Quinn is a mercenary, friend of Louis Wu. A user of boosterspice, he fought for 200 years. He fought during the Maldorian Border Wars. At some point he was an ARM lieutenant and served under CO Carson Teal until he testified against him to his superiors and as a result they relegated Teal to the "galactic wastelands".
He received an infodisk surgically implanted from Wu. When he disappeared, Quinn followed his orders and came to W'kkai Rift to protect the life of Chmeee. He met his son, Iaach-Captain, and confirmed his identity by presenting his father's ring. Then he told about the message from Wu. They discussed the rumor that the Patriarch Veeshka planned to annihilate the Puppeteers which would result in another Man-Kzin war, ending centuries of galactic peace. It was then when Patriarchy assassins led by Shachra broke in, killing Chmeee's family. Quinn shot Shachra with his stunner and escaped on flycycles.
They hijacked a Hyperdrive II starship being built for exploration under UN-Kzin cooperation, capable of matching the speed of Shachra's Destroyer which went to annihilate the Fleet of Worlds. They met with resistance from the engineering Miranda Rees who was still working in the ship. Quinn stunned her in order to launch and escape the Planetary Defense Forces.
On their way to Ringworld they convinced Miranda to join them by disclosing the Patriarch's orders to Shachra. Along the way they received a hologram transmission from Hindmost who sent coordinates of several stasis boxes on Ringworld containing ancient advanced technology. These boxes fell from a Tnuctipun ship adrift in stasis for centuries before it crash-landed on Ringworld.
They landed the Lance of Truth on an abandoned space port ledge and located stasis field-enclosed objects scattered throughout a small region on the surface. They piloted the lander toward the largest of the stasis fields and were led us to a primitive society of the Canyon People. Quinn stole a key from Olochagach and gained access to the Sky Silver, the Tnuctipun ship, but they were unable to penetrate the stasis field.
After that they moved to their next target, a cave populated by Flesheaters who use a pheromone to seduce their intended prey. Quinn was helped by a bat-like creature who had the pheromone antidote with which he healed Seeker.
Their next target was located in a field of Slaver Sunflowers, and then a box sunk beneath the Great Oval Sea, and sought the assistance of the Coastal Sea People and dolphins.
Their last targets were the Kzinti overlords on a planet-sized island shaped after Earth. Quinn posed as a slave and infiltrated the "Patriarch"'s castle and stole a final stasis box, and his Thrintun helmet.
Having returned to the Canyon People, they were able to open the Tnuctipun ship and found a survivor which Quinn healed by giving the helmet. However the alien attempted to manipulate them telepathically, Quinn was not susceptible because he was carrying a neural wave nullifier. They salvaged an antimatter drive and two stepping disks from the ship.
Finding their way to the Fleet of Worlds, Quinn released the overloading antimatter drive from its stasis field near the Destroyer. The resulting explosion obliterated the destroyer and then used the stepping disk to teleport safely back. After that, the Hindmost demanded they relinquish the found items, but the trio declined to.
It turned out that the Fleet of Worlds was never endangered by Shachra. The conflict was staged by the Conservative Party so as to scare the Puppeteers about the Ringworld's destructive potential (whom the radical Experimentalist Party had considered a safe harbor from the Galactic Core explosion) and strengthen their hold on the government.
The explosion caused some malfunctions to the Lance and Quinn had to repair the reactor and recover Wu's infodisk to rediscover the Ringworld coordinates, where the trio had to hide, as they were considered thieves and fugitives.