Occams Razor

Billy St. Francis keeps a good pace, not too fast but obviously showing a bit of familiarity with walking distances in rural areas. He checks his pistol once, making sure that it is loaded and ready before tucking it back away. He keeps his eyes on the surrounding area, and whistles tunelessly for a short minute.

Finally, as if to fill time on the walk, he asks "So, I don't recall asking what brought any of you to the island, if you don't mind me asking now?" There's a pause, and he glances back with a friendly smile. "Not that we mind the company, especially considering the circumstances. I'm just a curious person by nature, is all."

Nick gives a disgusted grimace, and gestures back the way they came, "Kesley and I were en-route to Canada when our bus had the misfortune to BOTH run out of gas and start to have engine trouble right outside Whisper Hill. We were looking to find a gas station on the island en-route to get some repairs done in Whisper HIll when the bridges blew..."

He shrugs. "We had a nice Cold Case waiting for us in Ontario, along with things like wi-fi, electricity, and hotel rooms; it kept for 5 years, so I suppose it can wait a little longer..."

Henry kept a few paces back from the group. The daylight helped keep the shadows from hiding too much. When the question was broached about their reason's for coming this far north Henry deferred to Mr. Sleet first. When the man finished Henry spoke up.

"A friend of mine got worried I was getting sloppy on my cases. Rather than watch anything else go sideways he told me to head north. 'Get out of the heat,' he said. I get the feeling if he knew what was happening...He's a bigger man than to say I told you so. That wouldn't stop him from making some pointed suggestions though."

Eden keeps the pace, but it's clear from her unfamiliarity with the terrain that she's a city girl. She continues to look around, her hand on her gun, alert for any unpleasantness that might come creeping out from behind the trees.

"I was asked to look into a murder case in Whisper Hill." Her tone is slightly distracted, given that she's trying to concentrate on her footing and her surroundings at the same time. "Also, my big brother wants me to keep an eye on Gus, make sure he stays out of trouble." She grins mischievously at the firefighter.

"So, what about you, Billy? Are you a local or are you traveling to Whisper Hill for reasons of your own?"

"I was looking into a disappearance on the island," says Billy simply. "A lot of my work comes from the tribe, and someone's nephew disappeared here on a camping trip. I haven't found any direct proof yet, but considering what we have seen and where he was camping, I would be surprised if his disappearance didn't have something to do with the megacorporations' presence here."

The private investigator glances towards Henry, and gives a nod. "Letting the heat die down is necessary when you're getting people angry," Billy admits. He glances at the others, and smiles faintly. "So, we got two PIs, two cops, and a firefighter? If we had a biker, we could be a musical act."

"We should invite Lou along," Eden chuckles. "Then we'd have a construction worker, too. Or Taz, I think he's a biker."

Growing more serious, she turns to Billy. "Some poor kid has gone missing on this island?" She hisses through her teeth in sympathy and shakes her head. "That can't be good. Any idea what happened yet? Was he here alone?"

When the group stops for a minute to *harrumph* take care a call of nature, they find they have a tag-a-long. The Professor comes hobbling up behind them, wheezeing and leaning on his cane.

"Another missing camper? Didn't a Senator's daughter go missing a while back? Milner, wasn't it?
Decided to follow along. I haven't been to the Sheriff's office yet."

The old chap turns to Eden Jones "A Biker? If his name is Eddie, I can be the Professor and all we need is a transvestite. The rest of this bunch would fit right in at a Rocky Horror Picture Show night. Either of you P.I's hiding anything under your trenchcoats?"

The Professor starts gimping along, hoping to get a head start on the group before they hurry on.

" I ended up here, pretty close to a few people's stories. I'm on sabbatical. Was taking a road trip north. Rented a Caddy convertible, had an autographed picture of Julie Newmar and everything. My final destination was a new archeological dig up in Nova Scotia. A new pre-Colombian Viking settlement was found. A little bit south of here. I *puff* had a little girl run out in the road in front of me. Put the Caddy in a ditch avoiding her. Once I got out, she was nowhere to be seen and the Caddy was too far in to get out without a tow truck. I waved down a passing Greyhound bus which was driving pretty slow already. *huff puff* It wasn't long after that, that the bus broke down too. We all ended up at the camp there"

"I'm actually working on a theory that this area must be some type of Nexus. Kind of a center of strange probabilities. I'm thinking that most of us were attracted, led, pulled here for some purpose. Of course, what worries me is what did the attracting, leading, pulling. No solid evidence, just a few hypotheses."

"Oh, and I just remembered something I've been wondering about. Who ever ended up with all those papers that were in that agent's briefcase? I couldn't read it very well. Looked like judicial writing, paralegal shorthand and a few other things I just couldn't grok. It would be nice if whoever had those could maybe make a copy in plain english for us civilians to look over."

"Hi Professor," Nick says, scanning the area while he walks along. "I'm not sure that standards of evidence apply anymore what with the craziness around here... of course that would put me out of a job, so here's to hoping standard investigative techniques still have some traction. Regarding the agents files, he reclaimed them along with the briefcase last night, but a couple people translated them before they were taken back. Let me look through my notes and see if I have any notes from them..."

Henry was impressed at the speed the large professor was able to wrangle out of his gait. He recalled the papers laying about after the agent was harried out of the Rec Hall. If someone took the time to translate those papers they deserved a drink. Now if they could just find a bottle full of anything stronger than Kool Aid. As for the thought about this place drawing them all here...

"Sorry, prof. I think this is one of those black cat getting crushed by a falling mirror in an umbrella factor moments. A whole lotta people were on the move and a whole lotta people got stranded in The Twilight Zone. Have to say though, a whole bunch of them got some moxie going. It takes a hell of a backbone to trust so many in one go. I get the feeling though if we weren't all bunched up a whole new ballgame would pick up."