Aftershock (Lord of the Flies)

A tall, fair haired boy stood on the burned remains of an island, alone and only in a ratty pair of shorts. Shattered pieces of a shell lay in ruins at his bare feet, pieces sharp enough to break one’s skin. He could see faintly through is eyes clouds of light smoke floating into the air coming from a lit source on the top of a large mountain in the center of the island. Drips of blood fell onto the sand from a long gash in his chest, but he felt no pain.

Ralph carefully walked over the broken shell and made his way down the white sand beach, looking around at his surroundings as if he was seeing them for the first time. It had been a beautiful island at one point, but no elegance existed and it hadn’t for quite some time. It was black and burned and horrible and sick.

“There’s a man!” a voice called from a distance not too far away. Ralph heard this and started to run towards the calling.

“He’s-agh!” the voice cried out in agony as he boy ran towards it. His speed quickened up as the cries of pain became intensively louder.

Ralph eventually reached the source of the screams, only to shriek in horror himself. “No!”

A young boy, about eleven or twelve, with long, black, coarse hair lay on the sand near the water, blood covering his arms, legs, and chest, his eyes fluttering shut. Ralph ran over to his side as the child in his presence started to lose consciousness.

“There’s a dead man… on the hill,” the boy weakly said until his breathing slowed down until it faded away into oblivion. Ralph put his hand on the boy’s bloody chest and let out an agonizing scream.

“Ralph!” another young voice cried out from further along the beach. Ralph recognized the voice from years ago and unwillingly left the dead boy’s side in search of the other.

“Ralph, don’t leave me!” the pleads became worse and more desperate as time grew on as Ralph gave all his effort to race towards the child. Once he finally reached the boy, the sight before him dreadfully went into play.

A young, chubby, nearly bald boy was falling from a cliff high above. Ralph, knowing how the event played out, turned his head away and waited for the horrible sound of the body meeting rock. When the dreadful sound was heard, Ralph looked to see the boy and the contents of his head being washed away by the ocean.

Ralph fell to his knees and pounded the sand with his fists. Screaming and crying and screaming and crying…

A small gasp escaped his lips as he woke up in a cold sweat, safe in his bed, well and unharmed. Another bloody nightmare had slipped into his sleep, the same events replaying in his brain for the past five years. He reached over to his nightstand and fumbled his hand around until they grasped a pair of spectacles, to which he put on his head in order to clear his foggy mind and perhaps regain sense.

Once he could see through the glass of the spectacles, Ralph looked over at his bedside to see the candle still dancing with its flame. He tried to relax his worried thoughts, thoughts about Simon and Piggy and Jack and the twins.

Even in the safety of the neighborhood and his house, the evils from those few months flew into his mind occasionally to set him on edge. Ralph used his finger to trace the scar that was forever implanted on his chest, remembering the hunts and the blood from years ago. Ralph ran a hand through his short blonde hair, reminding him of how long and filthy it used to be.

Wanting to hopefully fall back into a sweet slumber instead of a horrifying dream, Ralph put his specs back on the nightstand and wrapped himself in blankets. But the images still stayed vivid and pure in his head. Of Piggy, the conch, Jack, the beast, the horrendous boulder, Simon…

Ralph couldn’t help as tears gently streamed down his cheeks and onto his pillow.

_____

In the most dangerous corner of a reconstructed London, an old, fragile orphanage stood. Inside the orphanage were many children, many happy small children, who would call it home for the time being. And one seventeen year old boy with fiery red hair also called it home, to which he prayed for not much longer.

Jack Merridew sat on the roof of this orphanage, a pocketknife in his bare hands, dangling his feet of the ledge. He looked into the utter gruesomeness of London, watching the people walk by, sometimes with hazardous results. He remembered the time he witnessed a young mother and her child become victims of a robbing, the time a careless student under influence walked into the road. There was nothing he could, or would, have done to stop it. All he did was watch.

A pain shot through his head again, reaching up to his black eye from the fight at the school. A black eye was all he’d walked out with. At least it wasn’t as bad as the other times.

He looked into the streets again, watching the cars fly by, watching the people interact. But he didn’t interpret things the way everyone else did. Somehow, someway, everything led back to five years ago.

The women and her child. Simon and all the littluns. The man and the car. Piggy and the boulder. His fight with an older kid several hours ago. His fights with Ralph. Everything came back to it. It was like a broken record that kept replaying over and over again.

Jack looked down at his knife and his wrists. He saw the several gashes made on both his arms from the blade, from his need to see and feel blood. A way to forget the pain from the island, but at the same time just bring it back into the light.

He jabbed the knife into the roof of the orphanage, letting out a cry of anger as he did. It never stopped, the memories of his own evil always found a way to seep into his mind like poison. No matter what good he did, some things were just burned into one’s thoughts forever.

The one thing Jack had never done, although, was apologize. Apologize to Sam. Apologize to Eric. Apologize to Ralph. Things he’d never done and was too frightened to do today.

Jack pulled the knife from the roof and held it to his arm, but didn’t move it in any direction. He just let it sit there, as if the idea had come to his mind but he’d never committed to it.

He once more looked into the streets of London. Filthy, corrupt, bloody, and terrorizing. The things that Jack Merridew believed would surround him for the rest of his life.