Disclaimer: whew, another chapter. (Dear God! Not another one!)

So I was really bored today, what can I say? (well, I could say that I'm obsessed with LOtF(obviously!) but that would mean that I'd have to admit that I was crazy first!(who me::innocent face: NEVER!))

So I donas own LOtF. I sure wish I did, but I donas, so that's why we type these things up and send them to Because we donas own things and never will unless we get a life… ttfn

PS: ya'll know what happened in the raft if you saw the movie. So I'm skipping to that night on the island. O, and I'm real sorry if I skip scenes or lines, but ya'll have seen the movie, so ya'll know it…

Chapter One: The Island

Melanie was crying so hard, she didn't know what to do with herself. Katie. She was dead. Her baby sister had drowned all because she could never sit by the window because she was so afraid of heights. What would Mother say now? If Mother was here… but no, she wasn't here either. She was at home, probably making sandwiches for Jenny, her four year old sister, and Daddy. She wouldn't even know anything was wrong until she turned on the news that night. If any body knew about the crash…

Melanie sniffed loudly at this and collected herself. Well, what's done is done. She would just have to help the older boys take care of Ka… no, there was no Katie any more. Just the boys, the boys, and well, her. She was the only girl left now, so she better get used to it.

She felt a presence beside her and saw a dark haired boy kneeling beside her. Her first instinct was to say "Simon", but this boy was older than Simon. He had his arm in a make shift sling, which a blonde boy had made for him in the raft. The boy had dark brown eyes, and they seemed worried.

Ralph smiled at the girl, for that was what she needed most now, a smile. He had heard her jabbering all the way at the front of the plane, where he sat. As the Colonel, he was entitled to sit at the front, for he had earned it. He knew all about the girl's school, he had a sister there. And something reminded him deeply of his sister, this girl, she was, different.

"Hey, it's alright. I'm here now. Let me help you, come and sit with us…" he rested his un-slingged hand on her back and she looked up at him, her eyes red and puffy from crying. She saw that the boy had not cried. Maybe he was just stronger than she was, Melanie didn't know, all she knew was that she wanted Simon, Right now.

"Do you want to come and sit with me?" Ralph asked her, as if he was talking to a small child, or if he was asking a new kid to sit at his lunch table at school. This was far from school. She nodded helplessly at him.

"Alright then, are you alone? Didn't you have a sister? Where is she?" he asked. Melanie swallowed hard against the lump in her throat. She pointed wordlessly out to see. Ralph swallowed, mimicking Melanie. The lump in his throat was not his soon to be Adam's apple that was certain.

"Oh." Was all that he said to accompany the silence. That one syllable said it all at once, as if he had shouted "I'm so sorry, I feel bad for you, I love you, I Understand, I love you, I'm so sorry."

They sat wordless for what seemed to them like an eternity, before Melanie found her voice. It was rough and choked.

"Simon." Another single word that seemed to say it all, no matter how silent they were.

"Oh." Again, from Ralph, "Is Simon your brother?" he asked. And she shook her head.
"No. Just a friend." And that was all that she needed, a friend.

Ralph stood and wiped the sand from his pants and jacket with his good arm. Melanie stood, too, and was wringing long- dry sea water from the hem of her skirt, scattering salt flakes into the breeze.

"Melanie, isn't it? I heard you talking from where I was sitting. She nodded and they walked back to the circle of boys in the dark, away from the ocean.

When they drew nearer, Ralph saw that the boys were clinging to each other in packs of two and three, but he said nothing, he knew the boys would be teased. Fear is not something boys do. Boys don't fear the dark.

Ralph and Melanie sat, Melanie closer to Simon, who was watching over a man with a large bandage tied around his forehead. He was the captain, and he looked extremely ill. Ralph asked a boy, Jack, to get the survival kit from the raft, which had already been used to provide a sling for Ralph's arm. He brought it to Ralph with out question, for Ralph was the colonel.

"Jack, crack this for me?" she heard Ralph say, as if he were asking Jack a question! The colonel questions no body! Jack must have complied, because a second later, Melanie heard a resounding CRACK, and then a "here, colonel" in a rasping voice.

"That must have been Jack," Melanie thought, "He must have cried at least as hard as me!" She pondered why the boy was crying, and it took her thoughts away.

But Melanie was wrong. Jack's voice was sore from swallowing around the enormous lump in his throat that had settled there as soon as he left the airport, and his parents, maybe forever…

Ralph shook the glo-stick, for they needed light. He could see the boys grouped together hugging for warmth and security. A few of the littler ones were crying softly. He chose to ignore their tears, for boys didn't like to show fear, or tears, those were for girls. They were after all, the weaker sex.

This thought brought his mind around to Melanie, and he turned to look at her. She was sitting next to Simon, but her eyes were dry. He could not tell from the weak glow emitting from his glo-stick whether or not they were holding hands.

"What's that?" one of the littlest boys asked. Ralph remembered vaguely that his name was Johnny.

"It's a glo-stick" he replied, really to no one in particular.

"How's it do that?" another little boy, Mikey.

"From some kind of chemical." He answered the voice.

Then, another voice, not directed at him, but at Jack.

"Is there any one else here, sir?" this boy was named Percy.

"It's just an island! There's nothing here!" Jack snapped back.

"Uh-oh" Ralph thought. Jack sounded irritated. Ralph ignored this as more boys spoke out.

"I'm thirsty!"

"I'm hungry!"

"I want my mommy!"

"Yeah! Me too!"

Ralph felt almost thirty sets of eyes settle on him. He had to make a decision, and fast.

"We're all thirsty and we're all hungry. Lets just try and get some sleep, and tomorrow, we'll figure out what we're gonna do…" Jack nodded in response, and a scattering of boys signaled their compliance as well.

The boys lay down on the sand, some of the littler ones using each other's stomachs as pillows. Ralph saw Simon still sitting up by the pilot. From the light of the glo-stick, he saw Melanie's head in his lap. Simon was stroking her hair thoughtfully gazing out on the moonlit ocean.

"Simon?" Ralph whispered, for many of the boys were already asleep, even though they had lain down seconds before. Simon nodded to Ralph.

"Will you keep first watch? We don't know much about the island yet, or what may be out there…" Simon nodded again as Ralph's sentence trailed off.

Ralph sighed and got down onto the sand next to a fat boy with glasses, and Jack. He curled up, resting on his good arm, and was asleep almost before his eyes shut.

Simon sat awake the whole night, watching out for the camp. No one else awoke to relieve him, even though Ralph had promised to do so. After a few hours, his criss-crossed legs went numb, but he would not move, because is would wake Melanie. She'd had a rough day, and Simon thought she deserved to sleep, peacefully, if possible.

As the sun arose to join in him as he watched over the slumbering boys, Simon looked again out to the ocean, his only company the whole night long. Once or twice, he thought he heard a snorting sound, but he was tired, after all, so he may well have imagined it.

Melanie moved in her sleep, her head falling out of Simon's lap, onto the sand. He jumped at the sudden movement, but regained his composure a second later.

"Being stupid," he shook himself mentally.

Just then, Captain Benson moved and moaned in his un quiet rest. The word sounded like "water" but Simon couldn't be sure.

Thus reminded Simon of his own thirst, and he stood, looking around the camp. The boys wouldn't mind if he left to find water, would they?

Simon stepped, and at the sound of his scuffling, Melanie awoke.

"Simon!" she whispered. Simon put a finger to his lips to shush her.

"Watch over the camp, I'm going to look for water." She pouted her lips at him and then replied,

"Shouldn't I go with you?" she asked, but Simon shook his head, and repeated that she should watch the camp.

Simon departed into the foliage. Melanie sighed, and stared out to sea, waiting for the others to awake.

Simon returned twenty minutes later. Melanie sat upright at the sound of his stumbling feet. She smiled at her friend.

"He must have found water" she thought, marveling at his cleverness. "He looks peakish, shouldn't he have drunken some?" she studied his face. Simon bent down next to Ralph.

"Sir, Sir!" Ralph opened his eyes blearily at the smaller boy. "I found water…"