Chapter 4: November 29, 2011

    By dawn, we all felt like walking skeletons. But that didn't stop us from looking for food. We ate anything that was edible, not counting tree bark and animal feces. We ate things like plants, bugs, and blades of grass. We didn't care what it was. We were so hungry that we devoured anything we could get our hands on. By around noon, we had ravaged everything we could. One of us had gone completely insane. I saw that Ren huddled himself against a tree and was rocking back and forth, saying incomprehensible words to himself. The whites of his eyes had gone pale pink, and his irises had gone blood red. That was a sign that he had lost his mind. I turned to look at Knuckles. I gazed intently at his expression, and I read him like a book. His expression said, "If only he had a map to find his sanity." I became slightly angry. But I put it off for the moment. My friend needed urgent attention. I tentatively went closer to my crazy friend.
    That's when Knuckles said, in a rude tone, "Be sure you have a straitjacket with you. He really needs one."
    Ren hissed at him like a snake. It startled us.
    I managed to say, "Ren."
    He looked at me, with a look of crazy happiness on his face. He said, "Oh. Gil. Have you come to help a friend in his darkest hour?"
    His voice was awful. It was brittle and high-pitched.
    I then said, unabated, "Ren, I need you to calm down."
    Ren's expression changed from being a crazy happiness to deep ire. It was so sudden, I stumbled back in fear. Ren stood up and grabbed my uniform's collar.
    He growled, "Are you saying I'm mad?!"
    I said, barely able to speak, "Well, I...uh...yes. But, I don't mean that in a bad way...and...uh...I think you really should calm down..."
    Ren made an ear-to-ear, crazy smile that would make Chucky look like a Barbie doll. He then let out his trademark diabolical laughter. It sounded like a mad scientist's laugh, only a whole hell of a lot more disturbing.
    Then, he pulled out a pistol and aimed it at my chest.
    He then said, "I'm gonna kill you!"
    I said, fearfully, "Take it easy, Ren. Just think about what you're doing here."
    I heard his stomach growl vociferously, and then I understood what was going on.
    In growing horror, I uttered, "No...please don't!"
    "You know I haven't eaten anything in days!" he retorted.
    I found a bug right next to me. Before Ren could pull the trigger and kill me, I quickly grabbed the bug and shoved it in his mouth. He then began vigorously chewing it. Then, he swallowed. Immediately, he had calmed down. The whites of his eyes returned to being white, and his irises returned to being pink. He then became confused, like he had no idea what was going on.
    "What's going on?" he said. "Why do I have my pistol drawn to your chest?"
    Almost hyperventilating, I said, "I'll explain everything later, Ren."
    "Gil! You're tense."
    Now calm, I said, "Like I said, I'll explain everything later."
    Then, a bullet shot across Ren's upper arm. He let out a sound of pain. Immediately, I jumped up, calculated the trajectory of the fired bullet, and killed the enemy sniper...all in a fraction of a second.
    I then turned to Ren and said, "Are you okay?"
    "Yeah," he said, "I'm fine. Just a slight burning sensation on my arm."
    I breathed a sigh of relief and said, "Okay."
    "I'm still kinda hungry though."
    "There's a lot to eat around here. There's plants and bugs. Just don't eat any poison ivy or anything with three leaves on one stem."
    "Okay then."
    He then proceeded to devour every plant with the exception of what I told him. The entire time, I thought, Damn, Ren must be voracious. In only ten minutes, Ren had consumed a hundred plants (that equals ten plants per minute). Thankfully for him, he was "stuffed to the brim," as I like to call it. It's basically a term one uses when they eat a lot on Thanksgiving. Well, maybe I only used it...
    "We should still be looking out for enemies," Knuckles warned. "They might try to kill one of you."
    I then looked at him and retorted, "What the hell do you think I've been doing all morning, Knux?"
    And yes, some of us called him Knux.
    "Wasting your time?"
    I rolled my eyes. He knew it was a rhetorical question.
    Then, ironically, a bullet went into his back. I was shocked. He fell to the ground, face-first. I ran frantically to him. I tried to help him overcome his injury, but he succumbed to it. He died in less than a minute. I almost cried. First my best school friends, then Michael, then Molokov, and now Knuckles. I had seen death around every corner I turned, and I couldn't take it anymore. I felt a strong need to commit suicide. I held up my pistol up to my head, like one does in Russian Roulette. Ren ran to me in an attempt to stop myself from doing the deed.
    "Stop!" he yelled. "You don't need to do this!"
    "I have to!" I shouted. "I can't handle seeing all my friends die in front of my eyes! I have to kill myself!"
    He grasped my arm and pulled it to the ground. He looked at me with a solemn look on his face and said, "There's only gonna be more death! You can't escape it!"
    I struggled to try to get him to let go of me, but I was powerless. I was forced to move on with the painful loss of another close friend. Another crucifix-shaped tombstone was made, its engraving reading:

HERE LIES

KNUCKLES THE ECHIDNA

 

BORN: FEBRUARY 16, 1993

DIED: NOVEMBER 29, 2011

    I knew that Knuckles's death wasn't going to be the last I'd witness in this unforgiving war. I knew I had to carry on. Our army was dwindling. It now only consisted of four troops—me, Sonic, Tails, and Ren. Our uniforms were tattered and stained with blood and dirt. We persisted in finding and killing enemy soldiers. Our hearing was so trained that it became as acute as Dmitry's in the previous war. By six in the evening, we had killed off at least one hundred enemies, and at least one hundred and eighty by nightfall. We set up our campsite near the very edge of the thick forest that claimed the life of Knuckles. I still had a hard time coping with the loss. Tails went up to me.
    In a benevolent tone, he said, "I know you're taking Knuckles's death hard, but I've known him longer than you have. Yes, I'm sad that he's dead. But I don't let it eat me alive. Do you understand?"
    I slowly nodded. I knew he was right.
    "Come on," Tails finally said. "You need your rest."
    I went inside the tent and slept the long night away.