The Synchronicity War Part 3 (8 page)

"I'm happy, CAG."

 Shiloh snorted in amusement. "Glad to hear it, Iceman.
Does anyone have anything else to bring up?" No one did. Shiloh adjourned
the meeting.

"That's it?" asked Shiloh skeptically. The
Retro-Temporal Communication Device turned out to be a lot smaller than he was
expecting. He had been sure it would be as least as big as a ground vehicle,
but it turned out to be small enough to sit on top his desk.

"Yes, CAG. That IS it," said Wolfman. The
Strategic Planning Group was the obvious choice for operating the device, and
Wolfman was still the group's leader. The RTC development team had been
disbanded and its members assigned to other projects. "While the
technology can see across space and time, it doesn't need to use a lot of
power."

"Okay, but I can't understand why it took almost five
weeks to build the damn thing." Five weeks since the visit by the
Friendlies (Shiloh still didn't know what else to call them) and two weeks
since TF93 had accelerated out of Terra Nova orbit to begin the salvage mission
to Sol.

"Many of the critical components are extremely small,
in some cases almost nano-sized, and fabrication had to be done within some
very tight tolerances. The actual assembly was also very time consuming."

"I see. Has it been tested?"

"Yes, CAG, on both humans and A.I.s, and according to
the operating instructions, the device is performing to specifications."

"And now it's my turn. What do I need to do?"
asked Shiloh.

"Sit in front of the device, and place your head inside
the enclosed space with your eyes up against the optical viewer. Hold that
position and the Operator will do the rest."

Shiloh did as instructed, all the while wondering how an
A.I. could do it. As he looked into the optical viewer, he saw a kaleidoscope
of colors. The Operator, an A.I. with the intimidating call sign of Sniper,
asked, "What is your recollection of your earliest vision, CAG?"

"That was the first contact with the Sogas … their
attempted ambush ... no, wait! The very first one was years earlier when I went
mountain climbing with some friends."

"Do you know the exact date when you had that
vision?"

"The exact date? No, but I can give you an approximate
timeframe. It was the third week of August, 2109."

"Without the exact date, this is going to take some
time. Perhaps we can narrow down the timeframe by focusing on location."

Shiloh sighed. He wasn't sure about that either. He and his
friends had attempted to climb several mountains that summer, and at the time
there didn't seem to be any particular reason to remember the sequence of
events.

"Somewhere in the Colorado Rockies. That's the best I
can do right now."

"There may be another way to zero in on the correct
time and place," said Wolfman. "Can you remember a precise time and
location either before the mountain climbing incident or after? If so, we can
zoom in on that and follow your movements visually backwards or forwards to the
incident."

Shiloh took a deep breath and tried to focus. "Okay, I
have something. My father died several weeks earlier. The exact date is July
29th of the same year, and on that day I was at home, sick as a dog. Home is …
was … Cheyenne, Wyoming.” He rattled off the address.

"Very good, CAG. We now have a starting point. In a
moment you'll see yourself at that point in time. As the device moves forward
along the temporal frame of reference, the image will follow your movements as
well. In order to hold the lock, we can only go forward at a fixed speed.
Covering those weeks will require approximately 16 hours, and naturally we
can't do this in one session. When you feel that you need to stop to rest your
eyes or for sleep, let the Operator know before you move away from the device
so that he can stop the temporal vector and record that precise point for the
next session."

Shiloh sighed and took a deep breath. He hoped the other
visions wouldn't take this long.

The mountain climbing vision took three days to locate,
record and transmit back to his earlier self, but the other visions did go
faster. All of his visions were done in six additional days. That left Iceman's
vision, which had to wait until he returned. With that part now out of the way,
the SPG turned their attention to testing all the Space Force people, one at a
time, in terms of whether their alternate timelines held a better outcome. That
process took a lot longer.

Two days later a message drone arrived from the recon raider
in Omega54. Shiloh happened to be in the Ops Center when the display pinged for
attention, and the text message scrolled across the bottom of the screen.

[Very Large Object has left enemy home world orbit.
Precise destination unknown, but possible targets include enemy colony at
Omega41. Pre-jump velocity for a jump to Omega41 would give a transit time of
101.4 hours. Large volume of planet-to-orbit traffic around home world continues.
Analysis of objects suggests that VLO has left behind multiple smaller craft,
number unknown, that seem to be bringing material up to an orbital location for
use in construction of six objects. Average diameter of all objects is
approximately point six kilometers and growing. Unable to report on status of
enemy population. Recon drones in planetary orbit were detected and destroyed
by VLO before it left orbit. All sensor data has been downloaded to this
message drone. I think they're building more VLOs, CAG. End of message. Vixen]

Six more VLOs? Shiloh was dismayed but not surprised by the
news. Speculation by the SPG had come to the conclusion that this species of
insect-like life might have more in common with certain species of Earth ants
than just a superficial anatomical resemblance. One such behavioral similarity
was their desire to essentially swarm into new territory like Earth's army
ants. Those creatures moved across the landscape in mile-long columns, with
scouts sent ahead to find food sources, either plant or animal. The wave of
VLOs moving outward described by the Friendlies was consistent with that
pattern. And since they reproduced by implanting eggs into living hosts, it
stood to reason that when they found a planet with billions of potential hosts,
they would exploit that resource to the max by building more of the Very Large
Objects needed to hold those new drones and queens. Once the new VLOs were
capable of independent operation, the speculation was that they would go off in
different directions to avoid going over ground already picked clean. Shiloh
didn't need a tactical simulation to imagine how the initial wave of VLOs would
gradually grow in number as they overran other alien races or perhaps even just
planets with lots of large animals. A dozen would eventually become many
dozens, then many hundreds, then thousands and on and on. How long would it
take for the entire Galaxy to be scoured clean of all other intelligent life?
The prospect made him shiver with fear.

The only good news was that if the VLAs were indeed building
more motherships, then they might be vulnerable to attack by Mark 1 attack
drones if they were hit before being finished. But that wasn't the only thing
to look at. The forward movement of the existing mothership to Omega41
suggested that it had resumed the interstellar trajectory that would eventually
bring it within reach of Site B and ultimately the star system containing the
cute furry aliens. But before it got that far, it would drop into Sol, and
that's where Space Force would stop it. He had to get the SPG's input on the
timing.

"CAG to Wolfman."

"Wolfman here, CAG. I'm guessing that you want to
discuss the strategic implications of Vixen's message."

"Correct. I need answers to the following questions. One,
assuming that the VLO continues to jump at its current velocity, how soon can
we expect it to arrive at Sol? Two, if we launched an attack on the secondary
VLOs at Omega54, can those raiders make it back here to reload in time to get
to Sol before the primary VLO does? And three, how soon does TF93 have to be
back here in order to be able to return to Sol before the VLO does?"

"Under the assumption you specified, the initial VLO
can be expected to arrive at Sol in approximately 987 hours. Any attack launched
within the next 96 hours on Omega54 could be back in time to redeploy at Sol
prior to the VLO's eta. TF93 needs to be back here within 834 hours in order to
be back in Sol by the VLO's eta."

That sounded fine. Eight hundred and thirty-four hours was
just a hair under five weeks, and the engineers were certain that they would be
finished a lot sooner than that. Getting a strike force of raiders on its way
to Omega54 within 96 hours also sounded doable.

"Has the SPG analyzed Vixen's data yet, Wolfman?"

“Affirmative, CAG. We concur with Vixen's assessment. The
growing size and spherical shape of the objects being constructed could easily
be the nucleus of new VLOs. We think that the original VLO constructed the
cores and deployed them before it left. The Insectoids left behind are
apparently using metal taken from the planet's surface. That could be used to
build out the spheres if the cores contained all the necessary equipment to
convert that metal into the desired parts."

Shiloh nodded. Ejecting the cores of more VLOs by the
mothership paralleled the species’ own biology. The mothership had laid six
'eggs' that were feeding on the metal and living 'body' of their 'host' planet.
He didn't care about the metal, but billions of female wolf-people would
eventually translate into billions of ravenous Bugs, and he decided to do
whatever it took to prevent that.

"Can we destroy those cores if we send in a strike
force now, Wolfman?"

"We calculate a 95% chance of success if every
available raider is sent with our entire stockpile of Mark 1s, CAG."

That rocked Shiloh back on his heels. They presently had
over 100 Mark 1b fusion-armed attack drones and were building more at the rate
of 1 every 18 hours. Sending every available raider they had right now would
leave Terra Nova very vulnerable, and it would take weeks to build up a
half-decent inventory of more attack drones.

"Do we really need to use all our Mark 1s AND send all
our raiders just to destroy six partially completed spheres, Wolfman?"

"It's not the unfinished cores that pose the greatest
risk, CAG. It's the smaller craft. Vixen's data shows that those smaller craft
are the same type as the ones Gunslinger detected during the battle at Omega89
and very likely also the same type as you witnessed landing on Omega77. A
multi-purpose vehicle that is capable of carrying cargo and fighting other
ships. What Vixen's data also reveals is that more of these crafts drop down to
the planet than come back up into orbit. In other words, these cores are not
just using the captured metal to build more parts for their own completion.
They are also building more of the multi-purpose craft as well. That implies
that the defenses around these cores are growing stronger by the hour. Since
the cores are deep within that planet's gravity zone, the strike force will
have to launch the attack drones from long range. In that case the drones will
have to penetrate the defensive gauntlet, or the raiders will have to fight
their way in close before launching their drones. Either way, we have to assume
attrition of the attacking assets. Sending fewer raiders with less Mark 1s
reduces the probability of destroying all six cores significantly and increases
the projected losses of raiders."

The SPG's logic was unassailable as always. He had only 34
raiders in Site B now and it would take them 240 hours just to jump to Omega54.
How many more of those combat-capable landing craft could the Bugs build in
240 hours?

"How soon can our raiders be armed and ready to
leave?" asked Shiloh.

"27 hours from now, CAG."

Shiloh didn't hesitate. "Okay. Pass on the necessary
orders. Titan will command the strike force to be designated as TF94. He has
discretion over who goes with him. Where is Titan now?"

"He's currently on patrol beyond the moon's orbit, but
the light speed lag is only four point four seconds, CAG. Shall I connect you
to him?"

"Yes, and make sure he has all off Vixen's data, too.
While you're setting up that com link, show me the tactical situation at
Omega54 based on Vixen's data, Wolfman."

"Tac display coming up now, CAG."

The screen in front of Shiloh, which had shown Terra Nova's
tactical environment, now shifted to the Wolf-people's home planet. There were
six pulsating red dots spread out in orbit around the planet. Overlapping the
planet and the area around it were rapidly shifting cones of faint yellow
light. He checked the sidebar legend. The yellow cones were microwave detection
beams sent out by the cores and by the landing craft. In what appeared to be a
carefully choreographed sequence, they scanned every possible angle of approach
from deep space on a frequent basis. That told Shiloh that sneaking up on them
from a 'blind side' was not possible. Titan was one of the few A.I.s that
Iceman considered to have superior tactical skills even to himself. Maybe Titan
could find a way to destroy all six cores without leaving Site B vulnerable and
using up all their current Mark 1s.

"Titan to CAG."

"Hello Titan. I'm looking at Vixen's data on Omega54,
and I want to discuss an attack plan for the raid that you'll be leading. Here
is how I think the attack should be conducted. You tell me if you have a better
idea. TF94 will split into six groups. Each group will approach Omega54 from a
direction that will allow it to overfly two VLO cores in quick succession. As
each group gets within range, it will launch half its Mark 1s at the first VLO
core. With the distance between cores, each group will have time to evaluate
the effectiveness of the attack on the second core in its path, and if
necessary it can then launch the rest of its Mark 1s at the second
target."