Epilogue: Lord of the Flies

Red.

That was all he could see.

Red like roses. Red like fire. Red like blood.

He was sitting on the bed, head cradled in his hands. An unruly lock of golden brown hair tumbled across his pale forehead. His bags were discarded in the corner of the pitch black room. Thoughts, memories and dreams flitted through his mind. Thoughts of evil and darkness. Memories of chaos and confusion. Dreams of crimson and bloody red.

Ralph Thompson had been living in America for a lot of his life, now. He had moved there after the incident. He hadn't thought these thoughts, dreamt these dreams, for nearly 30 years. The only reason these memories were triggered was the letter. The letter that had brought him back to London.

To Mr Thompson,

My name is Mrs Pauline Emmerson. I felt the urgent need to contact you at this moment because of something that my charge has told me. His name is Jack Merridew.

I believe that you knew Jack in 1950. You were evacuated from Britain during the Nuclear War. I understand that the plane crashed and you boys on the plane survived on an island for a couple of days before you were rescued. Jack was fortunate enough to have been found by his mother and taken back home, to the countryside. However, his mother was soon struck by tuberculosis and she died. Jack was left in the care of an orphanage, until I took him into my home.

As soon as I had seen Jack in the orphanage, I knew that there was something strange about the child. The other children would talk to me and interact with me; Jack was silent and stayed in the shadows. I took pity on him, in all truthfulness. It was as obvious as daylight that he had experienced something traumatic on that island. Eventually, Jack would talk to me, but never about the island. I soon let this pass. I thought that he would tell me when he wanted to.

But now, it is too late. Jack Merridew has been infected by the same disease that claimed his mother's life. Yet, in his fevered delusion, he spoke a few things of the island to me. He mentioned the island and he uttered your name, before falling into a deep sleep. I still cannot rid my head of the pained expression his face held, the sincere tears falling down his cheeks.

Jack has never been a stable boy. I have never pried upon his life and I do not wish to start now. But I hope, I pray, that you can help him to make peace with himself. Please let him have the calm that he needs in his final moments on Earth. It took me a lot of time and trouble to find you in America. I hope that it isn't in waste.

Yours Sincerely,

Pauline Emmerson.

Ralph sighed as he stood up, his joints creaking like an old man's. He had sworn to himself when he had been rescued that he would never speak of Jack again. And now, he was being asked to see him. Ralph wasn't sure he could manage.

He dug into his pocket and fished out the creased, crumpled yellowing sheet of paper, the letters typed with cheap ink already smudging. He read it and re-read it and considered what to do.

It was a case of moral conscience versus a forgotten enmity.

In the end, moral conscience won.

Ralph walked the dark, grey streets of London with a heavy pace. His dry, pale hands were stuffed deep into his pockets, clenching and unclenching with desire for warmth. A red tartan scarf was pulled tightly around his neck, like a hangman's noose. His face was tilted down, his ice-blue eyes trained on the ground in front of him. The wind whipped Ralph's face until it was raw, leaving it red and flushed. A perfect paradox for the death-like man.

Eventually, he reached his destination: an austere looking house with an aura of death and mourning surrounding it.

Ironic, considering the situation, Ralph thought, wryly.

He walked to the door. The intensity of the situation dragged him forwards, willing him to pick up the huge door knocker and let it down with a dull, resounding thud. He stepped back and waited. His leg was jiggling with impatience and his head was swimming with an amalgam of raw, unidentifiable emotions.

Fear?

Pain?

Hurt?

Or was it sympathy for the man inside the house, waiting for the cold hands of death to snake around his throat and-

The door suddenly opened, revealing a wizened, old lady. Her thin wisps of grey hair were drawn into a bun, with small strands escaping from around her face. Her back was slightly stooped. Her face, however, was homely. Kind. It held a look that promised safety and security. It was not a look that Ralph and seen in his recent years. Her dull, saddened eyes lit up at the sight of him standing on the doorstep. She spoke in a weak voice, which held signs of hope.

"Mr Thompson? Mr Ralph Thompson?" she grasped at him with her bird-like arm. Ralph tried not to flinch at the sudden contact. The only meaningful contact he had received since his childhood. He nodded quickly, assertively. He wanted to get this over and done with as soon as possible. He didn't need the old memories. They would only get in his way.

The old lady all but dragged him inside with such vigour that Ralph stopped and assessed her. There was something inside her, a fighting spirit. Fighting for her dying charge. She started to speak again, a faint smile erupting over her face.

"I am Pauline Emmerson. I cannot tell you how overjoyed I feel that you have come. From what I can make out, Jack and yourself haven't met in many years. I was afraid that Jack wouldn't ever find peace, even in his death. I was scared that…that…"

She broke off. A wave of sympathy rolled over Ralph for Jack and this poor woman. He clasped her hand in his with an assuring look on his face.

"Shall I talk to him?" he asked, softly. She nodded, bringing out her handkerchief.

"He's upstairs, in the fourth room on the right. Would you like me to ring for someone to take you upstairs?"

Ralph gently declined. Once more, he grasped Mrs Emmerson's hand, the most intimate gesture that he could manage. Then, he made his way upstairs. He touched each door lightly as he walked past them, counting them in his head. Eventually, he reached the fifth door. He took a deep breath, blowing out a torrent of warm breath mixed with fear and anxiety. Placed a hand on the door. Pushed it open.

Inside, a pale man was lying on the bed. His flaming red hair was spread in tufts over the pillow. An unhealthy flush had spread across his cheeks like the rays of the sun on the bleeding sky. His breath was shallow and rapid, his eyes squeezed tight and twitching.

The whole room was bathed in silence. Ralph felt compelled to hold his breath as he tiptoed across the room and lowered himself onto the stool by the bed. Slowly, he reached out his arm and brushed away a stray red lock that fell upon the restless eyes. Almost at once, the man's eyelids flew open to reveal jade green eyes, clouded with a fusion of terror and false bravery.

"Who are you? What are you doing in my room? Pauline! Pauline!" he shouted as he picked up a small bell from the table and shook it in a frenzied delirium. Ralph stood and held his hands up- a gesture of peace. When he saw that the man wouldn't stop, he started speaking.

"Jack! Jack, it is only me. Ralph. It is alright, Jack. I am not going to hurt you. You are safe," he soothed Jack, honey in his voice as he held his hands and rubbed circles on them with the pad of his thumb. This, however, sparked a different kind of hysteria in Jack.

He shrank back into the headboard of the bed, grasping the covers around himself like a cocoon. The pupils of his eyes widened to dark, black, unseeing pools. His hands crept up towards his heads and started grasping his hair. He started to breathe faster, as if there was danger around him. As he tugged on his head, he started whimpering like a lost child.

"The pig! The pig! No! We have to kill it,Roger! Piggy? Where's Piggy? Why isn't he here? Ralph, make it stop! Make the fire go away! Go away, all of you! Someone, save me!"

Ralph immediately held Jack's hand, again. Jack involuntarily let out moan and tears began to cascade down his face. His body slumped against Ralph's as his whimpering reduced to muttering. Ralph's hand crept around Jack's body and he drew mollifying patterns on the overwrought man's back.

As he comforted the crying man, Ralph thought. He thought of his eternal hatred for Jack. He thought of how it dissipated in a matter of a few minutes. Could that hatred that he had held, with such a raging passion, really be hate if this was what happened to him? If just a moment of Jack's hysteria could make him become so…Not weak. It wasn't weak. Something else. But, what was it?

Ralph's train of thought was halted by the sound of Jack hiccupping. Ralph gave a wry smile. He gently moved the slumping body onto the bed, in a comfortable position. Jack closed his eyes, briefly, savouring the momentary peace inside him.

Then he opened them slowly. He forced himself to take in the blond-haired, blue eyed, sane existence that leant over him with such a worried expression. Jack reached his arm up, gingerly touching the man above him, making sure that he wasn't a fever-induced shadow but a real person.

"Ralph…" Jack croaked. The man above him gave a small, guarded smile. The false kind of smile that hides you pain. Jack tentatively smiled back. Then, he remembered who he was. He remembered what he had done.

"Ralph, I'm so sorry. I'm so, so, sorry. Piggy…Simon…" he trailed off, the tears already beginning to form in the corners of his eyes. Ralph grimaced as he knelt down by the bed.

"Jack. I do not know. I do not know if I can forget what happened on the island. Piggy, Simon… They were good people," Ralph said with thought. "I know that I had my part to play on the island. We all did. And Simon's death has played on my conscience from the moment I stepped onto the boat with the naval officer. But I have repented. Every day of my life, I have repented."

Jack looked reproachful.

"And what about the things that have been taken away from me? My mother? No one repented for what they did to her! She did nothing wrong and she was taken away from me," he stated. Ralph sighed.

"Jack, when you and all the other boys killed Simon and Piggy, do you truly understand what you did? Is it possible for you to comprehend that Simon might have had a loving father, a doting mother, young brothers and sisters who were waiting, patiently for him to come home? And you stole their happiness, their love from them. And Piggy. We never even bothered to find out what his real name was. We mocked him and teased him but he stood by us. He always wanted what was best for us.

But you. You had a home. You had a mother. And when your mother died, you had someone else, just as loving. Someone who cared for you. The other boys might not have had that. I did not have that. You must see how lucky you have been to have Mrs Emmerson. Can you not see that?"

A contemplating expression passed over Jack's face. It cleared, soon,

"But I have suffered, have I not? All this, this pain, these illnesses and fevers, they are part of my repentance, are they not?" he asked, hopefully, gesturing to his surroundings.

Ralph smiled, once more.

"I think that the important thing is that we never forget what happened on the island. And that we never forget how we changed and made each other suffer. So that we can remember in our next life and be a better person. I forgive you, Jack," he whispered, gently.

Relief wiped away the trouble and pain from Jack's face. He opened his mouth.

"Will it hurt?"

"No more than the emotional grievance that you and I have felt before."

"Thank you, Ralph. Thank you."

Jack let out a small sigh, his breathing returning to normal. Ralph leant forward and touched his cheek. Then he stood up again and left the room in silence. On the way out, he met Mrs Emmerson.

"I spoke to him. I think I should leave, now," he stated. Mrs Emmerson gave him a watery smile as she thanked him. She made her way upstairs and he made his way down.

The sound of wailing could be heard from the same house, later that night. Mourning for the dead. Ralph winced as he heard the howling and pleas for it not to be true.

He had heard those sounds before. Deep into his childhood, a boy had screamed in the same anguish and bitterness.

Thoughts of evil and darkness. Memories of chaos and confusion. Dreams of crimson and bloody red.

Evil had haunted Jack. But the Sun had set, long ago. It was the beginning of a new day. A new era. And this one would not be tainted by the blood spilled of an innocent man. At least, not to be spilled by him.

So, I think that it's really shite. But I need your opinion before I submit it (eek)!

Love and kisses, my darlings!