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"I can remember when the first pulsars were discovered. I was able to go and sit down and listen to graduate students talking about what their theories, to explain what pulsars really were."
- Vernor Vinge
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| Variable Sword | ||
| A sword that could vary in length, and cut through anything. |
Among the various inventions which make use of a Slaver stasis field, the variable-sword was one of the more elegant. Very compact, which was very handy for the kzin who wielded it.
| "I have a variable-sword," said Speaker-to-Animals. "I urge calm." The kzin stood against a curved wall. In one clawed fist he held something like an oversized jump rope handle. Ten feet from the handle, held expertly at the level of the kzin's eyes, was a small, glowing red ball. The wire which joined ball to handle was too thin to be visible, but Louis didn't doubt it was there. Protected and made rigid by a Slaver stasis field, the wire would cut through most materials including the back of Louis's crash couch. |
| Technovelgy from Ringworld,
by Larry Niven. Published by Ballantine in 1970 Additional resources -
|
Louis Wu, the 200 year old protagonist of this novel, considered grabbing the red ball to gain control of the weapon, but one of the other aliens had a better way to control this unruly kzin.
And what, you ask, is a kzin that you should fear it? Imagine an eight-foot tall tabby cat built like a linebacker, with paws the size of baseball gloves, with retractable claws to match.
Find out about a uniquely flexible blade: the belt sword by William Gibson.
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'The robant and the tiny old woman entered the control room slowly...'
'Guy named Otto Octavius winds up with eight limbs... What are the odds?'
'It is as you thought when you constructed the time crystal, my master Vaylan.'
'This was their world, their planet — this swift-traveling, yet seemingly moveless vessel.'
'Gaines and Harvey mounted tumblebugs, and kept abreast of the Cadet Captain...'
