Free It Lives Again by James Dixon

it was delivered. Suddenly Barbara’s face went pale; she saw the child! The child, or whatever it was, was coming out!
    “Oh, my God!” cried Dr. Forrest. He could not believe what he was seeing. “The needle,” he yelled at Barbara, “use the needle!”
    Barbara, with all her fright, managed to plunge the needle into the baby. It seemed to work as the baby lay there, grotesque, on the table, emitting its first sound: a low moan.
    “I think we’ve got it,” said Dr. Westley, watching this “thing,” fascinated.
    Then the eyes opened slowly. The baby looked around as if at that moment, seconds after its birth, it could SEE!
    The low moan was gone, and in its place was an animal GROWL. It was a singular sound, the wailing sound of a creature born to a world it does not understand, a world totally alien that wanted to kill it. Only now it had fallen into the hands of those who wished to save it. But how was the baby to know that?
    The growl increased, as if it were about to attack.
    “Another one, another needle,” said Dr. Forrest. “Quick.”
    Barbara ran to the side cabinet. She began refilling the hypodermic needle. Then she started to shake. She dropped the needle. “Oh, my God, I’m sorry.”
    “Another one,” cried Dr. Westley, panicked. “Get another one, quick!”
    Barbara pulled another needle out of a drawer and began filling it.
    Meanwhile Jody struggled to raise her head, trying to see what was there on the small table, wanting to know what she had brought into the world. “I want to see it,” she said. “I want to see my baby.”
    “No!” cried Eugene, running to her, holding her, refusing to let her get up, making it impossible for her to see the baby.
    The growls were getting louder and louder. Dr. Westley turned to Barbara. “Hurry,” he demanded.
    “Yes, Doctor,” Barbara replied, close to tears.
    Steven, the karate expert, watched intently, ready with his lethal hands. “We’re wrong in doing this,” he said. “It shouldn’t be allowed to live.”
    “Shut up,” said Dr. Westley, looking again toward Barbara.
    Suddenly the creature growled as never before. The growl of an attacking animal, a desperate, piercing shriek.
    “What’s happening?” cried Jody, still trying to see the baby as Eugene held her down. “What’s happening to my baby?”
    Eugene, his head turned away, would not look at this thing. He clamped his hands over his wife’s ears in a vain attempt to drown out the horrifying noise.
    “What is it?” Jody cried. “What is it?”
    “Please, Jody,” begged Eugene, “please don’t look.”
    Now Barbara was back with the needle.
    “Give me that.” Dr. Westley grabbed it from Barbara and then callously stabbed it into the creature’s stomach.
    Then, all at once, the growl diminished. The infant seemed to be sedated, the drug taking effect. The grotesque body went limp. The ghoulish thing seemed to be completely tranquilized.
    “Let’s put it away at once,” said Dr. Westley.
    Dr. Forrest, closest to the infant, bent to pick it up, but Dr. Westley moved in quickly. Clearly he wanted to be the first to touch it, handle it. “I’ll do it,” he said.
    Deftly he picked up the drugged baby, and wasting no time, moved to the special incubator with the bars—a cage, really, for a wild beast. He opened the incubator and, about to put the infant in, looked down.
    “It’s a male,” he said, turning to Dr. Forrest and the rest of the people in the mobile unit with a triumphant, proud-of-himself smile.
    And then, all at once, a shriek!
    Dr. Westley screamed. A clawed hand ripped across the doctor’s face in a flash, tearing his cheek open as it went for his throat.
    Dr. Forrest rushed forward. Armed only with a cloth drenched with chloroform, he stuffed it into the creature’s face. Dr. Westley fell to the floor, leaving Dr. Forrest to grab the infant, who suddenly went limp. Barbara ran to Dr. Westley’s aid, trying to stop the bleeding.
    “Antiseptic,