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From: jagardner@watmath.UUCP (Jim Gardner)
Newsgroups: net.sf-lovers
Subject: Re: protectors
Message-ID: <16168@watmath.UUCP>
Date: Tue, 13-Aug-85 09:40:59 EDT
Article-I.D.: watmath.16168
Posted: Tue Aug 13 09:40:59 1985
Date-Received: Sun, 18-Aug-85 22:23:57 EDT
References: <3246@topaz.RUTGERS.EDU>
Reply-To: jagardner@watmath.UUCP (Jim Gardner)
Organization: U of Waterloo, Ontario
Lines: 68

In article <3246@topaz.RUTGERS.EDU> mooremj@EGLIN-VAX writes:
>Speaking of protectors, how could Beowulf Sheaffer become a protector in
>"Down in Flames"?  DIF takes place about the same time as The Ringworld
>Engineers, in which Louis Wu is well over 200 years old.  Beowulf is Louis's
>stepfather, so he is closer to 300...way WAY past the maximum age to become
>a protector!  Ideas?

SPOILER WARNING: IF YOU HAVE NEVER HEARD OF "DOWN IN FLAMES", YOU MAY NOT
WANT TO READ THIS -- NIVEN MAY WRITE THE BOOK SOMEDAY.

Down in Flames was conceived before Ringworld Engineers...in fact, it may
have been conceived before Ringworld, since one of the premises of Down in
Flames is that the faster FTL drive (used in Ringworld) was actually a hoax.
Therefore, Down in Flames could very well be incompatible with Known Space
as it has since developed.

NEVERTHELESS, I can suggest one way that Beowulf Sheaffer could easily be
the right age to eat Tree-of-Life root anytime he wanted.  In the known
Sheaffer stories, he is likely in his late twenties/early thirties.  He
could be Louis's stepfather at this time.  Then for some reason (possibly
connected with the Puppeteer hoax that he helped start), he had occasion
to hop on a Ramjet and go off somewhere at speeds that would provide
enough relativistic time dilation to let him age ten years while Louis
ages 200.  At the end of the journey, Sheaffer ends up...at Home, for
example, where there is lots of Tree-of-Life root.  Sheaffer turns into
a protector, picks up an FTL rocket from the ones left on Home when the
other Protectors left, and rushes back to wherever he has to be to start
the events in Down in Flames.

Second possibility: the whole point of Down in Flames is that the T'Nuctipun
are not dead.  Suppose the T'Nuctipun get worried about human Protectors...
after all, human Protectors are supposed to be even nastier than Pak
Protectors.  The T'Nuctipun figure that it might be in their best interests
to study a Protector, maybe "put one on the payroll" so to speak so they
can have their tame Protector help them against other protectors that may
appear.  They grab poor Sheaffer as Sheaffer is off alone on some solo
trip (who cares what he's doing?), stuff him full of Tree-of-Life root,
then hold him prisoner for centuries.  Perhaps they can keep him in line
just by threatening to destroy large human colonies if he disobeys.  A
Protector would likely submit if the alternative was a direct threat to
his charges.  So Sheaffer has to help the T'Nuctipun for 200 years; then
he manages to escape in some clever way (perhaps he fakes his own death so
the T'Nuctipun don't make a retributive strike on humanity), and the wheels
are set in motion.  This makes a more interesting scenario, because it
means that there is at least one Protector out there who has some familiarity
with T'Nuctipun technology.

NOTE: To all those who have never heard of Down in Flames, it was a story
outline by Larry Niven that circulated on the net a few years ago.  In it,
the whole Known Space series was turned on its ear by the suggestion that
the T'Nuctipun were not a race that died out a million years ago.  They're
here, now, and nasty.  For their own reasons, they mug any ship that tries
to go FTL too close to any star's gravity well (it's to their advantage
that Known Space races believe that they have to go a long way out of their
way before they can go FTL).  The Puppeteers are fleeing from the T'Nuctipun,
not the exploding centre of the galaxy.  In fact, the centre of the galaxy
is not exploding.  That is all a hoax the Puppeteers played on Beowulf
Sheaffer to explain why they were running.  And so on, and so forth.
Everything you thought you knew is far from the truth.

Down in Flames was thrown together after some sort of party many years ago.
Someone suggested to Niven that he should write one last Known Space story
and destroy most of the galaxy.  Down in Flames certainly puts an end to
Known Space as we know it.  However, I doubt if it can be considered an
official part of the series; if and when the book ever comes out, it is
likely to be a lot different.

				Jim Gardner, University of Waterloo