A/N: Thanks so much for all the feedback I've been getting! It's great to see that stuff in my inbox, let me assure you of that. Here we have another chapter – chapter five, if I'm correct! Enjoy this; now our plot is getting somewhere!

-mo

"Get up." Ralph felt something nudge him, and he groaned. He wasn't ready to open his eyes, not yet, not when his sore legs and his arms felt like immovable lead. "Get up, dammit!" Ralph was nudged harder, then realized that he was being kicked and that the commanding voice belonged to Jack. "Get up!"

"I am, I am..." Ralph rolled over so that he was no longer facing the rocky wall of the cave, and he slowly opened his eyes. He was staring at the feet of the chief, and even though he was standing only inches away, he was out of focus. Ralph blinked his eyes several times, before leaning forward. "What time..." But he caught himself before finishing the question. It was a stupid thing to ask; of course no one on the island knew what time it was.

"You wanted to go find Eric?" Jack asked coldly, "We're going to look for him now." He started to leave the cave, and didn't look back or pause for Ralph to get up and join him.

"Wait up," the older boy grumbled, and he gathered himself to his feet, still stooping low because the limited space of the rocky cavity. When he got outside, it was as if he was on a totally different island. Along the beach, many feet below, were piles of seaweed and shells and other debris that had washed ashore during the night. The torrential winds had also caused the fronds of many of the palms to break off and blow away; the unburned portion of the jungle had a battered look.

"Good thing you did run out of the huts," Jack murmured, looking behind himself. "You could have been dead by now."

"It's not like you care about me anyway," Ralph responded, following the other boy at a cautious distance. "If I had gotten blown away it could have mattered less."

This time, Jack stopped and turned around. "It does matter," he said simply, but didn't explain himself any further.

Ralph rolled his eyes and a slight grin spread across his lips. "Everything you've done to me proves otherwise, Jack." He spat the other boy's name, and added, "It's a jolly nice thing to say to the same person you were trying to kill a day ago."

"Blame it on Roger," the chief snapped back. "He's behind all the killings and violence and you know it!"

"Said the boy who calls himself the chief."

"Shut up!"

"Will do, Chief."

Jack swept a hand through the tangled mass of red hair on his head. "Shut up. We're looking for Eric, alright?"

Ralph decided that it was probably unwise to continue the mocking of the other boy and dropped the issue. "Alright."

"We'll start over near where the huts were," Jack mumbled, then turned on his heel, headed toward the chaotic jungle ahead.

Sighing, Ralph followed the other boy silently, careful to keep himself from being caught up in the spiny creepers that blanketed the ground of the wilderness. Above the leafy canopy, the sun filtered down, and a beautiful blue sky stretched on for miles. It was a stark contrast to what the weather had been the evening before, but Ralph knew that in the tropics, such things could be more unpredictable than the moods of Jack.

"Hurry it up!" the chief shouted, several yards ahead of Ralph. His voice rebounded through the forest, followed by the squawking and screeching of disturbed birds and other animals. Jack waved his arms wildly at the swarm of insects that had formed around his head, and muttered a few muffled curse words.

Ralph picked up his pace, until he was walking at Jack's side. Not that he was his equal or anything. No, he was just a pet, a slave, who had not yet been tortured like he undoubtedly would be in the future. At the thought of such a fate, Ralph shuddered, before asking, "What do you plan on doing to me?"

"Hmm?"

"I'm your possession, Jack." He swatted a mosquito that had landed on his arm. "You promised from the very beginning that you'd treat me horribly? Why hasn't that happened yet?" Ralph wondered why he was even asking; it wasn't as if he wanted to be tortured, and yet, there he was, asking why it hadn't happened.

Jack glanced over to the older boy and sneered. "Do you want it that badly, then?"

"No, it's just that..."

"Then shut up."

Ralph didn't challenge this command, and, like a well-behaved slave, didn't say anything else. The two of them came upon the edge of the jungle, to where the lean-tos had been built. The leafy huts were no where to be found, however, except for a few branches that were still stuck into the sand. Ralph groaned.

"Well, we can assume he's not here," Jack said, a hint of disappointment fringing his voice. "Damn."

Ralph had left the other boy, and was making a slow trek across the beach. He avoided the carcasses of fish and crustaceans that littered the shoreline, pausing and stooping down every so often to lift a shell from the sand. He stopped, suddenly, when he came upon an unusually big, shiny object that was strangled in seaweed and grit. Pushing the offending stuff away, he saw what it was, in its full, beautiful form. It was a conch, not unlike the one that Piggy had discovered months before. "That's nice," Ralph said to himself, and lifted the shell from the sand. Inside was the mollusk's decaying body, and it smelled quite bad.

It all goes wrong, doesn't it? Ralph thought to himself. Something so beautiful, something so perfect, only to be spoiled by evil and death. Simon, Piggy, this island, hell, this damn conch! Everything's bad in the end. He shook the shell, and the slimy mass of the carcass slid out and fell to the sand. It was a sickening sight, and that, combined with the stench made Ralph want to throw up. Instead, he crouched down at the water, and let the conch bathe itself in the briny waves.

"What are you up to?"

Ralph almost jumped at the sound of Jack's voice. He didn't turn around, though, and instead held up the wet shell. "Recognize this, Jack?"

"I thought it broke."

"It did, when you ordered Roger to kill Piggy." Ralph let the conch soak a while longer, then lifted it from the surf for good. "Makes you feel bad, doesn't it?" Ralph asked bitterly as he faced Jack. "Makes you remember how everything started out so good, then went rotten."

"There's nothing either of us can do about it now," Jack said coldly, his arms crossed over his chest. "Maybe you should blow it and see if everyone comes running."

"Be quiet, Jack." Ralph examined the shell closely, running his fingers over its smooth, lustrous surface. The morning sun glinted off its glassy, organic curves, and the boy allowed himself to heave a sigh. "Everything is so damn horrible."

Jack rolled his eyes, and stepped closer to Ralph. "Can I say something?"

"You're the chief."

"I don't have the conch."

Ralph could have sworn he saw a sparkle of a smile in Jack's icy, blue eyes. He returned a knowing hint of a grin and handed the opalescent shell to Jack.

"Look, Ralph..." Jack sighed, digging his toes into the damp sand. "I know you think this must be so stupid, me telling you this, but I'm sorry about what happened."

The older boy snorted, and rolled his dark eyes. "Sorry for what, Jack? Sorry that you killed Piggy and Simon? Sorry that you turned against me? Sorry that you're a backstabber?"

The chief shrugged. "I'm sorry for all of it."

"I'll believe it when I see it," Ralph grumbled, and he turned away from Jack. "Come on, we're looking for Eric."

Dejected and hurt, Jack sighed and trotted ahead to Ralph. He still clutched the conch, though for what reason, he wasn't sure. "Should I try and blow on it?" he asked when the two of them came to a stop.

Ralph frowned and wiped off the sweat that was forming on his forehead. It was terribly humid after the storm, and with the sun out, the air was starting to feel like a steambath. "Look, you're the chief," he grumbled. "You should know what to do – unless you're unfit for leadership." Ralph drew out the latter half of the sentence venomously.

"Be quiet!" Jack shouted, and before he knew what he was doing, he had lashed his hand out at Ralph. The older boy held his face, a grimace forming on his lips. "Don't talk to me like that," Jack continued angrily. "I'm still your chief, Ralph. I still own you, whether you like it or not."

"Don't be stupid," the other boy grumbled. "You may be a chief, but you're not a chief." He squinted into the sun, his eyes following the winding shoreline, where the white sand met with the cool, blue water. Where are you, Eric? Ralph wondered with a quiet sigh.

"He could be anywhere," Jack said, and it made Ralph jump; it was as if the chief had read his mind. "For all we know, Samneric could be trading places just to play a cruel joke on us."

Ralph dropped to the sand; it was strangely cool, and for the longest time, he sat there, staring ahead at the beach.

"Ralph?"

It's him, isn't it? What happened? How could –

"Ralph!"

The fair-haired boy blinked. "He's down there." Ralph climbed to his feet and started off at a slow trot down the shoreline, but soon, his pace quickened, and he was running as fast as his battered legs could carry him.

"Ralph, what the bloody hell has gotten into you?!" Jack was sprinting, too, but was having trouble keeping up.

Sliding into the sand like a baserunner reaching home, Ralph was already fighting back tears. There, on the beach, was the small body of Eric, its arms and legs flailed out in an unnatural position. "No, no, Eric!" Ralph found himself crying uncontrollably, shaking the lifeless corpse of the young boy. "Who did it to you?! Who did it?!" There was no answer, no glimmer of hope, as the Eric's lifeless eyes stared into the heavens, dull and colorless.

"Ralph, Ralph! What's gotten into..." Jack didn't finish his sentence when he finally reached the spot where the other boy had collapsed to the sand. Ralph was kneeling above the body of one of the twins, and right away, Jack knew that it was Eric and that he was dead. "What happened?!"

The former chief shook his head, tears streaking his dirty face. "I don't know..." He was convulsing wildly, not able to tear his eyes from the corpse in front of him. "Oh, dammit, Jack, I don't know."

Jack knelt down in the sand, on the other side of Eric's body. He examined the neck and wrists and bare chest of the dead boy, then groaned. "He was beaten," he said, pointing at the purple bruises that encircled Eric's wrists and neck. "He was held down and beaten." Jack shuddered, not because of his close proximity to a dead body, but because the notion of such a young innocent boy getting hurt by another was so terrible, so barbarian, so outlandish –

And yet he had done it, once, twice, himself.

"Damn it, damn it..." Ralph stood, but couldn't avert his eyes from the dried trickle of blood that had ran from Eric's mouth. "Who the hell did it?!"

Jack narrowed his cold eyes, and turned to the direction from which they had come. "Roger."

A/N: Poor Eric! Did Roger do it? Is it a cover-up for Jack? Or is this some accident that wasn't ever supposed to happen? I'll keep you informed with my next update! Meanwhile, leave a little feedback and maybe it'll help me out a little. Thanks!

-mo