ᅠᅠᅠᅠᅠᅠᅠᅠᅠᅠᅠᅠᅠᅠᅠᅠ𝕮𝖍𝖆𝖕𝖙𝖊𝖗 𝕺𝖓𝖊

♪ If I leave here tomorrow

Would you still remember me?

For I must be traveling on, now

'Cause there's too many places I've got to see♪

"Shut up, Malichi, I'm trying to light a cigarette here."

"Hey, I'm just trying to lift everyone's spirits. You know our spirits need a little lifting."

"My spirit's lower than hell, it can't be lifted. Shut up."

The singing stopped, so the only audible sound was the crackling of a fire on the ground. The night sky was studded with several shimmering stars, and a crescent moon cast a soft, silver glow upon the men's faces. It was so beautiful and peaceful that it almost seemed like there wasn't a raging Iraq war going on under the stunning sky. 

Malichi looked up at the glowing moon and was trying to forget about the fact that he was going to pick up his gun to end the lives of more people once he woke up in the morning. He thought about how amazing it would be if the world just stopped fighting with each other and declared peace; however, his fantasy was cut short when he jumped in fear. A loud bomb exploded about 500 feet from the soldiers.

"Look, there goes another bombing," muttered one as he lit a cigarette.

Malichi sighed in frustration. "I hate this. I can't wait to get back to the States."

"Speaking of the States," a soldier said, "have you guys heard of the amount of suicides going on there? It's terrible."

"Yeah, I hate hearing news like that," Malichi replied. "It worries me. I think it's murder, though."

"Why?" 

"Well, they didn't seem to have a motive for suicide. A whole lotta important and successful politicians and businessmen killed themselves. When you're powerful and rich, what reason do you have to be sad? Someone definitely murdered them."

Five soldiers stared at Malichi as if he had just said Hitler did nothing wrong.

"Are you stupid?" said one. "Just because it doesn't look like someone is hurting, doesn't mean they aren't. You know this more than everyone here, Mal."

"Whatever. I still feel like they got murdered," Malichi responded. "When I go back to Chicago, I may write about it."

"Don't. You'll get a bad rep for being stupid."

Malichi rolled his eyes. "Hey, where's Rex at?"

Suddenly, a tall, lean man stepped out of a room and made himself visible. His thick camoflauge pants were unzipped and his belt unfastened. He wore a large white t-shirt with a small hole near his belly button. He stared at the six soldiers with no emotion. Even through his shaggy honey blonde hair, the soldiers could tell there was not a single feeling on his face. 

"Goddamn it, Rexford, don't scare me like that," Malichi chuckled to his best friend.

"That was quite the long piss," a soldier commented.

"Right," another chimed in, "that piss took like twenty minutes. I bet it was a shit. Rex usually takes quick pisses; and you know he never washes his hands after."

The six soliders bust out laughing. 

"He probably had some self-pleasure, I mean, the magazine with all the sluts on it went missing yesterday."

The laughter became even louder.

"Why the hell are we discussing Rex's piss or shit... or fun time. Whatever."

Rexford made his way to where the guns were located while the other six soliders were rambling on.

"Four more days and we're out of this hell, finally," a solider said. "What do you guys plan to do after you leave?"

Malichi sighed in relief. "Well firstly, I'm definitely going to go to the nearest-" Suddenly, he opened his mouth in shock, making his cigarette fall to the floor. "Rex!"

Rexford had cocked back the gun and started to shoot at his fellow soldiers! He screamed with a jagged intensity, his voice cracking and rising in a frantic crescendo that seemed to tear through the fabric of the night. The sound was raw and crazed, a haunting wail that echoed with the weight of his madness.

One by one, four soliders dropped to the ground with cold bullets in their once beating hearts. 

Malichi was startled but not scared, and at once stepped toward Rexford to snatch the gun from him. He would never think in a million years that Rexford would shoot and kill him, his best friend.

"Stay back, dumb fuck!" a solider shout-whispered as he grabbed Malichi's torso.

Malichi noticed a fine pistol laying on the floor just calling to him, "Use me!" He swiftly grabbed it and shot a bullet in both the thighs of Rexford.

Rexford dropped the gun and plummeted to the ground as Malichi and another soldier ran to him. They wer

"You dick!" the soldier yelled as he lunged at Rexford. "What the hell were you-"

Malichi quickly held him back. "Hold on!" he shouted.

He squatted down and sat Rexford up. Malichi stared into Rexford's dazed gray eyes. He knew something wasn't right. No one had never seen Rexford have that look of fear and bewilderment in his eyes before.

"Rexford... Do you know who I am?" Malichi asked softly. "It's Mal, your pal."

He looked down at Rexford's lips to see him drooling like a baby. 

Rexford's eyes became glassy as he tried to hold back tears. He opened his mouth to say something but quickly closed it after. "Uh... ah."

"Rex, say something, buddy, it's okay."

A tear escaped Rexford's shaking eye. "D-deadly... hooker," he managed to mutter.

Malichi and the other soldier looked at each other in surprised, and then back at Rexford. 

"Wha... What do you mean? Were the others some deadly man whores?"

"Did you catch an STD?"

Rexford started to shake uncontrollably. His pupils were dilated as his eyes grew. "Deadly hooker..."