Change. It's just a word. Change of power, change of clothes, very few to change when there's only 9 others to rule over. Things largely stayed the same after Avner took over. We just listened to him, instead of asking questions. He largely left us to our own. He held his title as largely a ceremonial one; the only caveat was that we'd each give him some of our food. He'd still go out gathering, although now on his own.
There's something wrong with Roland. Doesn't seem to get over the events that happened a few weeks ago. He didn't even bother cleaning the blood off of his face. A brownish streak remains at the side of his face, disgusting. Quieter, he has become, his eyes seem smaller and his movements slower. He seems like a defeated man. I feel for him. Small and quiet as he was, he must have had a large ego. No way he feels that way without it. I almost feel bad for him, but as much as I'd like to help, there's no doubt in my mind that I won't. After all, he's still a stranger; I hardly know anything about him other than his name.
Call it brotherly love. I feel for a man like that, one who merely did what he thought he should, yet received the treatment he did. Yet, he ought to see things the way they are now. Avner is no way near as bad as we thought he'd be. Not the huge tyrant I believed he'd surely be when he proclaimed himself the leader of our group. As big as he was, there was no way he'd want to take on all of us, especially Amir, who despite his quietness and submissiveness, was almost as big. He knew better, and gave us quite a bit of leeway and space to ourselves. In turn, he received the biggest space inside our makeshift home.
In the end, many things remained the same. We still toiled under the sun; the red hot air burned our skin like a kind of rash. Our skin had become darker. As much as we washed away, the crust on our skin composed of dry sweat never seemed to go away. White streaks of dead skin were seen all over our bodies. Hair was an utter mess. It was impossible to look at someone else's eyes and not see the sad, depressed eyes, eyes of defeat, of a low morale. I feel at least a couple were perhaps beginning to feel at least a little suicidal, although my mind lacked the creativity to see how anyone would commit suicide here. No weapons, no strings. The island was too flat to jump off somewhere, the water too shallow to drown.
We were hardly prepared for the coming monsoon. It rained all day it seemed, patches of hard rain, like lead bullets, followed by a cool mist that brought the temperature down quite a bit. We were stuck inside most of the time, quiet, uncomfortable as if we had all never met before. Stronger outside were the noises of thunder, stronger than the sounds of our churning stomachs, empty and in constant protest.
It wasn't that we weren't used to rain. The problem is that we weren't used to constant rain, and unprepared we were for the cold temperatures. At least a consequence of the ground become saturated with water was more worms to eat, keeping us alive. On the other hand, by this point we had already shed what little energy and weight we had regained.
The constant rain cooled down the weather considerably, not because of the winding down of humidity, but rather, because the gusts of wing that blew into the building were of a chilly nature. The chattering of teeth soon became quite common, almost in unison, our skin was covered in goose bumps, and our bodies trembled. Here and there you could see our breath in the sky. Our arms and legs were often glued to our bodies, the warmth confined to a part of our bodies made us long for blankets. We had nothing but rags and t-shirts. Those were used as blankets, although by the uncomfortable looks in people's eyes, I concluded that these were mostly inadequate. But I didn't need to see them to know that. My own teeth wouldn't stop chattering, it was a tic tic noise that emanated from my mouth, and any attempt to stop it would make my entire body shake instead. My arms were inside my t-shirt. I was curled up in the fetal position, with my hands on my armpits to steal what little warmth I possessed from my own body. That first night must have been the worst of my life.
In the cold, I slept upright, or at least tried to. The splendorous stars were opaque by the clouds and the rain, and the sound of raindrops crashing against the ground dominated our little world. In these cases, there's absolutely nothing to think about but home. There's no way to have a fire in our shelter without burning it down. With our situation already dire, empty stomachs, low morale, the new situation had us staring at the corners of the walls; almost pitch black, and remembering some obscure event in our lives.
Completely still we were, all ten of us, almost completely still. The shivering and swaying were evident in the dark. More so the chattering of teeth. It almost felt like a spark would come out of this action. The floor almost looked like a television set, playing the greatest hits or horror movies of our lives, as some of us seemed to have a faint smile, or a big frown.
Dr. Petrov died on the tenth day of the monsoon. I should've seen it coming, but it still caught me by surprise. I guess I should have read the signs, especially when he stopped talking so much about his crazy ideas, and the smirk on his face had disappeared. The event was terrifying to me, whereas the others seemed to hardly blink an eye at all at the event.
His skin had turned pale. Whiter than white, his body had the semblance of a ghost, or a cloud on a bright summer day. He had begun to stink, more than normal too. And anyone who touched him felt the coldness, the feeling of death. Fearful were the others, as his presence seemed to spread the omen of death, and the yellowing eyes seemed to predict more tragedy. Perhaps this is why, on the tenth day, Avner ordered us to take him and dump him into the woods.
On the tenth day, rain had stopped briefly. It was as if the clouds had parted in order for us to do our deed. Between five of us, we carried him as deep into the island as we could. His grunts and moans sounded like an agonizing cry, without any way to help. This was driving me crazy. It was as if the grim reaper himself was living inside that building with us, making everyone uncomfortable. As living organisms, it is our instinct to live, no matter how miserable our existence.
On a dry patch of the forest we set him down, way on the other side of the island. Panting, we leaned against the trees to catch our breath and recuperate the significant energy expended. After a couple of minutes, everyone started to leave, probably in order to avoid the rain. But it was all so… cold. Like dumping a bag of waste somewhere, no one even looked back. My impulse was to follow them, and indeed my body, almost on its own, followed them. But then I looked back. Perhaps it was a mistake.
He was still alive. His skin was pale, paler than a full moon on a dark night. He had stopped agonizing and screaming. He had a smirk on his face. Perhaps it was because his brain had released a mortal dose of endorphins, a merciful way to sedate his death, while his body shut down. I leaned down to touch his shoulder, but the coldness made me remove my hand just as quickly. It was a dead cold, different from the cold of ice or rain. It was as if nothing had ever been alive in there. But at least he wasn't shivering anymore. I looked into his eyes. I saw a faint gleam, rapidly diminishing second by second. He spoke.
"Why are you so afraid? This is merely the end of my cycle. Remember what I've taught you."
'What for?' I asked.
"Or don't. I don't care anymore. I won't matter to me anymore."
I looked away, towards the site of our camp.
"If you think it's dark now, you haven't seen anything yet. Wait 'till the shadows come out and play. Goodbye."
We shook hands, and at that moment I felt death, finality. After this, there's no tomorrow for him. The thought sent shivers down my spine. I felt the urge to cry suddenly, despite the fact that he's just a stranger, a man I never knew. I buried my face into my hands, and unleashed a river, like if his life had slipped through my hands, all while it began raining all around me, and he gave me a look pleading to let him die alone.
While I marched away I heard him sing a tune that was eerily familiar to me. I believe it went something like this:
Maybe, you'll think of me
When you are all, alone
Maybe, the one who, is waiting for you,
Will prove untrue, then what will you do?
Maybe, you'll sit, and sigh, wishing that I were near
Then maybe, you'll ask me, to come back again….
And maybe, I'll say, "maybe"!
Late at night we awoke, days after the monsoon. It came from one of the forgotten corners of our building. A white light arose, like if something divine had entered our hell. But no, it was merely the TV. We had forgotten the thing was there, since it hadn't been on, nor had we looked at it since the day of our arrival.
Dr. Schneiderlin was on it. He announced that there was a gun somewhere on this island, fully loaded. The idea of it sounded incredulous and absurd. But to the others, this meant power.
"I'm in charge, and I'll always be in charge." Avner told us menacingly, afraid of losing his power.
"If any of you go out looking for that gun, there will be consequences, DIRE consequences!"
But as we set out later to look for food, everyone scattered to look for that gun, as if Avner hadn't said anything. I was afraid for poor Roland, surely he'd hold the brunt of the punishment if anything went wrong. Avner dragging around a huge stick certainly only helped to make the others nervous, and search more intently for that gun.
The lack of food in recent days must have made Avner angry, even delirious. As of recently, there had been less and less food. No doubt that everyone had been looking for that gun. Most for power. But I was certain that there was at least one person looking to commit suicide with it. I believed this to be the case for Ribeiro, who hadn't gotten over the humiliation suffered at the hands of Avner. Avner seemed to be angrier and angrier every day, until one day, he was waiting for all of us with his stick as the sun began to set.
"I'm sorry it had to come to this, but I'm afraid I have to make an example out of you. You will respect my authority, one way or another. If I have to, I will inflict pain on you to make you comply." He began pacing back and forth.
"You know, the Romans had a system in place once upon a time. Said it instilled a great amount of respect from soldiers for their generals." He began to hit the palm of his hand with the stick. He looked at us.
"They called it decimation. It consisted of a group of men beating every tenth man out of a group. But there are only eight of you. Therefore, I shall let you vote on it. If you refuse, I shall randomly pick one of you. But it doesn't have to be that way."
Is he crazy?! No way had I believed that he could do that, no way he held that much power over us. But then the others started to comply, giving in to any semblance of order, no matter how misplaced. It looked as if they were going to comply with his nonsense. One by one, they all voted for Roland. Then they got to me. I didn't know what to do. I felt compassion towards Roland. It felt wrong to condemn him to a painful death. Yet, everyone had picked him, and my vote had no means of altering the outcome. It felt pointless to form antagonism with someone else over something out of my hands. So I selected Roland, and he stepped forward, merely uttering "Very well."
As we approached him, he lifted his shirt, revealing a sliver of silver in his waist. A gun! He pulled it out.
"I am in charge here. Now, I am god. This is my power. These are my thunderbolts."
Avner looked terrified.
"Here I am master, judge, jury, and executioner. Get on your knees, Ribeiro."
Ribeiro complied.
"Do you accept me as your master and overlord?"
'Yes.' responded Ribeiro.
Roland walked towards Ribeiro, drew his gun, and fired. At point blank range, the blood splattered over the floor. His body fell over, unreal, almost like a nightmare. To think that there had been life there seconds ago was terrifying to think. Chilling.
"Tie his hands up." He pointed at me as he holstered his weapon. Avner quickly complied, tying up my hands with a rag. I stood helpless and in awe at how quickly Roland had amassed so much power.
"Follow me. Bring him."
Avner and Amir escorted me, each with a hand around my arms. I was still in awe, my muscles were tense. I had no idea what they were going to do, but the thought lingered and I knew that it couldn't be good.
They made me kneel down by the stream, precisely where a tree cast a shadow over me.
I still couldn't believe it. This is absurd! It sounds like a poorly written story. How is it that Roland now has the power, and it is I who has lost? My mind was going at a thousand kilometers per second. Ba bump, ba bump, I could hear my heart beating faster. My thighs had turned into gelatin, and my eyes were watery, to the point of overflowing with tears.
I had been ungrateful! I know that I had wished for death many times. I've changed my mind; I've changed my evil ways! I've never ever believed in god, but if he's real, she, IT! I'd change! I'd start to believe. I'd dedicate my life to a higher cause if it meant that Roland wouldn't pull the trigger!
One. Two. Three. Four. Five. Six. Seven. I'm counting every breath. Every breath might be the last one. I want to live! Oh world! Why have you brought me forth into your bosom, just to sacrifice me like a sheep?! I ask for your hand to help me, for you to make the gun fail, for you to be merciful upon a sinner and deliver me from the silver hell of Roland's bullet.
But no one is going to help me. NO one ever has. Not even a footnote I've been in people's lives, more like a scrap of paper I've been, one that people flick away. Merely living would be an act of rebellion. I have to do something. I can't stay here on my knees and accept my situation. The idea of whimpering out of this life like a candle blown away by the wind is equivalent of the thought of being decapitated a thousand times. But my body won't respond. Oh, legs, why? Never have I felt freer than when we'd cut through the air like sharp knives, when we'd run like the wind on a sunny day. Why do you betray me now?
Like a slave, like a coward I will die. He has a gun! But I can't merely stay here and accept my destiny. Destiny is just a word! It is a word people make up to give excuses, to fool themselves that their desires are impossible, that their fantasies, left behind by even more absurd decisions, are unreachable.
Dr. Petrov was right. About everything. But now I'll never be able to show the world. Now what will remain is a host and a pool of blood, one red like the fire inside Roland. Oh, but why me? It's like the world has been conspiring against me, culminating in this precise moment. But this moment, I accept my beliefs, I accept what I am. Incoherently and clumsily, I dive for Roland's ankles while a shot rings out, and this moment stands still in agony and timelessness, becoming just another moment to add into the annals of man.