Bolzano: “In 2230, you could buy a city with that thing.”
Duarte: “I’d never sell. We have more. Wait until you see the stone we have picked out for you.”
Bolzano: “A gift for me? Bravo!”
From the log of Capt. Juniper Jones
Security Detail II
Had ourselves a nice little party once Kaikane put the pinchers on Hunter. Up to then, everybody was walking on eggshells.
Used one of his dirty holds to take Hunter to ground and disarm him. Very slick move. Surfer man toyed for a while. Got him good and bloody, crying and messing himself, then booted him from camp.
Smack-down put everybody in a good mood. Even Duarte, who arrived looking better than ever, but acting like she just took a bite of shit pie. Still don’t know what Hunter did but it must’ve been bad. She and Kaikane won’t talk about it.
Just glad we found and hid the damn belt. He’d probably roll in and kill all of us if he could. For now, he’s holed up under a burnt out tree about 100 yards north of camp. Spotted him while looking for red wolf, who took off when strangers hit town. Wonder what they’ll think of my dog.
Sal says Red’s hell on finding truffles. Saw them dig up a few and started doing it on his own. Let Flower pet him the other day. Think he likes her more than me. Know it. I warned Gray Beard to keep an eye on his little dog. Fuck, Red would eat him in one bite.
After dinner, Duarte and Kaikane hiked down to the boat to get some of the stuff they brought back. Damp night, but not raining. We stoked up the fire and spread one of the mats from the boat on the ground for everybody to sit on. Not the best position for my back, but what are ya gonna do?
Before they started handing out gifts, Duarte dropped a leather skin of hooch in Sal’s lap. “Plum wine,” she said. “Not as good as you make, but it does the job.” Handing him a horn cup, she said, “Salvatore, will you please do the honors of pouring.”
Careful not to spill a drop, Sal filled the horn, looked at it for a while, and handed it to Duarte. “You first.”
Chief Botanist drained the horn in one swallow. I was next, followed by Kaikane and Gray Beard. Summer Wind and Flower each tried a taste but didn’t like it. Sal took a pass. Thought Duarte might razz him, but she let it go. Actually, now that I think about it, she picked up the skin and horn and put them away. Wine wasn’t as strong as some of the nail polish Sal’s cooked up, but it put everybody in a good mood for Christmas.
Everybody got a shell necklace and promise of “something better later.” Whatever that means. Meant a lot to me when Maria slipped one of her handmade things around Flower’s neck and gave her a peck on the cheek.
Duarte needed that beat-down on Hunter as much as Kaikane did. It’s like a switch flipped on. Wasn’t long before she was dancing and clapping her hands with Summer and Flower while Sal sang and pounded on the drums he’s made out of our leather scraps. Old man joined in on flute, left Kaikane and me as the only ones watchin’.
“Come on, man,” he said. “It’ll be fun.”
It was.
TRANSMISSION:
Duarte: “I like Flower, she is very sweet.”
Jones: “Yep, sweet.”
Duarte: “Where are their clan mates?”
Jones: “Gone.”
Duarte: “I remember them as a grungy bunch, what did you guys call the wife? Dirt Bag?”
Jones: “No, that was Mud Hen. Dirt Bag was her husband, the dipshit leader. Summer’s son.”
Duarte: “I’d forgotten that! Summer may be a bit old for Salvatore, but it’s obvious they are in love. It’s cute the way they take care of each other.”
Jones: “Yep.”
Duarte: “You and Flower also seem quite tight. Is marriage in your future?”
Jones: “What’re ya gettin’ at?”
Duarte: “Paul and I talked. We think you should bring them with us. There’s enough room on the boat.”
Jones: “Just like that?”
Duarte: “Just like that.”
Jones: “Expected a fight.”
Duarte: “Not from me or Paul.”
Jones: “Would make our lives better.”
Duarte: “Mine too. I’m surrounded by men, I could use some female companionship.”
Jones: “Hunter said ya’d never let ‘em go.”
Duarte: “Hunter’s an asshole.”
Jones: “What’d he do?”
Duarte: “Not now. I can’t.”
Jones: “Whatever it was, must’ve been bad.”
Duarte: “Yes.”
Jones: “Your old man set him straight.”
Duarte: “Think we’ll pay a price for that?”
Jones: “Dunno. Maybe he knocked some sense into him.”
From the log of Maria Duarte
Chief Botanist
Will they call me insane if I suddenly change my mind about leaving? The wildfire has served up a botanist’s dream. Considering the groundwork I have already put in cataloging the flora of Italy, this is an amazing opportunity to study the rebound from such a pervasive event. What makes it doubly tempting is the number of new and unique plants popping up everywhere.
The rolling land is covered in a velvety carpet of ferns, grasses and strange succulents. These plants new to my eyes may have been spawned by seeds that laid dormant for years. Italy may not have seen their like since the last big fire.
In tonight’s report I set forth a hypothesis that these new seedlings could pre-date the ice ages. It is possible the fire cleared the decks of recent arrivals and triggered their bloom, or it could be that after two months of not logging onto my computer, I’m letting my enthusiasm get the better of me.
It is an interesting thought. Too bad I’ll never know the answer. There will be no staying, and I know it. The best I can do is drag my feet.
We climbed to the top of the Palatine on our hike back from the storage cave today. Trails that seemed so permanent have disappeared beneath a uniform green blanket. I wonder how long it will take for the hill’s trees to grow back to rival its pre-fire canopy. A thousand years? 500?
Paul and I tried scraping away the charred ruins of Sal’s tall pine to see if we could reach a place to count its rings. The fire burned the stump too far into the ground. It had to be one of the hill’s oldest. I estimate the pine lived 1,000 years or more.
Despite the chill, we all took turns stripping down and taking quick baths in Sal’s tub. This was not entirely unplanned, as I brought two bars of my latest soap. We had also collected enough firewood along the way to build a fire for driving away post-bath shivers.
Made from coconut oil, wood ash and alkaline salts, this is my best-smelling and best-working soap yet. We’re talking squeaky-clean hair. It took some coaxing to get Summer and Flower into the tub, but once the rest of us were done shampooing and ridding our bodies of grime, they could see and smell the difference. It was sweet the way Cpl. Bolzano stood ready to gather Summer Wind inside his fur cape and hold her close as she stepped from the tub.
Jones is not so obvious with his displays of affection, but he did make sure Flower had a place close to the fire and a square of leather to dry herself with. I know The Team will hate our plan to take them with us to North America–and hopefully South America, Hawaii and Asia.
What choice do I have? There would be a mutiny. A fool could read the dynamic the afternoon we arrived. They are in love. Even if I managed to pry the boys away, Salvatore and Jones would never forgive me.
I’ve played the schoolmarm. All it accomplished was making me the outcast. If we didn’t like the women, if they didn’t fit in, it might be different. I’m starting to get the gist of their language and thanks to their boyfriends they have a fairly good understanding of ours. As we cross these language barriers, I find they have stories to tell. Summer Wind and Flower are not ignorant, and they have not led dull lives.
I’m embarrassed to admit I gave Sal, a recovering alcoholic, a bag of booze the night we arrived. What was I
thinking? How stupid! To his credit, the Italian didn’t even flinch. He poured each of us a horn, but when it came his turn, declined in a quiet, unassuming way.
Practically married, sober, Salvatore Bolzano has become a new man. From what I’ve seen and heard about his Neanderthal dig, Sal accomplished a lot more than any of us, even he, expected. Abstaining from drink surely helped. He and I had opportunity to go over his reports during several lengthy work sessions last week. A cold virus swept through camp last week and we spent several rainy afternoons in his tent conversing while he recovered. Lucky for me, I was the only one who didn’t get sick.
Paul and I are now the old married couple of the clan, smirking and sharing knowing glances when we catch one of the other couples sneaking a kiss or copping a feel. He and I have been getting along well, though I still have bouts with anxiety and must work through days when I don’t want to be touched. He can usually sense when I need my space.
Paul insisted on staying with the canoe while the rest of us hiked inland for our overnight work detail at the cave. This was the first time we’ve been out of each other’s sight since the Nile. Several times I forgot he wasn’t there and turned to tell him something.
The red wolf finally made an appearance yesterday. I was beginning to think they were pulling my leg about him. Sniffing out truffles, battling side-by-side against bears and wolves, the stories seemed too farfetched to be true.
He arrived at the storage cave as were making camp for the night. Bello was shadowing Gray Beard while the storyteller collected ferns for their bed and somehow strayed. Looking up from his sniffing, Bello found himself snout-to-snout with the bison-sized wolf.
Turning to Gray Beard’s cry of despair, we saw the wolf towering over the small dog with fangs bared. In a split-second decision, the pup put his life in the hands of play. Wagging his tail, ducking his head low to the ground, Bello dodged left, right, left, then ran in a tight, gleeful circle at the wolf’s feet.
Expanding his circle, ears pinned back, eyes rolled wide, tongue lolling out, Bello careened through camp. Not one of us had the good sense to grab him as he zigzagged back to the wolf. “This is when it happens,” I thought as the wolf leaped to confront him.
Landing with his head to the ground, the wolf juked left, right, left, then turned a tight circle as the dog barked at his heels. They played for seven minutes, rolling on the ground and taking turns chasing each other. All it would have taken was one misstep by the wolf to break the dog’s back, or one overly playful bite to cleave him in half. Bello got the kid glove treatment.
Finally, the old man coaxed Bello away with a scrap of jerked rabbit. Face drained white by worry, all Gray Beard could say through a forced smile was, “I told you he was smart.”
CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
TRANSMISSION:
Kaikane: “You guys try to have fun without me.”
Jones: “Don’t launch early.”
Kaikane: “No worries. I’ll be here.”
Duarte: “Bye, hon. You want me to bring you anything?”
Kaikane: “Mushrooms and onions if you see any. I’ll catch us some cod for tomorrow’s dinner.”
Duarte: “Of course. Love ya, babe.”
Kaikane: “Love you too. Be careful.”
From the log of Paul Kaikane
Recreation Specialist
My wife says it’s time to write another “major” update for home. That’s pretty much my approach to every journal entry I write, so here I sit on the deck of the Leilani, watching the Tiber flow by, wondering what the heck to do different.
Am I supposed to get more deep? Say how much I miss everybody? Gripe about how hard life is in the Stone Age? Wrap things up?
All of the above, I reckon.
Hard to believe how fast 10 years fly by. In some ways, it feels like we just got here. But when I really think about it, start listing all the places we’ve traveled to, all the crazy stuff we’ve seen and done, I realize we’ve crammed a helluva lot in one decade.
Friends and sponsors thought I was nuts to walk away from the surf tour to join some secret Team nobody ever heard of. “What about the money?” my family asked. I won’t lie, not too many days go by when I don’t think about home, about my old life in the future. Sometimes I daydream about contests I won or extreme stuff I got roped into, but usually it’s about riding waves with family and friends, barbecues on the beach, sitting around a fire playing ukulele and talking story.
Do I miss home? Miss my friends and family? Sure. Would I love to go back and find the coaches and teachers who went out of their way to help a poor kid from a messed-up family? To shake their hands and thank them for giving me the tools to escape? For helping me become somebody to be proud of? Absolutely.
Would I go back if I could? Not in a million years. Even with all the problems at the start and all the hard times we’ve been through, jumping back with The Team is the best decision I ever made. I never would have fallen in love with Maria, or made friends with Jones, Gray Beard and Sal.
It is an honor to explore an Earth so pristine and bountiful. Within a stone’s throw of where I sit, 30 or 40 fish jump every minute. If I wanted a trout, eel, rabbit or swan for lunch, I could probably catch one in less than five minutes. Every morning we wake up there’s better than a 50-50 chance we’ll see or do something new that day.
Don’t take this wrong, but there’s no way someone reading this in the year 2232 can totally understand what this world is like. It took me years to get used to the constant pounding my senses take. Processing so many sights, sounds and smells wears on you. It’s a huge load, especially when every step you take there’s a threat of being nailed by a poisonous spider, swallowed by a snake or hooked by a rhino. We deal with all sorts of alpha carnivores, including panthers, wolves and bears, basically by staying out of their way.
Danger’s always there. If you don’t know what you’re doing, it’s easy to fall in the shit. So it figures, now that we finally have this land figured out, and a fire has turned it into a grassy park, we’re going to move on.
I’ve enjoyed our stay in Italy. It did us good to settle in for a few years and get comfortable. Sure, there’ll be stuff I’ll miss, but I’m ready to explore some new places. Now that Leilani has had her retrofit and shakedown, I’m not too worried about the crossing. We’ll sail out of the Med and stage somewhere along the coast of France to provision and wait for early summer. Voyage should take only a month, two tops.
I like the additions to our crew. It does Maria good to have Summer Wind and Flower to hang out with. Hopefully the two women can handle a long boat ride without freaking out in the first storm or puking the whole crossing.
They’ll have to learn their way around the canoe, how to pull their weight, but that shouldn’t be a problem. Neither Summer nor Flower strike me as the type to be afraid of work. The two of them are always stopping by to invite Maria along when they go gathering or are headed down to the beach to collect firewood. The way they have welcomed Maria into their circle means a lot to her. She can use some friends right now.
Fucking Hunter, she’s still shook up from that long run. Locking somebody in a suit so long it changes the color of their hair? So long that it messes with their head? I booted him from camp the day we got here. He stopped a couple days later to pick up his spears and blankets and we haven’t seen him since. If he’s not back when we sail, I’ll have no problem leaving him behind. If he does come, I’m thinking about lashing him to a kayak and towing him 30 feet behind the canoe like a lure. Is that against Team rules?
Maria and Sal worry about whether the crap we write will make it back. No matter how tough these computers are, 32,000 years is a long time to be buried. Their problem is, those two figure all their hard work will be worthless if nobody reads it in the future.
That’s not how I look at it. I think they have done great jobs. No matter what, they tried. They have done their best. If nobody reads my stuff it’s probably just as wel
l. What could a hapa-Hawaiian kid from Maui possibly have to share that would make any difference to the world?
Now that I’m thinking about it, if I could change things in the future, I would tell people to take better care of the planet. They have no idea how screwed up the Earth is in their time, or how beautiful and wild it can be. It may be too late to bring back the polar caps and animals that have gone extinct, but when we jumped there was still time to save the atmosphere, to stop polluting the rivers, lakes and oceans.
It may take Earth 30,000 years to bounce back, but with enough love she could do it. She’s more beautiful than anybody back home understands, and also more fragile.
Enough preaching. Hi Mom, Sis, Bro! Hope you guys are doing well! If you see any of my coaches or teachers tell them I said howzit! To all the students at Lahainaluna High School, King Kamehameha III Elementary School and Windward Community College I say, “Do what you dream. And don’t be afraid to dream big.” If a punk like me can travel back through time to find love, adventure and happiness, you guys and girls can accomplish your goals too.
With aloha,
Spc. Paul Kaikane
Einstein III
TRANSMISSION:
Rome Page 50