Louis Kills Gage Again

Louis Creed, having returned from the Micmac burying ground after reburying his son's body, wakes on the morning after the resurrection to find the house empty and a strange car parked across the road at Jud Crandall's house. He follows muddy footprints through his own kitchen and up the stairs, discovering that his medical bag has been opened and his scalpel is missing. The footprints lead him across the road to Jud's house, where he finds Jud's body lying in a wide pool of drying blood, covered with a white tablecloth that quickly stains with deep scarlet rosepetals. Louis covers his face, whispers apologies, and then hears a soft, stealthy sound overhead — deliberate, meant to be heard.

The Confrontation

Louis climbs the stairs, calling Gage's name into the shadows. A cold, sunless giggle answers him. At the top of the landing he finds his wife Rachel lying dead, her body stabbed dozens of times with his own scalpel, blood splashed across the wallpaper in idiot shapes. Louis begins to scream, his sanity breaking as he sees that something has been at her — something worse than mere murder. Then Gage appears, his mouth smeared with blood, his chin dripping, a hellish grin on his face, still holding the scalpel. The thing wearing Gage's form lunges, but Louis pulls back and kicks the child's feet from under him, pinning the hand that holds the scalpel.

The Killing

The thing beneath him writhes and changes, its face rippling through the dead faces of Jud, Victor Pascow, Louis himself, and finally the Wendigo — the creature from the woods with its low brow, dead yellow eyes, and bifurcated tongue. It pants "No, no, no" as Louis claws for the syringes in his pocket. The first hypo flies out of his hand and rolls away. He draws a second and jams it into the small of Gage's back. The thing screams and bucks, nearly throwing him off. Louis gets the third syringe and drives it into Gage's arm, depressing the plunger all the way. He rolls off and backs down the hallway as the child staggers to his feet, takes five steps, drops the scalpel, and falls to his knees. For one moment Gage looks up with his real face — unhappy and filled with pain — and cries "Daddy!" before falling forward dead.

Aftermath

Louis checks the pulse expertly, monitoring until there is nothing inside, nothing outside. Then he crouches in a far corner, pulling himself into a ball, tighter and tighter, finding he can make himself smaller by putting a thumb in his mouth. He remains that way for more than two hours. When he finally stirs, a dark and plausible idea comes to him. He strips a sheet from the bed, wraps his wife's body gently with love, and begins to hum. He finds gasoline in Jud's garage, drenches the kitchen where Jud lies, then the living room, and finally the hallway. At the front door he tosses a lighted match over his shoulder and steps out into the morning, the blast of heat immediate and savage against his neck.