Stalkers of Chernobyl

LUNAR AWARDS ENTRY: April 2023

“Welcome back to the Exclusion Zone. I am your guide, Sergei. We have a big group going in for the second half-life event, and I want each and every one of you to get what you came for, but for that to happen, don’t think about taking any risks. The more familiar you get with this tour, the more dangerous. Why? Because these tours attract people like you, people who think they can get around safely without a guide. They take an extra risk. They veer off the trail a little bit. Let me tell you right now. Don’t think about it. If you leave the trail, no one will notice and no one will come looking for you. So don’t get lost. We all have our own reasons for coming here. Maybe you are looking for a shadow or an echo of something that once was. Something that can make you feel a little bit like you are just coming home. But let me tell you right now: everything you think you know is dead. Remember that Cesium-137 has a half-life of thirty years, and so far, only the deer have found a way to live here. Humans still need to wait thousands of years before we can safely inhabit Chernobyl.

Now look around you. Let’s get you oriented with your surroundings. Yes, I know you’ve done this a dozen times. Why don’t you use this opportunity to note the changes in the environment since you last visited. And since you have done this so often, you’ll recall that the dizzy, disorienting feeling you get when you spend too much time here is a good indicator that it is time to leave. When you start to feel the radiation sickness, it becomes much more difficult to find your way out, so stay close. I’ve charted our safest route. I know it’s dark, but please turn off your headlamps for this orientation. Listen to the silence. No mosquitoes or beetles. No birds singing or owls calling in the night. Listen. Can you hear the hushed rustle of leaves? Yes, those are the deer. They know we are here. What do you smell? Smell the life beginning to return to this zone. The smell of this evening’s rain. Mushrooms and damp leaves and forest bark. What do you taste? Metal? I hope not, because it means we’ve hit a hotspot. Hopefully it’s just the lingering taste of your midnight coffee and not ionizing radiation. Next, what do you feel? I get goosebumps on my skin when the deer are close. Do you feel that chill? Yes, they are close. Don’t turn on your headlamps yet. They don’t like to be watched and we need to wait until we reach the Sarcophagus, which you’ll recall is the concrete shell over the destroyed nuclear reactor.

Now, turn on your headlamps and follow my flashlight. Watch your step; duck under these branches. Through here. As we go, let me tell you a little bit more about the deer. You all will recall that the hospital in Pripyat was exposed to extreme levels of radiation because of what was brought into it—the first responders, the liquidators. Some of you were born there before the disaster. My father was born there. Of course, we’re not touring the hospital tonight, but the basement of the hospital where the firefighters’ uniforms are—that is where the deer were first spotted. The deer seem to have adapted enough to survive even in the most contaminated places. You’ll get to see them tonight, hopefully. That’s what you’ve paid me for, and I intend to bring you to them. Just as a friendly reminder: there are no refunds.

Let me explain what we are hoping to see. As I said before, this is the second half-life event. The first event happened thirty years after the Chernobyl nuclear disaster, thirty years after 1986, so in 2016. I was there—just a teenager when it happened. I was just like some of you, hoping to find comfort or maybe just to pay my respects as if I was coming to visit the grave of a loved one. My father fled here when he was a schoolboy, but in some ways, it felt like visiting his grave, since it eventually killed him.  What I found was far from a cemetery—or maybe it was exactly what you would expect to find at a cemetery. I found beauty. Dazzling beauty. And it is the beauty that draws stalkers here time and time again, risking radiation exposure for one glimpse of the life here. It was at the first half-life event that the deer made their first appearance en masse over the lake across from the Sarcophagus…”

Sergei continues his tour guide speech, while I slowly slip to the back of the tour group. I turn off my headlamp. I stand still. I watch as the group marches forward. The sound of Sergei’s voice grows distant. The bobbing lights of the headlamps fade. I let my eyes adjust to the darkness. There is enough light for me to make my way through the woods alone, and I know where to find the lake. My fingers unconsciously reach up to my neck and feel the hard mass on my thyroid, pressing like a noose. It is time for me to join the deer and finally be at peace. No more fear. No more fighting. No more pain. For once, I feel I am the master of my path.

In the darkness, I run through the woods. I feel the exhilaration of using every ounce of energy without saving any strength for the return journey. I am ready. I slow my pace. Here it is—the church yard. I see one of them. Glowing blue-purple, gracefully walking among the crosses, illuminating the faces of the saints frozen in stone. I inch closer to the gate at the perimeter of the church yard. Is it her? Does she see me? I take another step closer. I see her ear twitch toward the sound of my footsteps. She turns her eye toward me, though I am unsure she can see me in the darkness. She freezes in place, as if calculating her next move. Maybe I should keep moving toward the lake, but I don’t have time for mistakes or missed opportunities. The half-life event is approaching quickly.

“Mom?” I whisper.

The deer does not move or make any acknowledgment that she heard me. I know it must be her. She told me this is the place I would find her. Does she recognize me? Wouldn’t she remember her daughter? The deer meanders in my direction, and I take another step toward the gate. I place my hands on the cold metal bars. I peer into the cemetery. It is at once beautiful and mysterious. The blue-purple glow of the deer casts shadows that move like the second hand of a clock as she walks through the path among the graves. Maybe she didn’t hear me the first time.

“Mom?” I whisper again, and my body begins to shake with adrenaline.

The deer looks at me. I know she is looking at me. “It’s me,” I say.

Suddenly, she turns. She runs and leaps over the church yard fence and careens through the forest. I run after her. I must not let the blue-purple light leave my sight, but she is already so far away. Now I have lost her. I no longer run after her in pursuit, but I run away from the life I have without her. I run away from the unknowns of this illness taking control of my life. I run away from the disappointments and the losses and the struggles that I promised myself I would not let define me. I run away from my failure to the one person who I know will always accept me, and she is not here.

I have come too far. I will not stop. I run toward the lake. She will be there. Here it is, the shore of the lake. And the other stalkers—I see them. They are getting into canoes sitting on the edge of the lake. Maybe I will join them after all. I run back to the group. I hear Sergei’s voice.

“Hey, is that one of our group? You there! Did you get lost?”

“I made a slight detour and found myself at the church yard. I made it back just in time, it looks like.”

“Well, if you’re going to get lost, the church yard is the best place to be. It has miraculously low radiation levels, and no one knows why. Now get into a canoe; we need to start rowing before the clock strikes 1:23 AM, the time of the first explosion on April 26, 1986. Everyone, our plan is to be in the center of the lake across from the Sarcophagus by 1:15 AM. That gives us a little bit less than ten minutes to catch our breath and quiet down for the event. Get rowing!”

I take a step toward a canoe when Sergei stops me. “You, the one who got lost. Come into my canoe. I don’t want to risk anything funny happening here.” I take a seat next to him.

I am rowing the canoe, searching the sky for any signs of the deer. Three other stalkers share the canoe with me. I wish I could be alone, but I do like the speed of four rowers. We are cutting through the water with great efficiency. I see the power plant and its semi-circle containment shell, like a tiny bandage to patch up someone who has already bled out. Our rows slow to a stop. We coast to the center of the lake and converge with the other canoes. The sky is clear; stars twinkle like gamma radiation. Minutes pass and it is 1:23 AM.

There they are. The deer are here. We see them prance onto the surface of the lake. Their dance looks joyful, and they move as one. They surround our canoes. I am close enough to touch them. I reach out my hand. I can’t reach them. A hand touches mine. Sergei. I turn to see his face. The blue-purple glow from the deer reflects off his face. I see him motioning upward without speaking. He is telling me to look up. When I look, I see millions of deer leaping into the air, spiraling higher and higher, a soft lavender mist rising. I want to join them, but I am mesmerized by the beauty, by the serenity. I lose myself in the experience of the moment, when all things feel peaceful and right and good.

As quickly as it began, the second half-life event is over. We row back to shore. It seems to take us longer to return. We jump out of the canoes and huddle as a group. We stand in silence for a moment. A few people whisper prayers. I just whisper, “Goodbye, Mom.”

We hike back to the outside of the Exclusion Zone. The sun is beginning to peek over the horizon. The stalkers disperse. Sergei walks over and puts a hand on my shoulder: “As beautiful as it was the first time, wasn’t it?”

“Yes. More deer this time, though. Maybe it was more beautiful,” I say.

“The sun is coming up. Can I take you out for a cup of coffee?” Sergei asks.

“You know I’m not interested in you. I never have been,” I say.

“Why does a cup of coffee sound like a lifetime commitment to you? Just coffee,” he says.

“I have cancer,” I say.

“I have been divorced three times,” he says. ”It’s coffee.”

“I wanted to join the deer. To become one of them,” I say.

“And maybe they want you not to be alone next time you try to join them.”

“Maybe,” I say. “It would be nice not to be alone.”

“Let’s go,” he says, and we go together.