Warnings: None for this chapter.
Note: Btw, I'd like to excuse for any crude grammar of expressions. I'm not a native speaker, only a German student.
4 Forms of strength
Ralph, who had unconsciously caught his breath when he had seen Jack tensing and clenching his fists, relaxed visibly.
So the Chief of the children had finally said the words. Words that said 'I know what I have done. I understand what I have done.'
Ralph wondered. Where did the sudden insight come from? Was it just their little conversation that had opened the savage's eyes? Or had this realisation come with time, had it been dwelling inside the boy's mind for years, growing and finally breaking out?
They stood in perfect silence, while the wind played with their wild hair and dried the water from their bodies. The soothing, never-ceasing sound of the little waves brushing against the shore cleared their minds of all what had been.
Suddenly a voice tore them out of their peaceful understanding.
"Ralph?" It was more of a shriek, a double-shriek. It came from the edge of the forest. Both boys turned around in surprised unison.
Even though Ralph had not seen them for nearly all the time of his madness, he still recognised them instantly, those identical faces. Samneric.
Samneric had grown into tall, muscular teens, nearly as big as Jack and both wore the same flabbergasted expression now.
Jack started and began talking.
"Samneric! Already up? What are you doing down here so early?"
He seemed nervous, even embarrassed to be caught with Ralph down here, all alone.
But the twins weren't listening.
"Ralph?"
Ralph smiled his new, crooked smile.
"Good morning, Samneric," he said almost too politely.
They stared at him and then turned to Jack who was looking nervously from them to Ralph.
"Chief? Is he... we mean.. is he..?" The simple minds of those two had never really understood more than that Ralph had gone batty for some obscure reason and that nobody had to touch him as was the order of their Chief.
But now, instinctively, the noticed the change. And it was most confusing and wondrous to them.
Jack looked at Ralph who still stood at the same place, thin, pale, but with a new yet familiar confidence.
"Yes. Ralph is normal again."
The two gaped at him.
"How?"
Jack shrugged. He become increasingly bored and irritated with those two.
"No matter. Ralph?"
Ralph looked up.
"Oh."
They headed for the mountain again, letting the baffled two where they were.
The climb up the mountain was hard for Ralph. Soon he was breathing hard and had to rest.
Gasping he said down on a little rock.
"Phew.. I feel like Piggy."
Jack laughed uneasily.
"We'll rest for a while."
"But others will come. What will they say if they see us?"
Jack frowned.
"I am the Chief. It doesn't matter what they say."
Ralph looked up to the redhead.
"You are not wearing your mask today," he noticed. He had noticed it before, but only now he realised the significance.
"I'm not going for a hunt, am I..."
"You used to wear it all the time."
"It seems you have rested enough for talking," Jack grunted.
"Samneric didn't wear a mask as well. Does anyone still wear them?"
Jack stopped.
"Roger does. And most of us when we are hunting. It is necessary."
Then he turned around quickly and walked on.
Ralph hurried to follow him.
The heat became stronger. The buzzing of insects rose over the forest and Ralph tongue felt swollen and hot. His legs became shaky and he felt the sting of a sunburn.
"Jack," he breathed.
The stubborn hunter didn't hear him.
"Jack!" he gasped weakly.
Jack turned around.
"What is it?"
"I... can't any more..."
Jack was impatient.
"It isn't far."
"No, Jack, really.."
Jack scowled.
Ralph looked at him from where he had slumped to the ground.
"Sorry."
It went surprisingly well. Jack himself hadn't known that he had become that strong, when he lifted the fair-haired boy up and carried him on his back like one would carry a little child. Ralph had wrapped his arms around his neck and after some minutes his head became heavier and finally rested against the broad shoulders. He hadn't known when he had become so tired...
When they reached the hut, Ralph was already asleep. Jack carefully bedded him on the pigskins and sat on his heels. He drank some of the fresh water one of the boys had brought him as it was their duty, and watched the sleeping boy.
His head was spinning with thoughts as it hadn't been for a long time.
When he had carried him up the mountain, he had felt strangely content. Hunting and killing had once been full of lust and ecstasy, and ruling his hunters had been satisfying. But there was always that hunger for more, that restlessness in his bones. But in that moment of content he had felt whole and strong.
There was a strength in controlling people. But he had just discovered another form of strength and power, that was all the more amazing. The strength of caring and protecting, the strength of true responsibility.
