I have been connecting via ssh to my GCP Compute Engine VM all day at work without issues.
I then used my work VPN this evening, and also ssh’d to my VM. Once I lost connect to the VM (computer went to sleep), I could not ssh back onto the VM, and the serial port logs show: “invalid ssh key entry - expired key”
So, it appears that GCP Compute Engine does not properly handle the usage of VPNs.
…and now I cannot connect to my VM.