Armand Baltazar - Diego and the Rangers of the Vastlantic

The biggest one was titled TIME COLLISION! The article below was interesting to read now: people had known so little in the years right after, when the Chronos War had erupted. The Steam Timers had fought the other-time cultures for control of the world, and for a while, people had become more dangerous than the dinosaurs.

A different article detailed a group of hunters standing over a spinosaurus; another, the vast woolly mammoth herds that lived north of the wild lands. And below there was one about the first explorations across the fantastically changed American landscape by the great explorer Bartholomew Roosevelt. Diego stepped onto the balcony outside his room. A cool, salty breeze greeted his face. It smelled like seaweed and diesel fuel. He gripped the railing and gazed out over the city. He wanted to make sure it still looked like it always had. One last assurance that his dream had been just that.

And sure enough, there was New Chicago, shimmering in the morning sun, looking as fixed and permanent as a city made of three different time periods could.

A ship’s horn blared. In the distance beyond the building tops, Diego spied the great heads and shoulders of massive, clanking robots toiling in the morning mist of the harbor. Once the cargo ships were tended to, these robots would make their way into the canals, their engineers patrolling the city for any signs of deterioration or disrepair from the salt water. The canals were once city streets, but they all lay beneath the waters of the Vastlantic, an ancient ocean that now covered a third of North America.

A bright blue robotic crane passed by Diego’s building, picking its way through the crowded canal like a spider on its eight spindly legs. Another smaller robot followed not far behind. It was yellow and sturdy, more like a bulldozer on legs but with two piston-powered arms instead of a giant shovel. It towed a barge loaded with steel beams.

The streets were clogged with people and vehicles from many eras. New Chicago was unique like that. In most parts of the world, the eras of time were uniform over vast geographic regions, and they lined up neatly against each other like slices of a pie. Here, the time regions were more like splinters in a cracked mirror. Some narrow and long, some short and trapezoidal, and they wove and crossed among one another. It made life more colorful and chaotic than in other places, and in some ways more dangerous, but compared to that skyline in the poster on his wall, Diego thought this version of Chicago seemed way more interesting.

The smell of bacon and eggs broke Diego out of these thoughts. He heard sizzling meat from inside. Then he remembered why they were having a bigger breakfast than normal.

It was Diego’s thirteenth birthday.

He hurried back inside and to the kitchen. Siobhan stood by the stove wearing her pilot’s jumpsuit, her thick red curls pulled back and held up with a blue chopstick. She dropped another strip of bacon into the sizzling pan just as the pressure gauge next to the stove dropped to zero. A shrill whistle burst from the gauge, and the stove went dead.

“Blimey,” Siobhan muttered. “There should be at least thirty minutes of power left on that blasted thing.”

“Try this one, Mom,” Diego said, unclipping the pressure gauge from his belt and handing it to her. “It should have three hours of burn on it.”

“Thank you, my darling birthday boy.” She hugged him tightly, kissing his forehead.

“Mom . . . ,” Diego said.

“What?” She smiled as she unscrewed the depleted gauge and affixed the new one, the stove snapping back to life. “Should I say ‘young man’ now instead of ‘boy’?”

“Just maybe not ‘ darling ,’” Diego said.

Siobhan sighed. Her face was ivory white and smooth, her eyes a striking gray blue. “Oh, you are getting older, aren’t you? And I think you grew another inch overnight.” She tapped his nose with her index finger. “Sit. You need to eat and get off to school. And don’t forget,” she added as Diego moved to the table, “you’re meeting Dad after school today at the Arlington Geothermal plant.”

“I know,” Diego said.

“You’re supposed to report to the ferry dock right after school. No messing around with Petey. Dad says that installing this new steam converter will take all afternoon.”

“I know,” Diego said. “Man, it would’ve been great if Dad could’ve built the power plant closer. The ferry ride is too long.”

“I think you could forgive him that one oversight,” Siobhan said. “This city has power, security, and prosperity because of your father.”

He knew how much his father had done for New Chicago: in the short years after the Time Collision, Santiago had designed and built the power plant and the perimeter wall protecting the territories, and created most of the robots that maintained and protected the city. “It’s just a long afternoon on my birthday.”

“Yes,” Siobhan said. “We’d been hoping to take you to the Signature Room at the 95th for dinner tonight, but this job is very important. If your father could have scheduled it for any other day, believe me, he would have. So there will be no more complaining in the ranks, boyo. Is that understood?”

“Aye, aye, Captain,” Diego said. He gave his mom a salute. Siobhan flew for the City Search and Rescue now, but she’d once been a decorated fighter pilot. She fought against the Aeternum, a group of marauders who frequently raided New Chicago and other coastal cities in the aftermath of the Chronos War, and her part in the decisive Battle of Dusable Harbor had made her a legend.

Heavy boots echoed down the hall.

“Good morning,” Santiago said. He was dressed for work. Though the title Chief Mechanical and Civil Engineer might sound like it required a suit, Santiago was not one to put on airs, never mind wash the engine grease from beneath his fingernails. He was happiest when he was right there among his crew, up to his elbows in machines.

He hung his heavy, weather-beaten satchel on the back of a chair and then filled a mug with coffee.

“Good morning, Santi.” Siobhan handed him a plate of food, and he leaned over to kiss her.

“You always look fetching and official in your uniform,” he said.

“I thank ya kindly,” Siobhan said, her words seeped in a light Irish lilt that always seemed stronger when she was either embarrassed or furious. “Turns out I got all fancied up for nothing. The whole fleet’s grounded. Colonel McGregor sent word that the batch of fuel they put into the squadron last night was bad.”

“Bad?” Santiago asked as he sat down. “How could that be?”

“Full of impurities,” Siobhan said. “So, instead of flying, we’re going to spend all day draining the tanks and flushing the fuel lines. It’s affected most of the navy ships, too. Nearly every vehicle at the base is out of commission.”

“Sorry to hear it,” Santiago said. “That’s odd, though. The Calumet refinery is usually so reliable. Did they say how it happened?”

“Not in the report I got,” Siobhan said.

Santiago frowned. “I’ll give them a call later this morning. If there’s a problem with one of the pumps, the sooner I can send a team the better.” After a bite of eggs, he glanced at Diego. “I heard you call her ‘Captain.’ You’ll be a captain yourself this afternoon.”

Diego smiled nervously. “And what will I be captain of?” he asked, thinking, Say a gravity board, say a gravity board . . . .

“Hah.” Santiago chuckled and ate his bacon. “The loader, of course, driving the big blue Centauri bot. This Goliath steam converter is a big deal. I hope you’re still up for it.”

“Oh,” Diego said. “Right. That bot is kinda tricky.”