Madness (Suicidal Book 3)

Chapter 9: The Inmates' Return

Tails drove the van into the city of Pride Rock. His white van passed by the same dilapidated and ruined houses and buildings that Kion and Sonic had gone by just hours earlier. Knuckles watched warily out the tinted passenger window for signs of trouble. Trouble from anyone, like Zira's mob, random street gangs, scavengers, homeless people, drug addicts and sexual child predators. And...cops. He snorted through his nose, glaring out at the scenes. He blinked, once, twice, as they passed a house he thought he recognized. It was swarming with cops. He tapped Tails' shoulder. 

"Hey, isn't that Rotor's house?" Knuckles asked him. Tails leaned over and looked out. "Yeah," he muttered. Then the two of them saw the police coming out of the house with a white canvas stretcher with the bullet-riddled body of a purple walrus on it. "Damn, Rotor's dead too," Knuckles snarled. "The fucking cops killed him, man." Tails nodded solemnly. 

The two of them saluted the house with somber, mourning faces as their white van continued through the sad, darker and more seedier parts of the Pride Rock underground. Bombed out buildings, burned down buildings, broken windows, bashed in doors, wood chips and paper littering the sidewalks and streets, cars crashed into street lights, fire hydrants, and buildings. Rags and towels flutter in the wind, hanging from wires strung between destroyed houses. Though they were wary for any scavengers or other crooks, they were also scared that more police officers would be going towards the place where they were bringing out Rotor after he was shot multiple times. 

Knuckles growled as the white van slowly rolled to a stop in front of a dark building and then stopped entirely as it parked. They had reached a safe house, or at least a place to hide until the police officers disappeared from Rotor's murder site. Knuckles got out of the white van carefully and looked both ways down the street, checking for anybody who would go after them. He moved quickly to the back of the van and opened the doors. Vita and Vitani poked their heads out gradually, and he nodded and beckoned them forward. The jackal and the tomboy lioness stepped out of the van and started to walk towards the house as Knuckles quietly shut the van door behind them and waited for Tails to get out. Tails shut off the van and slowly climbed out. He nodded to Knuckles and the two of them went inside the broken, slightly burned and unstable building. 

They walked inside. Vitani and Vita had already claimed the master bedroom's bed for themselves, so Tails and Kncukles agreed that Tails could have the other bedroom, the smaller one, and Knuckles would take the couch. As everyone all all bid each other goodnight, Knuckles settled down on the couch. But he couldn't sleep, he tossed and turned, and finally sighed and just lay there in the dark. 

There was a creaking noise and Knuckles bolted upright. He grabbed his pistol and looked warily and fearfully around the dark living room. Though the shadows cast darkness everywhere he looked, he didn't see anything. There wasn't anything there. Nothing at all, he told himself strictly. Nothing to be scared of. Nothing. He settled back down and decided he needed to fall asleep. 

Then a floorboard creaked again and Knuckles bolted upright and fell out of his bed. He grabbed his handgun on his way down and looked around the room, angrily surveying it, Carefully analyzing it for anything out of place.  But he found nothing. Then he saw a flash of blue out of the corner of his eyes, and he jerked around and fired three rounds. 

There was a scream of pain, but it wasn't a normal sounding scream. It sounded guttural, inhumane, raspy, the scream of the damned, he thought, shivering to himself. 

"Tails!" Knuckles called. He stood there, his hands shaking slightly as he watched the entire room for more blue or whatever it was. The red Fox stumbled groggily into the room, holding his small gun in his hands, and rubbing his eyes. Vita and Vitani stood behind him, both with their knives and shanks raised, ready for a fight. Prison apparently trained the two of them well. Knuckles nodded his thanks in an imperceptible way and the two of them gave him small smiles and slight nods back at him. 

"What is it, Knuckles?" Tails asked, yawning. "This had better be important, cause I'm so damned tired I'll shoot you if there ain't anybody here." 

Knuckles nodded. "There is someone here." Tails perked up and narrowed his eyes while the other two, Vita and Vitani moved past him and started sweeping the room. Knuckles helped them until suddenly there came a scream of rage from behind him and he whipped around just in time to see a large flash of blue and tan tackle him to the floor. 

It was a police officer of some sort, and apparently well trained. He seemed to know inherently how to block Knuckles jabs and punches as the two wrestled around on the floor. But the officer also looked...unhinged. His eyes were moving in all directions, and he was frothing and spitting out of his mouth, which was tinged with red, possibly blood. Knuckles' gun had been knocked out of his hand, but Knuckles wasn't called Knuckles for nothing. But this lion was strong. 

"Shoot him!" Tails screamed, trying to aim the gun so as not to hit Knuckles. "I know that guy, it's Officer Delgado from the asylum! He was the guard on our block!" 

"We can't!" Vitani yelled back at him, also trying to do the same thing as Tails was. "If we shoot, we have a high chance of hitting Knuckles as well!" 

With a growl of effort, Knuckles shoved Officer Delgado off of him and grabbed his gun as all four people in the room shot at him, shredding his body with bullets. Knuckles grinned, then stumbled. He looked down at his hands. The one not holding his gun was soaked in his blood. The cop had stabbed him. Knuckles staggered and went down. Tails and the others rushed to him. 

"We gotta get him to a hospital!" cried Tails, looking scared and worried as he watched one of his best friends bleed out on the floor of a broken house. 

Vita shook her head. "We can't. He's a wanted criminal. We take him in, they kill him." 

Tails growled at her, and Vitani placed her hands between the two of them. 

"C'mon, guys, leave me," Knuckles said. "It's the only way." 

"No," sobbed Tails, his eyes brimming and filling with tears. "I'm not going to leave you." 

Knuckles grabbed him and yanked him close. "Listen to me. You gotta leave me. Get to Sonic and Kion and stop Kovu, and maybe less people will keep drying. Is that clear?" 

Tails sadly nodded, tears streaming down his face. 

"Now! Go!" Knuckles said, groaning with the effort as he rolled over. Vitani and Vita nodded and saluted him, getting a weak and sad salute back from Knuckles, before they turned and led a crying Tails out of the room, to the van, where they shoved him in the back and sat up front so he wouldn't try to kill them all. 

As Knuckles vision faded, he smiled. He breathed his last and said his final words before he died. 

"Bye, guys. See ya soon."