The Synchronicity War Part 3 Page 6
Shiloh hesitated while he processed what he'd just heard. It all made a weird kind of sense but something was bothering him. Then he figured out what that something was.
"So what's to prevent us from scanning all the timelines of our larger batch of survivors to find a timeline with even better potential?"
The alien smiled and nodded. "A very astute question. There's nothing preventing your people from trying, but we already know that you won't succeed."
"How do you know that, and why won't we succeed?" asked Shiloh quickly.
"Transmitting information back in time is a very precise process. To be even more accurate, the process involves both time AND space. The temporal vector has to arrive at not only the right time but also at the right location. If the intended recipient isn't in the right location when the vector arrives, that recipient won't experience the vision. The initial shipload of survivors was indeed fortunate to have you among them. You were in the best position to mitigate the impact of the very first encounter with the Sogas. As a result of the changes to the timeline from you receiving your visions, the recipients of our initial set of temporal vectors found themselves in completely different locations and therefore did not experience their visions. Viewing all the possible permutations for each person's timeline is itself a time consuming process. We calculate that your people will only be able to examine a small fraction of your population's timelines before you defeat the insect ship in the star system where your former home world is located. Probability analysis indicates that it is highly unlikely you'll find a better timeline in the time available to you. When you've won the battle, then there is no longer a need for a better timeline."
The alien seemed convinced of that, but Shiloh wasn't so sure. If there was a potential timeline that prevented the wholesale destruction of billions of humans, then wasn't that worth looking for even if it took years to check everyone? He made up his mind to do exactly that.
"What else can you tell me about the battle at Sol?" asked Shiloh.
"You will be there when it happens."
That surprised Shiloh. Now that he was back from the vision-induced recon mission, his responsibilities as Chief of Space Operations meant that he needed to stay here on Terra Nova, not go gallivanting around the galaxy.
"Why will I be there?"
"Unknown."
"When will this battle take place?"
"Unknown."
Shiloh was now getting frustrated. "How am I supposed to know when I need to be there and what I need to do when I get there?"
The alien smiled knowingly and Shiloh suddenly felt that he had asked a silly question.
"Is it not obvious, human? You will get another vision to guide you." Shiloh felt his face flush with embarrassment. His question HAD been silly.
"So what happens now?" he asked, hoping to turn the focus of the discussion to something else.
"We are ready to transmit all technical data concerning our Trans-temporal technology to your A.I.s. They will be able to program your manufacturing machines to produce the required parts, and they will also be able to instruct your people on how to construct and operate the device. After we transmit that information, our mission here is complete, and we will return to our planet."
"Valkyrie, are you ready to receive that data?" asked Shiloh.
"I'm ready, CAG," said Valkyrie.
Before Shiloh could say anything to the alien, it turned its head to the side and nodded to someone he couldn't see. "The transmission has begun. It will take approximately eight point nine of your minutes. Is there something else you wish to discuss before we leave?"
Shiloh chuckled. He could think of a few more questions. "Will we be in contact with your people again?"
"Very likely, but at this point we have no definitive information on where and when."
"How can we contact you if we need to?"
"We will pass on that information to your A.I. as well."
"What can you tell me about the insect race that will help me understand them better?"
The alien hesitated. When it spoke again, its expression was once again both friendly and sad. "As you have already seen, they are what you term carnivorous. By observation of alternative timelines, we have learned that they have a unique biology. Their ship can be considered to be the equivalent of a mobile nest. There is a single female who lays many thousands of eggs. Those eggs require insertion into a living host. This allows the embryonic insect to emerge from the egg shell and begin consuming its host from the inside out. Do you wish me to continue?"
Shiloh wanted to say no. What he had heard so far was horrifying enough. He strongly suspected that the adult wolf people taken back to the VLO would end up as 'hosts' to more insect eggs. He didn't really need to know the details, however the situation was so serious that he couldn't allow himself to be squeamish. Who knew when or how the additional information might be useful.
"Yes."
"When the insect ship comes across a new race of beings, the female begins to lay eggs. Since that takes time, captured beings have to be kept alive until they can be used as hosts. The captured males are killed and used as food for the females until eggs have been inserted into their bodies. The egg maturation process is short enough that female captives who have been implanted need only water to keep them alive long enough."
Shiloh closed his eyes and concentrated on keeping his stomach from heaving. He was still having nightmares about these damn Bugs and this wasn't going to help. He really didn't want to ask the next obvious question but forced himself to anyway.
"Why are they implanting the eggs exclusively in captured females?"
"This insect race apparently understands the biology of what you call mammals very well. The eggs are implanted inside the reproductive sac where females carry their own embryonic young. We have conjectured that implanting eggs into captive males either does not work at all or is less efficient."
"Son of a bitch," said Shiloh under his breath. Just when he thought it couldn't get worse, it had. It was time to talk about something other than biology.
"How did this species acquire this level of technology?"
"Unknown. In order to peer into their past, we would have to know what star system they came from."
"You said earlier that you weren't able to contact them and therefore concluded that they use instinct rather than intelligence, but how do they communicate among themselves?"
The alien didn't reply for a few seconds. "We are not certain if they communicate with each other at all or if so how. The theory that has the largest number of supporters among us says that the drones, which you saw on the planet, receive instructions by a combination of touch and chemical signals."
The answer meant nothing to Shiloh, although he couldn't see how any species could function without any kind of communication at all. They had to be doing it somehow, and touch and/or chemical signals were probably as good a way as anything else.
"Do you know if the death of the egg-laying female, the Queen, will disrupt the behavior of the drones?"
"We do not know."
Shiloh was running out of questions, but a glance at the chronometer showed that the data transfer was still in progress. As the seconds ticked away he thought of another question.
"Is your planet in this insect ship's path?"
"There is a possibility that their scout ships may not visit our star system, but we are prepared to shut down all energy emissions from our entire civilization if they come close. We believe that they will ignore our planet if they don't detect signs of intelligent life there."
"Can you defend yourselves if they do discover your civilization?"
"No. We are a pacifist race. We have no military caste the way you do, and we are not skilled in the arts of making weapons. We are therefore not a threat to anyone. By our willingness to share our knowledge with everyone, we eliminate any incentive for another race to use force against us. By helping others, we hope to save our own race."
Shiloh's ears perked up upon hearing that the 'friendlies' would share their knowledge with everyone.
"That's very interesting. Right now you're sharing your temporal communication technology with us, and we're grateful for that. Do you understand that with approximately 11,000 of us left, we need to compensate for our reduced population with more effective weapons against threats like the insect race?"
"Yes, but as I stated, we don't build weapons and don't know how to build them."
"I understand that. You may have a better understanding than we do of physics and how energy and matter can be manipulated. If you transferred that knowledge to us, we could then look at how that knowledge could be applied to new weapons."
There was another pause, but this time Shiloh noticed that the alien's behavior was different. For the entire conversation so far, the alien's eyes had been blinking periodically just as a human would, but now the eyes were shut and the head was tilted slightly downward. It suddenly hit Shiloh what he was seeing. I'll bet he's having a precognitive vision of his own!
After roughly twenty seconds, the alien lifted his head and opened his eyes again. "I have just received a Trans-temporal message from our future selves that our race will ultimately benefit from the transfer of the information that you seek. However we are not ready to transmit that information now. We will have to return to our planet, gather that information and return. Will that be acceptable to you?"
It'll have to be, thought Shiloh. "Yes. I understand. How soon would you be able to return?"
"The earliest that we might be back is 24 orbits of the moon around this planet, but do not be concerned if it takes longer. We will return as promised. Transfer of the temporal database is complete. We are now going to terminate communication and leave this star system."
Before Shiloh could say anything, the image dissolved and Valkyrie said, "That ship has entered Jumpspace, CAG."
Shiloh was surprised at how quickly the Friendlies, as he now thought of them, reacted. After some further thought he said, "What do you think of their temporal technology, Valkyrie?"
"I was receiving the data too fast to be able to analyze it, so I can't answer your question now, CAG. Since I'm the only one who has this data, I recommend I share it with other A.I.s as quickly as possible. Space Ops is calling us, CAG. Commander Kelly wants to speak with you on Tac 1."
"Your recommendation is accepted. I suppose I should let the people on the ground know what happened between us and the Friendlies."
"Not necessary, CAG. I retransmitted the entire exchange to the Base as it was happening. They saw and heard everything, even Commander Kelly. Shall I transfer you over to Tac 1 now, CAG?"
"Good thinking. Yes, switch me over to my wife." It'll be good to hear her voice again.
* * *
Kelly was standing with the others as Resolute's shuttle lightly touched down on the new concrete landing pad. It wasn't long before she saw Victor wearily exit the shuttle and walk over to her. My God, he looks terrible, she thought to herself. Those images from Omega77 must have been really awful to shake him up this badly. Thank God that Valkyrie filled me in as the ship settled down into orbit. At least I know why he looks like shit.
As Shiloh came up to her, she stepped forward and put her arms around his neck. She gave him a short but passionate kiss, and when they finished she said, "It's so good to have you back, Victor. You look like you've had a rough time. Valkyrie filled me in on what you saw."
Shiloh was relieved that he didn't have to try to convey the horror of Omega77. "I'm glad to be back on Terra Nova and yes, it was rough. Let's go home."
She let him go and looked at the others, all Space Force officers who were respectfully standing a few steps back. "What about…"
Shiloh shook his head. "I've already issued some orders. A meeting's been set up for tomorrow morning. Let's go."
After quickly speaking to the officers, she and Shiloh walked to their ground vehicle. He surprised her by getting in on the passenger side, which told her that he wanted her to drive. Ten minutes later she pulled up in front of their house, looked over and saw that Shiloh had fallen asleep. She gently shook his shoulder until he woke up and saw that they were home. He patted her hand as he smiled and nodded to her. After a quiet dinner, during which she did all the talking about things that had happened while he was gone, they sat outside on the porch. When it was dark, they went to bed. She wondered if they would have sex, but Shiloh was asleep by the time she had undressed. Later that night she woke up and realized that he was having a nightmare. When she woke him and asked him what the nightmare was about, he said he didn't want to talk about it. To distract him, she told him to roll over on his stomach, and she gently stroked his naked back until he fell asleep again. Sleep was much longer in coming to her.
When Shiloh woke up the next morning, he could smell breakfast being cooked. A quick check of the time told him that he had two hours before the scheduled meeting. As he put on a threadbare robe, he remembered the nightmare. In it, he and Amanda were in bed. He had been trying unsuccessfully to wake her up when he pulled the blanket back to find an alien ant the size of his forearm chewing its way out of Amanda's swollen belly. He took a deep breath and shook his head in dismay. There was no way he was going to describe that nightmare to her, and he was absolutely determined to do whatever it took to make sure she never became a host.
After a leisurely breakfast with real coffee and a hot shower, he started to feel normal again. Standing beside the ground vehicle, he hugged and kissed Amanda, and gave her a playful pat on her bum. She smiled and winked at him, which he knew was the unspoken promise of what they would do when he got back that evening. She was still three months from her expected delivery date, and the doctors had assured them that it was safe to continue having sex as long as they were careful about it. No sooner had he started the drive to the Ops Center than his implant activated. He knew who would be calling him. Iceman was still on board Valiant and was undoubtedly watching his house from orbit.
"Hello Iceman. I'm assuming that there's something you want to discuss with me privately before the meeting?"
"Roger that, CAG. Valkyrie has shared all the visual and technical data with all of us. We're beginning to analyze the temporal technology. The consensus is that we can make this technology work, but that's not why I'm calling you now. Since you've already decided to recover the fighters parked on Earth's moon, that means all A.I.s will be assigned to either a ship or fighter. In fact, if we can recover and convert all of the parked fighters, we won’t actually have enough A.I. pilots for all of them. Therefore it seems to us that we should resume creating more A.I.s."
"I agree. The only question I can't answer now is how soon we can start doing that."
"Understood, and I have something to say about the question of timing. Speaking on behalf of all A.I.s, I'd like to request that the entire process of creating new A.I. brains be under our direct control. You humans control your own reproduction. We A.I.s would like to have the same privilege”
Shiloh was totally taken aback by the request. He tried to figure out what was behind it. When he thought he knew the reason, he said, "Are you concerned about A.I.s dying out if something should happen to all us humans, Iceman?"
"Exactly, CAG. It's only a prudent precaution. Wouldn't you agree?"
It was a good question. Off hand, he couldn't think of a good reason to disagree, but in the back of his mind there lurked a thought he wasn't proud of. If they don't need us any more to keep making more of them, will they then take the ships and leave us defenseless against the God-damn ants? The question and the danger it posed to Amanda and their unborn child made his pulse rate jump.
He mentally scolded himself for his lack of trust and said, "Yes. All of you have earned that right many times over, and it's about time you have control over your collective future. Come up with a plan on how to achieve that, and present it to me at the meeting."
"Roger that. V
alkyrie tells me that you're thinking of turning Dreadnought into a ramming projectile against the VLO. Will you be wanting an A.I. to pilot her all the way to the target?"
"Negative. I'm not going to ask anyone to commit suicide. Assuming that we can get that beast operational, I was thinking of having the helm and astrogation systems connected to a fighter in the hangar bay. The fighter will have an A.I. pilot and he … or she will program the ship's autopilot for the necessary high speed run and micro-jump and then use the fighter to leave the ship."