15-16

Luke Beckman
Chapters 15-16

Chapters 15-16 is more of the same brutality. Chapter 15 starts with them using the villages they capture as bases. This is just like what the rebels do, which makes the two sides both the bad guys. Then he says that his life changed in 1996, when he was 15. It starts with them going to a village. They were telling war stories, and boating about how many people they have killed. They were laughing when Jumah told them that he had taken his new gun from someone who had killed a bunch of his comrades. They really seemed not to care anymore about what happened around them. The Lieutenant went around, congratulating everybody on recent raids, when 4 people from UNICEF showed up. As it turns out, the Lieutenant was expecting them, and he led them into his house. The Lieutenant then comes out of the house and tells the boys to line up. He chose a few of them, Ishmael being one of them, and then he discharged them from duty. He said that they had been great soldiers. They were soon striped of there military equipment. However, when one of the men tries to search Ishmael, Ishmael tells him to back off or I will kill you. The boys were angry because they were being saved. This was almost unbelievable, until he said he envied the military MPs because they had guns and he didn’t. they were driving for hours when they reached the capital of the country, where they were taken to a UNICEF building, and then were given a place to sleep and some food. They met some other boys who were fighting for the army earlier in a different part of the army. At forest the two groups didn’t get along, but once they established they were on the same side and had seen many of the same things, they became a little less tense. Both the groups had no idea why they were taken off the front lines. Then the boys were taken outside, where they met some rebel boys. When they had heard this, the rebels rushed the army boys, and a massive fight broke out. Ishmael through his grenade, and people pulled bayonets out. When a few mps came to try to break it up, the boys took there guns and started shooting at each other. Soon more Mps came. Many boys had died or been seriously injured.
Chapter 16 was about the rehab. The boys were suffering from the lack of drugs and the lack of violence. The boys would fight for hours between meal for no reason. They were reckless because of there switch in environment. The chapter was filled with many isolated fights and the boys trying to get any drugs they could.