Author's Q&A

Q&A from the author's website.

## World Building

*January 11, 2024 at 4:37 pm*

1) **After Sol mission, do the military now encourage fighter pilots to take zero gravity wing training? Being able to free fly could come in handy for space pilots in emergency situations. It’s likely an extremely rare situation but it couldn’t hurt them to know.**

*Janet Edwards says*:

> 1) The Military will assist fighter pilots who wish to attempt zero gravity wing training, but not actively encourage it because so many people don’t have the aptitude.
>
>

2) **How did Jarra know about the Hera blockaid? Betha said Earth Rolling News hardly even mentioned it and Jarra was approximately 10 at the time. Drago even looked up the list of approved stations Jarra would be exposed to and commented how restricted they were. I believe he even said they were along the lines, if not worse, than the Delta sectors.**

*Janet Edwards says*:

> 2) Jarra watched a lot of Military recruitment and public information vids before she joined the Asgard 6 class. These included some mentions of the Hera comet blockade. However, either those vids didn’t specifically focus on Jaxon and Drago, or Jarra skipped those bits as not relevant to her research.
>
>

3) **Drago talks about how Tellon Blaze would use a laser pen to carve his thoughts into surfaces. The Tell clan children are regularly told only those who saved humanity could do that (hahah reminds me of how Amalie’s world Maranda in Epsilon prevent children mimicking their mayor’s affinity to swear). Drago wondered how the Blaze clan discouraged their children from replicating the action. That “the children of scientists were too dutifully earnest…” This passing thought gives this reader the implication the Blaze clan is more science based, may I ask for confirmation? Or will this be like the Ston clan and more information shared with later publications? \*hoping!\***

*Janet Edwards says*:

> 3) That mention of the Blaze clan was intended to convey they were a science-based civilian clan.
>
>

4) **We learn about Worldists and their belief in reaching Wisdom when they have visited at least one hundred worlds. They will have reached perfection if one thousand worlds are visited. Since new worlds are still being opened, does the next level go for euphoria and then nirvana? What are the Worldists view of Jarra’s “network of the stars under her skin” (Drew, Real Jerez Rivera, Earth Prime)?**

*Janet Edwards says*:

> 4) Worldists haven’t considered further levels beyond perfection. It could only become relevant when far more worlds had been colonized. After the events in Earth Flight, their view of Jarra would be more focused on the fact she was related to Jaxon and Drago, who’d saved Hera, than anything about her appearance.
>
>

5) **Did Jarra have rejuvenation treatments after being in the tank for three months? Drago is teased about having to have a rejuvenation treatment after being in a tank for an undisclosed amount of time. We also don’t know how old Drago was when he had extended treatment but we do know Jarra is younger than when Drago had his. It’s highly possible Jarra now carries the record for longest tank time and youngest to have rejuvenation treatment? Her doctors do say she had surprising little atrophy for such a long time but there could be other aspects that are addressed with rejuvenation?**

*Janet Edwards says*:

> 5) I wouldn’t read too much into Drago getting a single rejuvenation treatment when he was twenty-eight, because there were special circumstances. Basically, an annoyed Kar clan doctor chose to pre-empt the start of Drago’s standard rejuvenation treatment to keep him out of trouble long enough for his injuries to complete healing. There would be absolutely no reason to give a rejuvenation cycle to an 18-year-old Jarra.
>
>

(Source: https://janetedwards.com/fun-extras/portal-future-questions/#comment-135257)

*December 25, 2023 at 8:37 am*

**On reread umpteen it finally occurs to me to wonder; given the apparent academic success/excellence of the Asgard 6 class, which is, according to Lecturer Playdon, due to a student of Jarra’s vast experience being in “key spot” as tag leader for team one, how long does it take before off-world universities start to poach Earth born and trained students for their classes?**

*Janet Edwards says*:

> Again some of these things in this discussion are on my list to be written about in future, so I’ll just say that a lot of arrangements will be adjusted.
>
>

(Source: https://janetedwards.com/fun-extras/portal-future-questions/#comment-135221)

*September 19, 2023 at 6:30 pm*

**Is an honor child registered before birth? Given the speed with which Jarra was offered her honor ceremony, the military must have been automatically notified as soon as she unlocked her information whether or not she reached out to her parents. I imagine then that other honor ceremonies may have done for Earth kids regardless of their parents’ views.**

*Janet Edwards says*:

> Some of the things mentioned in this discussion are on my list to be written about in future, but there shouldn’t be any spoilers in me saying that it is customary for the family to reach an agreement on who should have an honour child before formally informing the Honour Order of their decision.
> That decision can be updated due to changes in family circumstances, but the Honour Order received no changes to the decisions on either Jarra or her cousin Bard, which was implicit family confirmation they could proceed with the Honour Ceremonies.
>
>

(Source: https://janetedwards.com/fun-extras/portal-future-questions/#comment-135105)

*November 4, 2022 at 9:04 am*

**How are the 9 in 10 identified? Presumably they don’t have the maternal antibodies that gives them extra protection as newborns, and it seems cruel to portal newborns off-world when 10% can’t survive**

*Janet Edwards says*:

> Sadly, Hospital Earth does use the portal off-world method to check if a new Earthborn baby is normal born or not.
>
>
> Their logic is that it’s the only real way to find out if a baby can only survive on Earth, and being portalled off world and back doesn’t cause any distress to the important normal born babies.
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> In fairness, carrying out the test with newborn babies is safer for those who do have an allergic reaction. As Fian says in Earth Star, newborns have longer than the standard two minutes before they die, because of the effect of their mother’s immune system
>
>

(Source: https://janetedwards.com/fun-extras/portal-future-questions/#comment-130652)

*July 29, 2022 at 11:47 am*

**...do all of the GSA worlds also have a cross sector military base...**

*Janet Edwards says*:

> In an established sector, there would be a sector headquarters Military base on the specialist Military supply world.
>
>

(Source: https://janetedwards.com/fun-extras/planets-in-the-portal-future/#comment-128642 )

*June 29, 2022 at 6:24 pm*

**Since it’s discovered in 2789 that Immune Syndrome has to do with the star a planet orbits rather than the planet itself, will the Earth solar array begin employing people with immune syndrome, or would that be impossible since part of the training takes place on Academy?**

*Janet Edwards says*:

> I’m assuming that people with the immune syndrome could safely work on solar arrays in Earth orbit, and in the orbit of other suitable planets as well. To avoid major spoilers, I can only say that the Military will be focussing on other issues ahead of this one.
>
>

*July 7, 2022 at 1:11 am*

**The story did not say immune syndrome was a result of the star, but that immune syndrome tolerance worlds had solar storms. It may be you have mixed cause with effect.**

> In Earth Flight, Leveque says – “Unfortunately, the Planet First teams have been deliberately selecting colony worlds of this specific type, because they’re also worlds that experience low levels of solar storms.”
> I don’t think there would be any spoilers involved in me clarifying that I’m assuming the star is definitely a central factor, but other factors such as a planet’s distance from the star could be important as well.
>
>

(Source: https://janetedwards.com/fun-extras/portal-future-questions/#comment-126932 )

*June 12, 2022 at 3:06 pm*

**When planets are being given names of gods, is it only ‘ancient’ ones which aren’t really followed anymore, or is it just chance that those are the ones we’ve seen? ie could there be a planet called Vishnu / Omoikane / Jehovah? I can see followers of the religion wanting to call their own world that, but being offended if other people named a world after their gods. Would the discovery by physicists that there may have been a creator (that you mention in Earth Girl) have had any bearing in the naming of planets?**

*Janet Edwards says*:

> The tradition of naming worlds this way actually started because several leading politicians suggested naming Earth’s first colony world after Thaddeus Ignatius Wallam-Crane the fourth. Ignatius knew perfectly well that was becuase they were planning to name the following new worlds after them. When Major Kerr made his comment in the original Earth Flight about the new world from space being the most beautiful sight he’d ever seen, Ignatius swept in and announced that colony worlds would follow the tradition of planets in Earth’s solar system and have names from ancient mythology. Major Kerr’s comment about the first world being beautiful famously led to it being named Adonis. Humanity still sticks to the mythology rule to avoid any more egotistical or otherwise awkward names.
>
>

(Source: https://janetedwards.com/fun-extras/portal-future-questions/#comment-125533 )

*February 2, 2022 at 7:11 pm*

**Do you have your own figure in mind for the total population of humanity? If so, is this accurate?**

*Janet Edwards says*:

> Hi Strawberry. Yes, I needed to establish basics like population size and the number of colony worlds in the Portal Future from the start. When I was writing Earth Girl, I had a history line of the main events between our time and 2789, and rolled forward through history thinking through the probable impact of those events on the birth rate, death rate, and the expansion to new colony worlds. That gave me the changes in population size and number of colony worlds through the timeline. All the numbers mentioned in the Portal Future, such as the one you quoted about over a million babies being born with Immune Syndrome each year in the 2780s, are based on that.
>
>

> If Jarra didn’t just look at the mathematical content of your post and scream, she’d tell you that your birth rate assumptions are far too deeply rooted in 2022, but your final answer isn’t wildly out. The population size of humanity in 2789 is about 105 billion people, and the expert advisors for Parliament of Planets are projecting a population rise of 21.5 per cent over the following hundred years. The actual population rise will obviously be affected by any dramatic events.
>
>

(Source: https://janetedwards.com/planets-in-the-portal-future/#comment-121821 )

*December 28, 2021 at 4:15 pm*

**How does calling/messaging people on a lookup work?**

*Janet Edwards says*:

> In the Portal Future, core mail addresses are very unintelligible strings of numbers, but people can link them to much more memorable user names. The equivalent of customized ringtones are available but people rarely bother with them because lookups usually flash up caller images. Spambots, fraudsters, and scam callers aren’t a problem in 2789, partly because of comms portal twinning making it easy to trace calls back to their source, and partly because they’re dealt with by specialist cross-sector units so can’t hide behind the equivalent of borders.
>
>

(Source: https://janetedwards.com/free-stories/#comment-121174 )

*December 15, 2021 at 8:35 pm*

**Should not Gateway be considered a special use planet ...**

*Janet Edwards says*:

> I’ve included both Gateway and Fortuna in the table because they qualify as planets mentioned in the Portal Future stories, but I’ve decided not to flag them with any more information at this point for multiple reasons. They don’t have officially confirmed names or classifications, their usage is temporary/changing, going into full details would be unnecessarily spoilerish, and I expect to eventually have a separate table on Zeta sector.
>
>

(Source: https://janetedwards.com/fun-extras/planets-in-the-portal-future/#comment-120916 )

*November 24, 2021*

**Quick question so In regards to the universe and the sectors what size are we talking here. The Milky Way is about 100,000 light years across and there are 100 billion+ planets in the Milky Way however only some of those planets are habitable or could possibly be habitable. So are all the sectors currently in the Milk Way or are they even more spread out.**

*Janet Edwards says*:

> As a general rule, there are few mentions of distances in the Portal Future. Given people can travel anywhere on the inhabited continent of their world with one step through a portal, they aren’t nearly as aware of distance as we are.
>
>
> Once it comes to interstellar distances, at the point I started writing Earth Girl, we knew little to zero about how common it was for a star system to have planets. I went with the maths on this one, and assumed that with over a hundred billion star systems in the Milky Way alone. there’d be billions of planets, and drop portal technology would mean humanity could pick the most ideal of them for colony worlds. Astronomers have since obligingly established that it’s extremely common for stars to have planets.
>
>
> The situation in the Portal Future was described by General Marshal Renton Mai in Earth Flight as follows:-
>
>
> “Portalling between inhabited worlds gives the illusion they’re packed closely together, when they’re actually scattered widely across space. We’re extremely selective when we choose our colony worlds. For every star system with a planet satisfying the criteria of Planet First, there are a hundred with a planet where human beings could survive with some difficulty, and many thousands with planets completely unsuitable for human life but with their own alien plant and animal life in abundance. Far more star systems exist without any sign of life at all. ”
>
>
> In the Earth Girl trilogy, humanity has somewhere approaching 1200 colony worlds (opinions vary about exactly whether you count worlds in Colony Ten stage as official colony worlds or not) spread across six sectors of space. I feel it would be incredibly unlikely for there to be two perfect candidates for colony worlds in the goldilocks zone of a star system, because their orbits around the star would have to be dangerously close together, so we assume there are roughly 200 star systems in each sector with a colony world.
>
>
> Making some estimates based on General Renton Mai’s explanation, let’s assume for ease of calculation that humanity is only colonizing one in 10,000 star systems in a sector of space. (If anything, it would be more like one in 20,000 or even higher.) With about 200 colony worlds in a sector, that means a sector covers about 2 million star systems. That’s a lot of star systems, but current estimates are that there are at least 100 billion star systems in the Milky Way, and probably a lot more.
>
>
>
> That means that in the Portal Future humanity has only explored a tiny percentage of the Milky Way.
>
>

(SOURCE: https://janetedwards.com/earth-prime#comment-120213 )

## Deltan Escape

*January 16, 2022 at 11:35 am*

**So is Playdon from Osiris, too?**

*Janet Edwards says*:

> An update on this. Rono’s impression is that Playdon’s parents were from Osiris originally and live there now, but moved between multiple worlds for work-related reasons during Playdon’s childhood. That means Playdon wasn’t born on Osiris. While Playdon identifies as being Deltan, he doesn’t regard any Deltan world as being his home world. In fact, Earth has come to fill that role for him. Rono’s information on different areas varies from being shaky to being utterly dependable. He’s likely to be dependable on this area.
>
>

(SOURCE: https://janetedwards.com/deltan-escape/#comment-121823 )

## 2781 Sequence

*July 21, 2022 at 7:31 pm*

**It would take a serious deorbiting burn to cause the skeleton dart to hit the sun**

*Janet Edwards says*:

> I believe your issue is to do with the original plan in Sol 2781 that the skeleton dart fighter would be sent to burn up in the sun to prevent it becoming a space hazard that could damage satellites. Sending the skeleton dart fighter out of the solar system would potentially make it more rather than less hazardous, so was never an option.
>
>
> In fact, sending the skeleton dart fighter into the sun didn’t actually happen in the end. Instead, the skeleton dart fighter was cut up into small enough pieces that one impacting a heavily shielded satellite wouldn’t be a problem, so they were just knocked vaguely aside.
>
>
> I have a maths degree but there’s no point in posting an answer that general readers won’t understand., so I’ll keep this simple by referring to real-life examples.
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> It is perfectly possible for an object in space to hit either a planet or the sun, or to go so close to the sun that it suffers extreme damage.
>
>
> Real-life examples.
> In August 2019. a sungrazer comet hit the sun.
> In July 1994, fragments of comet Shoemaker-Levy 9 hit Jupiter.
> To see space debris hitting Earth, you can watch any meteor shower – the Leonids are due to peak on November 17-18 in 2022 with Earth passing through debris from comet Tempel-Tuttle.
>
>
> Moving on to the case of an object in space orbiting either a planet or the sun. To quote NASA – “An object’s momentum and the force of gravity have to be balanced for an orbit to happen. If the forward momentum of one object is too great, it will speed past the other one and not enter into orbit. If momentum is too small, the object will be pulled into the other one and crash. When these forces are balanced, the object is always falling into the planet, but because it’s moving sideways fast enough, it never hits the planet.”
>
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> So, the original plan was that pilot of the skeleton dart fighter would start it deorbiting, after which the pilot would abandon ship and be collected. The skeleton dart fighter would continue the burn until it ran out of power which would definitely be a serious deorbiting burn.
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> Real-life example of a deorbit.
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> On 23 March 2001 Russia deorbited the Mir space station. This was achieved by three burns. You can see more information at https://www.nasa.gov/feature/20-years-ago-space-station-mir-reenters-earth-s-atmosphere
>
>

(Source: https://janetedwards.com/fun-extras/portal-future-questions/#comment-128654)

*November 8, 2021*

**Just remembered that Fians grandfather was part of Cionis Apprentices. I’m curious as to how Draco and Dragon may have reacted when it was realized given the history with the Tell clan**

*Janet Edwards says*:

> The Tell clan didn’t discover that Jarra had a boyfriend with links to Cioni’s Apprentices until they watched the coverage of her getting presented with the Artemis in 2789. Jarra had no idea how much consternation that caused, but the Tell clan realized they were in no position to demand she dumped her boyfriend.
>
>

(SOURCE: https://janetedwards.com/coming-next#comment-119931 )

## Fortuna

**March 10, 2020**

**Hi! I was wondering, will there be a full length book on Jarra and her adventures as a xenoarcheologist?**

*Janet Edwards says*:

> The short answer is that there’s likely to be more Jarra. The long answer is that I’m planning a new series about Fortuna, but I won’t know exactly how that will work out until I write it. I often have the problem that I’m not writing my stories, they’re writing me.
>
>
> The way I’m currently picturing the Fortuna books fitting into the general Portal Future is that the Scavenger Exodus series sets up the history that leads into Tellon Blaze and the first part of the Chimera wars. The Fortuna books are effectively the second part of the Chimera wars. Because of the way the Tellon Blaze and Fortuna series will interlink, there may be something weird like the books releasing alternately. Who knows. Frankly, I don’t at this point.
>
>
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> Anyway, when I started thinking this through, I realized that there were some aftermath issues from the Earth Girl trilogy that I wanted to tidy up but would be totally out of place in the new series. Hence the forthcoming collection being the Earth Girl Aftermath Stories.
>
>

(SOURCE: https://janetedwards.com/coming-next )

## Earth Girl

**April 10, 2018**

**What colour is Jarra’s impact suit?**

*Janet Edwards says*:

> The domes are equipped with standard, black impact suits. Jarra’s initially using one of those. The gift impact suit is the default metallic silver in colour. It can be sprayed to customise the colour but Jarra doesn’t get round to doing that. Partly because there’s a lot happening. Partly because her appearance isn’t high on her priority list. Later she has a Military blue suit.
>
>

**February 26, 2021**

**I think you need to read “Alien Moons” in “Scientic America – March 2021”. It may affect your world building in the portal universe. It suggests that large moon may be required for life on planets.**

*Janet Edwards says*:

> I’ve already seen that, but I was assuming from the start that all colony world’s would have at least one significantly sized moon for multiple reasons. While I obviously don’t comment on the moon or moons of every world, there shouldn’t be any references implying a colony world has no moon.
>
>

**I was thinking about the statement in chapter 4 of “Earth Girl”, ‘the moon is too big’.**

*Janet Edwards says*:

> Oh yes. You mean the bit where Playdon says Earth’s moon is too large for the Planet First criteria. Apologies that the explanation is a bit long and technical.
>
>
> While Playdon is in essence correct, he’s a historian not a physicist, so that statement is terminologically wrong. Jarra, due to her dreadful school physics teacher, doesn’t have the knowledge to correct him. Fian obviously does, but wouldn’t argue technicalities with Playdon, and anyway is distracted at that moment staring at Jarra.
>
>
> Some of the basic Planet First criteria for colony worlds date back to before humanity actually developed drop portal technology and reached other star systems. For example, to avoid health issues, scientists felt that the gravity of colony worlds should ideally not be higher than Earth’s gravity or more than a few per cent lower. Playdon is referring to a rule about moons that’s related to concerns about tidal forces. While tidal forces are generally beneficial, scientists were worried that a planet subjected to too strong a tidal force could have issues with things like excessive volcanic eruptions and earthquakes. An extreme example in our own solar system is Jupiter’s moon, Io.
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> Scientists therefore put a limit on both the tidal force exerted on the colony world by its moon or moons, and the total tidal force exerted by all bodies in the star system in every possible alignment. Tidal force technically isn’t related to the size of a moon, but its mass and how close it is to the colony world. As a non-scientist, Playdon doesn’t think of Earth’s moon being too massive for its close orbit, but just too large.
>
>
> Fun fact. The limit of tidal forces exerted by moons was originally based on Earth’s moon, but crucially used the mass of Earth’s moon before the invention of portal technology. As Tad mentions in Scavenger Blood, once portal technology improved to the point that the moon was accessible, there was some mining and dumping of hazardous waste. That both changed the surface appearance of Earth’s moon, and increased its mass by a tiny amount. so it became technically illegal under Planet First rules.
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> Given the number of habitable worlds available when you can portal massive interstellar distances, Planet First criteria have generally grown stricter rather than more relaxed over the centuries, so Earth’s moon remains technically illegal.
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(SOURCE: https://janetedwards.com/books/earth-girl/#comments Earth Girl)

## Earth Prime

**September 21, 2020**

 **I have some questions that I don’t think are very important over all, but I may have misjudged your intentions. I really don’t expect much of an answer, just yes, no, no comment or a very brief answer as I don’t want to take you away from your creative process. The questions are mostly just to fill in blanks on the wiki.**

>  I had to laugh reading your questions because so many of them are going to be covered either in the next collection or other future books so have to be classed as spoilers. In at least one case, it’s more at the level of SPOILERS!!!!!!
> I’ll answer the few remaining ones.
>
>

1. **What is Drago’s Mother’s name? In Hera 2781 she is mentioned as “the awe-inspiring Madrigal”, so one of your fans took that to mean that is her name, but I took it to mean a title or nickname, like Berrymore’s “the Great Profile” or Emily Dickinson’s “The Belle of Amherst” ….. is that what you meant?**

> Madrigal is Drago’s mother’s first name. She has always used only her first name as a composer and is staggeringly famous. Most of humanity has heard of Madrigal.
>
>

2. **Is Drago an only child?**

> No. More details will appear in future publications.
>
>

3. **The original Jarra Tell Morrath and Draco Tell Dramis’s parents were Male Dramis and Female Morrath, which one was a Tell?**

4. **Is Bard Tell \_\_\_\_\_ last name a spoiler? If not, can you share it for the family tree? We already know from Kappa Sector 2788 that it isn’t Galad.**

5. **Is Marack Tell Galad an only child?**

> No. More details will appear in future publications.
>
>

6. **In The End, and the New Beginning – Capri says that there were 4 original Military Betan Clans, in the Earth Girl Trilogy the Ray and Tar Clans are mentioned so, along with the new clans mentioned, Bran and March, were Ray and Tar clans the other two original military clans?**

7. **Will we ever hear from or about Captain Koulsy Mobele (Frontier) again?**

> I hope so.
>
>

8. **What is the problem with earth rabbits on Tethys?**

> It’s the same problem as rabbits in Australia.
>
>

9. **What size is an Asgard butterfly? Dinner plate size, size of a hand, or ?**

> Big dinner plate.
>
>

10. **Any additional information about volcanoes of Pyrrhus? Are they still active in the 28th century? Do/did they effect the continent that humanity settled on? Or will there be a book/story where more details will or may appear?**

11. **How long did the Runners and Changeling era last? c. 2420 to ——–?**

12. **When was the ability to bounce signals over long distances without going through cross sector portals created / invented? Approximate century, decade or year is good enough? Used for pre-empts, military, medical and babies with Immune Syndrome (It was in use for the end of the 2nd Roman Empire in 2658)**

13. **Type 4 portal intolerance: is there a Type 1, 2 and 3 portal intolerance?**

14. **Does the Asgard Rabbit have paws or hoofs?**

> Asgard rabbits are alien creatures so they technically have neither, but the appearance of their feet is closer to a hoof. Not that you can usually see much of the hoof because they have shaggy feet like shire horses.
>
>

**October 14, 2020 at 3:40 pm**

**How is Betan clan membership passed down? Jarra is of the Tell clan since her father’s clan is ranked higher than her mother’s clan. But what would have happened if Jarra’s parents’ clans were of the same rank? Or if Jarra’s parents were part of a triad marriage? What if one genetic parent’s clan – as in Lolia’s case – is only a clan cluster, but other genetic parent is of a higher ranked clan?**

> If one clan is higher ranked, then it’s normal for the children to belong to that clan, but this whole area gets spelled out in painstaking detail in the betrothal contract. Jarra gave up reading hers after clause 3, or she’d have discovered clause 9 specified exactly what would happen to her and Fian’s children in all possible circumstances including divorce, remarriage to each other, remarriage to someone else, divorce to allow remarriage to each other AND someone else, etc. Fian did read clause 9 and spent some considerable time making sure he understood it.
>
>

(SOURCE: https://janetedwards.com/books/earth-prime/ )

## Free Stories

**August 19, 2014**

**What are all the Military ranks – we see most of them from Captain upwards, but does it start at that or start lower? Thank you for the three amaz books!**

> Ah this is a complicated one:) The Military took the names of their ranks from several different armed forces back in the days of pre-history. The core list of ranks is:-
>
>
> * Cadet – Students at Academy
> * Lieutenant – Academy graduate still in training
> * Captain
> * Major
> * Commander
> * Colonel
> * General
> * General Staff
> * General Marshal (Commander-in-chief of the Military)
>
>
> There are also some specialist ranks for Medical staff, Solar Array specialists, and Planet First teams.
>
>

> **POTENTIAL SPOILERS BEYOND THIS POINT**
>
>
> Actually though, your basic rank is far less important than whether you are combat Military or not. There’s a huge division in this future Military between those with true combat Military assignments, and those in medical, admin, technical specialist, and the whole host of other support positions. Only combat Military have a position in the main chain of command. Only combat Military can hold the rank of Colonel or higher.
>
>
> For example, Major Rayne Tar Cameron is in a Command Support administrational position, which is not combat Military. Captain Marlise Weldon is a fighter pilot, true combat Military with a position in the chain of command. Captain Weldon is expected to treat Major Tar Cameron with the respect due an officer of superior rank, but in a crisis Captain Weldon would be the one giving orders.
>
>
> Similarly, Major Drago Tell Dramis leads a team of fighter pilots, and is assigned as Commander Stone’s deputy in charge of all the Attack teams. He’s only a Major, but his position in the chain of command makes him about fifth in command of the Alien Contact programme.
>
>
>
> Maybe I should have a special page somewhere for this sort of stuff . . .
>
>

**September 16, 2014**

**Also what language is “Language” mostly made up from?**

> The invention of portal travel in 2206 led to the era of United Earth. Language was legally adopted as the global common tongue in 2280. English was a significant influence on Language, but there was also input from several other major historical languages as well as Esperanto.
>
>

**January 21, 2016**

**I had a thought while rereading earth flight. How do the norm kids of the handicapped realize they themselves aren’t handicapped. Is there a test or something?**

> Yes, there is a test. It’s not mentioned directly in the trilogy because Jarra is naturally focused on her own situation, but babies born on Earth with either one or two Handicapped parents are portalled to Adonis for a few minutes within the first week of birth. The medical reason for that is that they have a significantly higher risk of having the immune system problem, and it’s far safer to test for it in controlled conditions with medical staff standing by than to discover it by accident. However the reason it’s done so young is also because Hospital Earth want to know as soon as possible whether a baby should be treated as a norm or not. As is mentioned in the trilogy, the norm children of Handicapped parents get special treatment, commuting to schools in Alpha sector worlds to aid their assimilation into ‘real society.’
>
>

**January 24, 2016**

**1. Hospital Earth runs three school systems, as you said. What if parents who came to Earth to be with their child want to send their non-Handicapped child to the same school as their sibling? (Perhaps they feel it’s too stigmatizing to their kids or they really like the teachers or their child is super interested in history and wants to join the history club which is there or something.) Is that possible? Is homeschooling an option for any parents?**

> 1) Hospital Earth would think it horrendously damaging to subject the non-Handicapped child to attending the same school as their sibling, with potential consequences for their social and mental development. There would the possibility of charging the parents with child abuse. Homeschooling would be acceptable, so long as the non-Handicapped child had regular social contact with other non-Handicapped children of their own age and occasional trips off world.
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**2. What happens if a Handicapped child being raised by their parents is orphaned (or the parents are abusive or imprisoned or whatever) and nobody else is willing or able to care for them? Do they suddenly get shunted into the dormitory situation, even if they’re, like, twelve years old?**

> Hospital Earth is a vast, bureaucratic, and totally inflexible organization. The child would be dumped into the dormitory situation.
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**I know adoption exists in-universe, because it comes up in the first book. Is it possible for an infertile couple on Earth to \*adopt\* one of the Handicapped babies that would otherwise go to a Nursery? That would surely reduce the load on the staff there, wouldn’t it?**

> Due to the advanced medicine available, such as full body regrowth tanks and rejuvenation treatments, there are ways to deal with virtually any infertility issues though people are advised to have their children before the age of 55 in women and 65 in men. If someone wanted to adopt a Handicapped baby in addition to their own children, the request would be refused for legal reasons. (I mentioned that Hospital Earth is vast, bureaucratic, and totally inflexible.) Hospital Earth would suggest they work in a Nursery unit instead.
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**January 30, 2016**

**You are aware that NYC – by which I presume we both mean Manhattan – has \*two\* major rivers, yes? (And any number of streams and kills and so on that have mostly been buried in the present-day, which btw is why the subway floods so much. And more rivers and streams and kills in the outer boroughs, of course.)**

> EARTH GIRL is told from Jarra’s viewpoint in a future where even country names are long out of use. In her future, New York went through some radical changes between our time and the late twenty fourth century, with some of the focus shifting from Manhattan to the Union City area. It was then abandoned for four centuries. I don’t attempt to pin down the locations within New York very much, because Jarra wouldn’t be using twenty-first century place names. If she knew any place names in New York at all, they’d be twenty-fourth century ones, but in any of Earth’s ruined cities the archaeologists use sectors, subdivided into grid squares, and further narrowed down with sensor readings to precisely locate where they’re excavating and where they’ve found stasis boxes.
> My personal image is that in 2789 New York Main is a huge irregularly shaped area covering most of the five boroughs as well as a large area on the New Jersey/Union City side of the Hudson River. New York Fringe is an outer large swathe. There are sizeable areas effectively missed out of both New York Fringe and New York Main, because they aren’t interesting enough to be worth dealing with extensive flooding or other major hazards. Apologies if I’ve got any of this muddled. I’m writing this from memory, and I have three different versions of New York in my head. The current one, the late twenty-fourth century one, and the 2789 one. There’s a risk of me referring to a landmark that won’t get built for the next couple of centuries.
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**We know what Jarra’s friends think of Fian, more or less, but what do his friends think of her?**

> I assume you’re asking what Fian’s two schoolfriends from Asgard think of Jarra. Since they are in a different Foundation class, on a different dig site, having different days holiday, meeting in person is difficult. During the events in EARTH GIRL they only hear about Jarra when Fian calls them to chat. They don’t actually meet Jarra in person until after they’ve seen the coverage of the rescue and medal presentation on Earth Rolling News. This is possibly part of the reason why they can see why Fian is attracted to Jarra but find her a little terrifying. Mind you, by the end of the trilogy, they’re finding Fian a little terrifying too. Incidentally, Fian has Raven, Keon and Krath supporting him at the betrothal ceremony rather than involving his old friends because both the thought of bombs and appearing on a live broadcast to most of humanity scares them to death.
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**What the heck happened at Gymir and those other places?**

> Sorry, details of either Gymir and Persephone would be potential spoilers because they are on the list of things I may write about one day.
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**March 16, 2016**

**We learn that General lost both his triad marriage partners while on duty so Jarra’s parents especially had her to be an Honor child for her grandmother, but what about her other grandfather?**

> There were several children of the triad marriage, including Jarra’s father, Marack. It was agreed that two different branches of the family would each have one of the Honour Children. So Jarra has a cousin in the Tell clan who is the Honour Child for her other grandfather.
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(SOURCE: Free Stories)

## Frontier

**March 22, 2016**

**In Frontier it is mentioned how people aren’t allowed/supposed to have children during the first 2 years of Colony Ten. What happens to the Handicapped Babies that are born after those 2 years? They get portalled to Earth, that much is clear. But what about the rule with living on Earth to keep your child? IIRC, people can only leave the Colony Ten planet if something massively goes wrong. Do the Colony Ten parents get to leave to keep their child (if they happen to want it) or is it an “abandon by default”? Can’t see something like completing the Colony Ten phase and the child not being a ward of Hospital Earth happening.**

> Only a very few Handicapped babies are born on Colony Ten worlds each year, but of course Colony Ten Command has a system for dealing with the situation.
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> You are quite correct that people can only leave a Colony Ten planet if something goes massively wrong, but (providing the planetary situation is reasonably under control) there is an exception for life threatening conditions that cannot be treated adequately on the planet. In the case of something like massive injury, the patient is portalled to a secure medical quarantine facility in Kappa sector for treatment. In the case of Handicapped babies, they are portalled to an isolated quarantine facility on Earth. The existence of that facility isn’t publicised because the Military don’t want people to start screaming about the risk of another Thetis.
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> The babies stay in the quarantine facility for a minimum of six months, and often longer depending on the current status of their world of origin. The facility is totally under the authority of Colony Ten, and covered by its safeguarding humanity powers which override Hospital Earth’s laws. Therefore the babies do not become wards of Hospital Earth until they leave the facility. The parents could appeal to Colony Ten to join their child at any point during that time. Depending on the state of the Colony Ten world, that request could be granted, obviously subject to the parents going through quarantine. However it’s extremely rare for that to happen. 92 per cent of ordinary parents abandon their Handicapped baby, and members of a Colony Ten group are extremely committed to their chosen lifestyle.
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(SOURCE: Frontier)

## Newsletter

**July 26, 2015**

**What exactly do you imagine cheese fluffle to be like?**

> Now I’m sure I told someone about cheese fluffle before, but I’ve hunted round and can’t find it. Jarra is passionate about cheese fluffle, but has only ever done camp fire cooking at dig sites. She buys her cheese fluffle ready made in cartons, so I’ve only been able to get vague information from her about the process of making it. Fian is totally useless on this subject, because you only have to say the word cheese fluffle and he throws cushions at you.
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> So this is an approximation at best. You bake potatoes until they are really soft inside. Scoop out all the potato from the skins and put it in a bowl. While the potato is still piping hot, add equal amounts of grated hard, strong tasting cheese. Mix thoroughly, reheating as necessary so the cheese melts into the potato, and ‘fluffle’ it thoroughly with a fork. To add the correct extra tang to the taste, you have to wait until the invention of interstellar portals to get the correct seasonings from Alpha sector worlds, so maybe skip that bit.
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> Jarra likes eating her cheese fluffle with toasted wafers. 28th century toasted wafers are similar to toasted slices of bread, but quite a dark brown and flat as if they use bread that hasn’t risen properly.
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(SOURCE: Newsletter)

## Scavenger Blood

**June 17, 2019**

**So…. Is the cache of paintings the same one Jarra finds in Earth Girl? Also does anyone feel a ping of sadness when the take historical documents out of stasis boxes to store their food? When I think of what Jarra would do if she knew that.**

> Yes, the cache of paintings is the same one Jarra finds in Earth Girl. I also pictured Jarra’s thoughts if she ever discovered her ancestor had wantonly destroyed historical documents. They weren’t just tossed out of their stasis boxes, but handed over to the alliance children to draw and write on the back. Sadly, I don’t think anyone in the *Scavenger Alliance* considered future historians at all.
> My other thought was about future archaeologists breathlessly opening a stasis box only to discover it was full of fish. Something I must try to sneak into a future story.
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**June 18, 2019**

**Given the song Donnel wrote for Blaze’s mom and Tads middle name, is the famous Betan love story with Paul and Helena about Tad and Blaze?**

> It might well be. 😀
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**August 3, 2019**

**By the way, did you have Exodus planned since writing Earth Girl? Playdon does mention a “massive fire that went on for two months” in New York. Also, does the timing mean we’ll be following these characters until 2409, when I gather Tad is in for a nasty shock?**

> The Portal Future is a bit like a jigsaw puzzle in my head. The Earth Girl trilogy is one of the pieces in that jigsaw puzzle. When I wrote the trilogy, I was often mentioning bits of past history, or including/referring to characters. I knew that many of those had stories which were other pieces in that jigsaw puzzle. I wasn’t plotting every bit of those stories in advance, but I knew some things about them and how they linked together, and included a few links in the trilogy.
> So yes, there are link references in the Earth Girl trilogy to the Scavenger Exodus series. A couple of links between the trilogy and Scavenger Alliance are the fire and flying lizards. You may spot other links when you read Scavenger Blood. In fact, there are links scattered through everything I write in the Portal Future, including the novellas and short stories. I remember at least one link reference to the Scavenger Exodus series in Frontier, but including these things is so automatic that I’m not always aware I’m doing it, and many links are to stories I haven’t written yet.
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(SOURCE: Scavenger Blood)