Jinx, is a top-flight computer programmer. He meets Shaeffer on a trip from Down to Gummidgy and they struck up a quick friendship. Horne is short and strongly built like most natives of Jinx, a high-gravity world. His ability to ask the right questions when programming complex problems also helps him deduce the probable identities of the kidnappers when the Kdatlyno touch sculptor Lloobee is kidnapped from the Argos as it was about to enter Gummidgy system. Despite Shaeffer's caution and some misleading comments that led Horne to believe he was wrong about Larchmont Bellamy and his crew being the kidnappers (Horne wasn't wrong but Shaeffer didn't want him running in with stun-guns blazing), they are taken prisoner when they attempt to infiltrate the location where Lloobee is being held, a cave created with a Slaver disintegrator tool, which Horne locates by having Shaeffer fly high above the ground to see the dust created by the tool. When he attempts to enter the cave, however, a stun-gun set in the "on" position and facing the door renders Horne unconscious. He is returned along with Lloobee after Shaeffer escapes from the kidnappers with Lloobee's help. Emil Horne appears in the Beowulf Shaeffer story "Grendel" and is mentioned in the story The Borderland of Sol. Sharrol Janss Sharrol Janss, a native of Earth, is Beowulf Shaeffer's wife and the mother of their daughter Jeena and another child, name unknown, whom she was pregnant with when Shaeffer encountered Ander Smittarasheed on Fafnir in 2655. Sharrol first met Shaeffer on Earth when she picked his pocket, and was later formally introduced to him by Dianna and Elephant as a fourth for bridge. Sharrol also has two children by Carlos Wu, Tanya and Louis, as part of an arrangement between the three so that Bey and Sharrol could raise children together on Earth. Sharrol suffers from Flatland Phobia, a fear of changes to a person's environment, gravity, etc. which makes them psychologically unable to bear space travel or being away from Earth. She was employed at the time she met Shaeffer as a computer analyst for Donovan's Brains, Inc. She had been previously employed by the Epcot-Atlanta police. During her childhood her father ran a lobster ranch in Boston. She was able to travel to Fafnir asleep inside Carlos Wu's special autodoc and later was frozen for travel to Home when Smittarasheed located Shaeffer on