Tangle in the Dark

This is the hardest science fiction in the Gordon’s Lamp series. Quantum entanglement, dark matter, Bose-Einstein condensates and quantum computing all figure heavily in this story. Gordon’s Lamp is returning from 61 Cygni, their data corrupted by a crewman’s hack, their mission to seed the planet with mortal humans thwarted by the biodisaster the planet had become, their chance of Angel colonization thwarted by the lack of exploitable resources. While en route, war breaks out between mortals, lead by Brazil, and simulates, lead by Heavenly Talstan. The war was triggered by data they know to be false, data fabricated by their own crewman, Alan Larkin.

In spite of that, the war is going badly, mortals have been bombed to barbarism, and now all simulated humans in the Afterlife are being targeted by comets from deep space, comets that can only be a Brazilian doomsday device in the outer reaches of the solar system. Even though Gordon’s Lamp is an unarmed exploration and colony ship, they are pressed into service to fight that doomsday device, even if it is guarded by Chinese or Brazilian warships.

Then one of their crewmen makes scientific discoveries in the dark matter beyond the solar system that may be the key to the weapon system that is destroying their civilization. As the enemy warship closes in, an enemy agent enters the ship. The fleet of all known starships is small, they should be able to identify their pursuer from its drive signature, giving them a chance to track down that agent. While attempting to track that agent, their System’s Administrator, Ava Bancour, is lost, and the only one aboard with the skills to get her back may be Alan, the hacker who started this war.

Prior readers have called this the best look at simulated humans they’ve ever seen, the most different alien they’ve ever seen (or is it a feral OS?) and the best look at ancient Atlantis they’ve ever seen. Some have also wondered why there is so much sexuality in it and why simulated humans would bring all their sins with them. The whole story happens in the afterlife and the real conflict of the story is between competing versions of the afterlife. Both are fictional, one may be possible, one is probable in our future, probably sooner than I’ve timed it. There are other visions of the afterlife in many other stories. The real point is, how we tell which one is real.