Exposition! Let’s hope none of my assumptions get shot down any time soon.
“As you remarked last night, the Old American fortress at Dorim Iduinath is the most ghost-haunted spot in the Caribbean.” Mahota kept her voice conversational, not that she had to. We had the entire goltrain carriage compartment to ourselves. She had bought up the extra seats, cool as could be, and the conductor had let her. Apparently everybody wanted to go to the big city, not away from it. “The first reliable reports of specters dates back to 2130, with a report of a ghost ship patrolling the approaches to the former naval base there. It was definitely occupied by the living as late as 2142, when the Second Republic managed one last supply run to the remains of the garrison. Reportedly, the survivors were offered the chance to return back to the homeland, but they all chose to stay and occupy the site.”
“Survivors?” I narrowed my eyes. “What was killing them off?”
“Old age. The youngest man in the garrison — and by then they were all men — was in his early sixties. Most of the officers were at least a decade older. They were all adamant about staying, however.” Mahota shrugged. “From the report, the captain chose not to argue the point. The Second Republic was still reeling from the Mutagenic Curses, so it was arguably a kindness to let the garrison die peacefully in the warm sun, with the faces and bodies they were born with.”
“Worse ways to go,” I agreed, grabbing a sandwich from the basket. “So what was the garrison hiding? Something from the First Republic?”