Jonas locates Asher, Fiona, and a group of other children at the playing field. He watches their game, which he has played many times in the past. They are in the middle of an imaginary battle pretending to shoot each other, falling down or running every which way to avoid being shot by the enemy, made up of another group of children. All Jonas can think about while he is watching the make-believe war game is the warfare memory in which the young boy dies. Jonas walks to the middle of the field without thinking about what he is doing and stops the game. The children walk away, uncertain of why Jonas stopped their game of war, and Jonas is left to face Asher and Fiona. He tries to explain how cruel the game is, but, of course, neither Asher nor Fiona understands. They don't understand death either. His friends finally leave.
Jonas' knowledge and wisdom have changed his life. He no longer acts or feels the same way as he did before he began receiving memories from The Giver; therefore, his relationships are not the same. He feels a great sense of loss. Refusing to live as a robot again, he knows that he can never go back to living without feelings (he has even stopped taking his pill for the Stirrings). He feels overwhelming sadness for his friends because they do not feel anything at all.
Lowry leaves us in suspense at the end of Chapter 17 after Jonas finds out that the identical twins will be born the next day and that one of the twins will be released and will go Elsewhere.
