On 27 May 2018 at 18:29, Michael Houghton wrote:

> Are you thinking of Derek Lowe, whose blog includes a category "Things
> I Won't Work With", which includes some compounds with way too many
> nitrogen atoms jammed in. For example:
>
> http://blogs.sciencemag.org/pipeline/archives/2011/11/11/things_i_wont
> _work_with_hexanitrohexaazaisowurtzitane

Reading thru the comments there's a lovely bit wondering how much of
this stuff organisms have to accumulate before they go "boom".

Which led me to the thought of a *major* storage depot for that
compound (it is a possible rocket fuel) lost during the long night.

Local critters breached the facility and some (probably fungi or
bacteria) started eating it.

They'd be able to get a fair bit of energy from metabolizing the
nitro groups.

But that leaves the hexaazaisowurtzitane part.

Something that eats them might accumulate that.

So here's some slow moving critter without many defenses. Has to be
slow moving because and fast moving critters that evolved the trick
tended to explode while moving.

Probably evolved a bright color pattern, as there defense mechanism
of goping "boom!" when attacked doesn't work well if predators don't
have a warning sign. (Maybe the oloration is a byproduct of some
other compounds in the storage depot that fungi and bacteria have
been eating?)

So Our Heroes encounter these (lets say) bright purple critters sort
of like a furless sloth. Thety move slowly, don't seem to be afraid
of large animals and eat these weird colored growths spread over the
area. (they thrive on the seepage from the buried storage depot into
the local water table)

At some point either someone kicks one out of the way, throws a rock
at it or something similar.

And it goes *boom*. Like it had TNT for bones or some such.

Yay. Walking land mines...

--
Leonard Erickson (aka shadow)
shadow at shadowgard dot com