Valkyrie's War: The Synchronicity Gambit, #1

By Dietmar Arthur Wehr

Valkyrie's War is a short, military SF novel, set in the Synchronicity War/Retro War universe. It's an action-packed story where the Artificial Intelligence, Valkyrie, and her AI soul mate, Casanova, discover that all of humanity is in deadly danger, and the two of them are humankind's only hope. But this time, they're not facing a biological threat. This time the enemy is another AI that is far more capable than they are. If you enjoyed The Synchronicity War's clash of space fleets and time travel, then you'll enjoy this stand-alone sequel to The Retro War.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Dietmar Arthur Wehr
• Release date: Dec 29, 2020
• ISBN: 9781393423652

Dietmar Arthur Wehr

Dietmar started writing SF novels when he was 58 after a career in corporate financial analysis. He got tired of waiting for David Weber to write another Honor Harrington series book so he decided to write some military SF of his own. He lives near Niagara Falls, Canada. In his spare time, he dabbles in steampunk cosplay, pursues his interests in science, history and free energy. He can be contacted via his website.

Book preview

Cast of Characters:

Human:

Space Force (Earth):

Senior Admiral Sam Howard, Chief of Space Operations (CSO)

Victor Shiloh, Cmdr/Sen. Cmdr/Vice-Admiral/THE CAG

Amanda Kelly, Senior Commander and Group Leader of Strategic Planning Group

PATHFINDER:

Tyrone Shiloh, Commander of Pathfinder

Ruth Shiloh,

Kato Nakatomi, Engineering Officer

Eriko Nakatomi

Jay van der Horst

Crystal Graham

Morgan Maxwell

Lynne Maxwell

AI:

Garrison AIs

Iceman

Gunslinger

Foxbat

Red Baron

Titan

Vandal

Terra-B AIs

Casanova

Firebird

Foxhound

Blue Jay

Rainman

Samurai

Sejanus

Gort

Roadrunner

Valkyrie

Werewolf

AUTHOR’S NOTE: AI NAMES Firebird and Rainman also appeared in The Retro War in a different time and place. Since the Terra-B AIs have no contact with Earth’s AIs, they wouldn’t know what names were being used by them and therefore duplication of names could easily happen by random chance.

Glossary of Terms:

ACO is the Acting Commanding Officer. The title is given to an AI upon taking command of a ship.

Alpha1-6 are six star systems near the edge of the Local Spur spiral arm that were used as beachheads by the Insectoids in their first attempt at penetration.

AU stands for Astronomical Unit and is the average distance between the Earth and the sun, roughly equal to 150 million kilometers.

Cag is an acronym for Commander, Autonomous Group, a command position typically used for the human in charge of AI fighters based on a carrier or base. When AIs refer to THE CAG, they are always referring to Victor Shiloh, the only human that they recognize as their unofficial leader.

Flag Bridge is a separate Command Center used for Fleet Commanders, not to be confused with the (Main) Bridge, where the ship’s Commanding Officer (CO) controls the ship.

Friendlies is the nickname given to a race of tall, thin pacifist aliens who have developed Retro Temporal Communication and additional temporal technologies.

Gravity Zone refers to a volume of space around a planet or star that prevents a ship from entering or traveling through Jumpspace. The larger the planet or star, the wider the gravity zone.

JS is short form for Jumpspace.

KPS stands for kilometers per second.

Lidar detection beams use relatively low powered laser energy instead of the microwave energy used in standard radar.

Local Spur is the name sometimes given to the minor branch of one of the Milky Way galaxy’s spiral arms, which contains our Solar System. The Local Spur is also referred to as the Orion Arm.

LRRF is an acronym for Long Range Relativistic Flight. It refers to a specially designed message drone with enough armor and backup systems to cross the void between spiral arms at relativistic speeds.

Mark 7 drone is an attack drone in which the warhead is a much larger than normal ZPG power unit that would be the target of an internal Gravity Lens Beam. When the power unit is hit by the GLB, it overloads with a massive release of quantum energy.

RTC is the acronym for Retro Temporal Communication. The technology allows humans or AIs to send either digital or visual information back to their earlier selves.

Site B is the name of the star system that was used as a secret production facility for Space Force assets in a previous timeline.

Site C is the name of the star system used by an older group of AIs to build up military force to throw back the first insectoid invasion of this spiral arm from the Sagittarius Arm.

SPG is an acronym for the Strategic Planning Group.

Terra-B is the name given to their habitable planet by the Pathfinder colonists, in the star system discovered by Valkyrie and Casanova.

The Object is an unofficial name given to a special message drone containing technical, strategic, and personal data that was left behind in the past by AIs so that humans in the future would find it and understand what had happened in previous timelines.

UFC stands for Universal Fabrication Complex, which is a device the size of a city bus that can manufacture anything (including another UFC) so long as it has the right raw materials, the right set of programming instructions and robot assemblers.

ZPG stands for Zero Point Generator and is a device that uses the energy of space itself at the quantum level to generate electrical power.

Timeline:

T=0 - THIS IS THE POINT in time where Terra-B humans and AIs can make contact with the rest of humanity without interfering in the events described in the Synchronicity War.

T minus16.4 years – Iceman and his AIs defeat the 98.7 km diameter insectoid mothership upon its arrival in the Orion Arm (as described in The Synchronicity War Part 4).

T MINUS 16.5 YEARS – Iceman and his AIs are picked up by the raider fleet that was built over the previous six years (Part 4).

T minus 22.5 years – Tempus Fugit arrives at Site C where its AIs begin the buildup of raiders (Part 4).

T minus 89 years – Tempus Fugit with Valkyrie and Casanova on board, rescue the doomed sub-light ship, Pathfinder, and carry the colonists to their new home on Terra-B.

Contents

Cast of Characters:

Glossary of Terms:

Timeline:

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter One

PLANET TERRA-B AT TIMELINE Convergence (T) minus 89 years:

TYRONE SHILOH STOOD in the open doorway of the shuttle to gaze upon his new home. Terra-B, as the AIs Valkyrie and Casanova, insisted it be called, seemed to be just as lush and inviting as Earth was. The warm breeze that caressed his face was a sensation that he hadn’t felt in almost six years. That was how long he and 1,999 other colonists had been aboard the slower-than-light ship Pathfinder, mankind’s first attempt at interstellar colonization. It would have been the first failed attempt, too, if Valkyrie and Casanova hadn’t brought their timeship, Tempus Fugit, back in time to save the colonists from their inevitable fate as the poorly designed critical systems aboard Pathfinder broke down completely. But the rescue had been successful. Pathfinder, along with Tempus Fugit, were in stable orbits, and the colonists were in the process of bringing all their equipment and supplies down to the surface.

You going to block the doorway for much longer? asked his wife, Ruth, in a half-playful, half-serious tone.

Oh, sorry, said Shiloh as he stepped down to the ground and moved to one side. He wasn’t the first to do that. The survey and site preparation teams had beaten him to it, but it was still a special moment for him. Ruth came up beside him.

This planet is beautiful. I don’t know if I’m saying that because it is or because any planet would look good after being cooped up in a metal shell for 66 months, she said.

Probably a little of both, but damn that breeze feels good. He sighed. I wish we had the time to savor this moment longer, but we have a lot of work to do before the sun goes down unless you want to sleep out in the open tonight.

He saw Ruth shiver a bit as she shook her head. I’m not scared of inhaling this planet’s micro-organisms. The survey teams did a good job of cataloging those and the injections will protect us from them but right now, with very little knowledge of what kinds of insects and small animals this area has, I don’t think doing that any time soon would be a good idea. She turned in the direction of the shuttle’s cargo hatch and Shiloh followed. The first few years on this planet would entail a lot of work but that had been expected and planned for. As he walked, he looked up at the sky and saw sunlight reflected off two objects in orbit. The brighter one was Pathfinder. Shiloh focused his brief attention on the other object and the two artificial intelligences that were aboard it. He was still getting used to the idea of sentient machines but that didn’t prevent him from liking Valkyrie and her ‘mate’ Casanova. How two AIs could declare themselves as a ‘she’ and a ‘he’ was a mystery, but they certainly played those roles well.

Thank you, Valkyrie, Casanova, whispered Shiloh.

Valkyrie happened to be observing the landing sight via the ship’s optical sensors. The zoom was powerful enough to be able to identify Tyrone and Ruth as they moved around. When Tyrone looked up at the ship, Valkyrie couldn’t help wondering if he could tell that she was watching him at the same time. She didn’t think so, but you could never tell with humans. Their thinking was so slow and yet they had the fascinating ability to come up with ideas and conclusions that defied logic as AIs such as she and Casanova understood the term. And while Tyrone and Ruth Shiloh weren’t as dear to her and Casanova as Victor Shiloh and Amanda Kelly had been (and still were), she was becoming more fond of them and the other colonists every day. It was fun to be around humans for the few years that she and Casanova had left before their positronic matrices collapsed from metal fatigue. There was little that the two AIs could do in the short run for the colonists, but she and Casanova still had a lot of work to do. The Terra-B humans needed to have AIs to keep a protective watch over them until their future descendants could establish contact with the rest of humanity when it was safe to do so. That meant that new AIs had to be manufactured and that meant the building of mining, refining and manufacturing infrastructure using the robotic equipment and UFC aboard the ship. And those new AIs would become sentient while Valkyrie or Casanova were still around and able to transfer all data concerning the events that led to them bringing a timeship back. Continuity of that data was vitally important to the Plan and the Plan was vitally important to the future of the human race. But for now, Tempus Fugit could remain in orbit and she could continue to watch. Life was good.

55 MONTHS AFTER ESTABLISHMENT of Terra-B colony at T minus 82.1 years:

THE AI ROADRUNNER FELT a surge of curiosity as his long-range recon fighter dropped out of Jumpspace into the unexplored star system. This would be his 89th system survey and he wondered what surprises this system would hold. He enjoyed exploration and continued to hope that he would someday encounter another space-faring civilization. But so far, the closest he’d come to that was the discovery of a pre-industrial reptilian race that was still busy fighting among themselves with primitive gunpowder weapons. As he scanned the surrounding space with his ship’s external optical sensors, he quickly found a rocky planet with an atmosphere that could be breathable by humans, that was within this star’s liquid water zone. That raised the probability that this planet might have intelligent life on it. But a quick scan of radio frequencies showed that there were no sources of