A Pale, Gentle Blur By C.N.



Declaimer: Lord of the Flies belongs to W. Golding. Also, the lyrics at the end are Sarah MacLachlan's "Angel". No money is made from this, so no suing please.



A/N: Hey there, I see that there's still somebody out there that likes this novel! Oooo~ I'm both surprised and happy!! ^o^ By the way, please read the MUST READS before you start the fic if you haven't done so, because there would be annoying confusions if you don't do it and you care a lot about logic like I do. Well, that's about it for now.

Enjoy!!



MUST-READS:

I added about five years onto the boys' age for the sake of logical sex scenes.

Some changes will be made to the plot of the original book.

Quotes are taken from the original book; I will not list them in declaimer because there are quite a few of them.

New setting: After the boys came back into civilization, four or so years after that.

I am not associating the new setting with the actual history of Britain at the time. I'm simply using today's society as the new setting. (It's too much work to do the actual time - for those who know me; you know how lazy I can be.)







O=======ooOoo=======O





A Pale, Gentle Blur By C.N.



Chapter 2: Murder



Murder, with one word;

Die, with one stare.

Hands gripping tight,

Tides hitting lives.

Dark secrets revealed,

Truth dares not know why.

Fingering lust and pain,

As a pale, gentle blur passed by.

[crimson nightmare]



There was no way he could have not fallen in love. But he was not aware of how serious the word 'Love' was until he thought he had lost the one he loved.

He had said these words - words of insanity when he realized in horror what they had done.



//flashback//





"Simon."



"Simon." He whispered hoarsely.



He was laughing hysterically.



"That was Simon." He said with a shakiness that made the others squirm under the sign of fatal rage and invisible tears.



"That was murder." He sentenced his crime of his young life and jumped up.



"You didn't see what we did --" He was back down again, rocking to and fro.



"I'm frightened. Of us. I want to go home. Oh God I want to go home." He repeated to himself crazily.



He shuddered at human contacts.



He was lost for that moment, torn in the feeling to kill and to break down and simply cry.



Then he sank himself in distracting talks with the others again, but he grasped onto the remaindering small amount of light shining from the soul that cradled his head gently, giving him comfort.

"Ralph --" it said, sounding like how Simon had always called his name shyly. "Go on. I'll always be there with you."

He grasped onto that light and went on with the hell descending onto the caging island.



//flashback end//



How could Simon have gone? How could they have committed this sin? He ended up like a crazed human being, with a scattered mind and distracted conversations. He laughed and snickered uncontrollably at matters at hand and he fought invaders with a kind of hatred that was not there before.

He remembered how, later, he smelt blood. He did not say anything, but laughed with insanity. The little light that Simon had given to him was forgotten momentarily.



"Sir --" There was a voice calling him from afar.

"Sir --" There was a voice calling him from somewhere closer.

"Sir -" There was a voice calling him, near.

He finally snapped out of his little perplexity and looked up. A waiter was looking down at him with concern, saying, "Sir, are you going to drink that? I really didn't want to bother you but you've been sitting there staring at it for the past two hours so I thought --"

"It's fine." He said quickly. "Thank you. I should be going anyways." He drained the cup of coffee in front of the waiter and grabbed his donuts and his bag and went out of the small coffee shop. Nine-thirty a.m. He was waiting for the hospital's visitor hours, which was now. He rushed into the hospital on the other side of the street and found the room he was looking for in a few quick turns at the white-painted halls.



***



He peered into the simple room quietly and tiptoed to the window by the bed. He put down his bag and opened up the curtains. Tender light shone into the room, which was painted pale-green like all of the other hospital rooms. A white teddy bear with a baby blue ribbon was placed at the corner of the light brown shelf that was on the left side of the bed. The bed had soft white sheets on. And in the bed was a young man, in a comma.



He was pale, the young man. He had paled considerably, in contrast to his child-time brown skin, since they were miraculously rescued from that cage of hell. It was appropriate since he had been lying in the hospital for four years now, continuously in comma. His black hair turned thinner and smoother since Ralph had been caring for it for him. Ralph gazed at the unmoving lips, weakly breathing chest and the rest of the young man's unmoving parts, and softly took hold of the limp hand on the bed and kissed it with great tenderness.



He sat down silently beside the bed and begun to talk quietly to the unconscious young man. There was a breeze that blew in from the gap of the half opened window, bringing in a scent of flowers and green leaves. He shuddered at the smell that reminded him of the wilderness, but at the same time it brought him memories, pleasant memories back. Memories of a blue field of flowers.



He looked down at Simon, and mouthed three words as he put his head down at the young man's limp shoulder. Now he understood what these words mean, and he was announcing it silently with the real will power to take responsibility for it.



'I love you.'



Spend all your time waiting

for that second chance

For the break that will make it OK

There's always some reason

to feel not good enough

And it's hard at the end of the day

I need some distraction

or a beautiful release

Memories seep from my veins

Let me be empty

and weightless and maybe

I'll find some peace tonight

In the arms of the Angel

far away from here

From this dark, cold hotel room,

and the endlessness that you feel

You are pulled from the wreckage

of your silent reverie

You're in the arms of the Angel;

may you find some comfort here



O=======ooOoo=======O





It was a miracle that Simon had survived. He was so sure that the boy was dead. He shuddered every now and then, haunted by the possibilities. What if they had not found Simon trapped between those shore rocks? What if they left without Simon? What if.



Something other than nature must have been at work that night when Simon was savagely stabbed by nine to ten spears at a time, because only three of the stabs went through - two through his right shoulder and one by his left thigh. The rest of the stabs were miraculously slipped off so that it did not go so deep, leaving no eternal bleeding and fatal injuries. He did not know to check the pulse at the time, and how lucky it was for Simon that the waves had washed him to a not often visited part of the beach so that later he, barely breathing, was found in a tangle of seaweed and sand by the rescuers.

The adults thought he was just a mess of seaweed and corpse, but he was alive, just trapped by the rock that jammed and broke his leg. Even the doctor could not believe how strong of a will power to survive that the boy had. He was unconscious for days, possibly up to weeks, and then he was certainly blessed by heavens because he survived by waking up momentarily every now and then and had the advantage of raindrops and fallen fruits provided by nature. He fell in and out of unconsciousness and did not have the smallest strength to speak a word when the island was on fire, and not even when he saw the rescuers coming in his way, searching for lost kids amongst the woods.

Later he was rushed into an emergency room, dealing with his seriously infected wounds, cleaning the rotten flesh out of his horrifying wounds, and dealing with his broken leg. He sighed, finally relieved that he was rescued, fell asleep and never woke up again. The doctors told Ralph later that Simon was in a comma.



Ralph considered all this while he adjusted back into civilization. It was not a pleasant process, but he succeeded in the end and even got a part time job as a regular tutor to pay his university fees - he found out when he came back, that his family had all been killed in the war and half of their money was not officially documented to be left to him. And so he took what was left for him and bought a sustainable little flat and went on to finish university. He found it stunning - his ability to adjust back into the academic world, getting the scholarship, and he was very thankful for it.

He made it a habit to visit Simon every Saturday morning. He would stay with the unconscious young man until the nurse comes in and shoos him out of the room. He formed a good, simple lifestyle that kept him from remembering the evil and savagery that devoured him on the island in his childhood. If only Simon could wake up and live with him.



***



"Hi --" An awkward voice came in. Someone he did not expect had appeared in front of him in the middle of his little remembrance session. He looked up and saw the figure and was shocked. For a moment he was relieved that the man looked okay, but the next moment all the hatred and anger had come back to him, for the man standing nervously before him was Jack.



He lowered his head and said, "What are you doing here, Merridew?" His voice sounded cold beyond words. It was hatred and rage, for the blood that was spilled, not only Simon, but also Piggy.

"I, um, came here to see him." The red-haired man stuttered.

"He's not for you to see." Ralph growled with a cold authority that made Jack flinch. "You have no right, too, to stand before me."

"Well I just thought --"

"Oh, you think?" Ralph cut him off coldly. "I didn't know you were capable of doing so. Go back to the forests, Jack, and live with pigs." He said without any mercy.

The other man stammered, "Please, Ralph, hear me out --"

"No!" Ralph stood up abruptly; Jack winced. "You don't have the right to be heard, Jack, you and your rules, and even the conch doesn't work now."

He watched as the red-haired man shiver at the word that reminded them of the island. The bright blue eyes looked at him again with plead, but he returned nothing but cold authoritative stare at the other man. He watched as moments passed by, as the hope in the blue eyes was lost and the eyes dimmed and backed down.

He stood there mercilessly and looked at Jack, who was cramped down and had tears of fear in his eyes. He did not blame him, for he knew just how terrible it was to refer back to anything that had to do with the island, and the murders. He was not going to forgive, though; it was just something that would take a miracle to accomplish.

"I'm not going to hear you out." He said in a soft, sad, empty tone. "I'm not going to forgive you, or let you see Simon. I don't want you near him anymore, you hear me? I know what you did to him the night that Samneric came in screaming they saw the beast. I know what you did that made you come later than most of the boys." His voice turned bitter and sharp again in the latter sentence.

"You knew? How?" Flinching again at the word 'beast' and the memories, Jack asked in a small voice.

"Did I not have sex with you before that I don't know what you look like after you came? Or Simon, all covered in bite marks?" Ralph said flatly.

The other man silenced in shame.



//flashback//



"Wake up, you little bitch."

The dark figure squatting by the sleeping boy clawed his hand tightly over the boy's mouth, silencing Simon, who woke up in panic.

"Get up." The dark figure instructed, pressing a cold blade at Simon's neck. "Walk out of the hut."

They walked out of the hut cautiously and Simon was finally allowed to turn around. He gasped, "Jack?!"

He looked astonishingly at the tall, blue-eyed boy who was presently looking raged and dark in the night. Then he began to back up a few steps, suspecting in horror what was coming.

"Don't move." Jack said coldly. "Get down."

"Jack, no --"

"Get down!" The tall boy said sharply.

Then Simon struggled under his crushing grip and he slapped the smaller boy across the face, leaving smudges of bloody fingerprints on the boy's cheek, for he did not clean his hand properly after the hunt. He watched coldly as Simon looked dizzy for a few seconds and then tried to get away but was snatched down again by Jack.

"Don't even try." He said icily. And crushed the boy onto the ground.

"Jack! Listen to me! Please -- " The fearful pleads of the smaller boy was whacked out of his mind right away. Blackness descended upon the two as Simon fought against the taller boy, who, by now, had his hands gripped tight behind his back and twisted them to an angle that he almost screamed out in pain.

"Tell me, Simon." A growl, that made Jack sounded like an animal, said, "Do you think I'm weak, too. Huh? Just like Ralph?" His hands swam down to the boy's tanned thighs, and going lower until he reached a tender spot and clawed hard into it. "You both think you can overthrow me, Simon?" He bit and nibbled amorously at the earlobe of the boy and sent chap-lipped kisses down the boy's spine. "You both think you can defeat me?"

"Jack! what are you talking about -- " Another whack across the face and Simon struggled to breath for a second or so.

"You both left me, you little bitch!" Jack became agitated. He was angry. He was jealous. He was everything one would be when one's power and lover had both been snatched away by a 'better' someone else. Suddenly Jack gripped Simon by the shoulder and bit deeply into the flesh, causing Simon to scream into his hand. The muffled tone was full of hurt, fear, and indignation. "I hate you, Simon. You and Ralph. I hate both of you -- " He pried open the delicate thighs of the boy underneath him and thrust in with a violent jerk. "I hate you, you pretty little bitch."



He came into Simon with an evil smile and whispered; "Now he's mine again, Chief."



//flashback end//



"Simon didn't say anything because he thought I might be angry enough to split with you and disrupt the assembly. But we did anyways, even if he didn't tell me." Ralph said with an empty tone.

They both looked at the peacefully sleeping young man on the bed and looked away quickly again. The young man held a light that was too bright for either of them, with blood on their hands, to look at when they are engaged in a stabbing conversation like this. Ralph sighed and sat back down again.

Jack nodded to himself in understanding that there was no chance, at least for now or a long, long time, for Ralph to ever forgive him, and heaven forbids, Simon. He turned and walked away, leaving a sentence behind.



"I should have never started that hunt."

***

So tired of the straight line,

and everywhere you turn

There's vultures and thieves at your back

The storm keeps on twisting,

you keep on building the lies

That make up for all that you lack

It don't make no difference,

escape one last time

It's easier to believe

In this sweet madness,

oh this glorious sadness

That brings me to my knees

In the arms of the Angel

far away from here

From this dark, cold hotel room,

and the endlessness that you feel

You are pulled from the wreckage

of your silent reverie

You're in the arms of the Angel;

may you find some comfort here



O=======ooOoo=======O



A/N: You've made it! *beams* Did you like it? If so, tell me which parts are weak and which are strong so I can improve in the future! I love long reviews, so babble away, everyone! Uh............I guess, I meant - anyone? ^.^;;



Big thanks to all of you who reviewed! And those who are reading this!

Replies for Reviews:



Aftertaste of a Razorblade:

Oh~ A Brian Adams fan!!! I like a lot of his songs, and the lyrics are just so interesting! Thank you for being my very first reviewer. Decent vocabulary? Ah~~~ *runs away~* because my English teacher once told me to get my vocab fixed or prepare to go to hell...........O.o But again, that was a while ago............I was so surprised that someone was still reading LoF fan fictions. I thought there wouldn't be any reviews for this one..........Oh well! As long as you like it (!

PS. - Where did you get that penname? Because that reminds me of something...........Know what I'm talking about? If not, go and check my fic gallery, and find the one that is the most personal. That's what I'm asking if you are or not. If not, then I would be very relieved............ *sighs~*



Jehan's Muses:

*Giggles~* Did you really go through the whole chapter thinking I didn't change their ages? Or make sub-changes to the plots? I feel for you for having to go through all that, because if I were you I would have left the fic right away thinking it doesn't even deserve the word 'logical'. If I may point out, however, that it would have saved you a lot of time and effort if you had read my "MUST READS", because in the very first sentence, if I recall correctly, says "I added about five years onto the boys' age for the sake of logical sex scenes.". Personally, I believe that should be clear enough for the readers, but I guess you just jumped right through all the warnings. It's okay, I do that often, too, though I simply wouldn't review if I thought the fic was bad.

I'm all okay with the first part about the age, but when I got to the second part - well, let's just say that I don't really appreciate the sarcasm - ".Oh, too late." (Assuming that it is. If not, tell me that it's not, because I feel really bad about it). I know my grammar can be a very annoying aspect in my writings, but if you think it's 'that' bad, would you be interested in becoming my betta reader? Change the grammar that you found blinding, and make yourself feel quite good for being able to do so. Would you like to be my betta reader?

I dare you to.

Check out my e-mail, and we can talk in private if you are interested. *Grins, as in "Welcome to my profile land!!"*



Redrose2310: Here's 'more' for you! I hope you would like the fic to continue even after you've read chapter two, too! Do you like it? Where? Or what didn't you like? Would you like to see something in particular? Tell me! I'm in need of feedbacks here~



Rylyn: Thank you for your sweet review! Though I'm not a Jack/Ralph fan, I'm still happy that you liked the line. How's this chapter, by the way (if you have read it, that is.) Tell you a little secret - I've actually written four chapters already. I just wanted to post it one at a time and see what improvements or highlights can be made. I'm also a long-review- lover, so I'm so happy that there are feedbacks! (Even if there's only four in total................o_o;;)



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Now, you see how much I like long reviews, so go down now and click that rectangular button..............There, see, that wasn't hard!

Review! Review! I'll give a cookie of some sort~ *digs for something decent...........;;;*

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