Isle of Broken Years

by Jane Fletcher

  “US Coast Guard.”

  Sam frowned. “Did you say useless coastguard?”

  Floyd laughed. “No. U. S. United States.”

  “Which means?”

  Liz rejoined them, holding a large book. “It means you’re from before 1776.” She held up a finger. “No, don’t tell me. Let’s see how close I can get. You can introduce yourselves while I find the page.”

  Floyd looked as if he was made from a series of balls, strung tightly together, with a round face, and round bulging muscles. He had to be in his fifties but was obviously still fit and active. What time period had he come from? But some things did not change. His straight back, along with the set of his shoulders, marked him as a soldier.

  “You were in the army?” Catalina asked.

  “Yes, ma’am. Started in the 29th Infantry Division, finished in the Coast Guard.” He touched a forefinger to his brow. “Sergeant Floyd Lombardi.”

  “You’ll have been in his boat already. The Inflatable came with him and his comrades,” the woman said.

  “While poor old USS Donahue sank.” Floyd assisted the African woman onto the bench. In her case the help was doubly needed, since she was clearly in the middle stages of pregnancy.

  Once seated, she leaned back with her legs outstretched. Her shift top rode up over her gently bulging stomach. She smiled at them. “My name is Kali.” Her voice was deep and rich.

  Catalina guessed Kali was a similar age to herself. She had seen Africans before—many at court owned slaves from across the known world, as far away as Japan—but this woman acted with none of their deference, and not just in her relaxed pose. Kali’s eyes met hers in honest, open appraisal. No viscounts, no special people, and it would seem, no slaves. Catalina’s grandmother would have been shocked. Fortunately, Catalina was not her grandmother.

  “I’m Catalina, and this is my fam—friend, Alonzo.” Most likely, there were no family retainers.

  “Right, found it.” Liz had a forefinger on the open book. “So let’s see, last jump, Atlantis had been stable for eighty-two days, which means…” She traced across the page. “You’re from 1625, give or take.”

  “March 1631,” Sam said.

  “That’s not bad. Maybe I can shave Nate’s numbers a little.” Liz sounded thoughtful.

  “Nate? Is he one of the people here?”

  “He was, but he’s long gone. He was first to spot the link between the date and the gap between jumps. The further back in time we go, the longer Atlantis stays put. Nate started plotting a graph. The trouble is, the points were concentrated at one end, which left a lot of extrapolation to do. There’ve been castaways like Madison, who managed to get herself shipwrecked during a ten-minute window in 2016. At the other extreme, the longest Atlantis has ever gone between jumps is 4,172 days, but nobody arrived then, and they wouldn’t have had a clue about the date, even if they had. Like Yaraha and Piracola. They’re pre-Columbus, so they’ve never heard of Pope Gregory, or his calendar.”

  “I couldn’t give a date either,” Kali said.

  “She escaped from a slave ship on its way over from Africa,” Floyd added.

  “Yes, dear. But we know you were roundabout 1780.” Liz looked up from her book “From the point of view of fine-tuning the graph, we hit lucky with Torvold. He was a bit hazy about dates, but his father was foster brother to Leif Erikson. He could give enough clues to put his arrival at 1010 AD. It dropped a point on the graph centuries earlier than anything we’d had before, and confirmed what everyone suspected. The graph was an exponential curve that shoots to infinity at about 1200 BC—the Late Bronze Age collapse.”

  Liz sounded triumphant, but was she still speaking English? Then she laughed. “Oh, listen to me. You probably haven’t got a clue what I’m talking about, right?”

  “Ah. No.”

  “Never mind, dear. Just do what everyone else does and nod. Humor me.”

  “We do listen,” Kali said, her tone gently teasing. “We take you very seriously. If we ever get off this island, it will be due to you and your graphs.”

  “Not much hope of that, I’m afraid.”

  “Never give up hope.”

  Liz shook her head sadly and turned to another page in the book. She dipped a quill in an ink bottle. “Anyway, we need to enter you three in here. So, your names again, in full.”

  “Sam Helyer.”

  “Catalina de Valasco.”

  “Alonzo Ortiz.”

  Liz put down the quill and put the book aside for the ink to dry. “I’m the thirty-ninth person to be record keeper since a castaway named Ivan started this journal. Some of my predecessors were a touch lackadaisical and there are a few gaps along the way. On top of that, no one has any idea how long Atlantis was jumping around before Ivan got here. Still, each sunrise I put one more mark on the tally sheet, and for what it’s worth, the day count of your arrival is 88,413.”

  “That many? It must add up to centuries.”

  “Oh, it does, dear. We’re at 242 years and counting. Hundreds of castaways have come and gone before us. And I don’t expect we’ll be the last.”

  Yaraha and Torvold reappeared, carrying trays. “Time to stop the chatter. I’ve made Spanish omelet.”

  The food smelled good and tasted better, but Catalina could not work out why Yaraha called it Spanish. She had never eaten it before in her life.

  * * *

  For Madison, something being cool had nothing to do with temperature, and the word “like” was a form of punctuation. All sentences ended on a high note. She had volunteered to show Catalina, Alonzo, and Sam around the buildings that made up the Squat and help them choose accommodations.

  Although Madison was in her mid-twenties, she possessed the sort of happy enthusiasm rarely seen in anyone past the age of five. She was the only castaway to have her own style of dress, although it amounted to little more than exposing as much skin as possible, while preserving a minimal level of decency. Alonzo was clearly having trouble knowing where to look—or where not to look.

  Madison had a knot tied in the hem of her smock top, so her midriff was on display. The castaways’ knee-length breeches were called shorts. In Madison’s case, the name was particularly apt. Her light brown hair was held back from her face by a cloth band tied around her forehead.

  Madison’s left hand flapped up and down. “This is, like, a condo.”

  Catalina looked around, trying to work out what this meant. She had given up asking for translations. A few feet away, Sam stood with her back to Catalina, possibly doing the same.

  A woman. Catalina was swamped by shock every time she thought about it. And yet now that she studied Sam, were the signs there? Did Sam’s hips sway more when she walked? Was her jawline too delicate? Her face was boyish but fine-boned, and intriguing. Catalina remembered Sam’s arm around her waist, saving her from falling into the sea—arms that were hard and strong, but also smooth. Catalina forced herself to look away. Sam had become far more interesting in ways hard to understand.

  Alonzo stayed at the entrance to the building, glaring at Sam with unmistakable disgust. Admittedly, the Bible forbade women from dressing as men, but it was a minor clause and hardly explained the strength of Alonzo’s reaction. Was it important, and should she talk to him about it later?

  Meanwhile, the tour continued. “Three of the boys live here. They’re cool, and there’s plenty of space if one of you wanted to join them. Or if any of you are a couple…” Madison left the sentence hanging and looked at them brightly, waiting for a response.

  After a few seconds of silence, Sam asked the question. “How can one person be two?”

  Madison laughed and clapped her hands. “Oh, you know. An item. Involved with each other. In a relationship. Lovers.”

  “Married?”

  “Doesn’t have to be official, honey. You know—try before you buy.”

  “Do you suggest Doña Catalina—” Alonzo’s eyes bulged. His voice choked off in outrage.
r />   Nobody had spoken of Madison as a woman of easy virtue, and there had clearly been no insult intended. Was it really just different morals from different times? Catalina sidled toward Alonzo. She did not want him to say or do anything until she had a better grasp of etiquette among the castaways.

  Madison was unperturbed. “One thing I’ve learned here is that people don’t change. When it comes to the itch, no matter when you’re from, girls will be girls.” She gave Sam a bright smile and added, “Or boys.”

  A sound like the mewling of a newborn kitten interrupted them, “Meea, meea, meea.” Catalina almost fell as a creature scuttled into the building, looking like nothing so much as a giant spider. It was the size of a large dog but had six legs and another pair of appendages, folded in front. The body was bulbous, the head just a bulge on top. If it had eyes, they were not obvious. Its skin was mottled white.

  “What is it?” Catalina could hear her voice cracking.

  “Oh, don’t worry, honey. It’s just a caretaker. They’re, like, harmless.”

  “Caretaker?” She had imagined something far more human.

  The creature ignored them. It lowered its body to the ground and ran back and forth, mewling all the time. Where it passed, the ground was left clean—a footprint, a blown leaf, a scrap of paper, all vanished. Then it scuttled to one side of the room, opened a panel, and probed with one of its front appendages. Catalina had no idea what it was doing, but then noticed one corner of the room had been slightly darker than the rest. Within seconds, the ceiling returned to a uniform glow. The caretaker replaced the panel and left. A last “Meea, meea” faded away.

  Catalina was shaking but tried to smile. “That saves work, I guess.”

  “Yes and no. We don’t have to clean up our own shit. But they won’t let us change anything. Years back, someone had the bright idea of growing normal plants over here, so they, like, brought seeds over from the outer island. As soon as they sprouted, the caretakers dug them up. They won’t even let seabirds build nests here. That’s why we have to go over for food supplies and play dodge the hunters.”

  “We can’t eat the plants here?”

  “Uh-uh. No way. If you’re lucky they just make you puke your guts out.”

  Catalina thought she got the idea.

  “Liz reckons it’s all, like, alien. You know, from another planet.”

  Sam looked surprised. “The wandering stars? You think they’re responsible for the poisonous plants here? How?”

  “You’re all from a long time ago, aren’t you?” Madison caught her lower lip in her teeth, clearly thinking. She then clasped her hands together. “Right. Well, you know the stars? They’re really other suns, but a long, long, long way away. And planets like ours go around them. You know this world is a planet, right? Anyway, we think other people live on those planets. Except they aren’t people like us. They’re aliens.”

  Madison was clearly making an effort to communicate. It was unfortunate this made her sound as if she were talking to three-year-olds. Catalina studied her face, trying to tell whether she was teasing them, but Madison’s smile held nothing but sincerity. I’m in Atlantis, having jumped though time, with monstrous spiders that clean the floor. Put in perspective, what was so hard to believe about people living on worlds in the stars? Even Catalina’s father had thought the church a little too quick to dismiss Galileo and Copernicus.

  Madison returned to adult mode. “Anyway. Like I said, Yaraha, Piracola, and Jorge live here, but there’s plenty of space if you want to move in. Or we can check out the other condos. Tell you what, I’ll show you what the digs are like.”

  She bounced across the room and into the sunshine with Catalina and the others trailing, bemused, in her wake.

  * * *

  Madison’s tour ended in the kitchen. “We all take turns to cook. Charles is in charge of the roster. He’ll let you know when it’s your turn.”

  “All of us?” Sam sounded apprehensive. She was looking at Alonzo.

  “Yup. Everyone. Don’t fret. When it’s your turn, somebody will, like, show you how the hotplates and ovens work. It’s a cinch.”

  “It’s not my cooking I’m worried about.”

  Sam spoke under her breath, but clearly enough to be heard. Alonzo’s scowl deepened. Something had gone on between them on the pirate ship, that much was obvious, but Catalina could not imagine what part cooking played.

  “Okay, that’s it. Catch y’guys later.” Which presumably translated as good-bye from Madison.

  Catalina wandered back to the room she had chosen. The walls were a uniform light gray, and there was nothing she could do to personalize it. Any changes would be undone by the caretakers. The bed was a large raised platform with a cushioned top. A bureau to one side had built-in lockers to store bedding and any other belongings she wanted to keep. A small side room had waste and washing facilities. Catalina stood in the doorway. Madison had strongly hinted they should make use of it at least once a day. So why not now? When in Rome…

  Catalina pulled off her clothes. Standing completely naked felt indecent, even with the door closed. She dropped her smock in the laundry bin and pressed the wall button. Water fell like rain from a pattern of holes in the ceiling. It was warm and scented, exactly as Madison had claimed it would be. What was unexpected, though, was how pleasant it was, flowing over her skin.

  Catalina had intended only the briefest of washes, but ended up taking ten minutes. At last she pressed the button again, and a hot wind blew from all sides, so she was dry within seconds. When she retrieved her smock from the bin it too was spotless and faintly perfumed.

  The control panel on the bedroom wall was another source of wonder. It looked like glass covering a pattern, but bars changed color as Catalina ran her finger back and forth, and the lighting changed accordingly. Another bar caused air to blow from vents, not just hot, as in the washroom, but also cold.

  Catalina did not understand how it was possible, and yet Madison had clearly seen nothing remarkable in any of this. Was it due to living in the Squat for years, or did the Earth she left also have such daily marvels?

  Catalina sat on the side of the bed and looked around in amazement. The room might appear Spartan, and would be improved by rugs, ornaments, and paintings, but it had a level of cleanliness and convenience she had never dreamed of.

  She was still playing with the lighting when a bell rang out, the signal for dinner. Catalina headed back to the common room. Maybe she would have another shower before bedtime.

  * * *

  Sitting on the circular bench between Alonzo and Kali made Catalina feel like a small child. Her feet dangled a foot clear of the floor. However, the only other options were to sit on the ground or eat standing up. Fortunately, the meal more than compensated. The stew with corn dumplings was better than anything Catalina had eaten for a long time. She finished and sat, wondering if there was any left for a second helping.

  “You liked that?” Kali asked.

  “Yes, I did. Very much.”

  “My Ricardo, he’s a good cook, don’t you think?” She indicated the man sitting on the other side of her.

  Ricardo smiled and lifted Kali’s hand to his lips. He was, at most, a couple of years older than Catalina. His skin was not as dark as Kali, or even Yaraha, but it was evident his ancestors were not all from Europe. His features hinted more at the Americas than Africa, but could easily be either, or both. His hair was black and straight. He was tall, thin, and very quiet. Catalina was yet to hear him say a word, yet the warmth in his eyes when he looked at Kali was unmistakable.

  There was no need to ask whether Ricardo was the father of her baby, though the absence of both church and priest in Atlantis made it unlikely they were married in any formal sense. Father Ortiz would have been horrified, but Plato would not, and Catalina knew who was the more astute thinker of the two. She remembered Madison’s offhand attitude. When in Rome… Catalina suspected she would need to remind herself of the proverb
frequently over the following days.

  “You did well with the cooking.” Catalina raised her mug of water in a toast to the chef. The absence of wine was her only complaint.

  Ricardo ducked his head and mumbled a response. It took a moment for Catalina to realize he was speaking Spanish. His accent was every bit as odd as the others were when speaking English.

  “Could you repeat that, please?”

  Judging by his frown, he found her Spanish equally strange. He cleared his throat and switched to English. “I said, I’m pleased you liked it. My brother, Jorge, is a better cook than me. It will be his turn the day after tomorrow, so you’ll see for yourself.”

  Kali barged him gently. “Always you say your brother is the best at everything. You should not put yourself down. You are my first choice.”

  “He’s cleverer than me.”

  “No, he’s not. He is older than you, that is all. Anyway, you’re much more handsome than him.” There was laughter in Kali’s voice.

  Catalina looked around. “Is he here?”

  “No. Jorge is off fishing with Torvold and Piracola,” Ricardo said.

  “I thought we couldn’t eat the fish.”

  “Not the ones in the inner sea, but there’s a canal through to the ocean. They have taken the Inflatable out and won’t be back until nightfall. Jorge is prepared to take the risk for fresh fish.”

  “What risk? Can the hunters swim?”

  “No. Thank God. But if they are on the open sea when a time jump happens…” He shrugged. “If any boat can survive, it is the Inflatable, so Jorge tells me. But then, he told me it would be safe to land on this island, when it showed up where none was supposed to be.”

  “You came from New Spain?”

  “Honduras. But yes, I think it was once part of the area called that. My brother and I, we were…” His expression became shamefaced. “Floyd does not approve, of course. It was his job to stop people like us. We were smugglers, you see. Mostly cocaine.”

  “Is that a sort of drink, like brandy?”