Chapter 13 Going Home
The boys march onto the cruiser from the rowboat. They are feeling excited and happy to finally be off the island and having something to look forward to. A marine is in front of the boys and says,
“I’ll give you a tour of the ship.” The group follows the marine around the ship exploring each area including the engine room, the bridge, the bow, the stern, and their quarters. After hearing a loud bang, Wilfred jumps on the bed and instantly falls fast asleep. Jack, Roger and Robert raided the kitchen’s food and fill their stomachs with stale chicken. As the group is sleeping, eating and exploring a loud alarm goes off, saying General Quarters. Many marines are running through the vessel going top side. Jack, Ralph and Percival follow them up to the deck and spot a fighter plane coming straight down in their direction. Someone yells, “Komakaze!” The boys run to the side of the ship to take cover. When the plane hits the middle of the vessel, Ralph, Jack and Percival go flying over the edge and they find some debris to hang on while the boat is sinking in front of them.
After several hours of floating in the warm, shark infested water, they watch each lifeless bodies of the marines and sailors go under the waves as the sharks disappear. In the distance, a large gray object appears to be sailing towards them and the boys are happy that they will finally be out of the water alive. When the carrier starts to pick them up and they get on board they can’t believe that it is a Japanese carrier. They are reunited with most of the other boys that survived the wreckage. Now, they are put in a jail cell as their prisoners.
“What luck!” Maurice says. I can’t believe we were rescued and now we are taken captive again. Roger is playing his harmonica, Sam and Eric are playing rock, paper, scissors and Ralph is using his metal mug scraping it across the bars. After having mush for breakfast, lunch and dinner, the group is feeling sad and depressed. They wished they were back on the island free to roam and wander. Each boy was taken one at a time to be questioned about the American cruiser and why they were on it. Each
one boy tells the same story about how they were rescued. When one of the Japanese sailors comes in and yells something, the other sailor replies back in Japanese. Next, the Japanese sailors direct them to the top side where they are given a plane with no pilot. The boys all get in and they argue about who will fly the plane.
Wilfred says, “Jack should fly the plane because he is the biggest.” Ralph disagrees and says.”I should fly the plane because my dad is in the Navy and he taught me how to fly.” The boys choose Ralph to be the pilot and Jack to be the co-pilot. When they have taken off, they fly east toward America. They are cheering and thrilled that they are still alive. The plane continues for several hours into the night. They see lights below and they decide to fly lower towards the light. They discover it is a U.S carrier and they try to land.
Ralph says, “I only failed on the landing.” So Jack took over and had trouble landing and ran into the tower on the boat. The plane survived the landing barely and the group got off quickly and were all shaken up. Ralph was looking around and found out that his dad was in charge of this boat.
Ralph stayed with his dad all night talking about what happened on the island, when the morning came they couldn’t find Roger and they was a missing lifeboat and they discovered that Ralph’s father kicked him off the ship with a lifeboat. Jack gets a helicopter off the boat and goes to his mom. Maurice decides to be a sailor and ends up dead in the next battle. Robert decides to be a stowaway off an American ship until he gets back to London his home country. Sam and Eric decide to be movie stars in the movie, The Twins Strike Back. Ralph continues to live a good life with his mom and dad. Wilfred and Percival both die of homework disease. Piggy and Simon work for Davy Jones and life a good live pirating Roger.
