The Walk moves into its second cold night under drizzle and clearing stars, and Garraty feels the temperature drop hard after the earlier warmth. Crowds still line the road, but they are subdued, and only two more boys have died since Jensen, bringing the total to fifty. Garraty walks mostly alone, fighting numb feet, sharp pain in his arches, and repeated warnings as the route passes through dark towns. When the Walk turns onto a new road near Oldtown, with confetti and a brass band marking the junction, Garraty feels a brief lift because the territory ahead is finally becoming familiar.

Stebbins falls into step with Garraty and begins probing him about home, his family, and what will happen after Garraty sees his loved ones. Then Stebbins shifts into another of his strange lectures, arguing that the mind controls whether a person is merely tired or truly exhausted. Using Baker's mule-and-carrot idea, Stebbins says Olson is the real lesson because Olson has lost the will that keeps a Walker moving. Stebbins hints that Olson can teach Garraty "the secret of life over death," which unsettles Garraty enough to draw him toward Olson.

Garraty studies Olson up close and is horrified by how emptied out Olson has become: dehydrated, filthy, barely human, and seemingly beyond pain. As they near the lights of Oldtown and struggle up a steep hill, Garraty nearly breaks down physically, matching his pace to Olson's in the hope of learning something from him. At the crest and beyond, a crowd from Oldtown High School erupts into chants of Garraty's name, but Garraty uses the moment to press Olson for answers. Olson manages only broken fragments: "God's garden" is "full of weeds," Olson says sadly that he does not want to die, asks the time twice, and tells Garraty that Jesus will save him.

Without warning, Olson turns toward the halftrack. He ignores the warning, climbs onto the vehicle, and even wrenches one soldier's gun away, but the guards shoot him in the belly and then repeatedly gun him down as he keeps trying to rise and move. McVries screams for Olson to kill them; Abraham is sickened into vomiting; and Stebbins coldly explains that the soldiers gut-shoot boys on purpose to discourage attacks. Garraty, weeping, runs to Olson and cradles him until McVries drags him away. Olson still forces himself upright once more, cries out, "I DID IT WRONG!" and collapses dead, after which the soldiers put more bullets into him and remove the body.

In the aftermath, Garraty tells McVries that Olson's last speech proves Olson was still alive inside and that there must be some pattern to what is happening. McVries rejects that hope, arguing that Olson's death was both magnificent and trivial, and the exchange reveals how badly Olson's execution has shaken him. McVries also reports that Scramm is burning with fever and speaking deliriously, while Barkovitch has become more cautious and is concentrating on endurance instead of taunting. Garraty regrets having made friends, worries about the humiliation of his failing body, and finally drifts into exhausted half-sleep while still walking, even as another boy is shot and the crowd keeps chanting his name.