. Takahashi on the stretcher and they lift him up

and they begin carefully moving him through this very panicked throng of commuters trying to evacuate that are coughing and vomiting. And so as they're moving, Masura, who's holding onto the stretcher, he turns back and he yells at the man who had come down with the stretcher. He says to him, hey, you called the ambulance. Where are they going to meet us? Because upstairs, there were several exits out of government center. And so unless the ambulance knew where to pick them up, it would be nearly impossible to sync up with them. And so Masura is looking back at this co-worker of his waiting for an answer. But this co-worker is staring at Masura with his eyes wide, totally glazed over. And then suddenly, this guy just collapses to the ground.

He lets go of the stretcher and falls to the ground and starts convulsing and shaking. And so Masura and the others put Mr. Takahashi down to deal with this new casualty. And as they did, Masura's chief, as well as the other two men who had been holding the newspapers, they begin to uncontrollably vomit. And so suddenly Masura is the only one who is not violently ill or in some way hurt. And so even though he had no idea what was going on and it's absolute chaos all around him, he did know he had to act right now. And so he yelled at this group he was with, who probably didn't even hear him, that he was going to go upstairs.

He was going to find this ambulance and figure out what exit they needed to bring Mr. Takahashi to. And then he turned and began trying to run up the stairs as fast as he could, even though he was totally surrounded by panicked commuters trying to get out as well. But eventually he got to the top of the stairs, at which point he ran through the crowd toward the nearest doors that would bring him outside. And as soon as he pushed the doors open, he couldn't believe what he saw. There were people outside on the ground everywhere. People were coughing and vomiting, and he could hear sirens, ambulance sirens everywhere. But there was no

ambulance outside waiting for Mr. Takahashi. And so he's thinking to himself, how is this ambulance not here? Where are these other ambulances going? What is going on? And so Masura couldn't help but think something really bad was happening across his city. And so he stood there for a minute wondering what he should do. And then he just decided, I have to go back down and just get Mr. Takahashi up here. We'll find the ambulance, but I got to get him up here. And so even though he was starting to feel very sick, very nauseous, he turns and just charges back into the station. Below ground, Kyoka was coming to the same realization that something very bad must be happening to them. When she left the bathroom and began running up the stairs to the street after

the alarm went off, she had looked behind her at some point and through the sea of people, the alarm went off she had looked behind her at some point and through the sea of people she could clearly see bodies lying on the ground on the platform and on the stairs and as she ran people to her left and to her right were crumpling to the ground vomiting and convulsing finally she managed to get upstairs and she ran toward the same exit doors that masura had just gone through moments before her and when she looked outside, her mind froze. The streets looked like a battlefield. People were violently convulsing on the sidewalk. There were people with spoons in their mouths, which she would later learn was to keep them from swallowing their tongues. She also saw men in business suits lying in flower beds staring straight up into the sky without blinking. One elderly man was foaming at the mouth. And so as she stood there shocked, Masura, along with the other very sick subway

attendants, they had rallied their strength and lifted Mr. Takahashi up on his stretcher. And they had brought him upstairs. And so they came barging out the doors right next to her. And then they placed Mr. Takahashi down kind of right in front of Kyoka. And Kyoka, she doesn't know who these people are, but she found herself just staring at them. And she watched as Masora ran up right next to Mr. Takahashi and he was holding his hand and he's kind of crying and trying to talk to Mr. Takahashi. And Masora is yelling out for someone to help him find an ambulance. And so Kyoka, she's kind of in shock and she's just staring at everything going on not sure what to do but then she kind of snaps out of it and she hears masura and she decides okay i'm

gonna help him find an ambulance and so she yells to masura that she's gonna go find his ambulance and so she runs all the way down to the street which was not far from the exit of the subway station and when she was in the road she heard the sirens everywhere. They were all over Tokyo, but there were none near them. But Kiyoka noticed there was this news van that had just pulled up and all these news people had hopped out. And they had their cameras up and they're filming the exits of the subway station. And Kiyoka just suddenly felt furious and she screamed at them to stop filming, help us. And so the news crew, they kind of sensed the gravity of the situation, even though they really had no idea what was going on and they said to kyoka you know what can we do and she said stay right there you're going to drive someone to the hospital and then kyoka ran back to masura and she

got him and his co-workers to lift up mr takahashi and they went down to the news van and they loaded mr takahashi into the back of the news van and kyoka would give Masura her handkerchief and she says, look, hang this out the window and wave it the whole time. They're going to drive you to the hospital. People will see you waving that and they will know it's an emergency. And so Masura thanked her and he and all of his co-workers hopped in the van with the news crew and they headed off. Mr. Takahashi would unfortunately die before they reached the hospital. By now, it was obvious to basically everyone in Tokyo that something horrible had happened inside of the subway, but nobody knew what it was. However, when the truth was finally uncovered, people had a very hard time believing it.

Earlier that morning, just before Dr. Hayashi got off of train A725K, he stood up in front of his seat and momentarily paused. As he stood there, he acted like he was patting his coat down one more time to make sure he had all of his belongings, but he wasn't really doing that. He was using that innocent-seeming gesture to shake loose a folded-up newspaper that was inside of his jacket. It was the same newspaper that his driver had purchased at the convenience store with him that morning. And once it was loose, it fell from the inside of his jacket down onto the ground right next to Dr. Hayashi's right foot. And Dr. Hayashi, he acted like he didn't know he had just done that. He kind of ignored the newspaper on the

ground. The only person on the train who seemed to be paying any attention to him was the little girl who was sitting in front of him. As he stood, Dr. Hayashi looked at her, but only for a moment before he looked away. Then he carefully, but forcefully, pushed the sharpened tip of his umbrella straight down into the newspaper that he had just dropped. He did this several times without looking down before finally hustling off the train. Wrapped up inside of the newspaper he dropped were two identical plastic packets that almost resembled dishwasher soap pods. Inside of these packets was a liquid form of one of the most deadly nerve toxins in the world, sarin gas. And when Dr. Hayashi jabbed his umbrella into the newspaper, he was attempting

to puncture those packets because as soon as that liquid was exposed to the air, it would vaporize and become sarin gas. He was only able to puncture one of the two packets, but that was more than enough. Developed by the Nazis in 1937, sarin is among the most toxic of any known chemical warfare agent. Within seconds of exposure, sarin disrupts the normal activity of our neurotransmitters, basically sending our nervous system into overdrive. Your muscles start to convulse and twitch. Your normal bodily secretions go crazy, so you start to cough and you can't stop. Tears come pouring out of your eyes, your pupils contract until they're like pinpoints, your nose starts running, you drool and vomit. As neurotransmitters

keep telling your nerves to go, go, go, go, go, your bowels and bladder evacuate themselves. And because sarin has no taste or smell, the people near it in the Tokyo subway had absolutely no idea what was happening to them. Instead, they felt the stabbing pain as their chest tightened. They started to feel nauseous, their vision blurred. Depending on the purity and strength of the sarin gas and the type of exposure, those symptoms could intensify, progressing to convulsions, paralysis, and death within 1 to 10 minutes. After fleeing the train and making it back to street level, Dr. Hayashi quickly got into the waiting car with Nimi, his driver, and the pair started driving

west. Their next destination was a large swath of desolate land located near the foot of Mount Fuji, an active volcano about 65 miles outside of Tokyo. As soon as the car broke free of Tokyo traffic, Nimi started to speed up. Soon, they both had a clear view of Mount Fuji, its peak covered in snow, and then about an hour later, the men had arrived at their destination. They pulled up to a collection of run-down looking buildings surrounded by a high chain-link fence. As soon as Nimi had parked the car inside of the compound, Dr. Hayashi opened the car door and walked toward one of the smaller buildings. Once inside, he walked straight through what looked like a waiting

room to a back door. He took a deep breath and then he opened that door and inside was the smaller office and there were eight men inside of it. Dr. Hayashi stepped inside with Nimmy close behind him and they took up their spot on the right side of the room, standing shoulder to shoulder with the other men, and just like everyone else, they waited in silence. A few minutes later, the door at the back of this inner office opened, and a 40-year-old man named Shoko Asahara came in. He was a stocky man with black hair down to his shoulders, and he had a black beard that reached halfway down his chest. When he stopped in front of Dr. Hayashi, Nimi, and the other eight assembled men, he stared at them through his gray eyes. After a few tense moments, a man standing next to Dr. Hayashi

nervously stepped forward and he looked at Shoko and he just said, mission accomplished. It would turn out Dr. Hayashi and every other person in that room and nearly 50,000 other people at the time were part of a doomsday cult called Aum Shinrikyo, which means supreme truth, and Shoko was their leader. Initially, Shoko had founded Aum Shinrikyo to preach a mashup of Hinduism, Buddhism, meditation, and natural healing, and he was extremely good at recruiting people to join, attracting many members of Japan's super elite like Dr. Hayashi. And once people joined, it was like they fell under Shoko's spell, and soon they would become obsessed with him, doing things like drinking his bath water to

try to get closer to him, or wearing electrically charged hats they believed would synchronize their thoughts with his. And so, when Shoko shifted gears and decided Aum Shinrikyo needed to focus less on spirituality and healing, and instead focus on starting World War III in order to cleanse the world, none of his extremely well-educated followers, like Dr. Hayashi, objected. Instead, they said, how can we help? And so, on March 20th, 1995, Dr. Hayashi, along with four other cult members that were in that room with him, carried sarin gas packets into the Tokyo subway and dropped and punctured them in strategic locations to ensure the gas spread as far as possible. And then afterwards, they ran back to the streets where

their drivers were waiting to take them away. And all of the drivers were in this room as well. Shoko hoped this attack would somehow prompt World War III and collapse the Japanese government, but it didn't do that. However, it did kill 13 people and injured 5,000 people. Amazingly, this was not the first sarin gas attack carried out by this cult. A year earlier, Shoko had orchestrated another sarin attack on a quiet Japanese neighborhood that killed eight people and injured more than 300, but at the time, no one knew the cult was responsible. On May 16th, 1995, so nearly one month after the Sarin attack in the Tokyo subway, authorities would figure out the previous attack was carried out by Shoko and his cult,

and this one was carried out by them as well, and so they would track down and arrest Shoko Asahara. He was discovered in a secret compartment between the second and third floors of the Mount Fuji headquarters. He was dressed in purple robes and meditating at the time of his arrest. In the weeks, months, and years that followed, police would track down and charge 200 cult members in connection with the subway attack and in connection with other crimes and murders. Dr. Hayashi, whose sarin packets were directly responsible for two deaths, along with hundreds of injuries, cooperated with the police, giving up information about the cult. In exchange for this information, he was spared the death penalty and given life in prison.

123 cult members would be given the death penalty, including Dr. Hayashi's driver, Nimi, and the cult's leader, Shoko Asahara. Kiyoka and Masura would both survive the Tokyo subway sarin gas attack. Masura would spend three days in the hospital, but after he was discharged, he would go right back to work. And Kiyoka, she initially did not go to the hospital, sticking around to help people as much as she could, but later that day, she would get very, very sick and she would stay that way for several weeks, but she would eventually make a full recovery. Thank you for listening to the Mr. Ballin podcast. If you enjoyed this episode and you haven't done this already, please take a picture of the five-star review buttons lawn

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