Occam's Razor

by J. E. Gurley

  Lyton smiled enigmatically. “Of course, Amissa. The expedition would not be possible without her and Jazon.”

  “One of the Trilock attempted to assassinate Jazon. He died in the attempt.”

  A look of horror crossed Lyton’s face. He had not been aware of the attack. “Is Lightsinger all right?” His show of concern startled Ulrich.

  “Yes, he’s okay now, but it was a close call.”

  Lyton visibly relaxed. “That’s very good. We could not stand to lose him.”

  Ulrich wanted to tell Lyton about Jazon’s change of heart but couldn’t bring himself to do so. Perhaps Lord Hromhada would bring him up to date.

  “No, no we couldn’t,” Ulrich agreed. There was an awkward moment of silence as the two stared at each other. He sensed he would learn no more from Lyton. “What were you reading?” he asked casually.

  Lyton blushed. “I, er, I was reading a book of sonnets by Elizabeth Barrett Browning,” he answered sheepishly. “She was a 19th century writer from Earth.”

  “Yes. I’ve read her works.” He closed his eyes and quoted:

  “The breaking waves dashed high

  On a stern and rock-bound coast

  And the woods, against a stormy sky,

  Their giant branches tost.”

  Lyton smiled and clapped his hands. “Yes, yes! The Landing of the Pilgrim Fathers.” He finished the verse.

  “And the heavy night hung dark

  The hills and water o’er

  When a band of exiles moored their bark

  On the wild New England shore.”

  “It’s one of my favorite poems,” he exclaimed almost giddily. “Do you know more?”

  Ulrich shook his head sadly. “No, I barely remember that one. It just seemed appropriate somehow. For our journey, I mean.”

  Lyton looked sad for as moment, and then his smile erupted again. “Band of exiles. That’s what we’ll be, won’t we?”

  “It would seem so, but I would like to know more about where we’re going.”

  Lyton grimaced. He looked around the room. In almost a whisper, he said. “Lord Hromhada is hiding something from us.” He put his finger to his lips and smiled weakly. When nothing more was forthcoming, Ulrich assumed he was finished. Nearly a minute passed before he added, “Do not trust the Dastoran Drones. They are a double-edged sword.”

  Ulrich nodded. He knew nothing more than he did, but Lyton acted as though he had just revealed a deep secret. Maybe Jazon was right about the Dastorans after all. Where was Jazon, anyway? He checked the computer console by Lyton’s desk and looked for Jazon’s signature – Compartment C, sublevel 3. What was he doing in the bowels of the ship?

  “I’m sorry, Lyton. I must find Jazon now. I will see you at dinner. I suppose.”

  “Yes, yes! It’s been, er, good to speak with you.” He smiled broadly and winkled conspiratorially. This man would make a lousy spy, Ulrich thought. Maybe that’s what Jazon was doing – spying. He hoped the Highborn Lord wouldn’t be upset when he found out.

  Concerned by Jazon’s prolonged absence, Amissa checked the computer to locate him. His injuries were fresh and he needed rest. The last thing he needed was to be wandering alone around the ship. She had decided to go to him and to offer to tend to him until his health returned, but now he was in an area of the ship unsuited for humans to explore.

  The machinery there was dangerous, and the low-level Dastoran workers would not have the cognitive ability either to warn Jazon of the danger, or to aid him should an emergency arise.

  She was reluctant to alert ship’s security for fear of angering him but felt it would be for his own good. She was thoroughly confused a few minutes later when security informed her that they had found Jazon’s tracker attached to a carrier robot but no sign of him.

  “Search the ship. He may be in danger.”

  What was he doing? If he feared someone following him, he was playing a dangerous game. Some areas of the ship contained security weapons keyed to the trackers. A man not wearing one would be in danger of vaporization. She paced her quarters nervously waiting for security to report. Why was she so concerned with his welfare? She was well aware of her growing feelings for Jazon, but felt she could control them. After all, a part of her training had been her ability to manipulate men.

  Jazon’s question about her self-worth as a clone had opened up new avenues of thought for her. Exactly of what had her training consisted? She could remember little of it. They couldn't have keyed all of it to her DNA. Even the Dastoran were not that far advanced. She could remember snippets, but they seemed more like dreams than real memories. She knew most of her advanced learning was through her neuro-link, but what about sex and interaction with others. Could one learn those while asleep? She didn’t think so. If they could wipe her memories, supplant false ones, in what other ways did they control her mind. How much her own person was she?

  She felt a strong link with Jazon, as if their past intertwined. It could have been in an earlier cloning, but he was too young for that. She had met many people in her 110 years, but few, if any, drew her interest as this man did.

  Was it love? She didn’t know if she were capable of love. It was such a vague, inconstant emotion. Some of her basic emotions were intact, if somewhat blunted, to allow her some freedom of purpose, but did love belong in this category? Whatever one might call it, she knew she needed him around her. His presence pleased her, took her mind from her life and focused it on his needs. She felt his loneliness and sense of despair as if her own.

  Another half hour passed and still security had not located Jazon. Perhaps Ulrich would know where he had gone. Rather than call, she decided to meet with him. She chimed his door and he answered promptly.

  “Have you found him yet?” he asked breathlessly.

  Puzzled by his question, she asked, “You knew?”

  “Security was just here looking for him,” he explained. “Do you know where he is?”

  She shook her head. “No, I had hoped you could help.”

  Ulrich paused before answering, “I think he’s jumped ship.”

  She looked at Ulrich, expecting a smile to accompany his joke, but saw that he believed what he had said. She shook her head, mystified. “It would be impossible to leave this ship without someone knowing,” she maintained.

  Ulrich laughed. “You don’t know Jazon. He is determined and quite capable. Has a shuttle left recently?”

  “Yes. One left for the surface about six hours ago.”

  “Then look for him in Hhat,” he pronounced, as if certain he was right.

  Slowly, she realized that Ulrich indeed believed Jazon capable of leaving the ship. His certainty concerned her. “But the shuttle did not go to Hhat. It went to Ghera, a small island off the coast, to deliver a gift from the Mrumban Envoy.”

  “Poor Jazon. He thought he could get a free ride to Earth, and now he’s stuck on some island.”

  Amissa didn’t laugh. A sudden terror gripped her. “You do not understand. Ghera is a wild animal reserve. The Envoy was here to deliver an Mrumban achikote, a small, flying reptile. It is very poisonous. There are many other dangerous creatures there as well. We must find him immediately.”

  Her fear finally struck a chord with Ulrich. “Don’t stand there. Call the shuttle!” He grabbed her arm and pulled her behind him down the corridor.

  6

  And when love speaks, the voice of all the gods makes heaven drowsy with their harmony.

  Love’s Labours Lost Act IV, Sc3 Wm. Shakespeare

  A warm yellow sun with small orange blotches dotting its surface peeked through the window of the abandoned pumping station where Jazon had spent the night. He rose refreshed from his sleep, if a little hung over from the vodka. He breakfasted on a sandwich and fruit, washed down with clean, sweet water from the stream outside the door. There was no need for concern about alien parasites. Every Terran leaving Earth received comprehensive vaccines against dangerous pathogens. Marines re
ceived a double dose. The concrete floor of the pump shack had been hard, but overall he had slept in worse places. Now, it was time to head into Hhat and see if he could pick up a few credits. He hoped the authorities swallowed his story about being a guest of Lord Hromhada. Even it they didn’t, he figured Dastoran jails were more comfortable than Ataxan jails.

  The quietness outside still disturbed him. There was none of the expected sounds of a city awakening. He knew that Dastorans were contemplative and reserved, but the port should be full of life – drunks, hawkers, barkers, half-credit menageries, and the occasional ship lifting off. He could hear nothing, not even the sound of coolant bleeding off tanks.

  He retraced his path to the field and, as he brushed the last tree branch out of his way, fell to the ground laughing. It was not a joyous, deep-hearted laugh. No, it was a whimpering, broken-spirited, hysterical chortle that brought tears to his eyes.

  “I’ve really done it to myself this time!” he shouted to the empty air. Even from where he lay, he knew he was not in Hhat. The field was empty except for one abandoned, rusty ship slowly falling to pieces at the edge of the crumbling tarmac. The control tower was a small, automated one, allowing the occasional ship to land, like the one on which he had so cleverly stowed away. The tarmac lay pitted and broken, covered with wind-blown leaves and broken tree branches. Hardy grasses sprang up through the cracks, reaching for the sun like sinners escaping an asphalt Hell. The crates he had used for cover the previous night were rotting boxes, overgrown with jungle vines.

  The city beyond – there was no city beyond, merely a collection of crumbling, tumbling walls and a single street ending at the edge of the woods. There was none of the usual sounds of civilization. He heard no motors running, no children playing, no mothers cooking breakfast. There were no civilized smells. He was alone, somewhere. Hell, I don’t even know if this planet is Lahhor. He had only assumed it was. The planet they had been circling could have been any one of dozens in Dastoran space. He looked around and began to take in the smells and sounds surrounding him.

  There were animals here; he could smell their offal. He spotted a few birds soaring overhead. One was peculiar, but too far away to see distinctly. Animal tracks of all kinds at the edge of the woods and paths lead to the stream from which he had drunk earlier. At least he would not starve. He could rig a snare and, in a pinch, he had his pulser and stunner. The pump house seemed to be the building in the best condition. He could use it as a base for exploring his new surroundings.

  He had never heard of an abandoned class-M planet. They were just too valuable. He must be at an old abandoned military field or something on an otherwise inhabited planet. That meant he could reach civilization, even if it entailed a long hike. Well, it’s better than what Lord Hromhada had in mind for me, he thought.

  He felt guilty at leaving Ulrich behind, but Ulrich had made up his mind. Ulrich saw things in black and white, without the myriad fuzzy shades of grey Jazon knew existed out there in the real world. He had lived in the grey for years, fighting the Cha’aita. He wasn’t proud of some of the things he had done, but they had called him a hero afterwards, so it must have been okay.

  Jazon was picking fruit from a low-hanging branch when a roar loud enough to shake the trees shot through the woods. The small hairs on his neck rose. He pressed himself against the tree trunk and pulled out his pulser. The sound of loud footfalls pounded through the forest, accompanied by the crunch and crackle of breaking limbs. Something very, very big was coming his way. He gave a brief thought to running but knew he must at least get a glimpse of this beast. His heart throbbed against his ribs, and he tried vainly to hold his breath as the bushes nearby exploded. A shower of leaves and limbs concealed their destroyer for a moment. He caught a glimpse of grey flesh. Then he saw it, and began to chuckle so hard he almost fell. As he stumbled around, doubled-up with laughter, he did fall to his knees.

  It was an elephant, a baby Earth African elephant, about five or six years old. It looked him in the eye, its own large eyes blinking in surprise, ears flapping like wings, and turned and ran back into the forest. He had frightened it. Jazon rolled on the ground howling with delight. Whatever a young elephant was doing here, he didn’t have to worry about it unless it stepped on him. There could be more, but he could easily avoid them. They hardly moved silently.

  He was reaching for another fruit when something hit him hard in the back, knocking him into the stream. He came up sputtering for air, searching for his assailant, but he saw nothing. His back felt as if the elephant had returned and kicked him. His reached back and detected a few scratches. Whatever had attacked him, it was gone.

  Wet and sore, he decided to head back to his camp to dry off. As he entered an open glade, he caught a glimpse of something out of the corner of his eye and dove to the side just in time to avoid its rush. It was a meter-long lizard with wings three times its length. He had seen the sun flashing off razor-sharp talons and teeth the size of his fingers. It soared into the air and circled him several times. He fired his pulser at it, but it was moving too erratically for him to aim. It disappeared from view. He stood there for several minutes, waiting for it to return, but it must have found easier prey deeper in the forest.

  “First, an elephant, and now a damn dragon. Where in hell am I?” he wondered aloud. He also wondered if his little forest held any more surprises. Never one to admit when he was wrong, Jazon was willing this time. He had stepped off into the ass end of nowhere with dragons after his ass. He hoped Ulrich had the sense to figure that he had jumped ship, find out where he was, and search for him. If ever a man needed rescuing, it was he. Even the Highborn’s little jaunt down the Arm looked good to him now.

  He might be rescued, but he couldn’t count on it. His departure from Ulrich had not been on good terms. Ulrich could easily decide that he had enough and forget about him. The first thing he had to do was secure his camp. Second, he had to find out where he was. The tower at the port was about twenty meters high. If he could climb it, it would give him a good view of his location.

  He found strips of corroded metal to construct a crude grill for the shack’s single open window, and a large tree limb to secure the door at night. He gathered vines and made small baskets filled with rocks. These, he strung around the pump shack and set trip vines across paths. Anything disturbing the vines would release the rocks, making enough noise to warn him. To protect against the dragon, he dragged several fallen limbs to the shack and piled them in an arch above the door. At least it could not pounce on him from the roof when he walked out the door. Satisfied that he had done all he could do without sensors and flares, he tackled project number two.

  Standing beneath the tower and staring straight up, Jazon developed an acute case of acrophobia. The tower swayed in the slight breeze almost hypnotically, a slender thread tying earth to sky. There was no way he could climb it.

  “Come on coward,” he admonished himself. “You’ve walked on the hull plating of a ship firing lasers at Cha’aita. How can this little tower scare you?”

  Then he remembered that while outside the Cha’aita ship, he had been wearing magnetic boots. He could use a pair here. Summoning his courage, he began the perilous ascent. The first few meters were easy enough. After that, the spaces between the braces were almost too small for a good toehold. Several times, his foot slipped, leaving him dangling from the sides by his hands, wishing fervently that he had never started the climb. Finally, he reached the point where the tower was too slender for climbing. He decided to shimmy up it like a tree. He wrapped his arms around the tower and slowing inched upwards. Under his weight, the tower arced like a clock’s pendulum. Jazon’s stomach churned with each sway. An ominous grinding below warned him that he had reached the tower’s limit of support. If he went any farther, it might collapse under his weight.

  Holding on as best he could with one arm, he took his hand and shaded his eyes against the glare of the sun. Scanning the horizon, he was disappo
inted to discover that he was on an island, a small one at that, fewer than twenty kilometers across. The island was flat with one sandy beach on the southern tip, and a jungle covering the rest. The only sign of civilization was the abandoned landing field and its crumbling buildings. There were no other buildings visible, no docks or boats, and as far as he could see out to sea, there were no other nearby islands. He was Robinson Crusoe. Robinson Crusoe with a damned dragon instead of Friday, he reminded himself.

  He started back down the tower by the expedient process of sliding. He had descended about halfway when a loud cry over his left shoulder almost made him lose his balance. It was the dragon returning. “Look’s like Friday’s angry,” he whispered. He had left his weapons, except his knife, below. Not wishing to fight while dangling from a tower, he loosened his hold and slid faster. He blistered the skin on his hands and his thighs from friction, but he considered the loss of a little skin a small price to pay for his life.

  He had barely reached a spot where he could brace himself when the dragon attacked. It glided in at him and hovered just out of arm’s reach, thrusting its beak at him, a mouthful of daggers ready to render flesh from bone. He slapped it with his hand, and it pulled away in surprise. He dropped a few more meters before it returned. This time it landed on the opposite side of the tower and tried to strike at him through the tangle of braces. Jazon dodged and twisted with each lunge of its vicious beak, often hanging by one hand. Almost as if choreographed, the two descended the tower, one lunging and the other dodging. The sharp beak sliced into Jazon’s arms several times. His hands grew slick with blood, making holding on even more difficult. The scent of blood seemed to enrage the creature. Its attacks became furious.

  Jazon braced himself and pulled his knife. He waited until the dragon thrust his head deep into the braces and slammed the knife home in its beak. The creature’s thrashings as it tried to free itself almost wrecked the tower. Jazon scampered down as fast as he could until he reached bottom. He scrambled for the pulser, but the dragon pulled the offending knife from its beak and fled, screaming its anger and frustration at Jazon. Jazon fired once, more in rage than with any hope of hitting it.