I lied! This isn't the last chapter! Okay, I planned it to be. But then it got really long, and I didn't want to publish a super-long chapter. So I ended up with this. It still seems depressing. But things get better in the next chapter; I promise.
Ralph gave Maurice's chest one final push and sat back on his knees. He rubbed his temples, trying to remember how he'd brought Simon back. His mind came back empty. There was a soft hissing sound from behind him, but he ignored it and continued to work on Maurice.
After a few minutes, he heard the hissing sound again. This time it was followed by a voice. The voice of a schoolmaster.
"Where have they gone, child?" it asked.
"Who?" Ralph replied. He didn't look up from his work.
"The others, of course. Bill and Robert and Piggy and Jack and Roger?"
"I...I don't know," Ralph admitted.
"Don't you see? They've run off. They're scared of you, Ralph." The voice was right next to him now. "Stop working. Look at me, child."
Ralph turned his head and saw the spear he had stuck through Maurice's neck. The blood was still running in little streams down his flesh, making a pool below his head. Ralph was unable to turn away. The sight was strangely beautiful: crimson flowed like the Nile. The spear pointing upward reminded him of a certain pig's head.
"I know that's gorgeous," said the voice, "but not nearly so beautiful as me. Up here."
Ralph turned his head upward and saw a serpent coiled around the tip of the spear. Its glowing eyes contained a thousand shades of shifting light, and its body seemed to change color every few seconds. The edges of its scaly mouth turned upward in an unnatural yet inviting grin.
"My poor, poor child," said the serpent, "can't you see he's gone? Just look at that carnage. No one could survive a wound like that."
"But—but—" Ralph tried to protest, but somehow he knew the serpent was right. This knowledge made him angry. It was the snake-thing. The beast. It was the beast's fault! The beast's! Not his! "How—how could you do this?" he demanded, feeling the tears run down his cheeks. "You're terrible, just terrible!"
The serpent laughed. "If I recall correctly, it was not me who stabbed an innocent boy with a spear. Of course, he wasn't truly innocent."
Ralph clenched his fists and stood, staring the serpent right in the face. "It was you. It had to be you. All I wanted was a tribe. A bigger tribe, so we could keep the fire going and be rescued. I never wanted to"—he forced the word out—"to kill Maurice! It was all your fault!"
"My fault?" said the serpent, feigning surprise. "In what way did I force you to murder this boy?"
Ralph was silent.
"It was you who stabbed him, was it not? I don't force you to do these things, child, for I do not need to. I must only stand back and watch them happen. Jolly good show." For a moment or two the forest and all the other dimly appreciated places echoed with the parody of laughter.
"Well—well, I just thought that after I saved Simon, I could—"
The serpent's eyes widened in delight. "After you saved Simon? You're worse than I thought!" The laughter echoed again. "You never saved Simon, you stupid child! He's dead! He was dead since the dance on the beach, and you helped kill him. Perhaps you should have listened to the one you call Piggy. He's wise beyond his years. Of course, so was Simon...but that didn't save him."
Ralph wanted nothing more than to argue, to respond in anger, but he found he had no words to say. His thoughts were jumbled and the sentences hopelessly tangled.
"They're all just like you, Ralph," the serpent continued. "I would know. I've had a nice talk with two of them: one in a dream and one in a vision. You're all the same to me. One stupid decision after another. Not that I mind, of course; it's very entertaining. You spend so much time running away from the beast, without realizing it's you!"
"I am not a beast," said Ralph. "I just want to be rescued."
The serpent rose up and glared at Ralph; lightning flashed in its eyes. "Not a beast? Look what you have done to Maurice and tell me you're not a beast!"
"I—I was batty!" Ralph insisted. "I never would have done that if I wasn't!"
"What is 'batty' anyway?" asked the serpent. "You say that a lot. Everyone's batty, aren't they? What would you say it is? Maybe it means thinking someone's alive when they're really dead. Are you batty when you fiercely believe something that couldn't be further from the truth? If that's the case, you've been batty your whole life." The serpent lowered its head until it was at Ralph's eye level.
"I haven't been batty my whole life," said Ralph. "I was just fine before...before things started breaking up."
"That's your biggest mistake," said the serpent. "You were never 'just fine'. You never will be. You're the beast, remember?"
"Not before this." Ralph tried to speak between sobs. "I—I want to go home. Oh God, I want to go home!"
"God can't hear you, you stupid child! God doesn't listen to the beast. You talk an awful lot about rescue and going home. But don't you realize that even if you do go home, you can't escape me? Don't tell me people in the 'Home Countries' don't get robbed, murdered, and kidnapped every day."
Ralph found he could no longer speak. His vision was blurred and foggy, and his mind was caving in on itself.
"What you really need is rescue from yourself, the beast. But that can't happen. Not after this. You're doomed no matter what. The others are just as beastly, you see. Instead of coming up with a reasonable plan, Jack and the others sought to kill you. Even Simon was no different from you. You're all the beast."
You said that already, Ralph thought. The serpent's molten eyes continued to bore into his.
"Now go," the serpent said. "You ought to have a funeral for Simon, just like in the Home Countries. He's dead, and soon you will be."
Ralph turned away from the serpent and stared at Maurice's body. The spear was still lodged in his throat. He grabbed it with both hands and yanked it out, shaking it to throw off the serpent. But the serpent was gone.
He grabbed Maurice by the feet and focused on dragging him to the beach, trying to forget the serpent. But no matter how hard he tried, the image of the color-changing snake with its glowing eyes would not leave his memory.
As soon as he reached the beach, he sat down in the sand and cried.
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Jack stood in front of his panicked tribe, trying desperately to come up with a plan. He knew he would have to kill Ralph—that much was obvious. But it was too dangerous to attack him in the open. Even though he was surely outnumbered, most of the tribe was littluns who didn't stand a chance against the tall, athletic boy.
"All right," said Jack. "Does anyone have an idea?"
"An ambush," Roger offered. "Get Ralph to come here. Then we all attack him at once. I've been thinking about this...it's perfect. We've just got to have some bait, to get him into the clearing."
"What kind of bait?" asked Jack.
"Piggy," said Roger. "I'll kill Piggy, and when Ralph comes to get his body, we can all throw ourselves on him at once."
The tribe was nodding its approval. Why hadn't Jack thought of this? Of course Ralph would want Piggy to join his tribe. All he really wanted was a bigger tribe. Besides, Piggy would be easy to hunt and kill. Easier than a pig.
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In the distance, Piggy could hear sobbing. Not loud sobbing, but sobbing nonetheless. It was a sound he seldom heard except from the littluns, and it pained him to hear it coming from someone older. Someone he knew and someone he was close to not so long ago. Ralph. It hadn't occurred to him how lonely Ralph must be, by himself on the beach with no one but two corpses to keep him company. Both of whom were now corpses at least partly because of him. Piggy supposed they were talking right now. Well, it would just be Ralph, of course, Piggy thought, but Ralph wouldn't know it.
The panic he'd experienced earlier had not gone away. Now, he realized, the threat of death loomed from both sides of the schism: from Jack and his hunters, and from the now-homicidal Ralph. Piggy was utterly alone. Alone, except for...
Piggy shook his head. Memories of the strange visions clouded his mind. No! Simon and Maurice were not in the forest! Ever since Ralph's attempt to strangle Piggy, he'd been a bit foggy and off-kilter. This was what he blamed when he saw either of them. Of course he was disoriented and confused: he'd nearly died because of Ralph, and seeing dead people was part of the recovery process. Nothing more.
He wiped the water from his cheeks and adjusted the spectacles on his nose. He'd have to find somewhere to hide, somewhere safe, with food and clean water. If everyone's current mental state was any indication, he'd be there for a long time. Perhaps for the rest of his life. No more assemblies, Piggy thought. No more talking things out, like before. Nothing. There is nothing left.
Oh, how he wished he could go home! He longed to be back with his auntie. He could vividly remember the candy shop now, the sweet scent drifting through the small store on the corner and beckoning to kids on the street. Piggy had even been friends with a few of the regulars. Now, of course, Piggy had no friends. Here, on the island, he had no value. Being smart meant nothing when you couldn't make sense of things.
But where could he go? Even the forest couldn't protect him forever: even though none of the others would go in there alone, he doubted they'd cower away from the challenge should they all go together. Plus, they had a good reason to search for him (at least, a reason they believed was good). He would have to move around to avoid being caught, and he simply wasn't cut out for that kind of physical labor. Not with his asthma.
He leaned up against the trunk of a tree and cried quietly. Now he knew how Ralph must feel. Up until this point, Piggy had suppressed the urge to cry, thinking it undignified and unable to solve any problems. But he found he could no longer lock up the emotions boiling to the surface. For the first time in a long time, Piggy let go of reason entirely—at least for a little while. Perhaps it was good for him.