Lord of the Flies: Journal #6

By: Simone Federici

Chapter: Beast in Air

Perspective: Jack

The Beastie Has Come

“Look over there! Look what’s falling!” Sam and Eric were shouting. The dark night disabled me from seeing a clear picture of what the falling object was, but I was able to make out the outline of the figure. At first the idea of something falling from the sky was ludicrous to me, but then I really that something could actually be there. Sam and Eric kept shouting what they saw, “It looks like a shadow of a parachute! Look everyone, its head it flopping up and down! You can hear the parachute swinging in the wind! It has sharp teeth and claws! It must be the beastie!” Their effigy of the monster seemed very interesting. At first I thought I was hearing the lamentation of the littluns, but then I realized that they were just whining because of their fear of the beastie. It seemed like Ralphs hope would come true. He had wished that an adult would send a message to the island. The creature didn’t look exactly like a message to me, but it didn’t seem like something unimportant. I knew I was going to have to take a look at it.

As soon as all the boys were gathered around from all the commotion, Ralph took charge. He didn’t blow the conch, but everyone seemed to listen to him…for about a minute, which is when the arguments and shouting out started. No one was following the rule of the conch. Instead of being able to talk only when you had the conch, boys were constantly blurting out words and yelling and screaming whenever they felt the need to say something, and you could hear the discursive voices of other boys in the background. At this point, I don’t think there is any reason to have the conch because no one is following the rules. There just isn’t anymore significance to the conch anymore.

Later that morning, I lead the group that went up to go investigate the supposed beastie. As we hiked up the forest-covered mountain, we rounded the corner tempestuously and came to a ledge, which had flat rocks down the slope, which made it look more like a cliff. When we stopped to rest, me and a lot of the other boys starting rolling rocks down the cliff. Our minds we having so much fun playing with the rocks that we no longer felt the need to go looking for the falling beastie. I could see that Ralph was very angry with us, but at that moment I didn’t care about him because he wasn’t being a very good leader, and frankly I didn’t care about anything else at the moment except having fun.