The Billion Year Backup System (working title)(Workshop & Comments thread)

[Rusty Edge]

This is a work of Larry Niven Fan Fiction in progress, set in his Known Space universe.

Comments welcome

[Story drafts copyright 2016-present "Rusty Edge"]
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The  spy gently descended towards the surface of the small frozen moon on a rocket device. First he pulled the trigger again to turn it off, and glided the last meter or two in the low gravity. Then he detached a mirror-surfaced box from his web harness an placed it on the frozen ground between his feet. He flicked the selector switch on his rocket powered lift, and the device transformed into a hand-held computer. "DON'T DELAY, ATTACK!" it said. Quickly he returned the selector switch to it's neutral setting, and the device became a silver sphere atop a pistol grip. Twisting the silver sphere he transformed it into a cone,  pointed at the planet dominating the sky and pulled the trigger.

A shimmering blue light reached towards the planet. Nothing happened for a moment, and then the planet didn't seem to explode, burn, or melt as he might have expected. It simply shattered. The entire planet.

Then he heard a voice in his mind say "Kill yourself, slave!" and he knew with crystalline certainty that it was the right thing to do. He set the secret weapon to self-destruct, and a second cone appeared on it. The spy pulled the trigger and he and his device vanished in a powerful blue flash.

*****

An aeon or so later, on that same frozen moon, now planetless:

"What do you think you're doin', Smitty?" said the Belter's partner.  Bob, like most resident miners in the Asteroid Belt, was a nudist, with a bald body and a hairstyle that looked like a cross between a Mohawk and a cropped horse's mane which ran all of the way down the spine by means of hair transplants, dyed popsicle blue. Smitty's crest was a natural copper color.

"I was reading about that Sea Statue they found in the muck on the bottom of Earth's ocean centuries ago, and I wondered if there could be anything like a relic hidden there on Ceres, underneath the lake in this ice covered crater. So I'm scanning it with the deep radar", he said, not looking up from the screen.

"Yer wastin' yer time. Mine,too."

"Uh, Bob,... I think you owe me a beer!" hooted Smitty.

********************

"Congrats again on taking the initiative with the Grogs. Please, have a seat," said my great grandfather, affectionately know as G Squared, the founder of the family business. Rather than get fat and soft as he aged, he seemed to get leaner and tougher, like beef jerky. You'd  think he might last forever. He had invented dolphin hands, which allowed them to use tools and computers and become both productive and wealthy, and Garvey Limited, too, in the process. My main accomplishment was discovering another handicapped sentient species, the Grogs, and negotiating contracts with them.

"Thanks," I said, sinking into a hover chair across the desk from him. Hover chairs were like sleeping plates, they automatically adjusted the gravity so that you could float in comfort, without falling off. "I had an inspirational example to live up to." Ripples in the artificial gravity field massaged my back.

"When are you going to settle down and give me my great, great, grandson so I can claim the title of G-Cubed and retire as chairman of the board ?" he teased.

"Well, there is this special girl on Down, Sharon Jilson, but I've got something I need to do first, before I try to get married," I confessed... "It will take time, money, and space travel. I've been preoccupied by a perplexing riddle, and it's dominating my free time. Bandersnatchi shouldn't have such huge brains, but they do. They were designer food beasts. There is was no need for them to be sentient. The less brains, the better. I know they also served as spies, but Tnuctipun sized brains should have been more that adequate for a spy. So what's the purpose? "

  Bandersnatchi were our clients, too, much like the dolphins. My grandfather, "G-Prime" was responsible for finding that market. Bandersnatchi lived in the Lowlands of Jinx, grazing upon yeast on the shores of it's equatorial ocean. They were slug-like single celled life forms scaled up to twice the size of a Brontosaurus. Externally they had a hard shell cell wall with a broad mouth and sensory bristles clustered at each corner. They were created by the Tnuctipun.

The Tnuctipun were a very intelligent race of bipeds, gifted in the ways of bioengineering and other advanced technologies. Unfortunately for them, they were enslaved by the Thrintun, a species of modest intelligence with natural mind control powers so mighty that they ruled most of the galaxy. At least until the Tnuctipun revolted about a billion and a half years ago and everyone died as a result, except for some Bandersnatchi on Jinx.

My great grandfather handed me a mug of Irish coffee, and sat down behind his desk with one of his own.

"G-Prime is our executive expert, what did he have to say about it?"

I savored the coffee. "He thinks maybe they Tnuctipun just scaled up a microbe which could convert anything into palatable protoplasm, and the oversized brain and immutability were simple unintended consequences. The spying was an afterthought, otherwise they'd have been designed with eyes. I wanted to get your input."

G-Squared rubbed his chin and furrowed his brow. "Brains used to be a delicacy until somebody discovered you could get prion and RNA viral brain diseases from eating them. Maybe it's because brains were simply worth more per kilo than meat. Maybe they had over-sized livers, too, for the same reason. Did you think of that?" he asked.

"That's disgusting, of course not. Far before my time. My gut says there's another answer...No pun intended," I said.

He chuckled. "Your gut was right about Grogs, and they're making us a lot of money now. Not just as animal herdsman, zookeepers, and police interrogators, as they suggested, but as pet and infant psychologists, memory retrieval specialists, doctor's assistants, interpreters, etc. They can even cure gambling, smoking, drinking and current addictions. Go figure it out, you have my carte blanche as majority shareholder of Garvey Industries. If it's bothering you, I have a hunch we're leaving money on the table."

"Take this, it came from the Belt. You can have it if you don't ask any other questions of me," G-squared said, handing me a bronze-like metal object he had taken from his desk drawer. Apparently an open stasis box, it could only have been smuggled. Stasis boxes were like buried treasure, they often contained advanced technology, some of it weaponry. Because of that, the UN claimed first right to it in the name of public safety. Stasis boxes were so dense that they reflected everything, they were practically indestructible, and whatever was inside was suspended in time while the box was closed and the stasis field was active. The boxes were relics of the Thrintin Slavers, built for them by the Tnuctipun slaves. This one contained a plasticized claw with 3 fingers, some cubes of meat in transparent wrappings, a flat rectangular gadget, an empty drinking bulb, and a canister of amber liquid. "It should provide some clues in your quest. The labs say the meat is toxic, and that big bottle contains a unique ethanol liqueur."

"Truth be told, I'd rather smoke than drink," continued G-squared.

"Go ahead," I said, following his lead and changing the subject. I was both alert and relaxed, feeling the effects of the fine Irish Coffee. "How has this dangerous smoking habit endured in humanity for over a thousand years, if you don't mind my asking? It doesn't make sense that it would."

"I suppose not," he said, as he took out a cigarette, put it in his mouth, and touched the other end against his ring. There were some blue high voltage sparks, then the cigarette smoldered, and the tip glowed orange as he inhaled. "You might have reasonably expected it to die out after the Surgeon General's warning appeared on the product, and they banned advertising from TV, around the time of the Moon landing. Maybe they should have outlawed it altogether, but Prohibition on alcohol didn't work, and besides, the government was a partner in crime with the tobacco companies through vice taxes. So it survived."

He blew a few smoke rings."Well, obviously it's an acquired taste, but an addictive one. Like all acquired tastes, the pleasure exceeds the pain, at least after the instinctive unpleasant reflex, in the short to intermediate term. So a lot of people continued to smoke, and a lot of people got curious enough to find out for themselves. Meanwhile the commercial interests were trying to revise their business plan with healthier, smokeless, and electronic versions of cigarettes, to grant themselves an extension. When marijuana was decriminalized in the early 21st century, the big tobacco interests muscled in on the market, and added tobacco to regulate the strength of the product, and make it more addictive, too"...

G-squared flicked off the excess ash from his cigarette. "As the population of Earth grew into the tens of billions, the do-gooders ended tobacco cultivation subsidies, and replaced them with stiff taxes. When that failed, they instituted an outright ban, claiming it was immoral to grow tobacco rather than food."

"Why didn't that work?" I wondered.

"The Belters. Before the Moon Landing, the cowboy was the iconic symbol of American self-reliance. It dominated entertainment. People wore the boots, hats, and blue jeans. They listened to the music. The cigarette advertising campaigns were built around cowboys. As the Earth became crowded and regulated, people with those independent streaks moved to the Asteroid Belt. Smoking was their homage to the cowboys, and a way to relax when they got outside of their space suits. The Belter Crest hair style was their homage to the musical and cultural rebels of the 1980s, the Punks." G-Squared took a long pull on his cigarette.

"The Belters were now the new cowboys of the new century. When tobacco production ceased on Earth, the Belters took up the slack, only now most cigarettes were smuggled, which was a way for everybody who used them to identify with their iconic heroes, or defy the U.N., or to appear wealthy. They made smoking cool again."

He let out a long stream of smoke. "Eventually medicine caught up, and you could use the auto doc at the pharmacy every week when you dropped by to pick up your cigarette supply, neutralizing most of the harmful effects, then the UN threw in the towel and deregulated tobacco, making it tax free." Automated doctors were sort of like tanning beds, you laid down in the tank, closed the lid, and the machines scanned you, then used drugs and nanite robots in your blood stream to make repairs and adjustments to your body and personal chemistry while you received a massage.

"The other reason smoking survived the intervening centuries," He took the cigarette out of his mouth and pointed it at me for emphasis, "was those kidnapping organ legger gangs! To them, a person was either a potential product or a potential black market customer, and smokers make way better customers than marketable product. Statistically, smoking made you less likely to die young!"

I went slack jawed. "Damned if you do, and damned if you don't!" 

[Buster's Uncle]

...I'll need time to digest this, but you've got the style pretty well nailed.

I'm pretty sure your line of dashes is what's borking up the thread width.  If you trimmed it to this long -

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-I believe it would fix...

[Rusty Edge]

Style was a major aim of reading and re-reading the stories. Yay! 

Before I'm finished I want to put some effort into voice, so that the various characters don't read like the same person saying everything. I don't think that's one of Niven's strong suits, at least not in his earlier writings.

But when it comes to writing stories about gravity, how technology affects society, and puzzles, he's my favorite.

[Buster's Uncle]

It's definitely not a Niven strong suit, distinct individual personalities, no.  He has done better in his more recent work.

Canon alert: I guess I need to re-read World of Ptavvs again to get it exactly right for you, but either Kzanol -or Larry Greenberg working from Kzanol's memories- flatly stated that Bandersnatch brains were a very tasty delicacy.  Kzanol wasn't too bright, so it could easily be a vast oversimplification, if you've got a good idea to justify modifying that, but it needs to be good and/or necessary...

[Rusty Edge]

I had no recollection of the tasty brains in the story, thanks for bringing that up. So the Slavers probably ate them... that could impact my plot, I'll have to contemplate it today. I think I can work with it.

Thanks!

[Buster's Uncle]

Slavers were very dedicated carnivores - the Tnuctip were hinted to be, too, but we know so much less about them, not having met any in person...  Tasty is the reason given for the big Bandersnatch brains so they could double as spys immune to being mind-read and The Power (which is why there were still Bandersnatch after Suicide Night, not just because suicide would be difficult for something without hands in the lowlands of Jinx) - but that was a guess over a billion years after the fact.

You might want to google In the Hall of the Mountain King by Jerry Pournell and S.M. Stirling from one of the Man-Kzin Wars books -I think the third- which has a similar beginning with a Tnuctipun spy, is in part a blatant ripoff of Treasure of the Sierra Madre, and has some ideas you may want to use or avoid about the Tnuctips, which are physically described, and the spy makes it into the present...

[Rusty Edge]

Slavers were very dedicated carnivores - the Tnuctip were hinted to be, too, but we know so much less about them, not having met any in person...  Tasty is the reason given for the big Bandersnatch brains so they could double as spys immune to being mind-read and The Power (which is why there were still Bandersnatch after Suicide Night, not just because suicide would be difficult for something without hands in the lowlands of Jinx) - but that was a guess over a billion years after the fact.

You might want to google In the Hall of the Mountain King by Jerry Pournell and S.M. Stirling from one of the Man-Kzin Wars books -I think the third- which has a similar beginning with a Tnuctipun spy, is in part a blatant ripoff of Treasure of the Sierra Madre, and has some ideas you may want to use or avoid about the Tnuctips, which are physically described, and the spy makes it into the present...

Thanks!

I guess I'll have to order Kzin III.  I believe I read Kzin I and decided not to read any more of them, I'm surprised how many there are.

Well, Bandersnatchi brains delicacies will affect my premise/plot, maybe even adding misdirection, but they won't disrupt it. Meanwhile, I will carry on with Garvey's investigation.

[Rusty Edge]

Okay, I know there are  continuity errors, because I haven't updated the original post in this thread as yet, and there have been some re-writes on my computer since. Anyway, here is the next part of the story-

****

 I chartered Jason and Anne-Marie Papandreou and their hyperdrive star liner, "Court Jester" for my quest, paying a premium for discretion. Jason was a former "Flatlander", or Earthling, and veteran of the Kzin Wars. Anne-Marie was a willowy "Crashlander", from the low gravity planet We Made It, in the Procyon system. Not only were they both able pilots, mechanics, observers, and improvisers, they were proven survivors. I would be in safe hands. I have no idea how, but Anne-Marie could make a soufflé in any gravity or acceleration. Their base of operations was Jinx, the ultra massive moon of the gas giant Primary, in the Sirius system, which was convenient, because I had a feeling I'd end up there sooner or later. That's where the surviving Bandersnatchi lived, and it was also the location of The Institute of Jinx, the greatest research university beyond Earth. That wasn't the only reason I selected them.

****

Aboard Court Jester:

Once we were safely out of Sol System's  gravity hazards and into hyperspace on a Wunderland heading, I told them about my quest, and about my experience with Grogs, small doglike desert animals on the planet Down. Mature females become sessile, that is, stationary, attaching themselves to rocks. Not only do their bodies enlarge, but their brains do, too, while their spinal cords shrivel and everything but their mouths become practically useless. They could summon their prey telepathically, and summon scavengers to groom them. They made telepathic contact with me because they wanted technology and trade. I realized they were the devolved descendants of the Thrint Slavers, who ruled the galaxy with such powers 1.5 billion years ago.

The Papandreous told me about their adventure with a stasis box purchased from the Outsiders by the Piersen's Puppeteers. They were transporting it and a Puppeteer named Nessus when they were ambushed and captured in a secret Kzinti operation, and a computerized spy's weapon found inside the box presumed the Kzinti had killed the rightful owner of the weapon, and self-destructed, killing all of the Kzinti. They narrowly escaped because they were in a crash web at that moment. That's why I hired the Popandreous, stasis box experience.

"How would you go to war against a race of alien telepathic mind readers with mind control, Jason?" I said.

"Hmm...Whenever you decided to act and give a general order, the Slavers would know instantly. There would be no surprise. They would counter-order or ambush. If the Slavers ever failed, they would simply order the rebels to halt, retreat, or commit fratricide/suicide."

Jason paced. "We humans were no match for the Kzinti, in man to "tiger" terms, in size, speed, strength, or ferocity. It was the Kzinti's impatience for planning, preparing, and organizing which was their downfall. But if you tried to organize against the Slavers, they would know before you knew they knew. They would know your network, your plans, your bases and supply caches and time tables.  It would be over before you could start. You'd be fools to try."

"Or desperate," quipped Anne-Marie.

Jay hedged a little."The more you did to prepare, the more likely the Slavers were to find out and thwart you. Perhaps a few living alone on the frontier somewhere could work towards a revolution undetected, but that's it."

"Any communication would probably have to be by secret couriers who didn't know what they carried...or better yet, didn't even know that they were couriers. Computer networks, lasers, hyper waves, and telecommunications could all be monitored, so that's out," Anne-Marie added, throwing her hands up in a gesture of futility. 

"Sure, Tnuctipin  could turn disintegrators against the Slaver planets and compounds, but as soon as you moved against them, or even gave the order to, the mentally interconnected Slavers would retaliate. Most likely making you fight your own. Or if they wanted to make an example, they could force somebody to publicly flay themselves alive with a variable sword until they went into shock or bled out", Jason explained.

Anne-Marie shuddered at first, then she wondered..."But really, wouldn't the Tnuctipun try to kill only the Slavers, not destroy the infrastructure they built and the other innocent slave species? They wanted to commit instant genocide, to liberate all from the overlords, not trigger Doomsday."

"That made it much harder," I realized. "No super anti-matter weapons, if such things were even possible. No disintegrators from orbit, either."

"I just don't see how it could be done. You'd have to degrade the enemy intelligence before you could even hope to plan & prepare," said Jason. "Then you would need a super-powerful first strike, or it would all be over."

"Well", I concluded, " I guess we know why the Slavers ruled the whole galaxy, and for so long."

What do you make of this?" I said, showing them the open stasis box given to me by G-Squared, and placing it on the table in the main cabin.

"It looks just like the one we bought from the Outsiders!," said Anne-Marie. "So does this stuff inside it."

"Tell me about each of these objects," I said, adding "Feel free to touch them, but I should warn you that the meat is toxic."

"And there's more of it," Jason observed. "Our box only had one cube of it, but it was poisoned, too."

"Why?"

"We concluded that the contents of our box were a sort of spy's survival kit. Maybe the meat was for suicide," Jason suggested.

"It could just as easily have been for assassination, since it was for spy use," Anne Marie offered.

"I knew I hired the right people!," I said as I hit the table with my fist for emphasis.

She picked up the laminated claw. "We figured it's a Slaver's hand, and that it was a trophy, hence my assassination theory. The secret soft weapon was more humane than suicide by poison in the self-destruct mode, and contained a variable sword for quiet work, a laser for long range, a stunner for live capture, an energy absorber and a rocket lift for quick escape, a computer to store info, and a disintegrator ray for mass destruction. Spy and assassin gear. Jay figured out it belonged to a spy, not a soldier," 

"Maybe the rocket gizmo for torture", Jason joked. "That soft weapon wasn't like a pocket phone that is a phone, a camera, a watch, a health monitor, a calendar, and a computer all in the same rigid gadget. It was like a swiss army knife that magically transformed into proper tools, one at a time- adjustable wrench, a set of locking pliers, a hammer, a hunting knife, a hand saw, only weapons instead of tools. It was as if it were made out of living liquid metal - total conversion of matter. That's what convinced me it was spy gear."

I was speechless.

"Speaking of pocket phones," said Anne-Marie, "The Kzinti ran some tests on this rectangular gadget, and determined it was a communicator that worked in hyperspace, but they saw no use for it as a weapon, and didn't care about it."

"Typical Tigers!" said Jason.

"WAIT!" I said. "A hyperspace pocket phone?! Where is this stuff you saw before, now?"

"In fragments plastered across the cabin wall of the wrecked Kzinti ship, next to the remains of the pilot", Jason explained, "when the soft weapon got suspicious and self-destructed."

"So this is the only hyperspace pocket phone known in the universe?" I asked.

"Yes," they said in unison.

"Have I mentioned that I hired the right people? I think we just paid for this expedition, and Garvey Limited is about to have a subdivision bigger than the parent company. I'll arrange a generous finder's fee once we successfully crack the device."

Jason and Anne-Marie did a high five and a happy dance.

"There was a cap like this in our box," observed Jason," but the Kzinti had no interest in it either. It could have offered the wearer invisibility for all I know."

Anne-Marie picked up the cap and put it on. "Perfect for bad hair days, or when you run out of makeup. Can you still see me, Jay?"

"Yep."

"Bleep! It doesn't work." Everybody laughed. "Maybe it offered some protection from the Slaver power, maybe our spies should have worn these instead of storing them."

I smiled. "I like that idea even better! I can test it with the Grogs next time I'm on Down."

Anne-Marie picked up the empty drinking bulb. "Our kit had one of these filled with a 40% hydrogen peroxide solution. We never figured out why.. Fuel? Water purification? Torture? First aid? For destroying evidence? Who knows?"

"Well, well, what have we here?" said Jason, picking up the transparent canister which contained about 5 liters of amber liquid and holding it up to the light. "Looks like beer."

"G-Squared said it was "a unique ethanol liqueur"

"That's justification for carrying it in the kit, as far as I'm concerned," said Anne-Marie, "I always pack booze. Can we toast the future of the hyperspace pocket phone?"

"I'm all for that, but let's keep things scientific, for now," I cautioned." Only one of us at a time."

"I volunteer to be the guinea pig," stated Anne-Marie, raising her hand,"because I've never tasted anything more than a century old...and besides, Jay is officer of the watch right now."

"TANJ!" he said.

Anne-Marie transferred some of the elixir to her drinking bulb. "Mmmm. It smells yeasty, like baking bread."

She took a slow sip. "It tastes like fresh bread, too!" She worked the liqueur around her palate, then swallowed.

"Very creamy in texture, and slightly savory. The finish is sweet and there's a hint of something else.."

"So it tastes like a cream ale?" asked Jason.

"No," she said emphatically, and took a long pull from her bulb. " It's a... It's a drink of croissant fresh from the oven, with butter and Myer lemon honey!"

I transferred some liqueur into a clean drinking bulb, in preparation for a toast.

"Is it ...Is it hot in here?" asked Anne-Marie, letting down her long brunette hair, and shaking it out. It floated sensuously in the .8G ship's acceleration. "Hey Jay, where are we going?"

"Anne, are you okay?"

"Never better! Who's your sexy friend and why haven't you introduced me?"

"We're on our way to your home planet of Wunderland, under hyperdrive, at the direction of Garvey, here, who is our charter. We met him a few days ago. Don't you remember ?"

"Nope!" She threw her arms around her husband's neck, held him close and kissed him hard for half a minute.

When they came up for air, Jason said "her mouth does taste delicious."

"We'd be willing to take this canister as payment for our finder's fee..." offered Anne-Marie.

"Not happening," I said. "This is all there is." They started kissing again.  "Okay, you two, take all of the time you need. Jason, please stay sober, and I'll call you if any alarms go off."

"DEAL!" He said, sweeping the dark-eyed beauty off of her feet, as she took another sip. He rushed into their cabin, and I didn't see them again for about 48 hours.

So this "unique liqueur" tasted delicious, got you drunk, cleared your head of short term memories, and was some kind of legitimate aphrodisiac. The perfect weekend beverage! ... Or the perfect way to get your great grandson to give you a great, great grandson faster...G-Squared played me. I love that guy."

[Buster's Uncle]

When you brought in the Papandreous, I wondered if this was to pre-date The Soft Weapon, the box contents being so similar and all -even though it's not possible, what with your Tnuctip self-destructing with the key device.

Perhaps that sentence should read "I chartered Jason and Anne-Marie Papandreou, who had actual previous experience at this kind of thing, and their hyperdrive star liner, "Court Jester" for my quest, paying a premium for discretion."

[Buster's Uncle]

Incidentally, you might want to google Niven's outline for the never-written Down in Flames, which is online in several versions in several places - Niven realized an obvious improbability in the Grog/Slaver evolution (though not as improbable as Slaver descendants being at all recognizable as relatives after so long [must've been stasis involved for well over a billion years]  --- there wasn't anything with a spine on this planet 1.5 billion years ago).

-You should enjoy the Down in Flames premise and plot, so google it anyway, but I'll spoil that it was the male Thrintun who were intelligent - and in Grogs, it's reversed.  Hard to see how the switch could've evolved...  That might affect your story, or you might want to think of a handwave to work in, just to be a fan doing fanfic...

[Rusty Edge]

I'm feeling dizzy tonight. I'm going to reread this tomorrow when it makes more sense. Thanks for reading it.

[Buster's Uncle]

I get that mornings, to varying degrees.

You know, the Papandreous' speculations about how hard it would be to keep secrets and fight The Power assume absurdly low limits on range and speed (I believe the range is on the order of a few miles, and propagates at lightspeed) and Grogs everywhere - or they're talking about what the Tnuctipun were up against, which would fit better.  It would be good if it was clear which, unless you're engaging in misdirection.

(Be happy I have nothing to say about the writing, at least; you clearly have a handle already on how to tell a story. )

[Rusty Edge]

I get that mornings, to varying degrees.

You know, the Papandreous' speculations about how hard it would be to keep secrets and fight The Power assume absurdly low limits on range and speed (I believe the range is on the order of a few miles, and propagates at lightspeed) and Grogs everywhere - or they're talking about what the Tnuctipun were up against, which would fit better.  It would be good if it was clear which, unless you're engaging in misdirection.

(Be happy I have nothing to say about the writing, at least; you clearly have a handle already on how to tell a story. )

We're preparing for travel, things that must be done, also means I got to be stand-in caregiver today. Too much bending over and looking high and low taxes my balance. Also, allergies seem to aggravate  my balance malady. Dizzy again tonight.

OK. I think I understand your comments better tonight.

Garvey instinctively knows that there is more to the Bandersnatch brain than is general knowledge. To figure it out, he's trying to understand as much about the Slaver Empire and Tnuctipin revolt as he can.
That's what his quest is about.

So I need to backfill a little so that that the reader knows that he's trying to wrap his head  around the ancient revolt, not worrying about the potential future one.

Yes, in Niven fashion I am trying to both foreshadow and misdirect. 
Except for the bottle of Liqueur, I'm not trying to introduce new pieces to the puzzle. As Niven pointed out in notes somewhere, with enough mystery tech you can write yourself out of any corner, defeating the puzzle.  That's why I'm using a spy kit virtually identical to the one from the soft weapon. In am drawing inspiration from the biology of the canon, and the idea that Tnuctipun stuff has hidden features. So there will be some new interpretations and secret purposes.

Frankly I'm clueless about the drinking bulb with high strength hydrogen peroxide.  Fuel for the rocket pistol? No idea. That's why this one is empty. I must have added it and removed it three times!

Anyway, it's gratifying to know that my writing passes. It's something I've always felt insecure about. I struggled with creative writing in high school. I was good at poetry and essay style literature, but my stories read like encyclopedia articles.

And storytelling? My grandfather was legendary. He was a preacher. As it turns out, one of the secrets to great story telling is not to let the facts get in the way of a good story... but I didn't figure that out until after he died, and came across some documents. Anyway, by whatever I compared myself to, I sucked at stories.

In recent years I have done some collaborating with a virtual friend from Peru who doesn't speak English well. He likes my writing. That gave me enough confidence to try this.

I guess the difference is that I've read a lot of books since, and met a lot of people that weren't other high school kids. And done stuff.

Probably be mid-week before I have something else drafted and an internet connection to upload it.

[Buster's Uncle]

Not a lot of relevance to your story probably, but a sequel by Niven to Relic of Empire set on Silvereyes, the planet in known space with sunflowers.  -I can't quite spot what made it non-canon, but it had to be some detail about the Puppeteer worlds/migration...

http://www.larryniven.net/stories/color_of_sunfire.shtml

[Buster's Uncle]

...I ended up re-reading it -it's not long- and I spotted the continuity problem this time.  -But it's nothing that couldn't be fixed in five minutes, so I'm confused in my understanding that that's why it's not published...