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VIDEO TRANSCRIPT – “What Really Happened on the Island”
[INTRO. Fast cuts from circulated footage: a phone skidding across sand; boys running beneath torn palms; a pink shell raised above a crowd; smoke climbing over the trees; painted figures on a distant stone ridge; naval personnel crossing the beach.]
[NEWS CLIP. A uniformed officer looks from the boys to the equipment scattered along the sand.]
OFFICER
All that equipment, and this is the best you could do?
[The clip ends before he finishes turning away. Cut to present-day Ralph facing the camera.]
RALPH
Ralph here. Everybody’s already seen, like, the crash, the conch, the fire and the ship. But most of that is just the clips that got shared, and they make it look like Jack was still in charge when the ship came. He wasn’t. I copied everything off the phones after we got back, including the stuff on mine that nobody’s seen. So this is what actually happened.
[PHONE FOOTAGE — RALPH]
Boys stand among opened bags and pieces of luggage, refreshing maps and holding their phones toward the sky.
BOY
Mine knows where I am.
ANOTHER BOY
Exactly. So they know where we are.
PIGGY
The phone knows, but who's it told?
Nobody answers. Three boys try emergency calls again.
[Cut]
RALPH (V.O.)
After that we found the conch, had a vote and agreed on water, shelters and a signal fire.
[PHONE FOOTAGE — SAM]
Ralph stands on the beach. Several boys wait around him.
Ralph raises the conch and blows. Along the beach, screens lower. Boys drift toward him.
RALPH
Anyone can start on the shelters.
BOY
Who’s making the shelter group?
RALPH
This is the shelter group.
BOY
Where is it?
PIGGY
You’re standing in it.
The boy looks behind him.
[Cut]
PIGGY (sitting apart)
I’m putting battery saver on. And airplane mode.
Several boys laugh.
BOY
Bit late for airplane mode.
PIGGY
Battery saver doesn’t stop it looking for a mast.
Three boys check their signal bars again. One begins walking uphill, watching for a bar.
RALPH (V.O.)
The fire is where the useful footage starts.
[Cut to sunlight flashing through Piggy’s glasses.]
[PHONE FOOTAGE — RALPH]
Sunlight flashes through Piggy’s glasses onto a twist of dry grass. Smoke rises. The tinder catches.
Several boys shout at once. One drops to his knees beside the flame, holding his phone almost level with the ground.
BOY
Don’t stand there. You’re blocking it.
ANOTHER BOY
Ralph, move the conch out of the shot.
PIGGY
Clear the dead stuff first. All round it.
No one moves the dead growth. Two boys lean closer to film the flame.
BOY
Do it again.
PIGGY
You can’t do fire again.
BOY
Just the bit where it starts.
[PHONE FOOTAGE — SAM]
Jack piles on a branch. The flame bends beneath it, then climbs.
PIGGY (off camera)
You need water up here. Before you make it bigger.
JACK
More wood.
Three boys run downhill. Nobody takes a container.
[PHONE FOOTAGE — UNKNOWN]
The fire has become a bright wall above the heap. Boys move around it, edging one another out of frame.
PIGGY
Clear the grass. I said clear the grass.
A gust scatters sparks into the dry growth.
For a moment, nobody speaks. Then a thin line of flame runs away from the main fire.
BOY
We’re cooked.
The line forks through the brush.
[PHONE FOOTAGE — RALPH]
The image shakes as Ralph backs away. Flames rise between the trunks. Several boys continue filming. One calls for water, then looks around as though waiting to be told where it is.
PIGGY
Stamp it out! Get branches — green ones!
Ralph lowers the phone. The frame catches his bare legs running into the smoke before the image tilts sideways into the dirt.
At the edge of the frame, Ralph beats at the flames with a leafy branch. Jack and two others join him. Smoke covers the lens.
[PHONE FOOTAGE — SAM]
Simon kneels beside a younger boy who is crying and coughing. He holds a water bottle to the boy’s mouth. Behind them, three phones remain raised toward the smoke.
[Damaged audio. The image breaks into blocks, then ends.]
RALPH (V.O.)
By the end of the first day, we had water, shelter plans and a working signal fire.
Two empty bottles lie on the bank beside the stream.
On a phone screen, a careful shelter diagram shows crossed supports and measurements. The battery warning appears, and the screen goes black. Blackened earth surrounds the smoking remains of the fire. No flame is visible.
[PHONE FOOTAGE — RALPH]
The signal fire is a bed of grey ash. Ralph stands on the ridge, his phone propped against a rock and facing him. Far behind him, a small dark shape moves across the glare on the water.
Ralph turns toward the sea.
RALPH
There! There’s a ship!
He snatches up the phone and swings it toward the horizon. The image floods white. By the time the exposure settles, only bright water is visible.
RALPH
Get the fire going!
No one answers.
He finds one smoking branch. It crumbles when he lifts it.
[Cut]
RALPH (V.O.)
Jack had taken the boys who were meant to watch the fire. By the time they came back, the ship was gone.
[PHONE FOOTAGE — ERIC]
The camera moves quickly through dense trees. Jack is crouched ahead, one hand raised. Red clay marks his face.
JACK
Sam, left side. Eric, behind the rock. Roger, wait for my hand. Nobody moves before I say.
The boys separate without speaking.
[PHONE FOOTAGE — SAM]
A pig crashes through the undergrowth. Jack signals. Roger drives it back from the rocks. Eric shouts from the far side.
The camera jolts, loses the animal, then finds Jack again as he brings the knife down.
[Cut]
Jack and the others emerge onto the beach carrying the pig on a branch. Their arms and faces are streaked with blood. Boys run toward them.
BOY
Did you get it?
RALPH
There was a ship.
The boys turn toward him.
RALPH
It passed the island. The fire was out.
Jack looks at the dead signal fire.
JACK
Did you film it?
Ralph says nothing.
JACK
Watch.
He takes Eric’s phone and plays the hunting clip. The boys crowd around the screen. Someone shouts for the moment when the pig turns. Another boy has filmed it from the other side.
RALPH (V.O.)
I couldn’t show them the ship. Jack could show them the pig.
[PHONE FOOTAGE — UNKNOWN]
Jack pauses the video on the pig in the air between two boys. He holds the screen up so everyone can see.
Beyond the screen, no smoke rises.
[PHONE FOOTAGE — SAM]
The image is almost black. Wind moves through the grass. Eric’s breathing is close to the microphone.
ERIC
There. Up there.
The camera lifts toward the mountain. A pale shape rises against the sky as the wind catches something above it. Cords pull tight. A darker mass jerks beneath it.
SAM
It moved.
The camera zooms. The image breaks into squares, sharpens, then blurs again. For an instant, a hard edge flashes below the hanging shape.
ERIC
Go. Go now.
The phone drops toward the ground as they run.
[Cut]
[PHONE FOOTAGE — UNKNOWN]
Boys crowd around Sam’s phone beneath the shelter. Rain taps against the leaves.
BOY
Do the close bit.
Sam drags two fingers across the screen. The shape enlarges and loses its edges.
ANOTHER BOY
Make it brighter.
Eric raises the contrast. The pale material turns white. The dark mass beneath it becomes almost solid.
BOY
Bro. That’s actually cursed.
YOUNGER BOY
Maybe that’s why there’s no signal.
RALPH
What?
YOUNGER BOY
The Beast. Maybe it blocks it.
Several boys look at the signal bars on their phones.
SIMON
Maybe we’re just frightening each other.
JACK
They saw it move.
SIMON
No. The wind moved it.
JACK
You weren’t there.
Jack takes the phone and holds the enlarged image toward the others.
JACK
There’s something on the mountain. Ralph keeps saying we need the fire, and nobody even wants to go up there.
RALPH
I didn’t say the fire kept us safe.
JACK
You said you were chief.
[Cut]
RALPH (V.O.)
We went up to check because otherwise everyone would keep saying we hadn’t.
[PHONE FOOTAGE — RALPH]
Ralph, Jack, Roger and two other boys climb through wet grass. Ralph films from behind them. The picture jolts with every step.
RALPH
Sam said it was near the top.
JACK
Keep quiet.
They crouch below the ridge. Above them, the pale shape lies folded against the ground.
ROGER
I can see it.
A gust fills the canopy. The shape lifts. Cords snap tight, hauling the body upright.
Someone screams. Ralph’s phone swings across grass, sky and Jack’s painted face as the boys run downhill.
[Damaged audio]
[PHONE FOOTAGE — ROGER]
The boys break through the trees onto a high stone formation. A narrow passage opens between two walls of rock. Beyond it, the ground rises to a flat ledge above the forest.
Jack stops.
JACK
Wait.
He turns slowly, looking at the stone walls, the narrow entrance and the drop on either side.
RALPH
We need to get back to the beach.
JACK
Nobody could get in here unless we let them.
He climbs onto the ledge. The others follow.
BOY
This place is actually sick.
JACK
This is the entrance. That can be the lookout. We can keep the fire against the wall.
RALPH
No ship can even see us here.
Jack looks back toward the ridge.
JACK
Ships could see your fire.
Roger’s camera is pointed at the ground.
JACK
No. Film it.
The camera lifts. Jack waits until he is centred in the frame.
JACK
Ships could totally see your fire.
[PHONE FOOTAGE — UNKNOWN]
Boys carry branches, bottles and strips of meat through the narrow entrance at Castle Rock.
JACK
Water against that wall. Meat under the overhang. Roger, you’re on the entrance. Sam, lookout.
Sam points toward the highest ledge.
SAM
That one?
JACK
That’s the lookout.
[Cut]
Two boys stack stones around a cooking fire. Another hangs meat from a branch beneath the rock.
JACK
Nobody takes anything from the stores unless they ask.
The boys nod. One scratches the word STORES into a patch of pale stone.
[Cut]
Rain begins beyond the entrance. The cooking fire holds beneath the overhang. Jack tears meat into portions while boys wait in a line.
JACK
One each. Then back to your places.
BOY (quietly)
Jack’s actually locked in.
Roger watches Jack assign the portions. When one boy reaches for a second piece, Roger steps between him and the meat. The boy withdraws his hand.
RALPH (V.O.)
They kept that fire going because they could eat from it.
[PHONE FOOTAGE — SIMON]
The mountain rises ahead through wet trees. Simon’s breathing is uneven. He climbs beyond the ground scorched by the signal fire. Wind shakes the branches above him.
[A low-battery warning covers the screen]
Simon dismisses it and keeps climbing.
Higher up, the trees thin. Something pale moves against the ridge.
[Battery: 1%]
Simon steadies the phone against a rock. The image catches a strap, one hard metal corner and dark fabric beneath the pale shape.
The screen goes black.
[End of recovered footage]
[PHONE FOOTAGE — RALPH]
Clouds gather over the island. The beach shelter sags under the first drops of rain.
JACK (off camera)
Nobody’s making you stay here. There’s food at Castle Rock tonight. Anyone can come.
Ralph turns the phone. Jack stands beyond the shelter with two painted boys behind him.
JACK
Anyone who wants meat. Anyone who wants to be safe.
[Cut]
Ralph and Piggy walk through the rain toward the stone ridge.
PIGGY
We’re not joining them.
RALPH
I know.
PIGGY
We’re eating.
RALPH
I know. I might get some of them to come back.
Thunder rumbles over the mountain.
Ahead, firelight shows through the narrow entrance. Boys are already chanting inside.
Ralph and Piggy stop just beyond the circle, close enough to receive food and far enough to pretend they have not entered it.
[PHONE FOOTAGE — RALPH]
Rain drives through the open entrance. The cooking fire bends beneath the overhang, throwing light across the painted faces gathered around it. Beyond the fire, rain lashes the exposed ledge.
Jack stands on a flat stone above the circle. The rock walls catch his voice and send it back.
JACK
Again.
The boys strike their feet against the ground.
BOYS
Kill the Beast. Cut its throat. Spill its blood.
Roger stands at the entrance. Sam and Eric are on either side of the fire. The younger boys press close to the wall, repeating the words a fraction late.
Ralph and Piggy remain near the edge of the gathering. Ralph’s plate is empty. Piggy holds his against his chest while rainwater runs from his hair.
BOYS
Kill the Beast. Cut its throat. Spill its blood.
Jack points across the circle.
JACK
Ralph. Close it up.
Ralph moves before stopping himself. The shoulder of the boy beside him knocks against his own.
PIGGY
Ralph.
Ralph does not answer. He is watching Jack.
Lightning fills the entrance.
For an instant, a figure stands in the narrow passage between the rocks. It is bent almost double beneath a dark pack. Mud covers its legs and shirt. One side of its face is streaked with blood. Something pale hangs from a loosened flap and flashes in the firelight.
The figure takes another step.
BOY
There!
The chant breaks apart.
ANOTHER BOY
It came down.
Simon tries to speak. His mouth opens, but the storm and the shouting cover him.
SIMON
It’s—
A gust drives rain through the entrance. The fire drops low, then rises again.
Simon lifts one hand. The pack slips from his shoulder and strikes the stone. He catches it by a strap.
SIMON
It isn’t—
BOY
The Beast!
The word moves through the circle faster than Simon can speak.
Boys back away from the entrance and press against one another. Roger lowers his spear. Jack steps down from the stone.
Ralph reaches into his pocket.
His phone screen lights his face.
He raises it.
The camera finds Simon in the entrance, blurred by rain. Ralph taps the screen. The image sharpens on Simon’s eyes, then shifts to the dark pack hanging against his side.
PIGGY
Ralph, put it down.
Ralph keeps filming.
SIMON
It’s only a man. On the mountain. He’s dead.
Thunder covers the last word.
JACK
Roger, behind him. Sam, block the path. Eric—
The boys move.
Roger slips along the wall toward Simon’s left side. Sam steps into the entrance behind him. Eric hesitates, then takes the other side.
The shouting narrows into Jack’s commands.
JACK
Keep him there. Nobody lets it through.
Simon turns and sees Sam behind him. He tries to move toward the open ledge, but Roger lowers his spear across the way.
SIMON
Listen to me.
JACK
Forward.
The circle tightens.
Ralph’s image shakes. Someone strikes his shoulder, but he keeps the phone raised.
Simon drags the pack in front of him as though it might shield him. The strap catches around his wrist. He pulls free, stumbles through the entrance and falls hard beside Piggy.
The pack hits the stone. The loosened flap tears open.
A folded panel, a coiled cable and a laminated card slide partly out.
Piggy looks down.
Across the top of the pack, beneath mud and water, block letters read EMERGENCY COMMUNICATIONS.
PIGGY
Wait.
No one hears him.
Jack points toward Simon.
JACK
Roger, move in.
Piggy drops his plate. He kneels and pulls the card free.
Rain has already crossed its surface. Three pictures show a panel beneath open sky, a marked cable and a green light.
PIGGY
Ralph. Ralph, look.
Ralph’s camera remains fixed on Simon.
Piggy unfolds the unit. His hands shake so badly that the card knocks against the casing.
Simon tries to push himself upright.
SIMON
It was caught in the lines. That’s what moved.
A boy kicks the pack away from Simon. It strikes Piggy’s knee and throws him against the wall.
The card slips from his fingers. It lands face down in water.
Piggy reaches for it. A foot comes down between his hand and the card. He pulls back, waits for the boy to move, then snatches it up.
The pictures are streaked with mud.
Piggy wipes them on his shirt. He looks at the first picture, then at the overhang above him.
PIGGY
Open sky.
He gathers the terminal against his chest and pushes through the edge of the circle.
JACK
Don’t let it move!
Roger moves in and braces the shaft of his spear across Simon’s chest, pinning him against the stone.
Ralph’s camera follows Piggy onto the exposed ledge.
Piggy sets the terminal down in the rain. He raises the panel. The card trembles in one hand. He traces the second picture with his finger, finds the marked socket and pushes the cable into it.
Nothing happens.
Piggy kneels beside the unit, one hand resting on the casing as though movement might interrupt it.
The light remains dark.
Then it turns green.
Piggy pulls his phone from his pocket. The screen lights in his hand. It vibrates.
The sound is small beneath the rain.
Ralph’s camera swings back to Simon. Roger has lifted the spear from Simon’s chest and drawn it back.
Sam turns his head.
SAM
Was that yours?
Piggy does not answer. Light from the screen flickers across his wet face. Ralph’s camera drifts from Simon to Piggy’s screen. Delayed messages crowd the display. Piggy swipes them aside.
Eric leaves his place at the entrance.
JACK
Eric. Stay there.
Eric takes out his phone and holds the power button. Sam does the same. The chant begins again somewhere behind Ralph.
BOYS
Kill the Beast. Cut its—
One voice stops.
Then another.
Sam’s screen lights his face. He stares.
SAM
It works. I’ve got, like, ninety notifications.
The boy beside him breaks from the circle.
BOY
No way. Let me see.
Eric’s phone connects. Three younger boys crowd around him, forcing him back against the wall.
ERIC
Wait. Stop pushing.
Roger lowers his spear to look over his shoulder.
JACK
Put them away.
Piggy bends over his phone, shielding it from the rain with both hands. A younger boy leans across his shoulder.
PIGGY
Move. I need to send the location.
The camera holds on Piggy’s screen as a location marker appears over the island.
JACK
I said put them away!
BOY
Why’s he crashing out?
A boy at the back laughs at something on Sam’s phone. He looks up, notices that the chant has stopped around him, then bends toward the screen again.
Roger leaves Simon and crosses to Eric.
ROGER
What did you get?
ERIC
Everything.
The circle opens.
Boys step out of their assigned places. Some jab at black screens or hold them toward the open sky. Others crowd around the three working phones. Small groups form against the stone walls around whatever still works.
Jack remains beside the fire.
JACK
Back in the circle.
Sam crouches beneath the overhang with four boys leaning across him. Eric sits near the entrance, surrounded on both sides. Piggy stays by the terminal, entering numbers with wet fingers.
JACK
Everyone back here.
The fire still burns. Stone still encloses the entrance. The lookout stands above them.
Nobody is facing Jack.
[Cut]
RALPH (V.O.)
I thought it was the Beast. That’s why I kept filming.
[The image returns briefly to Simon in the entrance, trying to speak while Ralph’s camera holds him in focus.]
RALPH (V.O.)
Simon’s phone died halfway up. He kept going.
[PHONE FOOTAGE — RALPH]
Ralph holds the camera over Piggy’s shoulder.
Piggy crouches beside the terminal, wiping rain from his screen with the side of his hand.
PIGGY
The map’s got numbers. These ones.
He copies the coordinates into the emergency message field, then checks each number against the map.
RALPH
Have you sent it?
PIGGY
I’m checking the numbers.
He reaches the final digit, then presses the screen.
PIGGY
Now I’ve sent it.
[Cut]
The storm has passed. Boys sit beneath the overhang and along the stone walls, gathered around the remaining charged phones. Some sleep with their heads against one another. Others watch clips and messages load.
Jack sits alone beside the cooking fire. His spear lies across his knees. Ralph props his phone against the stone and walks to the open entrance holding the pink shell.
RALPH
We need everyone together.
No one moves.
He raises the shell and blows.
The note passes between the stone walls and out across the trees.
A younger boy sitting beside Sam looks up. His face changes with recognition. For a moment, he watches Ralph.
Sam’s screen changes. Someone on his other side laughs.
The younger boy looks down again.
Ralph lowers the shell.
[Cut to present-day Ralph facing the camera.]
RALPH
Piggy sent our location, and a naval ship picked us up that evening, just before the last phones died.
[On-screen: a map of the island, the sent coordinates and a still image of a naval ship offshore.]
RALPH (V.O.)
So Simon found the unit, Piggy got it working, and that’s how the ship knew where we were. Jack wasn’t keeping everyone together. The signal came back and everyone just stopped listening to him. After that it was basically fine.
[Cut to present-day Ralph facing the camera.]
RALPH
People in the comments are doing way too much about it. So that’s all. Thanks for watching. Smash that like button, subscribe if you want the rest, and turn notifications on so you don’t miss it.
[EMBEDDED AUTOPLAY PREVIEW: “JACK RESPONDS — RALPH LIED ABOUT THE ISLAND”]