Dana Scully

"Humbug" - Episode 2x20 (videos,guide,stills,transcript)

2010-10-05T08:45:00.000-07:00

Videos
Humbug - Trailer

Episode guide
(Source: http://xfiles.wearehere.net/episodes/2x20.htm )

2X20 Humbug

When Jerald Glazebrook aka 'Alligator Man' is attacked and killed in Gibsontown, Florida a retirement community for freaks and side show performers. It matches a pattern of forty-eight similar attacks spanning twenty-eight years all across the US. Someone working in circuses travelling from place to place across the US would be a primary suspect. Mulder and Scully investigate the recent attack in an attempt to catch the killer. They meet with Sheriff Hamilton who fills them in on the case. Mulder is intrigued by a drawing by local artist Hepcat Helm of the Fiji Mermaid, an exhibit P.T. Barnum billed as a 'genuine fake' as it was supposedly a fish's tail sown on to the body of a monkey. When Hepcat Helm is later killed in his studio and the only access is via a very small window, Mulder theorises that the Fiji Mermaid is not only real but responsible for the murders. As they later discover that Sheriff Hamilton himself used to be Jim-Jim, the dog-faced boy and encounter other town residence like Dr Blockhead who performs human feats of endurance and The Conundrum, a tattooed jigsaw man who eats live animals. Scully finds it difficult to find a normal suspect, in a place where nothing is normal. Her suspicions fall on trailer park porter Lanny's congealed twin Leonard, as Scully theorises that Leonard is capable of extracting himself from his brother's body. Lanny later confirms this but claims that Leonard does not mean to hurt people, he is merely searching for another brother.

Noteworthy Quote

Dr Blockhead: "It's a mystery, maybe some mysteries are never meant to be solved"

Credits

Writer:	Darin Morgan
Director:	Kim Manners

Cast:

David Duchovny	Special Agent Fox Mulder
Gillian Anderson	Special Agent Dana Scully

Guest Cast:

Jim Rose	Dr Blockhead
The Enigma	The Conundrum
Michael Anderson	Mr Nutt
Wayne Grace	Sheriff Hamilton
Vincent Schiavelli	Lanny
George Tipple	Hepcat Helm
Alex Diakun	Curator
John Payne	Jerald Glazebrook
Alvin Law	Reverend
Blair Slater	Older Glazebrook Child
Devin Walker	Younger Glazebrook Child
Debis Simpson	Waiter

Episode Stills

Transcript Humbug 2x20
(Source: http://www.insidethex.co.uk/transcrp/scrp220.htm )

SCENE 1
GIBSONTON, FL

(Two kids splash each other in the pool, laughing.)

YOUNGER GLAZEBROOK SON: Stop!

(They continue play-attacking as someone strange watches them from the trees. It's green eyes staring at them, he breathes heavily and makes his way through the trees. It's skin looks scaly. The boys do not notice it as it walks out towards the lawn quietly. The older one hears it and looks in the general direction. The younger one does the same, then splashes the older brother. This incites the older brother to splash back, and they continue playing. The strange being swims into the pool and slowly approaches them underwater. He jumps out, screaming. The boys scream back. The younger one splashes the man lightly as he picks the boy up playfully.)

Oh, Dad, cut it out.

OLDER GLAZEBROOK SON: Beautiful, Dad.

JERALD GLAZEBROOK: Quit picking on your brother. Remember he loves you!

YOUNGER GLAZEBROOK SON: No, I don't!

OLDER GLAZEBROOK SON: We're glad you're back home, Dad.

JERALD GLAZEBROOK: Ah, not as glad as I am.

OLDER GLAZEBROOK SON: Did you see a lot of weird stuff this year?

JERALD GLAZEBROOK: Yup, it was the weirdest show ever. But right now, your mother thinks you guys are getting ready for bed and if she comes out here and finds you guys still in the pool, she's going to kill me. So come on, out of the pool.

(He puts his youngest son down. The boys moan and whine. In the forest, something else is watching them.)

YOUNGER GLAZEBROOK SON: Awww...

OLDER GLAZEBROOK SON: Awwww, Dad...

JERALD GLAZEBROOK: Quit your whining. Come on or no bedtime story. Out you go, that's it.

(The thing in the trees is more of a monster than the Alligator-Skinned Man, weezing as it breathes. It winces constantly and it's face is bloodied naturally. The boys start back to the house.)

OLDER GLAZEBROOK SON: Come on, Dad, there's no school tomorrow...

(Jerald floats on his back a little, shooting water up into the air with his mouth. The thing watches and makes it's way into the pool. It approaches Jerald and he stands, looking at it.)

JERALD GLAZEBROOK: What the hell?

(It screeches and bites into Jerald's side. It repeatedly does so as Glazebrook screams with each bite. It rips through the skin and Jerald holds himself up on the ladder as blood pours out into the pool. It screams and snarls in victory.)

SCENE 2
X-FILES OFFICE; FBI HEADQUARTERS; WASHINGTON, D.C.

(Mulder hands Scully a picture of Glazebrook's face.)

SCULLY: What happened to him?

MULDER: Nothing you can ascertain from that photograph. The victim suffered from ichthyosis, a congenital skin disease characterized by the shedding of the epidermis in the form of scales.

(He hands her another picture of a large wound in the side of Glazebrook.)

This shows the entry wound of the undetermined weapon. There were no other injuries inflicted upon the body, no internal organs removed and/or cannibalized, and there's no signs of sexual molestation either.

(He stands.)

That's forty-eight attacks over the last twenty-eight years. Occurring in every state in the continental U.S. almost, the first in Oregon and the last five in Florida.

(He shows pictures of various people with the same wounds.)

The victims range from all different age groups, races, both male and female. The mutilations appear so motiveless that one would suspect some form of ritual yet they adhere to no known cult. A lone serial killer would have been expected to escalate the level of violence of his attacks over such an extended period of time. So what do you think, Scully? What are your initial thoughts?

(Scully looks at the picture of Glazebrook.)

SCULLY: Imagine going through your whole life looking like this.

SCENE 3

GIBSONTON, FL

(There is a picture of Glazebrook on his coffin. There are flowers all around and the mourners sit off to the side. The priest is at the podium.)

PRIEST: "The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want. He maketh me to lie down in green pastures, he leadeth me beside the still waters. He restoreth my soul. He leadeth me in the paths of righteousness for his name's sake. Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death..."

(Scully and Mulder walk over. Sheriff Hamilton nods to them from across the way.)

"I will fear no evil for thou art with me. Thy rod and thy staff, they comfort me. Thou preparest a table before me in the presence of my enemies."

(Mulder walks past Scully in the row of seats and they sit down.)

"Thou anointest my head with oil, my cup runneth over. Surely, goodness and mercy shall follow me..."

(He turns the page with his foot, having no arms.)

"...all the days of my life, and I will dwell in the house of the lord forever." We are gathered here today to mourn the passing of Jerald Glazebrook.

(In the front row of seats, Glazebrook's wife rubs the back of her eldest son in comfort. She has a thick beard. Her younger son is seated next to the other son. Scully watches them.)

Beloved husband, father, friend and entertainer.

(Scully looks at a man in the front row as he takes out a flask and drinks from it. There is a smaller person attached to him, who has his head in the bigger man's side and is also dressed in a suit.

We mourn not only the passing who overcame the obstacles of his earthly incarnation but also the passing of the love that dwells in his all too-human heart. We mourn the passing of the admiration and the respect he instilled in his fellow colleagues.

(Scully looks in back of her at a row of other circus freaks, each deformed in some way. There is a fortune teller, a teenager and a little kid, both of whom have the same problem. Scully and the little boy smile at each other.)

We mourn the passing of the laughter and the enjoyment he brought each audience who saw him.

(Mulder slowly looks to his right and slowly looks up at the giant sitting next to him.)

For although Jerry was a world-renowned escape artist, there is one strongbox from which none of us can escape.

(The coffin starts to shake violently. Sheriff Hamilton tries to hold it down and looks to some other people.)

HAMILTON: Help...

MAN #1: I got it...

(Other men run up to the coffin and lift it up and away from the grave. A bump starts moving underneath the covering of the grave.)

WOMAN #1: Move it out of there...

WOMAN #2: Oh my lord!

(As the congregation moans and gasps, a man breaks through the covering, growling, carrying a railroad spike and a hammer.)

MAN #2: I don't believe it...

BLOCKHEAD: Having not known the deceased personally, I am in no position to perform a proper eulogy. I'm sure he was a nice guy, et cetera, et cetera. But as an admirer of the man's work, I am in a position to perform an impromptu tribute in his honor. Namely, ramming this spike into my chest!

(He does so with one quick blow, sparks flying off of the contact point. Blood coats the front of his sweater. The crowd gasps and cringes. Even Mulder and Scully flinch. The man, Doctor Blockhead, staggers around, screaming.)

MAN #3: You crazy, don't you have any respect at all?

BLOCKHEAD: I think I hit my left ventricle!

(Hamilton grabs his arm and Blockhead shoves him off.)

WOMAN #2: This is a funeral!

BLOCKHEAD: Get back, fascist!

(People start jumping at him left and right. In fact, the whole congregation starts after him.)

MAN #2: For crying out loud!

MAN #4: Get him out of here! Get him out of here!

WOMAN #3: You're awful!

(Mulder and Scully are left all alone, seated where they were. The rest of the seats are pretty much in disarray. They sit in silence for a second.)

MULDER: I can't wait for the wake.

SCENE 4
PHIL'S DINER

(Mulder, Scully and Hamilton are sitting at a table.)

MULDER: On his vicap form, Jerald Glazebrook's occupation is listed as artist.

HAMILTON: Jerry was an artist... the best escape artist since Houdini. He should have been headlining Vegas but his skin condition kept him on the sideshow circuit.

SCULLY: I guess I didn't realize that sideshows were still in existence.

HAMILTON: There are about two or three of them still around.

MULDER: I got the impression that Glazebrook wasn't the only sideshow performer residing here.

HAMILTON: The town was founded back in the 20s when some of Barnum and Bailey's troops started coming down here during the winter off-season.

SCULLY: You know, this town's history might help explain our case's history. A sideshow performer would have toured much of the country over the years. And their isolation from everyday society caused by their physical deformities could have built up pathological resentments so intense that murder might be...

HAMILTON: Now, now, hold on a second. Around here, we refer to them as "very special people." Now, some of them may be different on the outside but it's what's inside that counts. And on the inside, they're as normal as anybody.

SCULLY: Until their arrests, many serial killers are considered by their friends and family to be quite "normal." If you truly regard these people as normal, then you must also consider the possibility that they are capable of committing these crimes.

HAMILTON: It's just been my experience that many people have a harder time accepting these people's deformities than they do themselves.

(Mulder opens up the menu and looks at a picture.)

MULDER: Sheriff, what is this? This design here, it's, uh, copyrighted by Hepcat Helm.

(He points to a picture of a monkey with a mermaid's tail, then at the copyright logo.)

Is that a local artist?

(Hamilton chuckles.)

HAMILTON: A bit too local. His workplace is right behind my station house.

MULDER: Do you think that we could meet Hep... cat?

SCENE 5
HEPCAT HELM'S WORKSHOP

(A grotesque rubber head sits on a pike as Screamin' Jay Hawkins' song, "Frenzy", plays loudly. Hepcat Helm is sitting at his desk painting as Hamilton walks in, followed by the agents.)

HAMILTON: Hepcat! Hepcat!

(Hepcat looks at them, then turns down the music.)

HEPCAT HELM: Who are the rubes?

HAMILTON: These are F.B.I. Agents Scully and Mulder. This is Hepcat Helm. He operates a carnival funhouse.

HEPCAT HELM: Oh man, how many times have I told you not to call it that?

(He throws down the handkerchief and goes over to them and looks at Mulder.)

It's not some rinky-dink carny-ride. People go through it, they don't have fun. They get the hell scared out of them. It's not a funhouse, it's a tabernacle of terror.

(Hamilton looks over at Mulder.)

HAMILTON: It's a funhouse.

(Mulder takes out the menu and shows the picture to Hepcat.)

MULDER: Mister Helm, I wanted to ask you about this menu illustration. I recognized most of the historical portraits you've drawn here, but what's this here?

(Scully rolls her eyes at the words "historical portraits.")

HEPCAT HELM: It's the Feejee Mermaid.

(He walks back to his desk carrying the menu.)

HAMILTON: Is that what that thing is?

SCULLY: What's the Feejee Mermaid?

HEPCAT HELM: The Feejee Mermaid. It's, it's the Feejee Mermaid!

HAMILTON: It's a bit of, uh... humbug Barnum pulled in the last century.

HEPCAT HELM: Barnum billed it as a real live mermaid but when people went into see it, all they saw was a real dead monkey sewn on the tail of a fish.

(Mulder walks over to him.)

MULDER: A monkey?

HEPCAT HELM: A mummified monkey.

HAMILTON: It supposedly looked so bad, he had to exhibit it as a "genuine fake."

HEPCAT HELM: Oh, but see? That's why Barnum was a genius. You never know where the truth ends and the humbug begins. He came right out and said, "This Feejee Mermaid thing is just a bunch of B.S." That just made people want to go and see it even more. So, I mean... who knows? Maybe for box office reasons, Barnum hocked it as a hoax... when in reality...

MULDER: The Feejee Mermaid was a reality.

(Hepcat exhales loudly and shrugs. Mulder walks back over to Hamilton.)

Sheriff, we're going to need to find a place to stay tonight.

HAMILTON: There are lodgings right across the way, but, uh... what's all this about?

(Mulder takes out a picture of a long row of small footprints in the sand heading towards a rock pile.)

MULDER: These tracks were found at several of the past few crime scenes. They've defied exact identification but one expert speculated that they might be simian in nature.

HAMILTON: You don't mean to tell me you think these tracks were made by the Feejee Mermaid?

SCULLY: Do you recall what Barnum said about suckers?

(She nods slightly towards Mulder.)

SCENE 6
GULF BREEZE TRAILER COURT

(The proprietor, Mister Nutt, is a midget. He climbs up a small stepladder and puts it down on the desk in front of the two agents. Nutt's dog sits on the counter.)

MULDER: Tell me, have you done much circus work in your life?

NUTT: And what makes you think I've ever spectated a circus, much less been enslaved by one?

MULDER: I know that many of the citizens here are former circus hands and I just thought that maybe you would have done...

NUTT: You thought that because I am a person of short stature that the only career I could procure for myself would be one confined to the so-called "big top." You took one quick look at me and decided that you could deduce my entire life.

(Mulder shakes his head a little. The dog whimpers as Nutt starts around to the area in shelf in back of the desk.)

Never would it have occurred to you that a person of my height could have possibly obtained a degree in hotel management.

(He holds up his degree.)

MULDER: I'm sorry, I meant no offense.

(Nutt walks back up to the desk.)

NUTT: Well, then why should I take offense? Just because it's human nature to make instantaneous judgments of others based solely upon their physical appearances? Why, I've done the same thing to you, for example. I've taken in your all-American features, your dour demeanor, your unimaginative necktie design...

(Mulder looks down at his tie.)

...and concluded that you work for the government. An F.B.I. agent.

(Mulder looks at Scully, who arches her eyebrows in surprise.)

But do you see the tragedy here? I have mistakenly reduced you to a stereotype. A caricature. Instead of regarding you as a specific, unique individual.

MULDER: But I am an F.B.I. agent.

(He holds up his badge. The dog whimpers some more. Nutt smirks a little and takes out another paper.)

NUTT: Register here, please.

(He rings the bell. Mulder and Scully are led by their trailers by the bellhop, a man named Lanny. He is the man with the smaller twin that has the twin's head inside of his chest at the funeral. He is also carrying their bags.)

MULDER: Tell me, have you done much circus work in your life?

LANNY: I was on the stage for most of my life. I was a headliner.

SCULLY: Did it not bother you to have other people staring at you?

LANNY: Best work I ever had. All I had to do was stand there. Occasionally, I'd say...

(He stops and stands tall as if on stage. They watch him.)

"Ladies and gentlemen, I'd like you to meet my brother Leonard."

(He pauses.)

"Excuse him, he's a little shy." Big laughs, I tell you, big laughs.

(They start to walk again.)

MULDER: Why'd you give it up?

LANNY: Mister Nutt, the kindhearted manager here, convinced me that to make a living by publicly displaying my deformity lacked dignity... so now I carry other people's luggage.

(They come to a set of trailers.)

I believe these are your trailers. If they are not, then I am wrong.

(Mulder takes the suitcases from him.)

Oh, that's most considerate. Thank you very much.

(They shake hands and Lanny starts off.)

Good night. Sleep tight. Don't let the bedbugs bite.

(He turns back in a worried manner. I walks back hurriedly, unscrewing his flask.)

No, no! That, that's not what I meant. I, I didn't mean to imply we had bedbugs. I, I meant to say, "Don't let... don't let the..."

MULDER: The Feejee Mermaids bite.

(Lanny tips his flask to him.)

LANNY: Yes, that's right, the Fee, the Feejee Mermaids. Don't, that's right, that's...

(He takes a sip from his flask and starts off.)

That, that's exactly... the Feejee Mermaids bite...

SCULLY: Mulder, what is this Feejee Mermaid business?

MULDER: Every murder investigation begins with a list of possible suspects. You should try not to be so exclusive, Scully.

(He hands her her suitcase.)

SCULLY: As long as you try not to let the atmosphere of this town distort your list all out of proportion.

(They stare at each other.)

SCENE 7
HEPCAT HELM'S WORKSHOP

(Hepcat Helm is listening to the same song as before, playing it extremely loud. He is painting a mask for his funhouse, then he walks over to a desk under the window and wipes off his hands. He takes an instrument and goes over to another sculpture, this one made mostly of glass. Reflected in the glass, in the window behind him, is the small monster slowly crawling in through the window. Helm stands up and the monster is gone. He goes to work on another part and sees the small monster crawling towards him in another reflection, looking blurred and distorted. He turns around and looks at it.)

HEPCAT HELM: What the hell?

(It pounces, it's grotesque face flying at it. Blood splatters over the menu as it pries it's jaws into his neck. There is a gash in his head.)

SCENE 8
GULF BREEZE TRAILER COURT

(Mulder is going for his morning jog. He stops in the road, trying to catch his air, and hears some splashing in the lake next to the road. Looking over, he sees a half-naked man coming out of the water, wearing only a loincloth. He has a tattoo of a puzzle all over his body, some of the pieces painted blue, mostly around the head and shoulder regions. He crouches down and starts eating the fish as Mulder watches intently. The strange man looks over at Mulder and throws down the fish, then starts off towards the forest.)

SCENE 9
SCULLY'S TRAILER

(The time is 7:15. Scully's eyes flicker open. Birds chirp outside as she looks out the window. She closes her eyes for a second and looks back outside, still laying down. A man seemingly falls off her roof. She sits up and sees that there is actually a men bouncing on a trampoline outside her window while another two people watch. In the background, people are performing various stunts. There is a frantic pounding on the door. She loosely puts on her robe and opens the door. Lanny stands there, his robe also loosely tied on.)

LANNY: Uh, ma'am... sheriff, he, uh... wants to see you.

(Leonard is exposed out of Lanny's stomach. Scully can't help but stare at him. Lanny, meanwhile, has his eyes on her cleavage, which is partly exposed. They both slowly look at each other, then look down at their objects of interest, then tie their robes up tighter.)

There's been another murder.

SCENE 10
HEPCAT HELM'S WORKSHOP

(Hamilton is standing over Helm's body, writing down notes on his pad. Scully is kneeling over Helm. Mulder is looking at the window. There is a streak of blood on it.)

WOMAN ON APB WIRE: Unit Thirteen, man down...

MULDER: Hey, Scully, there's some blood on the window here we should send to the lab.

SCULLY: Why run a test on the victim's blood?

MULDER: No, not this window.

(He walks over to the adjacent window as she stands.)

This window. This seems to be the point of entry and there's a... smear of blood on the outside of the window.

(He takes off some blood from a streak on the outside of the window with his finger.)

SCULLY: Why would there be blood before the attack?

HAMILTON: Why didn't the attacker just come through the open door? For a person to crawl in and out of these windows, they'd have to be a contortionist... or just plain crazy. Or both.

SCENE 11
GULF BREEZE TRAILER COURT

(Doctor Blockhead is suspended over a vat of hot water in a straitjacket, grunting and groaning. He starts unbuckling the straps when Mulder and Scully walk over.)

MULDER: While they're performing the autopsy, I want to go down to the...

(Mulder and Scully watch from a short distance as he frees himself. He throws off the straitjacket, takes the key and looks at the agents.)

BLOCKHEAD: How many people do you know that can get out of a straitjacket in under three minutes?

SCULLY: Fortunately, none.

MULDER: We caught your act yesterday at the funeral. That was some trick with the railroad spike.

(Blockhead unlocks his restraints and jumps down.)

BLOCKHEAD: Doctor Blockhead does not perform "tricks."

(He walks over to a toolbox and opens it up. He takes out a hammer and a nail. There are a number of skull pins next to the nails. Mulder and Scully walk over to him.)

Doctor Blockhead performs "astounding acts of body manipulation and pain endurance."

(He puts the nail in his left nostril and begins tapping it into his head as Mulder and Scully watch on in horror and awe.)

SCULLY: You must be one of those rare individuals whose... nerve endings don't register pain.

(He puts the hammer down and pulls out a pair of pliers.)

BLOCKHEAD: You just keep telling yourself that.

MULDER: Have you ever performed this tr, uh, act on anyone else?

BLOCKHEAD: What, are you sick? I tell my audiences that if they're stupid enough to try this themselves, they'll end up with a slight lobotomy. I am a professional.

MULDER: Exactly how does one become a professional blockhead? May I?

(He takes the pliers and starts to pull the nail out from Blockhead's head.)

BLOCKHEAD: Starting in my homeland of Yemen, I studied with yogis, fakirs and swamis, learning the ancient arts of body manipulation.

(Scully and Mulder grimace all through Blockhead's speaking as he slowly pulls out the nail. Mulder looks at the bloody nail.)

But most men know nothing of these arts. For instance, did you know that through the protective Chinese practice of Tiea Bu Shan, you can train your testicles to draw up into your abdomen?

MULDER: Oh, I'm doing that as we speak.

(The Conundrum pops out of the vat, gasping for air. They all look at him in shock.)

I saw him this morning down by the river, he was eating a fish.

BLOCKHEAD: He knows between-show snacks will ruin his appetite.

(He rubs the Conundrum's bald head.)

MULDER: I could be mistaken. Maybe it was another bald-headed, jigsaw-puzzle-tattooed, naked guy I saw.

SCULLY: Is this... man also a body manipulator?

BLOCKHEAD: No. In the classical sense, the Conundrum's a geek.

MULDER: He eats live animals.

BLOCKHEAD: He eats anything... live animals, dead animals, rocks, light bulbs, corkscrews, battery cables, cranberries...

SCULLY: Human flesh?

BLOCKHEAD: Only the Conundrum can answer that question. But he doesn't answer questions, he merely... poses them.

(He takes out a jar of crickets.)

When an audience partakes in the Conundrum's human piranha act, they are left to ask themselves...

(He pours out some crickets onto the Conundrum's head, who eats them joyously.)

"Why." But... where are my manners?

(He holds out the jar to the agents.)

SCULLY: Thank you.

(She takes a cricket, puts it in her mouth, smiles and walks away. Mulder looks at her, then at the crickets, and leaves. He catches up to Scully, and watches her in disbelief. She smiles, reaches behind Mulder's ear, and "pulls out" the live cricket.)

It's an old sleight of hand my uncle once taught me. He was only an amateur magician, but he was still better than those two.

MULDER: Well, I'm going over to the lab to see if they can test the blood on the window against the blood on Doctor Blockhead's nail.

(He holds out his hand, then moves it in a clockwise direction. When he finishes the circle, he is holding out the nail. He starts off.)

Everybody's uncle is an amateur magician.

SCENE 12
GIBSONTON MUSEUM OF CURIOSITIES
3:14 PM

(Scully walks into the old cabin. The bell rings as the door opens. There is a sign next to a pot that says "Freaks Free; Others Please Leave Donation." Scully walks over to it, puts a bill in, and starts looking around. She looks at a picture of siamese twins. Passing various strange things in jars, she picks up another picture of the siamese twins. They are named Chang and Eng. The curator walks out behind her. His face is disfigured and is reflected in a small mirror.)

CURATOR: Welcome to my museum. May I put to rest any questions you may have conjured?

SCULLY: I was just reading about the fascinating life of Chang and Eng and wondering if their death was just as fascinating.

CURATOR: Oh, very much so. On a cold January eve in 1874, Eng awoke to find his brother had passed away during the course of the night. A few hours later, Eng himself departed from this world. Now, these facts themselves may be less than fascinating but imagine... imagine being Eng and lying there.

(He puts his disfigured hand on her shoulder.)

Knowing that essentially half your body was now dead... that the rest must inevitably follow... and being able to do about it absolutely nothing. At the autopsy, it was officially concluded that Chang died of a cerebral hemorrhage.

SCULLY: And what was the official cause of Eng's death?

CURATOR: Fright.

(He smiles and starts to walk away.)

SCULLY: Do you have any information on blockhead or geek acts?

(They walk into another room.)

CURATOR: This is a historical collection of human curiosities. Blockheads are skilled performers.

SCULLY: Like magicians?

CURATOR: Like sword swallowers who really do swallow swords. And geeks are neither skilled nor curiosities. They're merely unseemly... not even attaining the level of "gaffs."

SCULLY: "Gaffs?"

(The curator takes a picture of two siamese twins who look very different.)

CURATOR: Observe closely the dissimilarity of the facial features. Conjoined twins are always identical. These twins are phonies... gaffs.

SCULLY: Sort of like the Feejee Mermaid?

(He laughs and puts the picture down.)

CURATOR: You're investigating the Alligator Man's murder, yes? I have something I believe you might find of some interest.

(He hands her a picture of "Jim-Jim, the Dog-Faced Boy.")

SCULLY: What does this have to do with the Glazebrook murder?

CURATOR: I've recently come into possession of an authentic P.T. Barnum exhibit. Now, I don't show this display to all my customers... only those with the intellectual curiosity to appreciate it.

(He walks over to a door behind Scully.)

Barnum billed it as "the great unknown."

(He opens the door. Scully is about to enter, but he stops her.)

I must first ask of you two favors. Tell no soul what you witness in here.

SCULLY: And the second favor?

CURATOR: An additional donation of five dollars.

(She hands him five dollars and steps inside the dark room. He locks the door behind her. She walks over to the only object in the room, a trunk cast in a spotlight. She tentatively opens the trunk to find... nothing. A door swings open to her left with an "Exit" sign above it. A buzzer goes off and she looks down at the trunk, smiling slightly at having been duped.)

SCENE 13
SCULLY'S TRAILER

(Mulder hears a clanking and a groaning underneath the trailer. He looks under and sees a small figure moving around. He walks over to where the small figure is, unhooking his holster. He kneels down and Mister Nutt crawls out.)

MULDER: Does Agent Scully know that you're under her crawlspace?

NUTT: I was merely repairing the plumbing on this unit. I know what you're thinking, my friend, but you are grossly mistaken.

(He and Mulder stand.)

Just because I am not of so-called "average" height does not mean I must receive my thrills vicariously. Not all woman are attracted to overly tall, lanky men such as yourself. You'd be surprised how many women find my size intriguingly alluring.

MULDER: And you'd be surprised how many men do as well.

(Nutt, offended and disgusted, walks off. Mulder looks at his footprints. Scully steps out of her trailer.)

SCULLY: Oh, it's you. Is Mister Nutt finished with the plumbing?

(Inside, Mulder and Scully sit across from each other.)

MULDER: The blood from the window matched the blood from the nail but they were both O-positive. They've been sent for further analysis. I ran a background check on Doctor Blockhead. His real name is Jeffrey Swaim and he wasn't born in Yemen, he was born in Milwaukee. He does not hold a doctorate.

SCULLY: Well, I ended up running a bit of a background check myself.

MULDER: On who?

(She flips open a folder.)

SCULLY: On an orphan discovered in the wild forest of Albania in 1943. "Although physically adept at catching his own food, he could not speak a word, save for a few savage grunts. Brought to this country, he was exhibited behind a locked cage, necessitated by his feral ferocity, where he would terrify onlookers by devouring chunks of raw meat." However, for reasons I could not ascertain, he ran away from the circus and spent a vague number of years mysteriously roaming about, supporting himself through a number of non-descript jobs. Eventually, he wound up in Gibsonton, where he took up a career in law enforcement and has spent the past four terms serving as sheriff.

MULDER: You're talking about Sheriff Hamilton?

SCULLY: I'm telling you that before becoming Sheriff Hamilton, James Hamilton was Jim-Jim, the Dog-Faced Boy.

(She hands him the picture given to her by the curator.)

SCENE 14
SHERIFF HAMILTON'S HOUSE

(Sheriff Hamilton is digging a hole in the front yard with a shovel. Scully and Mulder are in the bushes watching him. Hamilton looks up at the full moon, then cuts something, rubs it on his hand and throws it into the hole. He recovers the hole and walks inside. Mulder and Scully wait until he is gone, then walk over to the hole and start to uncover it. Mulder is using a shovel while Scully is playing look-out. Mulder stops and they whisper to each other.)

MULDER: You know, Scully, hypertricosis does not connote lycanthropy.

SCULLY: What are you implying?

MULDER: We're being highly discriminatory here. Just because a man was once inflicted with excessive hairiness, we've no reason to suspect him of aberrant behavior.

SCULLY: It's like assuming guilt based solely on skin color, isn't it?

MULDER: Yeah.

(They look at each other, then kneel down and start digging with their hands. Mulder takes out a napkin and puts the object in it. Hamilton walks out and shines a flashlight on them.)

HAMILTON: May I ask what you're doing?

MULDER: We're exhuming... your potato.

(He holds up the napkin with the sliced potato that Hamilton buried and they unearthed.)

HAMILTON: May I ask why?

(They stand.)

SCULLY: Sheriff, it, it's, it's been documented that many serial killers possess a fascination with police work, some of them even holding positions on their local force... so surveillance of investigation team members is often utilized as a precautionary...

MULDER: We found out you used to be the Dog-Faced Boy.

(He hands Hamilton the advertisement of the Dog-Faced Boy. Hamilton looks at it and smiles.)

HAMILTON: Boy, look how skinny I was back then.

SCULLY: So that is you.

HAMILTON: Oh, sure. I spent the first half of my life as Jim-Jim. Then one morning I noticed a bald spot on top of my head and realized I was not only losing my hair but my career as well. Eventually all the hair went... on top of my head, anyways. The rest of my body is still pretty hairy, which is why I never go to the beach.

SCULLY: That doesn't quite explain the potato.

HAMILTON: I got, uh... some warts on my hand.

MULDER: That doesn't quite explain the potato.

HAMILTON: To get rid of warts, you rub a sliced potato on your hand and bury it under a full moon.

(Mulder and Scully look embarrassed.)

Investigation isn't going too well, is it?

(Mulder throws the potato back in the hole.)

SCENE 15
TRAILER PARK

(The Conundrum walks along, a piece of paper in his shorts. The manager's dog starts barking at him, and he runs after it. After chasing it for a while, the dog runs into his doggy-door and the Conundrum slides after it, just missing it. Mister Nutt opens the door and looks at him. The Conundrum stands, ashamed, and hands him the paper with one of Blockhead's skull pins in it. Nutt looks at it, and it is a check with the name "The Conundrum" at the top. Nutt closes the door.)

NUTT: So, tell me, Commodore... why are the weirdos the only ones that pay their rent checks in advance?

(He walks away, but the dog continues growling and barking at the door.)

I warn you, you tattooed cretin, I have a licensed firearm and I'm more than eager for an opportunity to use it!

(He goes to open the door when the mutant's hand reaches out and grabs his ankle. He screams as he falls to the ground. The thing pulls his foot through the door and starts trying to pull Nutt through as he looks on in horror. He finally kicks it away and crawls back in. The mutant shoves it's head through the door, screaming. Nutt screams as well.)

SCENE 16

(A man with bloody hands unlocks the door and walks in, waking Scully up. She sits up in bed, pointing her gun. Lanny puts his bloody hands on her shoulders.)

LANNY: I found him. He's dead. He's dead...

(She looks at him, confused.)

SCENE 17
MISTER NUTT'S TRAILER

(Hamilton points out the blood on the outside of the doggy-door to Scully)

HAMILTON: Lanny says all of the doors and windows were locked from the inside.

(Inside, Mulder is looking at Nutt's body. Lanny is also there, standing of to the side in his robe.)

MULDER: Scully, come here!

LANNY: He was like a brother to me...

(Hamilton puts his hand on Lanny's shoulder. Scully kneels down next to Mulder.)

MULDER: I don't know if a contortionist can get through that doggy-door, Scully, but look at this...

(He shows her the skull pin, which is in Nutt's hand. Lanny starts screaming and banging on the door. Hamilton grabs him and turns him around.)

HAMILTON: Lanny! Lanny! Take it easy. You're going to hurt yourself.

LANNY: So what?

HAMILTON: So you might hurt me in the process.

(Scully looks a little disappointed. Lanny hugs Hamilton, who looks at the agents.)

He gets this way sometimes. I'll have to toss him in the drunk tank.

MULDER: We'll take Jeffrey Swaim into custody.

HAMILTON: C'mon, Lanny, let's go...

(They walk out. Mulder stands up and walks to the door.)

SCULLY: You know, Mulder...

(She stands.)

For a while there, I was beginning to suspect this case involved something a bit more, um...

MULDER: Freakish?

(She shrugs a little and nods, kind of like an embarrassed "yes.")

You really shouldn't complain about banality, Scully, when your main suspect is the human blockhead.

(He smiles and starts out.)

SCENE 18
DOCTOR BLOCKHEAD'S TRAILER

(Doctor Blockhead has attached hundreds of hooks into his chest. All of the hooks have ropes on them. He is adjusting them, sitting on a bed of nails when there is a knock on the door.)

BLOCKHEAD: It's open!

(Scully walks in, showing her badge, followed by Mulder.)

SCULLY: Mister Swaim, federal agents, we're here to qu...

(She stops, looking at him.)

BLOCKHEAD: It's a variation of an American Indian sun dance ritual. I suspend myself by these hooks and the pain becomes so unbearable I leave my body. If people knew the true price of spirituality, there'd be more atheists.

SCULLY: Mister Swaim, we're here to take you into custody to question you about some recent murders.

BLOCKHEAD: I don't answer any questions until I talk to my lawyer.

MULDER: Who's your lawyer?

BLOCKHEAD: I represent myself.

(Scully grabs his arm.)

SCULLY: Sir, if you're going to be uncooperative, I'll have to handcuff you.

BLOCKHEAD: What gives you fascists the right to do that?

(Scully stands him up and handcuffs him.)

SCULLY: Did I not mention we're federal agents?

BLOCKHEAD: Did I not mention I'm an escape artist?

(He throws off the handcuffs, puts them on Scully, pushes her into Mulder and runs out the door. Mulder, despite trying to stop his fall, falls onto the bed of nails.)

SCULLY: Mulder, are you okay?

MULDER: It's more comfortable than a futon.

(The door swings open and Sheriff Hamilton stands there, holding Blockhead by the roped hooks.)

HAMILTON: Hey... look what I caught.

(He gives the ropes a little tug.)

BLOCKHEAD: Ouch!

SCENE 19
POLICE STATION

(In the drunk tank, Lanny moans and groans. He has blood on his hands still, and his eyes open when he ears a slithering sound. He looks onto the ceiling and sees something horrific.)

LANNY: What the hell?

(The thing on the ceiling squeals happily as it crawls to the window. Lanny screams.)

No! No!

(Hamilton leads Blockhead into the station by the arm. Mulder and Scully follow quickly.)

BLOCKHEAD: This has all the makings of one of those mistaken identity, miscarriage of justice things that prove so popular on Sixty Minutes.

(Hamilton sits him down. Mulder holds up a bag containing the skull pin. Hamilton sits at his desk.)

MULDER: Does this belong to you?

BLOCKHEAD: The fifth amendment of our beloved constitution says...

(He stops and everyone turns when they hear a high-pitched moaning.)

MULDER: What is that?

HAMILTON: It's Lanny in the drunk tank. He'll be all right once he sleeps it off.

(Scully is looking down the hallway at Lanny.)

SCULLY: No, I don't think he's going to sleep this one off.

(They all run over to Lanny's cell, including Blockhead, who is led by Mulder. They look at Lanny, who looks dead, blood on his hands. There is blood on the wall underneath the window.)

MULDER: There's been another attack.

HAMILTON: How could anyone have gotten in there?

SCULLY: No one got in, but some one got out.

(Lanny moans. Hamilton unlocks the door.)

MULDER: What are you talking about?

SCULLY: I'm not sure myself, Mulder, but I think we'll know more when we find Leonard.

MULDER: Leonard?

SCULLY: Lanny's brother.

(The agents walk in, followed by the others. Scully rolls Lanny over and pulls his robe away to reveal that Leonard is gone and there is a wound where he once was.)

HAMILTON: Oh, God, they extracted the twin.

SCULLY: No, the twin extracted itself.

(Mulder kneels down and looks at the wound.)

MULDER: But it's an appendage...

SCULLY: Yeah, Mulder... this wound is identical to the other victims' wounds. With one exception. He's not bleeding.

(Mulder stands.)

HAMILTON: If you're trying to tell me his twin brother can crawl out of his body and then go gallivant around town, you're as drunk as he is.

(Scully stands up.)

SCULLY: You said it yourself, Sheriff. It's what's inside that counts. I have a feeling that Lanny has an internal anomaly that allows his conjoining twin to disjoin

MULDER: But, how? H-how...

LANNY: How could I turn him in without turning myself in?

SCULLY: Lanny, why does he attack other people?

LANNY: I don't think he knows he's harming anyone. He's merely seeking... another brother.

(He moans, almost crying.)

HAMILTON: Are you in pain, Lanny?

(Lanny sits up.)

LANNY: It hurts. It hurts not to be wanted. I don't know why he hates me so. I've taken care of him for all of our lives. Maybe that is the reason why.

SCULLY: How long can he survive outside of your body?

LANNY: Long enough... to understand that you cannot change the way you were born. Don't worry. He'll come back. He always does. I'm still his only brother.

(Lanny lays back down.)

MULDER: Sheriff, we're going to need the paramedics.

(Hamilton runs off.)

Scully, you're the medical expert. If you think the twin can disengage, I believe you but how mobile could such a thing be?

(Scully looks out the window and sees a small figure crawl along the ground quickly. The gate in the back swings open.)

SCULLY: Too mobile.

(Scully looks at him and runs out. Mulder follows. Blockhead looks at Lanny.)

BLOCKHEAD: So your twin can, uh...

(He makes a "going out" motion.)

And then...

(He makes a "coming in" motion. Lanny nods.)

What an act!

(Scully and Mulder run out of the gate to the nearest building, which is large and brown. They hear a snarling growl.)

SCULLY: I'll cover the back.

(She runs off and Mulder runs up the steps. He flicks the switch next to the door and the generator turns on. Taking out his gun, he opens the door and begins walking down the dark hallway. He peeks around the corner and sees Leonard crawl backwards down the adjacent hallway away from Mulder. Mulder aims his gun, but is too late. He runs that way and turns the corner. He runs down the next hallway. Turning the corner, he finds a dead end. He pushes against it, then heads back. Scully hears another growl then some footsteps. She turns the corner and points her gun.)

Freeze!

(A rumbling starts and a suspended mannequin with a head similar to Leonard's comes flying at her on a rope from the ceiling and stops, cackling and making strange noises.)

The funhouse.

(Mulder turns another corner and finds another dead end. He hears a growl and sees Leonard crawling away again. He runs down that hallway and quickly turns the corner, slamming into a wall. He staggers into the adjacent wall, which spins around, taking Mulder with it. Scully walks into the hall of mirrors. Everywhere around her, there are Scullys. She hears another growl and turns to see Leonard on the ground. She fires at him but only ends up breaking the mirror that reflected him. She looks at the shards and sees Leonard is nowhere around. She starts walking down a hallway and bumps into a mirror. Turning left, she walks down another hallway and Mulder slides out of a shaft in front of her. She instinctively points her gun, but steps back when she sees who it is.)

MULDER: I thought I heard a shot fired.

SCULLY: I think we better go outside and catch this thing coming out.

(She steps over Mulder and walks down the hallway. The agents run out and see Leonard crawling into the woods. They run down the road and point their guns at another small figure. The figure starts barking and they lower their guns.)

It's the manager's dog.

MULDER: The trailer park.

(The dog leads them through the forest.)

SCENE 20
CONUNDRUM'S TRAILER

(The Conundrum steps out of his trailer, carrying a garbage bag. He puts it in the can as Leonard sneaks up behind him. He turns and screams as the mutant jumps onto him and starts biting. Mulder and Scully run into the park, hearing screaming and shrieking. They come to the Conundrum's trailer and see him lying on the ground, looking a little bloated. They kneel down next to him.)

SCULLY: Are you all right?

MULDER: Have you seen a, uh... uh...

(He tries to show how big it is, but runs off in frustration, not expecting an answer. Scully runs off as well. The Conundrum looks at his stomach and rubs it as it gurgles contentedly.

SCENE 21
GULF BREEZE TRAILER COURT

(In the morning, the sheriff is talking to a deputy. Scully is walking slowly towards the middle of the camp.)

HAMILTON: Uh, check out the area behind that trailer. Let me know what you find.

(The deputy walks off and Hamilton turns to Scully.)

Now, you're sure it was the twin you saw running around here. I mean, maybe it was the Fiji Mermaid and he jumped back in the river and swum his way back to Fiji.

(Hamilton walks away as Mulder walks up to her.)

MULDER: Now you know how I feel.

(Mulder keeps walking. Scully walks up to Doctor Blockhead, who is tying various pieces of junk to the roof of his car. The Conundrum gets into the front seat.)

SCULLY: You're taking off?

BLOCKHEAD: With that thing still on the loose?

SCULLY: They've been searching for it all day. It can't have sustained itself for this long.

BLOCKHEAD: It will probably try to crawl back up into it's brother.

SCULLY: No, his brother Lanny died last night. I already performed the autopsy on him this morning.

(Blockhead throws the rope over and walks around the car.)

BLOCKHEAD: So, I guess it's true, you can never go home again.

SCULLY: His body wounds were non-fatal. He died as a result of advanced cirrhosis of the liver.

(Blockhead starts tying things on this side.)

BLOCKHEAD: Oh, there's a moral to the story. Lay off the booze.

SCULLY: Well, his body possesses some anatomical discrepancies... some offshoots of the esophagus and trachea that almost seem umbilical in nature and... I've never seen anything like it.

(Blockhead finishes tying.)

BLOCKHEAD: And you never will again. Twenty-first century genetic engineering will not only eradicate the siamese twins and the alligator-skinned people, but you're going to be hard-pressed to find, uh, a slight overbite or a not-so-high cheek bone. You see, I've seen the future and the future looks just like him.

(He points at Mulder, who is standing in front of a trailer in a classic model pose. Hands on his hips, one foot up on the step, looking off into the distance.)

Imagine going through your whole life looking like that. That's why it's left up to the self-made freaks like me and the Conundrum to remind people.

SCULLY: Remind people of what?

BLOCKHEAD: Nature abhors normality. It can't go very long without creating a mutant. Do you know why?

SCULLY: No, why?

BLOCKHEAD: I don't either, it's a mystery. Maybe some mysteries are never meant to be solved.

(He gets in the driver's side as Mulder walks over. He looks at the Conundrum, who looks sick.)

MULDER: What's the matter with your friend?

BLOCKHEAD: I don't know what his problem is. Maybe it's the Florida heat.

SCULLY: Hope it's nothing serious.

CONUNDRUM: Probably something I ate.

(He smiles at the agents and the two freaks drive off. Scully and Mulder watch them go, then look at each other in realization.)

[THE END]

"Død Kalm" - Episode 2x19 (videos,guide,stills,transcript)

2010-10-05T08:13:00.000-07:00

Videos
Død Kalm - Trailer

Episode guide
(Source: http://xfiles.wearehere.net/episodes/2x19.htm )

2X19 Dod Kalm

When the U.S.S. Ardent disappears off the Norwegian coast just below the 65th parallel, an area Mulder refers to as the second Bermuda Triangle, where nine other vessels have disappeared since 1949. Mulder arranges for Scully with her medical background to gain access to the sole survivor Lieutenant Richard Harper at the Bethsheda Naval Hospital in Maryland. Scully is surprised to find that the 28 year old Harper is a wrinkly grey haired old man. Mulder believes it has something to do with the Philadelphia Experiment during World War II, a government project to render ships invisible to radar, which Mulder claims used technology recovered from the infamous Roswell Incident. Mulder and Scully travel to Norway to investigate, but find it difficult to get anyone to take them out to the area. Only Henry Trondheim captain of the local trawler Zeal is willing to take them. They find the U.S.S. Ardent dead in the water, a rust covered old ship despite the fact that is was only commissioned in 1991. As they explore the ship the trawler Zeal is hijacked and sails away leaving them stranded on board. They encounter a local pirate whaler Olafssen, who seems unaffected by premature ageing. They realise his apparent immunity holds the key to the case. As Mulder and Scully begin to age rapidly Scully theorises that if the U.S.S. Ardent was drifting towards a meteorite on the ocean floor, the resulting electromagnetic energy could be exciting free-radicals, the elements believed to cause ageing.

Noteworthy Quote

Scully: "Something very strange is going on here Mulder"

Credits

Story by:	Howard Gordon
Teleplay by:	Howard Gordon
	Alex Gansa
Director:	Rob Bowman

Cast:

David Duchovny	Special Agent Fox Mulder
Gillian Anderson	Special Agent Dana Scully

Guest Cast:

John Savage	Henry Trondheim
Mar Anderson	Halverson
Dmitry Chepovetsky	Lieutenant Harper
David Cubitt	Captain Barclay
Vladamir Kulich	Olafsson
Claire Riley	Doctor Laskose
Stephen Dimopolous	Ionesco
John Mcconnach	Sailor
Bob Metcalfe	Nurse
Kelly Irving	Burke

Episode Stills

Transcript Død Kalm 2x19
(Source: http://www.insidethex.co.uk/transcrp/scrp219.htm )

SCENE 1
NORWEGIAN SEA, 65 DEGREES LATITUE,
8 DEGREES EAST LONGITUDE

(A lifeboat marked '925' hits the water and there are sounds of men preparing to abandon a ship. As some men climb down to the lifeboat, the captain confronts his lieutenant on deck. The captain appears to be in his mid-thirties, the lieutenant a few years younger.)

CAPTAIN BARCLAY: This is mutiny!

LT. HARPER: No, sir. It's survival.

CAPTAIN BARCLAY: They'll come for us! They're sending help!

LT. HARPER: By the time they get here, it'll be too late. It may already be too late.

CAPTAIN BARCLAY: Don't do this! (the captain raises a gun at the lieutenant) That's an order!

SAILOR: (from the lifeboat) Lieutenant Harper?

LT. HARPER: Shoot me if you want, Captain Barclay, but I'm not waiting around so I can wind up like the others.

(The lieutenant climbs over the rail and down to the lifeboat. The captain lowers his weapon.)

SAILOR: Cast off!

SCENE 2
18 HOURS LATER

(On board the Lisette, the captain and his first mate are playing blackjack on the bridge.)

LISETTE CAPTAIN: Hit me.

(The radar blips. They check the radar screen and see the echo of a boat straight ahead.)

LISETTE FIRST MATE: It looks like she's just drifting out there.

LISETTE CAPTAIN: Mmmm ... we're heading straight for her. (to radio) This is the Lisette, Canadian fishing vessel CV233, please identify. (no response) This is the Lisette, come in please. (still no response) (to first mate) Cut the engines and meet me up on deck.

(On deck, they search the night with a spotlight. They see a lifeboat ahead, marked '925'.)

VOICE FROM LIFEBOAT: Hello out there. Hey!

LISETTE CAPTAIN: We're throwing you a line. Grab it and we'll pull you in.

(They throw out a line, and someone in the boat catches it and anchors it to the boat. As the captain and mate pull them in, they scan the crew with the spotlight.)

LISETTE CAPTAIN: Is everybody all right? Are there any injured?

(They see a group of men, all of whom appear to be extremely old. The man in front, wearing a lieutenant's pin on his lapel, appears to be Lt. Harper.)

SCENE 3
BETHESDA NAVAL HOSPITAL, BETHESDA, MARYLAND

(Scully gets off an elevator and meets Mulder.)

MULDER: Scully. Thanks for coming.

SCULLY: What was so urgent that you couldn't tell me over the phone?

MULDER: I didn't want to waste any time. A Navy destroyer escort, the USS Ardent, has been missing in the North Atlantic for the past 42 hours.

SCULLY: Missing?

MULDER: Yeah, there's been no radio contact, no distress signals picked up. Search planes and satellites haven't picked up anything either.

SCULLY: You're saying that a ship and its entire crew just vanished?

MULDER: Well, that's what it looked like until last night. A Canadian trawler picked up 18 survivors.

SCULLY: Well, they must have reported what happened.

MULDER: Only one of those survivors is still alive. He's been taken into the ICU under heavy security.

SCULLY: What's wrong with him?

MULDER: That's what I was hoping you could tell me. (they see a soldier guarding a door at the end of the hall) They won't let me in to see him, but because of your medical background, I was able to get you a clearance code. I want your opinion on this. His name is Harper, Lt. Richard Harper.

SCULLY: Mulder, wh ...?

MULDER: Meet me back in my office when you're finished. Thank you. (he leaves)

(In the hospital room, an extremely old looking man is on a respirator and is being attended to by a nurse. Scully reads the patient's chart.)

SCULLY: Excuse me. Is this Lt. Richard Harper?

NURSE: That's what his wristband says.

SCULLY: And he's been positively identified?

NURSE: All military personnel are fingerprinted. Those records were crosschecked at the time of admittance.

SCULLY: Well, then I think there's been some kind of a mistake here. According to this report, Lt. Harper is 28 years old. (the nurse says nothing and walks away) Why hasn't a systemic workup been ordered on this patient?

(A doctor enters the room behind Scully.)

DR. LASKOS: I wasn't aware that my diagnostic decisions required your approval. I'm the physician in charge of this patient. Let me see your clearance.

(Scully hands her badge to the doctor, who looks it over.)

SCULLY: Can you tell me what's going on here? How can you explain what happened to this man?

DR. LASKOS: This clearance code is invalid. Where'd you get this? Who are you?

SCULLY: I am a medical doctor and I would like to see the autopsy reports on the remaining victims.

DR. LASKOS: I haven't got time for this. Give me my patient's chart and leave before I have you removed.

(Scully hesitates a moment, then returns the chart and exits the room.)

SCENE 4
MULDER'S OFFICE

(Mulder is examining some photos as Scully enters.)

SCULLY: Something very strange is going on here, Mulder.

MULDER: Did they let you in to see Lt. Harper?

SCULLY: Yeah, I saw somebody, but whether it was actually the Lieutenant ...

MULDER: What do you mean?

SCULLY: He looked about 90 years old. Off by about half a century. You don't seem too surprised.

MULDER: I want to show you something, Scully. (he takes her to map on the bulletin board with a number of locations marked by pins) This was the course of the USS Ardent when she disappeared. Now, I've been tracking the points of departure and destination for each of these X-files. On December 12, 1949, a Royal Navy battleship disappeared between Leeds and Cape Perry. The sea was calm, the weather sunny. In 1963, at the height of the Cuban missile crisis, a fleet of Soviet minesweepers left from here for Havana. All 6 vessels vanished without a trace. All in all, I've counted 9 unexplained disappearances. Each of them passed through here - the 65th parallel.

(He points to a circled area on the map in the Norwegian Sea where all the ships' courses intersect.)

SCULLY: Another Bermuda Triangle?

MULDER: It's more like a wrinkle in time, if Lt. Harper is any indication.

SCULLY: (frowning) A wrinkle in time? Wh ...

MULDER: You know anything about the Philadelphia Experiment?

SCULLY: It was a, uh, a program during World War II to render battleships invisible to radar. But then the Manhattan Project heated up, and it was discontinued and most of the scientists were relocated to Los Alamos.

MULDER: Except none of those scientists ever made it to Los Alamos.

SCULLY: Where were they sent?

MULDER: Roswell, New Mexico.

SCULLY: Are you suggesting that the Philadelphia Experiment used alien technology?

MULDER: Less than nine months after the alleged crash of a UFO in Roswell, New Mexico, the USS Eldridge did more than just hide from radar screens, it disappeared altogether from the Philadelphia Navy Yard only to reappear minutes later, hundreds of miles away, in Norfolk Virginia.

SCULLY: That's not possible, Mulder, not without defying all laws of, of time and space.

MULDER: Those physicists may have been trying to manipulate wormholes on Earth.

SCULLY: Wormholes?

MULDER: Actual portals where matter interfaces with time at a relatively decelerated or accelerated rate. I'm betting that the military never stopped the work it began 50 years ago.

SCULLY: And that's what you think happened to Lt. Harper?

MULDER: I'll find out soon enough. I'M BOOKED ON AN 8:30 flight to Norway.

SCULLY: Have you let Skinner in on this?

MULDER: I'm giving myself a 24-hour head start before I give Skinner my report. I want this one myself.

SCULLY: (looking back at the map) I'm going with you. If that really was Lt. Harper, I want to know what happened to him.

SCENE 5
PORT OF TILDESKAN, NORWAY

(Mulder and Scully are talking to a captain at a crowded sailors' bar. The sailor points to an area of a map and speaks Norwegian, apparently saying "no" as he walks away.)

NORWEGIAN SKIPPER/SAILOR: Nei! Nei! Det er altfor farlig [No! No! It's way too dangerous]

MULDER: 0 for 5.

SCULLY: What is it, Mulder? Why are they so afraid? My father spent the better part of his life at sea. He had a healthy respect for the ocean, but he never feared it. I see fear in these men's eyes.

(A man at a nearby table speaks up and approaches them.)

TRONDHEIM: Brooklyn couldn't have taken you up there anyway. Your ship has to be classified ice class before it can even go past the Lofoten Basin. My name is Trondheim - Henry Trondheim. The ship you want is the Zehar, a 50-ton trawler with a double hull. It's my ship.

SCULLY: You're American.

TRONDHEIM: I was born and raised in Pensacola. I ran a charter business there. I got fed up with tourists.

MULDER: How do you feel about the sea north of Beerenburg?

TRONDHEIM: This time of year, it'll be 10 hours minimum, each way.

MULDER: So you've been there?

TRONDHEIM: A few times. A few times I got some of my best hauls out of there.

SCULLY: Why is everyone else so afraid to go there?

TRONDHEIM: Well, legends. They grew up on stories.

SCULLY: What stories?

TRONDHEIM: A huge stone came out of the sky and crashed into the pack ice.

SCULLY: A meteorite?

TRONDHEIM: An evil god. They worship it by staying away. So ... exactly what is it that you're looking for up there?

MULDER: A number of things. How good are you?

TRONDHEIM: About as good as you're going to get, considering no one else will take you there.

MULDER: When can we leave?

TRONDHEIM: As soon as we shake on a price.

(Mulder nods.)

(Later, they are en route on board the Zehar. It is dark and there is a thick fog. The radar blips and Trondheim checks it, while his mate, Halverson, looks with binoculars. Scully stands beside Trondheim, while Mulder, looking queasy, emerges from the lavatory. Scully approaches him.)

SCULLY: Feeling any better?

MULDER: Uhhh ... You're lucky you inherited your father's legs.

SCULLY: What?

MULDER: His sea legs.

SCULLY: (smiling) Oh.

MULDER: (to Trondheim) It's been about 12 hours. You said it was only gonna take 10. What's going on?

TRONDHEIM: I told you before, the visibility is lousy. I've never seen it this thick.

MULDER: How much longer 'til we get there?

TRONDHEIM: Well, we're right where you want to be. I even think we've got what you're looking for. Except one minute it's right in front of us and the next minute it's not. Like something's messing with my radar ... and my navigation system. I can't explain it.

(The radar screen shows an echo fading in and out, while his instruments show his bearing fluctuating widely. Halverson sees the outline of a ship emerging in the fog, straight ahead.)

HALVERSON: Captain! Pass pε! [Look out!]

(Trondheim throws the ship into reverse but the ship ahead gets closer and closer.)

TRONDHEIM: We're gonna hit!

(They collide, and all four are thrown forward.)

TRONDHEIM: Halverson! Check the hull for damage!

(The four have now moved their gear onto the deck of the Ardent.)

TRONDHEIM: I don't get it. This is what you're looking for?

MULDER: The USS Ardent. It's a destroyer escort.

TRONDHEIM: All right ... what do you want with it, anyway? It's a ghost ship. I mean, look at all this corrosion. No one's been aboard this vessel in 20, 30 years.

(Mulder finds the ship's nameplate, which says "U.S.S. Ardent, 1991". The nameplate is heavily corroded and barely readable.)

MULDER: Scully. (she comes over and looks) Let's check the crew quarters first.

(They go below into the crews quarters. They find a number of bodies, all of which look extemely old and are heavily crusted with a white residue.)

SCULLY: Mulder. They almost look mummified.

MULDER: Like they've been dead a very long time.

SCULLY: Except for this strange residue.

(She reaches with a knife to scrape some of the white residue off a dead man's hand, but when she touches it, the hand breaks off. They hear an engine starting.)

SCULLY: What was that?

MULDER: An engine.

TRONDHEIM: My ship!

(They hurry back on deck and see the Zehar pulling away from the Ardent.)

TRONDHEIM: No! That's my ship!

MULDER: Hey!

TRONDHEIM: You're taking my ship!

MULDER: Hey!

TRONDHEIM: Hey! (very upset, he grabs Mulder by the lapel) That's my ship!

(Halverson grabs Trondheim's shoulder.)

HALVERSON: Ta det med ro! [Take it easy!]

Trondheim releases Mulder as the Zehar fades away into the fog and darkness.)

SCENE 6

(Mulder and Scully are on the bridge of the Ardent. Mulder is working on the radio from below while Scully tries it out.)

SCULLY: Nope.

MULDER: All right. (he makes an adjustment) Try it again.

SCULLY: No. What is it?

MULDER: It's caked with the same residue that's covering everything.

SCULLY: So we can't even send a distress signal.

(Mulder stands as Trondheim comes up from below.)

TRONDHEIM: The engine's so corroded down there you can't even ... you can't even tell what it is. I've never seen anything like it. Halverson's trying to salvage some parts, but basically what we are is dead in the water.

SCULLY: Well, the radio's dead too.

TRONDHEIM: Somebody's not telling me what's going on here. (neither Scully nor Mulder respond) Now look, that ship wasn't just my livelihood, that was my life. I have a right to some straight answers.

MULDER: What we're seeing here may be the result of some kind of military experiment.

TRONDHEIM: Military experiment?

MULDER: An artifical time band, where matter moves through time at an accelerated rate.

TRONDHEIM: Tell me in English.

MULDER: Time may be speeding up.

TRONDHEIM: Right. That's almost as crazy as Halverson's "there's a rock that comes down from the sky ...".

MULDER: The ship ... the ship was launched in 1991. I don't know how else to explain the extent of the corrosion or the decay of the bodies down below.

TRONDHEIM: (to Scully) You're not buying any of this, are you?

(Before Scully can respond, they hear a yell. The three quickly go down to investigate and they hear a door creaking. Weapons raised, Mulder and Scully move back in the ship. Scully finds Halverson, dead, lying on the deck with blood coming from a wound in his head. She kneels to check him as Mulder and Trondheim catch up.)

MULDER: What happened?

SCULLY: His skull's been fractured.

TRONDHEIM: Who was that? Halverson!

(They hear another noise from farther back in the ship. Mulder and Scully investigate, while Trondheim kneels over Halverson's body. In the ship's galley, Mulder hears a noise and approaches the door to a small compartment. When he opens it, he finds a very old looking man cowering and clutching a bottle of whiskey.)

MULDER: Who are you?

CAPTAIN BARCLAY: Captain Barclay. Commanding officer, USS Ardent.

(Later, Mulder gives Barclay a glass of water drawn from a faucet.)

MULDER: Here you go.

(Barclay drinks, shakily holding the glass with both hands.)

SCULLY: Captain Barclay, um, according to your log, shortly after the navigation system failed, several of your crew members saw something in the sea - a growing light.

CAPTAIN BARCLAY: It, it came up through the fog, in the middle of the night. Like it was on fire.

SCULLY: Do you have any idea what it might have been?

CAPTAIN BARCLAY: Power loss. Everything stopped. Everything. Even the sea. Even the wind. Then the ship, my ship, she began to bleed through the hull near the rivet seams.

HALVERSON: (laughing) He's a drunkard. He's a drunkard! And he killed Halverson. To hell with him, I don't have to listen to his lies!

CAPTAIN BARCLAY: I'm no liar. It happened, first to some of my men and then to all of them.

SCULLY: What happened?

CAPTAIN BARCLAY: Time got lost.

(Mulder and Scully exchange a glance as Barclay starts wheezing.)

SCULLY: It's OK, captain. You can take it easy. We're gonna do whatever we can to help you out.

CAPTAIN BARCLAY: What can you do? You can't do anything. I'm 35 years old.

(Mulder pulls Scully aside for a quiet, private conversation.)

MULDER: There's no way he killed Halverson.

SCULLY: Yeah, I'd have to agree with you. That blow that killed Halverson was delivered with considerable strength, and he can't even hold a glass with two hands.

MULDER: That means there's somebody else on board.

(Next morning, an emotional Trondheim prepares to bury Halverson's body at sea.)

TRONDHEIM: You were a good first mate. You left me alone, and you did your job. It's a shame this had to happen to you so young.

TRONDHEIM: God vei videre [Farewell/Goodbye, old buddy]

(After saying a few words in Norwegian, Trondheim then lets Halverson's shrouded body slip overboard. As Trondheim crosses himself, a man approaches and takes a swing at him with a pipe. He ducks under it, but the man then knocks Trondheim to the deck. As he raises the pipe for a third try, Mulder appears and draws his gun on him.)

MULDER: Put it down! Put down the pipe! Put it down!

(He complies. Trondheim gets to his feet and kicks the pipe away. He then grabs the man by the throat.)

TRONDHEIM: I could kill you for what you've done.

MULDER: Back off, Trondheim!

TRONDHEIM: He killed Halverson!

MULDER: He may be our only chance to figure out what happened. Look at him. Look at him! He hasn't aged. Back off!

(Trondheim releases him.)

TRONDHEIM: His name's Olafsson.

MULDER: You know him?

TRONDHEIM: Everybody in Gildeskal knows him. He's a pirate whaler. He's a wanted criminal. He supplies whales to the Japanese black market. Blues, belugas, sperms.

MULDER: Ask him how he got here.

(Trondheim asks Olafsson a question in Norwegian.)

TRONDHEIM: Hvordan kom du hit? [How did you get here?]

OLAFSSON: Dra til helvete [Go to hell!]

(Olafsson's terse reply prompts Trondheim to lunge at him again but Mulder stops him.)

MULDER: We'll question him later. I don't want to leave Scully alone, in case there are others.

(Olafsson, Trondheim and Mulder go back below and join Scully. Trondheim gives a terse command to Olafsson in Norwegian as he pushes him along.)

MULDER: I think we found who killed Halverson.

TRONDHEIM: He'd have killed me too, if it wasn't for Mulder.

SCULLY: The ship's log says something about four Norweigian sailors who were picked up when their vessel had sunk.

TRONDHEIM: I guarantee it was Olafsson's men, took my boat and left him stranded there. It's just like these dogs to slit each other's throats.

MULDER: Maybe we should ask the Captain some more questions.

SCULLY: Mulder, Captain Barclay is dead. I don't know how it happened, it was just in the last 15 minutes. It's just like those men below. It's more than rapid aging, Mulder. It's almost as if he's turning into a pillar of salt.

MULDER: Is that what this substance is?

SCULLY: Well, it appears to be crystalline, but beyond that ...?

MULDER: All right, we're all tired. Let's stow the captain's body and tie up Olafsson so we can all get some rest. I'll take first watch, in case he's not alone.

(Later, all are asleep except Mulder. His wristwatch timer goes off and he walks toward Scully, who is asleep with her head on a table.)

MULDER: Scully?

SCULLY: Mmmm. I just fell asleep.

MULDER: You want a few more minutes?

SCULLY: No. I'm up.

(As she lifts her head, we see that her face looks about 20 years older.)

MULDER: Scully ...

(She sees that Mulder is similarly affected.)

SCULLY: Mulder, what happened to you?

SCENE 7

(Trondheim is looking in a mirror. He is also showing signs of aging. Mulder and Scully are nearby.)

SCULLY: Time acceleration is an equation, Mulder, a theory.

MULDER: Then theoretically it's possible. What else could it be?

SCULLY: Well, whatever it is, it isn't a time warp. None of us has directly observed any of the phenomenon recorded in the ship's log. There is no hard evidence to indicate that this is a time warp.

MULDER: We're the evidence, Scully! Look at us! We're aging by the minute.

SCULLY: Well, if this is rapid aging phenomena, then why hasn't our hair greyed or started to fall out?

TRONDHEIM: (motioning toward Olafsson) Then what about him, huh? What about him? Why isn't he getting old?

(He directs some words at Olafsson.)

TRONDHEIM: Hvorfor blir du ikke gammel? [Why haven't you gotten older?]

MULDER: Relax, relax, Trondheim. Save your energy.

TRONDHEIM: (to Mulder) I don't have to listen to you. It's because of you that we got into this.

MULDER: Nobody twisted your arm.

TRONDHEIM: I signed on to bring you here. Not to die.

SCULLY: Mulder, what do you know about free radicals?

MULDER: Is this a quiz?

SCULLY: They are highly reactive chemicals containing extra electrons. Now, they can attack DNA proteins, they can cause our body tissue and cell membranes to oxidize.

MULDER: Grow old, you mean?

SCULLY: It's the prevailing theory on how our bodies age.

MULDER: So you think something is triggering that reaction in us?

SCULLY: This is just a theory. But what if this ship is drifting towards another massive metallic source, like a meteor. Maybe it's way down deep in the ocean or embedded into an iceberg. But the two could effectively be acting as positive and negative terminals with the ocean itself being a kind of giant battery. That level of electromagnetic energy could be exciting the free radicals and effectively oxidizing every piece of matter in its field.

(Trondheim notices several drops of red liquid falling onto the floor from above.)

MULDER: It makes sense, Scully. The organic equivalent to rust would be rapid premature senescence.

TRONDHEIM: What the hell?

(They look up and see that liquid is leaking from a flange in an overhead pipe.)

SCULLY: Captain Barclay said the ship was bleeding.

(Mulder rubs some of the liquid between his fingers.)

MULDER: It's not blood, Scully. It's rust. Trondheim, you keep an eye on Olafsson.

TRONDHEIM: Where are you going?

SCULLY: Mulder. Where are we going?

MULDER: I'm not sure yet, but we don't have much time to get there.

(Mulder and Scully walk back through the ship. Mulder is looking at the overhead pipes. All are darkly colored except for one yellow pipe.)

MULDER: See this yellow pipe? It's the only one that hasn't corroded through.

(As they follow the pipe, Trondheim and Olafsson are still in the dining order. They converse in Norwegian.)

OLAFSSON: Hei, Trondheim, komme her. Det er noe jeg vil fortelle deg. [Hey Trondheim, come here. There's something I want to tell you.]

TRONDHEIM: Det er ikke noe du kan fortelle meg som jeg er interesserte i. [There's nothing you can tell me that I want to know.]

OLAFSSON: Er du sikker? Hvor gikk de andre du, tror du? Og hvorfor tror du de etterlot deg? [Are you sure? Where do you think the other two went? And why do you think they left you behind?]

TRONDHEIM: Jeg vet hva du prψver ε gjψre, Olafsson. [I know what you're trying to do, Olafsson.]

OLAFSSON: Hvis du ikke stoler pε meg, sε stole pε de egne ψyne. Du sε hva som hendte til kapteinen. Det tar bare et par timer. Men du behψver ikke ε dψ. [If you don't trust me, trust your own eyes. You saw what happened to the captain. It only takes a few hours. But you don't have to die.]

TRONDHEIM: Vi mε alle dψ. [We all have to die.]

OLAFSSON: Ikke pε denne mεten. [Not like this.]

TRONDHEIM: (angrily) Hvorfor skulle jeg hψre pε deg? Du er en lψgner og en morder. [Why should I listen to you? You're a murderer.]

OLAFSSON: Jeg bare drepte gutten for ε overleve. Du ville gjψre det samme. Du kan fremdeles gjψre det. [I only killed the boy in order to survive. You'd have done the same. You still might.]

TRONDHEIM: OK, jeg hψrer hva du sier. Fortell meg den store hemmeligheten. [OK, I'm listening. Tell me this big secret.]

OLAFSSON: Fψrst la meg gε. [First, let me go.]

TRONDHEIM: Hvordan vet jeg at du forteller sannheten? [How do I know you're telling the truth?]

OLAFSSON: Se pε meg, Trondheim. Og sε, se pε deg selv. [Look at me, Trondheim. Then take a look at yourself.]

(Mulder and Scully have followed the pipe to where it goes down through a hatch labeled "sewage processing hold". They open the hatch, descend some stairs and open a large door. Inside they find many rats as well as clothing and other signs that the area has been recently occupied.)

MULDER: Olafsson and his men.

SCULLY: Why would they hold up here?

(Mulder notices a slow drip from a faucet in a large tank in the room.)

MULDER: This is the only drinkable water on the ship. We were both wrong, Scully. It's the water. All the other water's been contaminated.

SCULLY: Contaminated how?

MULDER: Something must have gotten into the desalination tanks where all the ship's potable water is stored. But the water in the sewage system is recycled again and again. It doesn't come from the sea.

SCULLY: Well, if you're right, then Captain Barclay's drinking binge is what kept him alive.

MULDER: (banging on the tank) The water from this tank may do the same for us.

SCULLY: It doesn't sound like there's very much left.

(In another part of the ship, Olafsson sits motionless next to blood-stained pipes, apparently killed by Trondheim. Trondheim is using his hand to drink water out of the toilet.)

SCENE 8

(Back in the crew dining area, Mulder holds up the rope that was binding Olafsson and confronts Trondheim. Olafsson is nowhere to be seen.)

MULDER: What happened? You were supposed to watch him.

TRONDHEIM: I feel pretty bad about it. I shouldn't have dozed off. Well, what do you want me to say? He's gone, he got away.

MULDER: (angrily) I want to know what happened?

TRONDHEIM: I can ask the same of you. You're the one that tied him up.

MULDER: There's nothing wrong with my knot! This rope's been severed!

TRONDHEIM: I don't like being interrogated. I don't owe you any explanations.

(Trondheim starts to walk past Mulder, who grabs him by the shirt. Trondheim grabs Mulder as well, and they grapple briefly.)

SCULLY: Trondheim!

(Mulder draws his gun.)

MULDER: Let go of me.

SCULLY: Look, we have a lot of work to do here. I'm gonna need blood and urine samples from both of you.

TRONDHEIM: What for?

SCULLY: We found out what caused the aging.

TRONDHEIM: What is it now? The two of you are full of theories. First it's one thing, then it's another. By the time you figure out what it is, we'll all be dead.

MULDER: It's the water, Trondheim. Something got into the de-sal tanks, but the water in the sewage system is untainted.

SCULLY: It kept Olafsson alive this long, maybe it will slow the process in us.

TRONDHEIM: This is good news, isn't it? So what happens now?

(It is now daylight outside. Scully is writing in a journal.)

SCULLY: (voice-over) It has been 18 hours, 45 minutes since the onset of symptoms. Rudimentary blood tests have revealed impossibly high concentrations of sodium choloride - salt - though the contaminated water itself is not saline. It appears to catalyze existing body fluids, causing massive and rapid cellular damage. The untainted water has slowed the degenerative progression in Trondheim and me, but Mulder has fared less well, perhaps because of the dehydration he suffered on the way here.

(Mulder places a urine sample on the table. While Scully looks somewhat older than previously, Mulder is more considerably aged and has developed a twitch in his neck.)

MULDER: I think I just lapped George Burns.

SCULLY: I'll be right back.

(Scully takes the sample to a make-shift laboratory that she has set up across the room. Trondheim edges up behind her.)

SCULLY: If you've got something to say, say it but don't hover behind me like that.

TRONDHEIM: The water isn't helping him.

SCULLY: Then maybe we should double his rations.

TRONDHEIM: What for? A lake full of water isn't going to bring him back.

SCULLY: We don't know that for sure. Not yet.

TRONDHEIM: Look at him! We've wasted too much water on him as it is.

SCULLY: Who are you to decide?

TRONDHEIM: You don't have to be a doctor to see that he isn't gonna make it. But you and me, Scully ... you and me ... we better start looking out for ourselves.

(Mulder looks over his shoulder at Scully and Trondheim, but it is not clear whether he heard them. Scully has transferred the sample to a test tube and drops a reactant into it. The sample turns red.)

(Later, Scully writes in her journal as Mulder sleeps.)

SCULLY: (voice-over) Mulder's urinalysis continues to indicate his kidneys' failure to excrete the substance I'm calling "heavy salt". Whether the untainted water taken from the sewage system is even helping him at all is unclear. What does remain clear to me is that I can't give up trying.

(Across the room, Trondheim turns off a lantern to go to sleep.)

(Later, it is dark outside and Scully is leaning her head against a pipe and dozing. She awakens to see that Trondheim is no longer there. She hears a bump and the sound of water flowing. She grabs a flashlight and heads back to investigate. She hears a rumble and sees the water being pumped from the toilet, which has a yellow pipe behind it. She goes back into the sewage processing hold and opens the door, finding Trondheim at work inside.)

SCULLY: Trondheim! What are you doing?

TRONDHEIM: Listen to this. (he bangs the water tank with a wrench) You know what that is? It's a funeral bell. There's only a few gallons left, maybe less.

SCULLY: There's enough to keep us all alive for a few more days.

TRONDHEIM: Or one of us alive long enough to be rescued.

(He walks toward her. Scully draws her gun and cocks the hammer.)

SCULLY: Don't come any closer.

TRONDHEIM: What are you gonna do? Shoot me?

SCULLY: Trondheim, listen to me. The navy knows where we are. They know these coordinates and they're gonna be here soon. So why don't we just go back up into the mess hall ...

(He continues to approach her and she gives ground.)

TRONDHEIM: Why don't you just go ahead and shoot me if you think that I'm gonna let Mulder have another drop.

(He pushes her back out of the room and closes the door, wedging the wrench in the handle and locking himself in.)

SCULLY: Trondheim! Trondheim!

(Scully frantically goes through the crew's quarters and galley looking for other sources of water. She finds a snow globe in the quarters and a can of sardines in the galley. She carefully drains the liquid from the sardines into a glass. When she comes back to the dining area, Mulder is awake and reading her journal. He continues to look worse than her.)

MULDER: You're almost out of pages. It's good you kept a record.

SCULLY: Trondheim's locked himself in the sewage hold. He's backflushed all the water and he's keeping it for himself. I looked everywhere and this is all I could find. (she places a capped jar half full of yellowish liquid on the table) It's sardine juice, half a dozen lemons and uh, the water from a snow globe. (Mulder licks his lips) It's not Evian, but ...

MULDER: You go ahead and drink it.

SCULLY: No, Mulder!

MULDER: It's the only logical choice, Scully. You're a woman. Your life expectancy is greater, and your body retains more water in fatty tissues.

SCULLY: That's more reason for you to drink it.

MULDER: You have a much greater chance of surviving until help comes.

SCULLY: Don't do this, Mulder.

MULDER: Don't be so stubborn, Scully. You know I'm right.

SCULLY: Well, there isn't much liquid to make a difference anyway.

MULDER: There might be.

(He pushes the jar across the table toward her. Scully looks at him, then the jar, then downward for a moment.)

SCULLY: No.

(There is a metallic groaning sound and the ship suddenly shudders, knocking both Mulder and Scully to the floor. The jar vibrates along table. In the sewage hold, Trondheim is also knocked to the floor. In the dining area, Mulder and Scully get back to their seats.)

SCULLY: What was that?

MULDER: The outer hull must have finally corroded through, which means we're taking on water.

SCULLY: Mulder ... the water.

(The jar is broken on the floor. They look at one another as odd noises continue to be heard from the ship.)

(In the sewage hold, several pipes burst and spray water. Suddenly a bulkhead gives way and water starts pouring in. Trondheim removes the wrench and struggles to open the door, but it won't open.)

TRONDHEIM: Uhhh! Can't open the door! Help me! Help me! Help me!

(He continues to call and bang on the door as the hold fills. Then there is silence as he has drowned.)

SCENE 9
14 HOURS LATER

(Mulder, trembling badly, sits to the side as Scully writes in her journal.)

MULDER: I always thought when I got older I'd maybe take a cruise somewhere. This isn't exactly what I had in mind. The service on this ship is terrible, Scully. (she smiles) It's not fair. It's not our time. We still have work to do.

(Scully puts down her pen and turns toward him.)

SCULLY: Mulder ... When they found me, after the doctors and even my family had given up, I experienced something that I never told you about. Even now it's hard to find the words. But there's one thing I'm certain of. As certain as I am of this life, we have nothing to fear when it's over.

(Mulder has slumped over to his side.)

MULDER: I'm so tired.

SCULLY: You should sleep.

(She strokes his forehead.)

(Later, Scully writes in her journal.)

SCULLY: (voice-over) Agent Fox Mulder lost consciousness at approximately 4:30 this morning, the 12th of March. There is nothing more I can do for him, or for myself. Supplies are exhausted, no food or liquid consumed for over 24 hours. The outer hull most probably flooded, though for now the inner hull is supporting the ship's mass. Among Halverson's belongings, I found a children's book of Norse legends. From what I can tell, the pictures show the end of the world - not in a sudden firestorm of damnation as the Bible teaches us, but in a slow covering blanket of snow. First the moon and the stars will be lost in a dense white fog, then the rivers and the lakes and the sea will freeze over. And finally a wolf named Skoll will open his jaws and eat the sun, sending the world into an everlasting night. I think I hear the wolf at the door.

(Scully drops her pen and her eyes close.)

(Later, a rescuer boards the vessel and searches the decks below with a flashlight. In the dining area, he finds Mulder and Scully slumped over on opposite sides of a table, as well as her journal.)

(Much later, Dr. Laskos at Bethesda Naval Hospital is shining a light into Scully's eyes to check her response and trying to awaken her. She looks considerably better.)

DR. LASKOS: Agent Scully? Agent Scully, can you hear me?

SCULLY: (groggily) Mmmm. Yeah.

DR. LASKOS: It's been 36 hours since your rescue. I've got you on dialysis with a high-flux filter. You're obviously responding well. Your electrolytes are almost back to normal and your fluid status has been corrected.

(Scully opens her eyes, swallows and raises her head slightly but then it falls back on the pillow and she closes her eyes. As her mind clears, she raises her head again.)

SCULLY: Mulder? Where is he?

(She looks to her right and sees Mulder in the next bed, still unconscious but looking much better.)

DR. LASKOS: His endocrine system was considerably more compromised than yours. Frankly, we didn't think that he'd make it - until we discovered this. (she shows Scully's journal) Based on your observations, we're giving him a course of synthetic hormones, which seems to be working.

SCULLY: Whatever caused this is still out there. I have to talk to a naval liaison. We have to salvage the ship in order to study the salt ...

DR. LASKOS: Agent Scully, the ship was taking on water. It sank less than an hour after you were rescued.

(There is a closing view of the fog-covered North Atlantic.)

[THE END]

"Fearful Symmetry" - Episode 2x18 (videos,guide,stills,transcript)

2010-10-05T07:36:00.000-07:00

Videos
Fearful Symmetry - Trailer

Episode guide
(Source: http://xfiles.wearehere.net/episodes/2x18.htm )

2X18 Fearful Symmetry

Mulder and Scully are called in to investigate after the death of a federal employee and the destruction of personal property is linked to an escaped elephant, despite the fact that no witnesses saw the creature. Mulder and Scully travel to Idaho and meet Ed Meecham, the elephant trainer at the Fairfield Zoo who shows them that the elephant's cage is still locked. He suggests they talk to Willa Ambrose, a naturalist hired by the zoo to develop more suitable habitat for the animals. She explains that she was hired to improve conditions at the zoo after pressure from an animal activist group called the Wild Again Organization. She also tells them to talk to Kyle Lang, a member of the WAO. Their meeting leads Scully to believe that the WAO is to blame, a theory given credence when a member of the group is mauled to death by an escaped tiger while attempting to break in to the zoo. However Mulder confers with Frohike and Byers of The Lone Gunman via a satellite linkup. They inform him that the Fairfield Zoo is renowned for never having had a successful live birth in captivity. Which leads Mulder to the conclusion that extraterrestrial are impregnating the zoo animals and harvesting the embryos as part of a conservation plan. When Mulder expresses his theory to Willa Ambrose she is incredulous until Scully's autopsy on the elephant reveals that it had been pregnant in the past. It seems the only place to find the answers is in the cage of a hand signing gorilla.

Noteworthy Quote

Sophie the gorilla: "Man save man"

Credits

Writer:	Steve De Jarnatt
Director:	James Whitmore Jr

Cast:

David Duchovny	Special Agent Fox Mulder
Gillian Anderson	Special Agent Dana Scully

Guest Cast:

Charles Andre	Ray Floyd
Jack Rader	Ed Meecham
Jayne Atkinson	Willa Ambrose
Lance Guest	Kyle Lang
Bruce Harwood	Byers
Tom Braidwood	Frohike
Dean Haglund	Langly
Garvin Cross	Red Head Kid
Tom Glass	Trucker
Jody St Michael	Sophie

Episode Stills

Transcript Fearful Symmetry 2x18
(Source: http://www.insidethex.co.uk/transcrp/scrp218.htm )

SCENE 1
IDAHO MUTUAL INSURANCE TRUST, FAIRFIELD, IDAHO

(Two janitors are cleaning the lobby after hours. A radio is playing, and the younger one is dancing with his mop. The older one looks over at him.)

JANITOR 1: [They don't pay you to dance, Roberto!]

JANITOR 2: Okay, okay.

JANITOR 1: (pointing overhead at the security camera) [God is watching.]

JANITOR 2: Okay.

(The first janitor lays a cigarette on end on the floor. The floor begins to shake and the cigarette vibrates across the floor tile. The security camera shakes in its support, and a loud thumping is heard. The first janitor turns off the radio, and he and second janitor look toward the large front window. Suddenly it shatters. They duck, then run to the window to look outside. A path of destruction works its way up the street. First a car is crushed, then a street sign is bent and a sidewalk stand is crushed. A second car is then crushed and shoved onto the sidewalk. The janitors look on in amazement. The first janitor crosses himself.)

JANITOR 1: Santa maria san locos.

(Some road construction men are drinking coffee when they hear an approaching rumble.)

WORKER 1: What the hell is that?

(They see nothing, but the road barricades leading to them are crushed one by one.)

WORKER 2: Hey! Get out of the way!

(They scatter except for the first worker who stays in the roadway. He is suddenly thrown backward and there is the sound of an angry elephant. The other men go to their fallen co-worker.)

WORKER 3: He's hurt bad, man!

WORKER 2: Hurry up! Get an ambulance!

(It is early morning and a truck tractor is bob-tailing down a highway in the fog. The driver calls in on his CB radio.)

BREWER: (to CB) This is Wesley Brewer out on Route 7. Looks like About an 8:00 ETA on that trailer pickup. This fog's gonna slow me down.

DISPATCHER: (on CB) 10-4, Wesley.

(Out of the fog ahead, an elephant suddenly appears, heading straight for the tractor.)

BREWER: Mother of God!

(He slams on the brakes, and the tractor comes to a stop inches from the elephant. The elephant moves alongside the cab and stares at Brewer for a moment, then moves on.)

(Two state police cars speed down the highway, sirens blaring. They stop at a group of people standing on the road. A young child is crying. They approach the elephant, lying on its side in the road.)

WOMAN: She was just lying there when we found her, officer.

(The elephant is alive but unable to get up. As the young child continues to cry, another child kneels in front of the animal. The elephant moans.)

SCENE 2

(Scully is outside the Idaho Mutual Trust Building, interviewing the two janitors.)

SCULLY: So you saw nothing when the window broke? No one outside?

JANITOR 1: No.

JANITOR 2: (shaking his head) Nothing.

JANITOR 1: We heard a noise like thunder. Then glass everywhere.

SCULLY: Okay. Thank you.

(The janitors leave. Mulder, who was in the building, climbs out through the broken window frame.)

MULDER: What did the janitors say?

SCULLY: They claim they didn't see anything.

MULDER: That's not surprising. The security monitors don't have a recording of anything either. Just a giant implosion of glass like some kind of giant shock wave.

SCULLY: What the janitors describe sounds more like a sonic boom.

MULDER: No sonic boom did this. (points to the crushed car on the street) The construction worker who was killed had his spine crushed like a string of seashells, a circular abrasion on his torso in roughly the shape of an elephant's foot. Other workers at the site said they felt the ground shake followed by a faint whiff of animal odor in the wind.

SCULLY: Mulder, if you're still suggesting that the elephant did this, it just defies logic. Somebody would have seen it.

MULDER: Well, if somebody would have seen it, Scully, we wouldn't be here. Another vehicle would have left evidence of a collision - distress to the metal, or paint. I can see signs of neither of those things. I'd be willing to admit the possibility of a tornado but it's not really tornado season. I'd even be willing to entertain the notion of a black hole passing over the area ... (Scully gives him a skeptical glance) ... or some cosmic anomaly, but it's not really black hole season, either. (he smiles) If I was a betting man I'd say that it was, uh, ...

SCULLY: An invisible elephant?

MULDER: I saw David Copperfield make the Statue of Liberty disappear once.

MEECHAM: Agent Mulder?

(A man approaches who just drove up in a panel truck.)

MULDER: Yeah.

MEECHAM: Ed Meecham, Fairfield Zoo. Sorry for the holdup. We had trouble transporting Ganesha's body this morning.

MULDER: This is Agent Scully.

MEECHAM: (to Scully) Hi.

SCULLY: Have they determined what he died of?

MEECHAM: She. Ganesha was a 12-year-old Indian female. Near as I can figure, she ran herself into exhaustion.

MULDER: How did she escape?

MEECHAM: Well now, there's a puzzle. When I got the call this morning, I expected to find her cage open or something but it was locked tight just like I left it.

MULDER: Any idea how she could have escaped a locked cage?

MEECHAM: No, sir. No signs of tampering.

MULDER: I've read about something called the elephant rebellion in zoos across the country - a high incidence of elephants turning on their keepers, destroying their pens. Was Ganesha ever a problem like that?

MEECHAM: Elephants are very big, very willful animals.

MULDER: So you're saying there were problems?

MEECHAM: Well, the person you're gonna want to talk to about that is Willa Ambrose.

SCULLY: Ambrose?

MEECHAM: She's a naturalist. She was hired by the Board of Supervisors last year to oversee things. Well, now she's supposed to be the reigning authority.

MULDER: Well, let me ask you something. In your opinion, the damage here on the street - could this have been caused by an escaped elephant?

MEECHAM: In my honest opinion?

MULDER: Yeah.

MEECHAM: Sure. Will you excuse me?

(Meecham walks away. Mulder walks along looking at the trash on the street.)

SCULLY: What're you looking for, Mulder?

MULDER: A local paper. I want to see if David Copperfield's in town.

SCENE 3
FAIRFIELD ZOO

(The zoo is open. Mulder and Scully approach a zoo worker.)

SCULLY: Excuse me. We're looking for Willa Ambrose.

WORKER: (pointing) There.

SCULLY: Thank you.

WORKER: Sure.

(They approach Willa Ambrose, who is standing with a clipboard along one of the zoo's paths.)

SCULLY: Miss Ambrose?

WILLA AMBROSE: Yes.

SCULLY: I'm Agent Dana Scully. (flashes her badge) This is Agent Mulder. We're with the FBI.

WILLA AMBROSE: How can I help you?

SCULLY: Well, a federal employee was fatally injured last night, and there seems to be a case developing around the elephant that escaped from your zoo.

WILLA AMBROSE: It was my understanding that the eyewitnesses to the accident said that they didn't know how the man was killed.

MULDER: Actually, what we're trying to determine is how Ganesha escaped.

WILLA AMBROSE: Well, what did Ed tell you?

MULDER: He said he found the cage locked, the same way he left it.

WILLA AMBROSE: What more can I say?

MULDER: I don't want to belabor this, but a man was found trampled to death. An animal from your zoo was found 43 miles from here. No one's looking to place any blame, we're just trying to understand the facts that led up to this incident.

(They are now in a concrete building, and Willa shows them a heavy padlock on a seven-foot heavy metal door.)

WILLA AMBROSE: This is where Ganesha was held when she wasn't in her habitat.

MULDER: Who has keys to this lock?

WILLA AMBROSE: Only myself and Mr. Meecham. Otherwise, this is a restricted area. (Scully is looking at the tops of the bars to the cage) Elephants aren't particularly good jumpers if that's what you're thinking.

SCULLY: No, I was just wondering why such a small pen for such a large animal.

WILLA AMBROSE: The zoo was built in the 1940s. The pens and habitats are all too confining. I was brought on to expand and create more humane environments. Unfortunately, these things take time.

(Mulder has been looking at a tie-down ring with chains attached.)

MULDER: Those, uh, chains on the ground there?

WILLA AMBROSE: Those are tie-downs. They're meant to restrict the animal's movement. I disallowed their use when I came to work here.

MULDER: Disallowed their use by whom?

WILLA AMBROSE: It was Ed Meecham's practice. It reflected an old, nonprogressive zoo policy.

MULDER: How's your relationship with Ed Meecham?

WILLA AMBROSE: I'm his boss and I'm a woman, and Ed doesn't like that much.

SCULLY: Would he be vindictive enough to let Ganesha go as an act of sabotage?

WILLA AMBROSE: Well, if he did that would be foolish. The facility is running at a deficit and in danger of losing its funding.

MULDER: Have you spoken about the incident with Ed?

WILLA AMBROSE: No. I think Ed's got enough dealing with the W.A.O.

SCULLY: W.A.O?

MULDER: It's the Wild Again Organization - they're a radical group that believes any captive animal is a crime against nature.

WILLA AMBROSE: Believe me they're gonna have a field day with this one. Excuse me.

SCENE 4
CONSTRUCTION SITE, HIGHWAY 24

(Among the debris from the previous night's accident, Scully and Mulder are talking to Kyle Lang, leader of the local W.A.O. Scully and Mulder are examining some photographs taken of Ganesha lying on the highway.)

KYLE LANG: The W.A.O. believes only tragedy results from keeping animals in captivity. In the wild, an elephant like that would roam an area 20 square miles, minimum. Ganesha weighed in excess of 5000 pounds, and she was being held in a 50 by 50 foot cage.

SCULLY: And you consider that inhumane treatment?

KYLE LANG: It's like you or I living in a pickle barrel.

SCULLY: According to FBI files, you've been arrested over a dozen times for activities involving the kidnapping of circus and zoo animals.

KYLE LANG: The W.A.O. sees it as liberation.

SCULLY: Hmmm. Were you involved in the liberation of Ganesha?

KYLE LANG: That would make me an accessory to murder, wouldn't it? (Scully arches her eyebrows) Endangering these animals is against everything we believe. These are incredibly spiritual creatures. Their rituals and behavior are linked to a past no man ever witnessed. Did you know they actually bury their dead? They can visit an elephant graveyard centuries old and know instinctively where the bones of their ancient ancestors lie.

MULDER: What do you think Ganesha was running from?

KYLE LANG: You want to see what she was running from? I'll show you.

(They are now in the W.A.O. office. Lang is showing them a video of two men forcibly pulling an elephant to its feet. Another younger member of the W.A.O. is in the room with them.)

KYLE LANG: This is how Ed Meecham treats these majestic animals.

MULDER: This is still going on?

KYLE LANG: Ed Meecham's a barbarian. He's been torturing animals at the Fairfield Zoo for years. We figure he's still at it. Eventually we're

gonna get some proof. We're here to put pressure on the zoo. We're keeping track of what goes on there.

MULDER: Even though Willa Ambrose claims that she's put a stop to most of his old practices?

KYLE LANG: Whatever Willa Ambrose's intentions, she's too preoccupied to really know how Meecham operates.

SCULLY: Preoccupied with what?

KYLE LANG: A lawsuit she's fighting against the Malawi government over a lowland gorilla named Sophie. Willa rescued her from a north African customs house ten years ago. Raised her like a child. Now the Malawi government wants her back.

SCULLY: Will they win?

KYLE LANG: This is a perfect example of man's imperialism over the animal kingdom - this craven impulse to turn animals into objects for our own selfish pleasure.

SCULLY: I thought you said she rescued this gorilla.

KYLE LANG: Yeah, rescued her so she could spend a life behind bars. Her obligation should have been to return the gorilla to the wild. All animals should run free.

SCULLY: Even if that means trampling a man to death?

KYLE LANG: Maybe he should have gotten out of the way.

MULDER: I'm sure he would have if he'd seen it coming. Thanks for your time, sir, and we'll get back to you soon.

(Scully appears annoyed at Lang. On their way out, Scully notices a video camera on a shelf.)

(They step out of the W.A.O. office. It is now dark.)

MULDER: It's all happening at the zoo, Scully.

SCULLY: Well, we found our suspects.

MULDER: You think they busted out the elephant?

SCULLY: Well, you heard the man - "all animals should run free."

MULDER: What about all the eyewitness accounts, the security tapes from the video camera, the fact no one saw an elephant until it was miles away from the zoo?

SCULLY: Well, the lights they were using at the construction site were mercury vapor, 10,000 candlepower. They can restrict a man's ability to adjust his vision to the dark. And their security cameras are poor quality. A gray elephant may not have registered an image on tape in the dim light in front of the building.

MULDER: Ah, I'm not buying it, Scully. I think these guys are all talk.

SCULLY: These guys are dedicated to exactly this kind of activity, unabashedly. Did you check out the night vision camera they had lying on the shelf?

MULDER: No.

SCULLY: It wouldn't surprise me if they tried to capitalize on their success.

MULDER: By doing what?

SCULLY: By liberating another animal. Willa Ambrose said that the zoo was in trouble financially. A loss of another big exhibit could shut them down entirely.

MULDER: All right. You keep an eye on the W.A.O.

SCULLY: And where are you going?

MULDER: Talk to the animals.

SCENE 5
JOJO'S COPY CENTER

(Mulder is in a satellite conference room. Frohike and Byers are projected onto the screen.)

FROHIKE: Beam me up, Scotty.

MULDER: Did anybody ever tell you the camera loves you, Frohike?

FROHIKE: Yeah, the arresting officers at the "Free James Brown" rally.

BYERS: So what's this costing the taxpayers, Mulder?

MULDER: Uh, about 150 bucks an hour.

FROHIKE: Ouch. Almost as much as Bill Clinton's haircuts.

MULDER: Where's Langley?

BYERS: He has a philosophical issue with having his image bounced off a satellite.

FROHIKE: What are you doing in Idaho?

MULDER: I'm in the town of Fairfield. What do you know about it?

BYERS: They got a little zoo there. Lots of strange lore - animals escaping, disappearing without a trace.

MULDER: Any idea why?

FROHIKE: You're not far from the Mountain Home Air Base. Major UFO hot spot.

BYERS: Weird fact, Mulder. No animal at Fairfield Zoo has ever brought a pregnancy to term.

FROHIKE: Not a cub or a chick.

BYERS: The woman who runs the zoo has a gorilla that knows sign language - supposedly with a vocabulary of 1,000 words.

(Mulder's cell phone rings. Frohike steps toward the camera.)

FROHIKE: If that's the lovely Agent Scully, let her know I've been working out. I'm buff.

MULDER: (smiling) (to phone) Mulder.

(It is the lovely Agent Scully. She is a short distance from the entrance to the zoo.)

SCULLY: Mulder, it's me. I was right. I just followed the kid from the W.A.O. to the zoo. He's just about to make it over the fence.

MULDER: All right, I'll be right there, Scully.

(The kid scales the chain-link fence. Scully runs to the fence and climbs over it as well. The kid walks through the zoo, with Scully keeping a discreet distance. The kid climbs over a stone barrier. As Scully approaches the barrier, a hand grabs her shoulder and turns her around. She gasps in surprise.)

ED MEECHAM: What the hell are you doing here?

SCULLY: There's a member of the W.A.O. on the premises.

ED MEECHAM: Come with me.

(They enter a zoo building, as the kid continues through the zoo. He pulls the night vision camera out of a flannel bag.)

(Mulder pulls up at the zoo entrance and he also climbs the fence.)

(The kid walks alongside a tiger's cage, and the tiger snarls at him. Several other animals, including a lion, a cougar, a baboon and several birds, start making lots of noise.)

(Scully and Meecham are still inside a zoo building. They hear the racket outside.)

SCULLY: What's going on?

(In another building, Willa Ambrose looks up as Sophie, in a cage across the room, also become agitated.)

WILLA AMBROSE: (motioning with sign language) It's okay, Sophie. Calm down.

(Outside, the kid points the night vision camera at the tiger and begins filming. Suddenly, there is a blinding light and the kid shields his eyes. When the light fades, the tiger has disappeared. He hears a roar behind him and whirls around but sees nothing. He is knocked to the ground and drops the camera, which is still filming. His face has several large cuts as if he's been clawed. He is then grabbed by the neck and thrashed from side to side, although there is no animal visible. He screams as the camera continues filming.)

SCENE 6
W.A.O. OFFICES

(Scully is questioning Kyle Lang. Several police officers are also in the room.)

KYLE LANG: I don't know what you're talking about.

SCULLY: You have no idea what he was doing at the zoo?

KYLE LANG: If you're asking me if I have any idea of his intentions, the answer is simple. Not the slightest.

(Scully holds up a plastic bag with the night vision camera in it.)

SCULLY: What if I said I saw this camera sitting up there on the shelf yesterday?

KYLE LANG: Guess I never noticed it before.

SCULLY: A tiger is missing, and a member of your organization is dead. For such a principled man, you show an amazing lack of emotion.

KYLE LANG: If the tiger killed this person, then it was a natural act.

SCULLY: Well, if I find evidence that he was releasing those animals under your orders, I'll make sure you spend the rest of your life behind bars.

(Mulder opens the door and enters.)

MULDER: Scully?

(He motions to her. Scully walks out, handing the bag with the camera to an officer at the door. They walk through the building.)

SCULLY: You know, that guy really pisses me off.

MULDER: You okay, Scully?

SCULLY: Yeah.

MULDER: You calmed down?

(She shoots him a not-so-pleasant look.)

SCULLY: Have they found the tiger yet?

MULDER: No, but I looked at the cassette from the kid's recorder. He wasn't killed by the tiger.

SCULLY: What?

MULDER: Unless it's trick photography, that kid was killed by some kind of phantom attacker.

SCULLY: You saw his body, Mulder. That kid was mauled to death. He had deep claw marks on his chest and on his back.

MULDER: I can't explain it either, but I know someone who might be able to.

(Mulder and Scully are walking through a building at the zoo.)

MULDER: Excuse me? Miss Ambrose? May we have a word with you?

(Willa Ambrose is carrying a clipboard and was just going into a room with a "Sick Animal - Restricted" sign on the door.)

WILLA AMBROSE: I don't know anything more than I've already told the police. I have nothing to say.

MULDER: Is this where you keep Sophie?

WILLA AMBROSE: Sophie is ill.

MULDER: You think we could meet her? We're not here to try to take her away from you.

(She opens the door.)

(Sophie is sitting in her cage, moaning.)

WILLA AMBROSE: About six weeks ago I had to take Sophie out of her public habitat. She'd become so withdrawn and depressed, she'd curl into a ball in the corner of her cage and just shiver.

MULDER: Did you ask her why?

WILLA AMBROSE: All the time.

MULDER: What'd she say?

WILLA AMBROSE: "Light afraid." Literally, she's afraid of the light.

SCULLY: She speaks to you?

WILLA AMBROSE: Over 600 words using American sign language. She understands over a thousand. I'll show you her vocabulary list.

(She steps over to her desk.)

SCULLY: Is this who you wanted to speak to, Mulder?

MULDER: It's basic investigative procedure, Agent Scully - interview all possible witnesses.

(Willa returns and hands both of them a piece of paper.)

WILLA AMBROSE: Gorillas are highly sensitive creatures, and Sophie's use of language skills makes her even more so.

SCULLY: Why would she be afraid of the light?

WILLA AMBROSE: Well, you've obviously heard about the trouble with the Malawi government. There's a chance that Sophie could be taken away from me, and I think that she knows that.

(Mulder has been looking at some "drawings" on the wall.)

MULDER: Are these Sophie's?

WILLA AMBROSE: Yes.

MULDER: What do you think they mean?

WILLA AMBROSE: Well, until recently Sophie desperately wanted a baby. The brown object in the center (points to one of the drawings) is her expression of that.

MULDER: Have you tried to mate her?

WILLA AMBROSE: We were looking for a partner but under these stressful conditions I didn't want to put her through it.

MULDER: Do you have a veterinary facility here?

WILLA AMBROSE: Yeah.

MULDER: All right, this may seem like a rather strange request but it might help explain what's been going on here. I'm gonna need your help on this, too, Scully.

(Mulder and Scully are standing on a scaffold, while Willa works below, exposing Ganesha's chest cavity. Scully is wearing gloves and coveralls and a flashlight on her head.)

SCULLY: I hope you know what you're getting us into, Mulder.

MULDER: I'm pretty sure of what we're gonna find.

SCULLY: This isn't exactly in my job description.

MULDER: And the next thing you know, they'll be doing it on MTV Sports.

WILLA AMBROSE: (from below) Okay. The elephant's cavity is clear. I'm ready for you.

(Scully climbs down the scaffold to join her.)

WILLA AMBROSE: The knife's right down there.

SCULLY: Okay.

MULDER: I've been told there's never been a successful pregnancy at the Fairfield Zoo.

WILLA AMBROSE: Sounds like you've been talking to Kyle Lang.

(Scully takes the knife and kneels down, out of sight. Various squishing noises are heard.)

MULDER: Well, is it true?

WILLA AMBROSE: Yes. But I don't think for the reasons Kyle claims - not because Ed Meecham has done anything to these animals.

MULDER: Why then?

WILLA AMBROSE: Because bringing a pregnancy to term in captivity is always difficult.

MULDER: But a perfect failure rate?

WILLA AMBROSE: I know. It's one of the things I was determined to change when I came to the zoo.

MULDER: Was an attempt ever made to mate Ganesha?

WILLA AMBROSE: No. Mating an elephant out of the wild is rarely successful. There have only been six elephants born in captivity over the last ten years.

(Scully re-appears with a large piece of elephant tissue that she hands to Willa.)

WILLA AMBROSE: Here's the uterine tissue, but I'm still not clear on what you expect to find.

(Scully is now examining the uterine tissue with a magnifier.)

SCULLY: You're right, Mulder. The signs in the uterus and ovaries are unmistakable.

WILLA AMBROSE: So what did you find?

SCULLY: This animal had been pregnant.

WILLA AMBROSE: What are you talking about?

SCULLY: There's evidence of hyperplasia and the corpus luteum is ruptured.

WILLA AMBROSE: That's not possible.

MULDER: Neither is an invisible elephant.

WILLA AMBROSE: What is going on here?

MULDER: Whatever it is it's been going on for some time, and I think you'll find evidence of the same thing when your tiger returns.

SCENE 7
BLAKE TOWERS CONSTRUCTION SITE, DOWNTOWN BOISE

(Two workmen are carrying a large piece of wood over their shoulders.)

WORKER 1: I still can't believe you bet on the Chargers.

(There is a loud thump in the background. The other worker stops.)

WORKER 2: You hear that?

WORKER 1: Hear what?

(There is a second sound, much closer and sounding more like a roar. The two men look to their right, wide-eyed.)

(Some time later, police and emergency vehicles surround the building. A van pulls up, and Ed Meecham gets out with a rifle.)

ED MEECHAM: Where's the tiger?

POLICEMAN: Somewhere inside the construction site. He's got two men trapped in there.

(Willa, Mulder and Scully approach.)

WILLA AMBROSE: Put the gun away, Ed.

ED MEECHAM: You want to be responsible for another death, Miss Ambrose?

WILLA AMBROSE: I think we can capture this cat without any harm to anyone.

ED MEECHAM: This is no time for wishful thinking.

WILLA AMBROSE: I'm ordering you, Ed.

ED MEECHAM: (with sarcasm) Yes, ma'am. Lead the way.

WILLA AMBROSE: Thank you.

(Willa steps past him. She moves through the construction site, loading a tranquilizer into a gun. Mulder and Scully follow some distance back.)

SCULLY: How'd the tiger get all the way across town without being spotted?

MULDER: I don't know, but we better find it before Meecham does.

(Meecham stands nearby, still carrying his gun.)

(The tiger moves through the building. The two workmen are on a grating just above the animal. Willa Ambrose moves into the same area. The workmen call to her from above.)

WORKER 1: (whispers) Hey! Shhh! It was just here.

(Willa moves slowly through the area. The tiger watches from the shadows, then makes a run at her. Willa hears the tiger roar at the last moment and turns, her hands up. A shot is fired. Mulder and Scully hear the shot and run toward it, finding Meecham lowering his weapon. The tiger is dead at Willa's feet.)

ED MEECHAM: It's all right, Willa. They don't all talk and draw pictures.

SCENE 8

(A sign on the entrance to the zoo reads "Zoo Closed to the Public Until Further Notice." Inside, in a room looking out into the zoo's aquarium, a board meeting is concluding.)

BOARD MEMBER: This last incident has left the Board with no choice but to withdraw all funding.

WILLA AMBROSE: Well, if that's your decision, there's nothing else I can say.

BOARD MEMBER: I'm sorry.

(The board members leave. Willa is near tears, a combination of sorrow and frustration, as Mulder enters and closes the door behind him.)

WILLA AMBROSE: I'm out of a job. They've cut off all funding. The animals are being shipped out to other zoos starting Monday.

MULDER: I'm sorry.

WILLA AMBROSE: It could not have happened at a worse time.

MULDER: You mean for Sophie?

WILLA AMBROSE: What I had going for me was my position here. Having a place for her. Have the results come in on the tiger?

MULDER: Agent Scully just finished the test. The tiger had been pregnant too.

WILLA AMBROSE: It's impossible. Theres no chance those animals could get pregnant. No way.

MULDER: What if they've been artificially inseminated?

WILLA AMBROSE: That's an extremely fine and complex process. I would have known.

MULDER: Unless it was done somewhere else.

WILLA AMBROSE: Where?

MULDER: What do you know about alien abduction?

WILLA AMBROSE: (laughs in disbelief) You're ... you're ... you're kidding me. (Mulder stares at her with no response) You think these animals were taken aboard some space ship?

MULDER: I don't know where they're being taken but there's obviously some problem getting them back. Due to what is probably an astrological variation, a trouble with the time-space continuum - these animals that are being taken from locked cages are being returned roughly two miles westsouthwest of the zoo.

WILLA AMBROSE: Aliens impregnating zoo animals?

MULDER: Yes, and harvesting the embryos.

WILLA AMBROSE: Why?

MULDER: Maybe their own Noah's ark? To preserve the DNA of these animals that we're depleting to extinction. Whatever it is, that's probably the reason why you've never had a successful birth at this facility.

WILLA AMBROSE: I think that's the most ridiculous thing I've heard.

MULDER: I understand that you might think it's ridiculous. Maybe you should ask Sophie.

WILLA AMBROSE: You think this is what she's so afraid of?

MULDER: I believe she's pregnant, and she's afraid of them coming for her baby.

(Mulder and Willa are standing at the door of Sophie's cage.)

WILLA AMBROSE: (signing to her) Sophie, come here. I want to ask you a question. It's okay, Sophie. Come here.

(Sophie makes a motion with her arms.)

MULDER: What'd she say?

WILLA AMBROSE: She says, "man, woman - hurt." She thinks you or your partner are going to hurt her or me. Sophie ... (signs again) ... man, woman are here to help you. They want to know about Sophie's baby.

(Sophie moans and seems uneasy.)

MULDER: Can I ask her a question?

WILLA AMBROSE: Yeah.

MULDER: Will you ask her if she wants to leave here?

WILLA AMBROSE: (signing) Sophie - do you want to leave here?

(Sophie motions with her arms again.)

WILLA AMBROSE: She says "light afraid." (signs again) Sophie, what are you afraid of? Tell me.

(Sophie motions again.)

MULDER: What did she say?

WILLA AMBROSE: She said, "baby go flying light."

(Scully knocks and enters.)

SCULLY: I just finished up in the infirmary. A sheriff's deputy came looking to serve you papers. I think it's about Sophie.

WILLA AMBROSE: What am I going to do?

MULDER: Whatever you do, you can't leave Sophie here. Not if you want to protect her.

WILLA AMBROSE: I have nowhere else to take her.

DEPUTY: (knocks, then enters) Excuse me. Willa Ambrose?

WILLA AMBROSE: Yes.

DEPUTY: I'm serving you with a court order to release a gorilla named Sophie into protective custody.

(Willa takes the order from the deputy.)

(A vehicle pulls up in front of a downtown building. Kyle Lang is typing a report at his desk. Willa Ambrose appears in front of him.)

KYLE LANG: What are you doing here?

WILLA AMBROSE: I've come to ask for your help, Kyle.

KYLE LANG: Help with what?

WILLA AMBROSE: Sophie. They've taken her into protective custody.

KYLE LANG: Let her go, Willa.

WILLA AMBROSE: They're putting her in an iron cage as we speak - without bars, without windows. It'll kill her.

KYLE LANG: Sophie's been behind bars her entire life. Let her go home, Willa. She'll have the freedom she deserves.

WILLA AMBROSE: (angrily) Freedom to what - be killed by poachers and have her hands cut off as souvenirs?

KYLE LANG: They've promised she'll be in a preserve.

WILLA AMBROSE: She's mine, Kyle! I won't let her go! (pleading) Please, come on. We can find a place for her here - a private reserve. You know people.

KYLE LANG: (shaking his head) That's against everything I stand for.

WILLA AMBROSE: She's pregnant.

KYLE LANG: What?

WILLA AMBROSE: Sophie's pregnant.

KYLE LANG: I don't believe you, Willa.

WILLA AMBROSE: It's true.

KYLE LANG: Well what if she was? Is the baby gonna live out its life behind bars, too? Look, Willa, she doesn't belong to you. She's not your child. She belongs with other gorillas, not selling tickets for a zoo.

WILLA AMBROSE: You won't help me?

KYLE LANG: No.

(She leaves.)

(Ed Meecham is driving a forktruck, carrying a large metal cage. He sets it down. Mulder watches from a short distance. Scully approaches him.)

SCULLY: You want to see something interesting?

(She hands him a newspaper clipping.)

MULDER: Where did you get this?

(The clipping shows a younger Willa Ambrose and Kyle Lang, standing with his arm around her shoulder. The headline below reads "Naturalists Willa Ambrose and Kyle Lang will bring the animal back to the U.S.")

SCULLY: I was looking for a pen to finish my report in Willa's office, and it was in her drawer.

MULDER: It's a small world, after all.

(They look up to see Willa approaching the large steel cage. Sophie starts banging on the cage and moaning loudly, and Willa rushes to the front of the cage and signs to Sophie.)

WILLA AMBROSE: It's okay, Sophie. It's okay, honey. Sophie, Sophie, Sophie - don't worry. I'm with you.

(Sophie calms down. Mulder and Scully look on, then step away. Willa is fighting back tears as Sophie nuzzles her hands through a hole in the door of the cage.)

WILLA AMBROSE: I love you too.

(At night, a truck pulls up in front of the main zoo entrance and Kyle Lang gets out. Kyle steps into Willa's office.)

KYLE LANG: Willa?

(No one is there. He walks through the zoo building and opens the door marked "Maintenance Entrance.")

KYLE LANG: Willa? Are you there?

(No answer. He walks into the darkened area, passing cages of animals.)

KYLE LANG: Willa? Where are you? Willa?

(He steps to Sophie's cage and looks in but it is empty. He is suddenly thrown across the room and into another cage. He looks up to see a large metal cage falling onto him. He screams.)

SCENE 9

(Willa is being questioned by Scully and Mulder in her office.)

WILLA AMBROSE: I told you, it happened exactly the way it did with the tiger. I heard the animals going crazy. I got out of bed to check on Sophie and she was gone. That's when I found Kyle.

SCULLY: Do you have any idea what he would have been doing at the zoo?

WILLA AMBROSE: No.

SCULLY: We have a witness who says that you visited Kyle's office yesterday. Is that true?

WILLA AMBROSE: Yeah.

SCULLY: For what purpose?

WILLA AMBROSE: Basically, to tell him he'd won. That the zoo was being shut down, that Sophie was being taken into protective custody.

SCULLY: Did you ask him to help you take Sophie to prevent her from being taken from you?

WILLA AMBROSE: No. That would be against everything Kyle believed in.

SCULLY: But he helped you to rescue her originally, isn't that correct? He had a connection to you and to this animal that went back several years.

WILLA AMBROSE: Whatever connection he and I had was over long ago.

SCULLY: But you asked him anyway ... to help you.

WILLA AMBROSE: No.

SCULLY: Then what was he doing here last night, and why did he give you this note?

(She hands her a small piece of paper. On it is written "Willa - Let's talk. Kyle.")

WILLA AMBROSE: I don't know. I told you.

SCULLY: Did he make a habit of visiting the zoo?

WILLA AMBROSE: If he did, it was probably late at night after he jumped over the fence like a good W.A.O. soldier. Anyway, why don't you ask Agent Mulder what he thinks happened? He seems to have a novel theory. Maybe it was alien abduction.

MULDER: Scully, can I talk to you for a second?

(They step outside.)

SCULLY: You think she's telling the truth?

MULDER: Why do you say that?

SCULLY: Well, Kyle Lang's death and the disappearance of the animal match the previous incidents.

MULDER: Yes.

SCULLY: And you've been pushing this alien abduction angle.

MULDER: I still am, but in this case, Willa's reactions are all wrong.

SCULLY: You mean to losing Sophie?

MULDER: I think she knows where Sophie is, and Kyle Lang died because he knows what she's capable of.

SCULLY: You think she killed him?

MULDER: I think she'd do anything to protect that animal.

SCULLY: Even wait atop a stack of crates for a former lover to walk underneath?

MULDER: I think an examination of the body will give us a lot clearer picture of what happened last night. You do that, and I'll check out the warehouse.

(Mulder walks through the warehouse, examining Sophie's cage and seeing some straw just outside the door to it. He hears a noise and steps over to see Ed Meecham closing an electric door at the loading dock. Outside, it looks to be late afternoon.)

(It is now dark, and Ed Meecham backs his truck up to another loading dock. He gets out, carrying a gun, and enters the building. Mulder watches from his car, then gets out.)

(In her office, Willa is packing up her belongings, including a picture of Sophie and her. Scully enters.)

SCULLY: Looks like you're in a hurry.

WILLA AMBROSE: Well, there isn't much to hang around for, is there?

SCULLY: I'm afraid there is. I found evidence that Kyle died a wrongful death. He was hit with a cattle prod. There's gonna be an investigation so I have to read you your rights.

WILLA AMBROSE: It was an accident. Kyle surprised Ed. He wasn't supposed to be there.

SCULLY: Ed Meecham took Sophie?

WILLA AMBROSE: Yes. (near tears) There was no one else to turn to.

SCULLY: Where is she, Willa?

WILLA AMBROSE: Ed has her. She's in some building on the road to Boise.

(Ed Meecham walks through the other building, carrying a flashlight in one hand and the gun in the other. Mulder steps in front of him, gun raised.)

MULDER: Put it down, Ed. There's been enough violence, don't you think?

ED MEECHAM: I didn't kill Kyle Lang.

MULDER: Put down the gun and we'll talk about it.

ED MEECHAM: (putting down the gun) I was only doing what she paid me to do.

MULDER: (picks up the gun) Where is the animal, Ed?

ED MEECHAM: Down the hall.

MULDER: Okay. You show me where - we're gonna go there together. Come on.

(They walk through the building, Mulder following with his gun on Meecham. They approach a storage room, and there are loud roars and banging noises coming from it.)

MULDER: What's she doing?

ED MEECHAM: She's throwing herself against the door. She's gone crazy.

(Mulder steps to the door and looks through the reinforced glass at the top of it. Something hits the glass, startling him. He backs away.)

MULDER: She's scared.

ED MEECHAM: Yeah? Well, she's gonna kill herself.

MULDER: Okay, Ed. Well, you're going to have to save her. Take your tranquilizer gun. I'll be right behind you.

(He hands Ed the gun and takes his flashlight. Ed opens the door.)

ED MEECHAM: I've only got one dart in this thing, so you got to get her out in the light.

(Mulder points the flashlight around in the room.)

MULDER: You see her?

ED MEECHAM: I think she's over in that corner over there.

(Sophie suddenly comes out of the shadows, knocking Mulder down. Meecham ducks out of the room, locking the door behind him.)

MULDER: Hey, Meecham!

(Meecham disappears, leaving Mulder in the room with Sophie.)

MULDER: I'm not gonna hurt you.

(Sophie moves toward Mulder, striking him again. She then moves away and sits accross the room. Dazed, Mulder watches as she motions with her arms. Then there is a blinding light as Mulder loses consciousness.)

(Some time later, Scully is unlocking the door to the room. Mulder lies on the floor, alone in the room. A policeman is with Scully.)

SCULLY: Mulder? Mulder?

(She sees him and rushes to his side. He is bleeding from a cut on the top of his head. Scully touches his head and he awakens, moaning loudly.)

SCULLY: Sorry. Lie still.

MULDER: Where's Sophie?

SCULLY: Lie down. (to policeman) Can we get a paramedic in here?

POLICEMAN: Yes, ma'am.

MULDER: Meecham.

SCULLY: Ed Meecham's been arrested. We picked him up on the way to Boise. That's how we found you here.

MULDER: They took Sophie.

SCULLY: Who did?

MULDER: Where's Willa?

SCULLY: She's outside. She's going in to make a statement about Kyle Lang.

MULDER: I got to talk to her.

(He gets up and hurries out of the room. Scully picks up his gun and follows. Mulder runs outside, where it is early morning and foggy. Willa gets out of the back seat of a police car as she sees Mulder approaching.)

WILLA AMBROSE: Where is she?

MULDER: She's gone.

WILLA AMBROSE: What did he do to her?

MULDER: It wasn't Ed. She tried to tell me something.

(He motions with his arms, like the ones Sophie made earlier.)

MULDER: What is that?

WILLA AMBROSE: That doesn't make any sense.

MULDER: What does it mean?

"Man save man."

(A report is heard from the police radio.)

DISPATCHER'S VOICE: (on radio) We've just received a report of a large animal spotted down off the interstate just west of the service road off ...

MULDER: That's her.

WILLA AMBROSE: She's heading back towards the zoo.

(They quickly get into the car.)

(Later, their car approaches the site. There are several cars and police vehicles there, along with a number of bystanders. They get out of the car.)

WILLA AMBROSE: (to an officer) Where is she?

OFFICER: (pointing) Over there.

(Willa runs in that direction.)

SCULLY: (to officer) What happened here?

OFFICER: Animal got hit by a car. Ran off in the field.

(Mulder and Scully run after Willa, crossing a field. Willa comes to Sophie, who is lying dead. She throws herself to Sophie's side, crying.)

WILLA AMBROSE: Oh, no. Oh, no, no. Sophie! Sophie! Oh, no, no.

(She puts her head down on Sophie as Mulder and Scully watch.)

(Mulder and Scully drive away from the area. Both stare straight ahead somberly.)

MULDER: (voiceover) Willa Ambrose and Ed Meecham have been charged with manslaughter for the death of Kyle Lang. And though the courts will rule on this matter, and justice will be no doubt be served, the pall of a greater tragedy remains. The motives of the silent visitors who set these events in motion remain unclear. Could this be a judgement on a global rate of extinction that has risen to 1000 times its natural rate in this century? An act of alien conservation of animals we are driving hard toward oblivion? And if so, might it follow that our own fate and existence could finally be dependent upon the conservatorship of an extraterrestrial race? Or in the simple words of a creature whose own future is uncertain, will "man save man?"

(As they drive, they pass a church with a sign in front on which is written "Man has no pre-eminence above a beast: for all is vanity. Eccl 3:19.")

[THE END]

"End Game" - Episode 2x17 (videos,guide,stills,transcript)

2010-10-04T18:17:00.000-07:00

Videos
End Game - Trailer

Episode guide
(Source: http://xfiles.wearehere.net/episodes/2x17.htm )

2X17 End Game

Samantha confides in her brother, telling Mulder she was returned to earth some time ago and has been living with 'visitors' to the planet. The doctors who all look alike are really alien clones living on earth, just like her adopted father. But the colony is under threat from an alien bounty hunter sent to kill them. Meanwhile Scully is taken hostage by the mysterious alien bounty hunter who has the ability to morph himself to look like other people. He demands to know where Mulder is but Scully refuses to co-operate. The alien bounty hunter holds Scully ransom in exchange for Samantha. Mulder sets a trap for him with the help of Assistant Director Skinner, but it goes awry and the alien bounty hunter and Samantha tumble off a bridge in to the water below. Mulder is devastated at loosing his sister again so suddenly and has to break the news to his parents. Bill Mulder gives Mulder a letter that Samantha left for him should anything happen to her. It contains a key and the address of an abortion clinic. Mulder goes there and encounters more 'Samanthas', it turns out one of them pretended to be his sister Samantha in an attempt to get him to protect them. But they are too late as the alien bounty hunter finds them and kills the last of the clones. Mulder risks his life and tracks the alien bounty hunter in a effort to find out about his sister but ends up being exposed to a toxic alien poison and is left for dead high up in the arctic. Scully tries desperately to find Mulder before it is too late. Part Two

Noteworthy Quote

X: "You'll only win the war if you pick the right battles agent Mulder. This is a battle you can't win."

Credits

Writer:	Frank Spotnitz
Director:	Rob Bowman

Cast:

David Duchovny	Special Agent Fox Mulder
Gillian Anderson	Special Agent Dana Scully

Guest Cast:

Mitch Pileggi	Assistant Director Skinner
Brian Thompson	Pilot/Alien Bounty Hunter
Dana Gladstone	Dr Landon Prince/Gregor
Megan Leitch	Samantha Mulder
Peter Donat	William Mulder
Colin Cunningham	Lieutenant Wilmer
Steven Williams	X
Garry Davey	Captain
Andrew Johnston	Special Agent Weiss
Allan Lysell	Able Gardner
JB Bivens	Sharpshooter
Oliver Becker	2nd Doctor
Beatrice Zeilinger	Paramedic
Bonnie Hay	Field Doctor

Episode Stills

Transcript End Game 2x17
(Source: http://www.insidethex.co.uk/transcrp/scrp217.htm )

SCENE 1
BEAUFORT SEA; 67 MILES NORTH OF DEADHORSE, ALASKA; USS ALLEGIANCE;
CRUISING DEPTH 1,000 FEET

(The captain of the submarine runs down a hallway passing officers.)

OFFICER #1: Sir.

(He salutes. The captain keeps moving.)

OFFICER #2: Captain.

(He salutes as well. The captain goes to a ladder and climbs up it to the control room. He moves over to a man at the radar station.)

CAPTAIN: What have you got?

RADAR OFFICER: I'm not quite sure, sir. We picked up some paint approximately two minutes ago.

(The captain looks at the radar screen.)

CAPTAIN: Looks like the damn thing's just hanging there.

RADAR OFFICER: Yes, sir. It's approximately two-hundred meters below the ice. Looks to be about eighty meters across and it's noisy.

CAPTAIN: Noisy, how?

RADAR OFFICER: It's emitting radio signals across the spectrum but it's... it's just random noise, sir. We can't detect any pattern.

CAPTAIN: Get me Pacific Command on the satellite uplink.

RADAR OFFICER: Yes, sir.

(He stands and adjusts some controls. The captain gets on the phone.)

CAPTAIN: Yes, admiral. I don't know what we found but it appears to be some kind of craft.

(Some murmuring is heard through the phone.)

Yes, sir, that's correct.

(More murmuring.)

But we're on a cartography mission, admiral. My crew isn't prepared to...

(Murmuring.)

Yes, sir.

(More murmuring.)

Understood, sir.

(He hangs up and walks over to the control panel.)

Set a course heading 0-4-7.

(The man at the panel starts flipping switches. The captain moves back over to the radar officer.)

RADAR OFFICER: Toward the object, sir?

(The captain picks up the phone.)

CAPTAIN: Weapons room.

(A man is heard over the phone.)

MAN: Aye, sir.

Lock torpedoes on target. Prepare to fire on command.

RADAR OFFICER: Captain, shouldn't we at least attempt to identify this object first?

CAPTAIN: We have our orders, Lieutenant.

RADAR OFFICER: But, sir...

(A loud buzzing suddenly starts. The officers cover their ears and the ship rumbles. People scream to each other as consoles start exploding, knocking people and papers over. The buzzing grows louder. Finally, it stops.)

MAN: Everything's down, negative!

(People still scream to each other as the red warning lights come on.)

CAPTAIN: Reactor's gone down.

(He picks up the phone.)

MAN: Over here...

CAPTAIN: Engine room?

(The lieutenant stands up.)

RADAR OFFICER: That won't work, captain. We've only got battery power.

(The captain hangs up the phone.)

CAPTAIN: I'm going down there. Prepare to surface at once!

(He runs back down the stairs. The radar officer looks around.)

RADAR OFFICER: Surface into what? We're under thirty-two feet of glacial ice.

SCENE 2
VACATION VILLAGE MOTORLODGE; GERMANTOWN, MARYLAND

(Scully stands, ear to the phone. We see Mulder standing behind her, but Mulder is also on the phone.)

MULDER: (on phone) Scully? Are you there? Scully? What's going on?

(She slowly turns around and looks at Mulder. He mouths the words "who is it?")

SCULLY: No, sorry.

(She hangs up.)

MULDER: Who was that?

SCULLY: It's a wrong number. Where have you been, Mulder? I've been trying to get a hold of you.

MULDER: I, I was trying to reach you. I went by your house but you weren't there. I got here as quickly as I could.

SCULLY: Why didn't you call when you got my message?

MULDER: I, I, I did call. I, I couldn't get through.

(She turns around, grabs her gun and aims it at Mulder.)

SCULLY: Put your hands against the wall.

MULDER: Scully, what are you doing?

SCULLY: I said put your hands against the wall!

MULDER: What's wrong?

SCULLY: Do it!

MULDER: Scully, it's me...

(He turns around and puts his hands against the wall. Scully moves up to him.)

SCULLY: I don't know who you are.

MULDER: Okay, I'm going to take my left hand and reach into my pocket and get my I.D., okay? Just don't shoot me. I got shot once and I didn't much care for it.

SCULLY: I said keep your hands up.

(Mulder spins around and backhands her with his left then punches her with his right as he spins, sending her flying into the near wall. Her nose is bleeding. She slumps down against the wall as "Mulder" walks up to her.)

MULDER: Where is he?

(She reaches for her gun but Mulder grabs her by the throat and lifts her above his head against the wall with one hand.)

That was him on the phone, wasn't it? Tell me where he is.

SCULLY: I don't know what you're talking about.

(He throws her up and she breaks through a glass table. He looks down at her and his face morphs to that of his true identity, the Alien Bounty Hunter. Later, there is a knocking on the door.)

MULDER: Scully?

(He breaks open the door. The room is dark. He tries the light switch, but it won't work. Samantha is standing behind him in the doorway.)

SAMANTHA MULDER: He's been here.

(He picks up the lamp and turns it on. He looks down at the broken table. Samantha walks over to him.)

Your partner is alive.

MULDER: How do you know?

SAMANTHA MULDER: He took her to get me.

MULDER: There's no sign of a break-in. She wouldn't have just let him in.

SAMANTHA MULDER: She might not have known who he was. She might have thought it was you.

(They start walking back to the car.)

He's going to contact you. He's going to say he wants to make a trade, your partner's life for mine.

MULDER: Why, why does he want to kill you?

SAMANTHA MULDER: Because I know how to kill him.

MULDER: How?

SAMANTHA MULDER: By piercing the base of his skull.

MULDER: That would kill anybody.

SAMANTHA MULDER: Yes, but this is the only way to kill him and it must be precise. I'm fairly sure it'll work.

MULDER: Fairly sure?

SAMANTHA MULDER: He's got powers I've never seen before. If it doesn't work, there's a chance you could die.

MULDER: From what?

SAMANTHA MULDER: Their blood is toxic, human exposure to it is fatal.

(Mulder looks away, thinking.)

I know this must seem incredible to you...

MULDER: No, no, no, no, no... that's just it. It doesn't seem incredible at all. Now, how do we find him?

SAMANTHA MULDER: We don't. He'll find us.

SCENE 3
MULDER'S APARTMENT

(THE TIME IS 12:38. Mulder paces around his apartment as Samantha sits on the couch.)

SAMANTHA MULDER: He'll call.

MULDER: You're sure?

SAMANTHA MULDER: I know what he wants.

MULDER: And if he doesn't get it?

SAMANTHA MULDER: I know this is hard for you, Fox...

MULDER: No, it's not hard. It's unbelievable.

SAMANTHA MULDER: You don't believe me.

MULDER: After twenty-two years, why come back?

SAMANTHA MULDER: I've explained to you...

MULDER: No, no, you've explained only what you had to! I know next to nothing about these people you call your parents or about the man who wants to kill them.

(She stands.)

SAMANTHA MULDER: The men you've been seeking are the progeny of two original visitors, clones who have been attempting to establish a colony here since the late 1940's.

MULDER: A colony?

SAMANTHA MULDER: Loosely. The community, by necessity, is dispersed. There are clones identical to my parents living in virtually every part of the country.

MULDER: What are they trying to accomplish?

SAMANTHA MULDER: It's their belief that our stewardship of the planet is being forsaken, and that by default, they'll someday become the natural heirs.

MULDER: And in the meantime?

SAMANTHA MULDER: Through hybridization, they've been working to erase that aspect which has forced the community to scatter... their identical natures.

MULDER: All the clones worked in abortion clinics, why?

SAMANTHA MULDER: Access to fetal tissue. Though the biologies are incompatible, they finally found a way to combine human DNA with alien DNA.

MULDER: And this man... why has he been sent to kill them?

SAMANTHA MULDER: The experiments weren't sanctioned. It was considered a dilution of their species, a pollution of their race. So a bounty hunter was dispatched to destroy them and terminate the colony.

MULDER: That's a good story... but I've heard a lot of good stories lately.

SAMANTHA MULDER: I've got no reason to lie to you. I'm your sister, Fox, you have to trust me.

(They look at each other. There is a knock on the door. Mulder picks up his gun off the table, takes it out of the holster and walks to the door.)

MULDER: Who is it?

SKINNER: It's Skinner.

(Mulder looks at Samantha, who runs off to the side.)

Mulder?

MULDER: The door's open.

(Skinner opens the door and sees the apartment is dark. He walks in and looks at Mulder, who is sitting on the couch.)

Make yourself at home.

(Samantha takes a sharp object out of a kitchen drawer. It has a wooden handle with a long metal point sticking out of it.)

SKINNER: What's going on here, Agent Mulder? Why are the lights out?

MULDER: Orders from my opthamologist.

SKINNER: Are you all right?

(Samantha starts to sneak up behind him.)

MULDER: Yeah, I'm fine.

SKINNER: I've been trying to reach you and Agent Scully.

MULDER: I haven't checked my messages.

SKINNER: Are you aware that Agent Scully incarcerated four men with the federal marshal's office? And those men are now missing?

(Samantha flicks on the lights. Skinner turns around and Mulder stands, pointing his gun at Skinner.)

SAMANTHA MULDER: It's all right, it's not him.

(Mulder sighs in relief and puts the gun down.)

SKINNER: What the hell is going on here, Mulder?

(Both Fox and Samantha walk towards Skinner.)

MULDER: This is my sister, Samantha Mulder.

SKINNER: What?

MULDER: I haven't had time to explain, Agent Scully is missing.

SKINNER: What do you mean, missing?

(The phone rings. Mulder picks it up.)

MULDER: Hello.

(Cut to Scully, bruised and battered, blood over a good part of her face, standing in a phone booth. The Bounty Hunter skulks around the booth.)

SCULLY: Mulder, it's me.

(Cut to Mulder, looking up in shock.)

MULDER: Scully, where are you?

(He signals to Samantha, who picks up the phone and listens.)

SCULLY: I don't know, I'm... I'm in a telephone booth.

(Cut to Scully.)

He's got my gun, Mulder. He says he's going to kill me if you don't give him what he wants.

(Cut to Mulder. Skinner watches Mulder, unsure of what's going on.)

MULDER: Well, what does he want?

(Cut to Scully.)

SCULLY: A woman who's with you. He says you'll know what I'm talking about.

(Cut to Mulder, who's looking at Samantha. She nods.)

MULDER: All right, tell him we'll negotiate.

(Cut to Scully.)

SCULLY: He doesn't want to negotiate. He says he wants to make a trade.

(Cut to Mulder.)

MULDER: All right, let me speak to him.

(Cut to Scully.)

SCULLY: He wants you to be at Memorial Bridge at Bethesda in one hour.

(Cut to Mulder.)

MULDER: Scully, I need time, I need more time than that.

(Cut to Scully.)

SCULLY: Mulder...

(The Bounty Hunter presses down on the switch, hanging up. Cut to Mulder, who hangs up his phone angrily. Samantha hangs up as well.)

SKINNER: Where is she? What's this about a negotiation?

MULDER: We don't, we don't have any time. If I ever needed your help, your trust, I need it now.

SCENE 4
OLD MEMORIAL BRIDGE; BETHESDA, MARYLAND

(Mulder and Samantha drive onto the bridge and stop near the middle. Skinner and a sharpshooter are in the bushes. The sharpshooter is building his sniper rifle.)

SKINNER: Mulder's in position.

(He looks through his binoculars.)

MULDER: We just need to get him out of the car. Make him think we're going to make a trade. We just need one shot.

SAMANTHA MULDER: To the base of the neck.

MULDER: These guys can hollow out a dime at two-hundred yards.

(They look to see another car pulling up.)

And, Samantha. Do not take any unnecessary risks out there.

(She nods. He unbuckles his seatbelt and gets out of the car. The car pulls up and Mulder walks towards it. The Bounty Hunter steps out, gun in hand. He yanks Scully out and grabs her, holding the gun to her head.)

Scully?

(They walk slowly towards him.)

ALIEN BOUNTY HUNTER: Bring her out.

(Mulder stares at him, then looks back at Samantha. They look at each other, then Samantha gets out of the car and walks up to Mulder. They stare at each other. Samantha nods slightly, then starts walking towards the Bounty Hunter.)

SKINNER: Take your shot when you got it.

(Samantha and Scully look at each other.)

ALIEN BOUNTY HUNTER: Step close. Right up close.

(She slowly moves up to him. Through the rifle's scope, we see him push away Scully and grab Samantha. Scully runs over to Mulder.)

MULDER: Scully, you all right?

SCULLY: Yeah.

MULDER: Yeah?

SCULLY: I'm okay.

(The Bounty Hunter puts his gun away as Scully gets into the car. The Bounty Hunter slowly inches his way back towards his car. Mulder follows. In the scope, we see that Samantha and the alien are moving behind a column. Samantha looks at Mulder then spins around and attacks the Bounty Hunter with the same weapon she was going to use on Skinner.)

SHARPSHOOTER: I lost the shot.

(The Bounty Hunter grabs Samantha again. Mulder aims his gun.)

MULDER: There's no way out. We've got both sides of the bridge covered. Now let her go.

(He slowly walks towards them. The Bounty Hunter whispers in Samantha's ear.)

ALIEN BOUNTY HUNTER: Tell me where she is.

MULDER: Let her go!

(In the scope, the Bounty Hunter slowly moves into the shot. A shot rings off and the Bounty Hunter staggers. Samantha moans as the Bounty Hunter topples over the side of the bridge and they both plummet into the water. Mulder runs over to the side.)

Samantha! Samantha!

(Morning. Two scuba divers jump off a raft.)

RAFT DRIVER: Spread out.

(The divers move away from the raft.)

Clear!

(He drives off. A car pulls up next to Mulder who is leaning on the railing. Scully gets out.)

SCULLY: Mulder...

MULDER: You should be in the hospital, Scully.

SCULLY: I was discharged an hour ago and I asked to come here. Have they found anything yet?

MULDER: Nothing yet. You think she could've survived?

SCULLY: Maybe... but the water's thirty-six degrees.

MULDER: Well, maybe she went into hypothermic shock. I've heard about people who have lived after being stranded in water like this... eight to ten hours.

SCULLY: Mulder, why didn't you tell me on the phone that it was her?

MULDER: I couldn't tell you.

SCULLY: Why not?

MULDER: Cause you'd never let me go through with it.

SCULLY: Are you sure that it's your sister?

(He spins around and looks at her.)

MULDER: Why would you even question me on that?

SCULLY: Because back at the motel, Mulder, it was you but, but it wasn't you.

MULDER: Well, it was her.

(He starts walking. She follows him.)

SCULLY: Well, then who is this man and what does he...

MULDER: He's an alien.

(He opens his car door.)

SCULLY: Is that what you're going to tell Skinner?

MULDER: I already told Skinner, that was the easy part. Now I got to tell my father.

(He gets in.)

SCENE 5
MULDER'S APARTMENT

(Mulder opens the door and his father is standing there.)

WILLIAM MULDER: You didn't have me come all this way to give me good news.

(Mulder turns away.)

What is it, Fox?

MULDER: Samantha's gone... Dad. I lost her.

(William walks in.)

WILLIAM MULDER: What do you mean, you lost her?

MULDER: There was a man... he was holding my partner hostage in exchange for Samantha.

WILLIAM MULDER: You let this man take your sister. Isn't that what you're trying to tell me?

(Fox turns back.)

MULDER: I, I can't explain it to you, but, um... I believed I was doing the right thing, Dad.

WILLIAM MULDER: Was this your decision?

MULDER: Yes. I'll tell Mom.

WILLIAM MULDER: Do you realize what losing her again is going to do to your mother?

(They look at each other. Fox is about to cry.)

Do you?

(Fox tries to say something but can't. He looks down at the floor, crying.)

MULDER: I'm sorry, Dad. I'm sorry. I'm... I'm sorry.

(William goes to leave when he pulls an envelope out of his pocket.)

WILLIAM MULDER: Your sis... Samantha left this at the house for you.

(He puts it down on the table and leaves, slamming the door shut. Mulder walks over to the envelope and opens it. He takes out a letter and a keycard to a clinic that says 4A. The letter reads:

"If anything should happen to me or if we become separated, you must meet me here:
1235 91st St.
Rockville, Maryland")

SCENE 6
WOMEN'S HEALTH SERVICES CLINIC; ROCKVILLE, MARYLAND

(Mulder pulls up in his car. As he gets out of the car and walks up the stairs to the gate, his cellular phone rings. He takes it out and turns it on.)

MULDER: Mulder.

(Scully is on the other end.)

SCULLY: Mulder, it's me.

MULDER: Scully, she left a path in case we got separated. I think she's alive.

(Cut to Scully.)

SCULLY: Mulder, I think you should come back as soon as you can.

MULDER: Why? What'd you find?

SCULLY: It's your sister.

(In the background, a team of agents takes Samantha's body off of a raft.)

We just pulled her body out of the river.

(Cut to Mulder, who's face turns to a combination of shock and sadness. Cut back to Scully.)

Mulder, I'm so sorry.

(Cut back to Mulder.)

MULDER: Are you sure?

(Cut to Scully.)

SCULLY: Yeah.

(She sighs.)

You know... whatever you're feeling, you can't blame yourself.

(Cut to Mulder, who exhales deeply.)

MULDER: What about a second body? Did you find a second body?

(Cut back to Scully. The agents carry the body up the hill.)

SCULLY: No, not yet.

(Cut to Mulder.)

MULDER: I'll be there as soon as I can.

(He starts down the stairs slowly.)

SCENE 7
OLD MEMORIAL BRIDGE; BETHESDA, MARYLAND

(A female and male agent run around from the back of the FBI ambulance to Scully.)

FEMALE AGENT: Agent Scully? There's something you need to see.

SCULLY: What is it?

FEMALE AGENT: It's the body we pulled from the water. Something strange is happening.

(Scully and the two others run up to the truck. Scully swings open the doors to see Samantha, her face green and bubbling. The three look on in horror and disbelief as Samantha's face fizzes and starts to cave in.

SCENE 8
WOMEN'S HEALTH SERVICES CLINIC; ROCKVILLE, MARYLAND

(Mulder stands on the stairs, thinking. He turns back and runs the keycard down through the sensor. The door opens and he walks in. He looks around the room, which is full of boxes, and hears a beeping. He takes out his gun and walks towards the beeping. Stopping at a stairwell, he hears some noise downstairs, which is where he moves. He moves into a room where a person is standing at a desk. He points his gun.)

MULDER: Federal agent. Put your hands where I can see them and turn around. Slowly.

(The person turns around.)

Who are you?

(She takes off her goggles and doctor's mask. It is Samantha. Mulder lowers his gun.)

SAMANTHA MULDER CLONE #1: She's dead, isn't she?

MULDER: What the hell is going on?

SAMANTHA MULDER CLONE #1: Come, please. There's not much time.

(She opens a door.)

MULDER: Who are you?

SAMANTHA MULDER CLONE #1:Please.

(Mulder tentatively walks into the room and sees another Samantha clone standing at a computer, green vats all around her.)

MULDER: It was all a lie.

SAMANTHA MULDER CLONE #1: We needed your help. We knew you could be manipulated.

SAMANTHA MULDER CLONE #2: He'll be coming. We must hurry now.

MULDER: Who?

(Another Samantha clone walks up behind him, this one in a lab coat.)

SAMANTHA MULDER CLONE #3: The man who's been sent to kill us.

MULDER: He's dead.

SAMANTHA MULDER CLONE #1: How do you know?

MULDER: He was shot. In the back of the neck!

SAMANTHA MULDER CLONE #2: How did he die?

MULDER: He fell off a bridge... with one of you.

SAMANTHA MULDER CLONE #3: Then we don't know for sure. You could have been followed. Come with me.

(She walks out of the room.)

This way, Agent Mulder.

(Mulder looks at the first clone then follows her down the hallway to a door. The third clone slides her keycard down a sensor and opens the door.)

The rest of us are dispensable.

(Another clone steps out.)

She was the first. The one from which we all came. The one you must save.

(Mulder realizes that Samantha was indeed not Samantha, that they were all alien clones.)

MULDER: I'm not your savior.

SAMANTHA MULDER CLONE #4: You must help us. You have no choice.

MULDER: No, I... I do have a choice and my choice is to walk out of here.

(He starts to walk away.)

SAMANTHA MULDER CLONE #4: We know where your sister is.

(Mulder turns back.)

Ask yourself, Agent Mulder, how else would we know so much about her?

(A fire alarm goes off.)

SAMANTHA MULDER CLONE #3: He's here.

(She starts to walk away. Mulder turns back and walks down the previous hallway, gun in hand. He walks down a hallway flooded with smoke, coughing. He reaches a doorway and when he turns to go through, he is met with an open fist by the Bounty Hunter. Mulder goes down, nearly unconscious. The Bounty Hunter flicks open his gimlet and steps over Mulder's body. He looks down the hallway, then goes back the way Mulder came. Mulder groans on the floor. The fire trucks arrive. Firemen run around, some pulling out hoses, some running into the building as it burns. A fireman runs through some fire and comes across Mulder.)

FIREMAN: I found one!

(He kneels down and starts to help Mulder up, who is coughing.)

Sir, we're going to get you out of here.

MULDER: What about the others?

FIREMAN: We got real lucky. There are no others.

(He leads Mulder up the stairs.)

MULDER: No. Wait. There were women in here.

FIREMAN: We looked. You're the only one here.

MULDER: No. You've got to keep looking...

SCENE 9
FBI HEADQUARTERS; WASHINGTON, D.C.

(Scully is typing up her report. We hear her speaking over it.)

SCULLY: After being treated for smoke inhalation, Agent Mulder was released from Samaritan Hospital in satisfactory condition. At his request, the abortion clinic where he was found has been searched repeatedly but the bodies of the women he insists perished there were not found. My report on this case remains incomplete. Many aspects continue to defy explanation including the identities of the identical men and women. Agent Mulder's claim of alien origins cannot be substantiated. The man suspected in their disappearances is still at large...

SCENE 10
US MEDICAL RESEARCH INSTITUTE OF INFECTIOUS DISEASES

(A man in a quarantine containment suit is standing over Weiss' body, which has been dissected. Stitch marks run around Weiss' neck and down his chest. He picks up a scalpel off a tray. Scully can still be heard.)

SCULLY: ...and has now been charged with the death of F.B.I. Special Agent Barret Weiss, whose body has been quarantined at the U.S. Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases. Weiss' cause of death involved a thickening of the blood. It is now believed that he was subjected to a virulent strain of virus whose origin and behavior are also unexplainable.

(A man in a labcoat, Able Gardner, walks in with Scully, talking.)

It is my hope that further analysis of this contagion will aid in the solution of this case.

(Scully looks through a microscope at a sample of Weiss' blood, which has many long blue viruses in it.)

This is a retrovirus?

GARDNER: Yes, but none of us here have ever seen anything like it. Do you recognize it?

SCULLY: Was the thickening of Agent Weiss' blood an immunological response to the virus?

(Gardner walks around Scully to a computer.)

GARDNER: Apparently. When the body's exposed to it, it triggers a massive production of red blood cells. Now, take a look at this.

(A picture comes up on the screen of blood with a few blue viruses in it.)

We took a second culture and were able to control it's growth.

SCULLY: What did you do to it?

GARDNER: All we did was lower the temperature by five degrees fahrenheit.

SCULLY: So the virus is inhibited by cold.

GARDNER: Knocked out by it. For some reason, this retrovirus goes dormant at cold temperatures.

SCULLY: We pulled a body from the river yesterday that was chilled near freezing. When it started to thaw, it began to corrode.

GARDNER: Corrode?

SCULLY: If you find out anything else, you let me know as soon as possible.

(She walks out as the man in the containment suit works on Weiss in the back.)

SCENE 11
KENNEDY CENTER; WASHINGTON, D.C.

(X walks around the side of the building and walks up to Mulder. He is wearing a tuxedo.)

X: You wanted to see me?

MULDER: How was the opera?

X: Wonderful, I've never slept better. I don't like these hasty public meetings, Agent Mulder.

MULDER: I'm sorry. I need your help.

X: It's over. The fat lady is singing.

MULDER: I need to know what you know.

X: Okay, they're all dead.

MULDER: No. One of them is alive, the one who was sent to kill them. Where is he?

X: A nuclear submarine located his craft in the Beaufort Sea five days ago. They were ordered to destroy it but they were disabled. An attack fleet left port from Anchorage this morning to make sure this man does not leave.

MULDER: I got to get up there.

X: You'll only win the war if you pick the right battles, Agent Mulder. This is a battle you can't win.

(He walks away.)

SCENE 12
MULDER'S APARTMENT

(Scully knocks on Mulder's door.)

SCULLY: Mulder, it's me, are you there?

(She looks down and sees two newspapers stacked. She kicks one, then unlocks the door and goes inside. Sitting down and putting her coat on the chair, she goes to his computer and turns it on. The modem dials a number. She looks at his window and sees an "X" in masking tape on it. The computer beeps and she sees a small box that reads:

"Message Notice
E-mail message waiting
Mulder, 000517"

She double-clicks on it and it expands to an e-mail to Scully with the heading:

"MAIL-238479
TO: Dana Scully, 001813
FROM: Fox Mulder, 000517"

We hear Mulder reading the letter.)

MULDER: Scully, when you get this message, I will be too far away for you to stop me, but where I'm going I cannot allow you to follow. I won't let you jeopardize your life and your career for reasons purely personal to me. You were right, Scully... you said a line has to be drawn somewhere. I'm drawing it for you here. I'll contact you when I can.

(She gets up.)

SCENE 13
ASSISTANT DIRECTOR WALTER SKINNER'S OFFICE; FBI HEADQUARTERS; WASHINGTON, D.C.

(Skinner sits at his desk, writing. Scully opens the door.)

SCULLY: Sir?

(He looks at her.)

I'm sorry to come unannounced, sir, but your assistant wasn't at her desk.

(He stands.)

SKINNER: What is it, Scully?

SCULLY: May we speak off the record, sir?

SKINNER: About?

SCULLY: Agent Mulder.

(He walks over and closes the door.)

He's gone.

SKINNER: Where?

SCULLY: I don't know, I was hoping that you could tell me or help me to find out.

SKINNER: When I spoke to Agent Mulder the day before yesterday, he said he was going to take some time off.

SCULLY: He told me the same thing but I don't think this matter with his sister is settled. Sir, is there any way that you can reach him through unofficial channels?

(He thinks about this.)

SKINNER: I can't help you, Agent Scully.

(He turns back towards his desk.)

SCULLY: Please?

(He looks back at her.)

SKINNER: Agent Scully, you and I both have a greater responsibility to consider and that is to the F.B.I. Agent Mulder's actions in this case are in violation of his duties, his oath of trust and bureau protocol. He's risked my position, your life.

SCULLY: Agent Mulder has saved my life!

SKINNER: If he wanted or expected you to the same, he would have told you where he was going.

(He walks back to his desk and sits down.)

Please close the door on your way out, Agent Scully.

(She stares at him for a few seconds, then leaves. Skinner picks up his pen to write, then slams it down and looks back at the door.)

SCENE 14
MULDER'S APARTMENT

(Scully turns on Mulder's desk light and shines it through the window on the "X." Later on, she falls asleep. There is a knock on the door and she wakes up. She opens the door and sees X standing there. X is surprised to see her.)

SCULLY: Where is Mulder?

X: Sorry, I must have the wrong apartment.

(He starts walking down the hall. Scully walks after him.)

SCULLY: Where's Mulder? I need to know, damn it!

X: I'm sorry, you've mistaken me for someone else.

SCULLY: I'm losing time!

(He presses the button on the elevator and gets in.)

X: I'm sorry. I can't help you.

(The door closes. X lets out a deep breath and looks down at the floor. The elevator stops and the door opens. X goes to leave but his path is barred by Skinner.)

Excuse me.

SKINNER: Did you tell her what she needed to know?

(X looks at him with a strange face, then goes to pull out his gun in realization. Skinner grabs him by his trenchcoat and slams him up against the back wall of the elevator.)

How hard do you want to make this?

X: No harder than it has to be.

(X headbutts Skinner then punches him with a right hand, knocking him back. X once again goes to pull out his gun but Skinner grabs him and punches him in the gut. He then delivers his own headbutt and throws him into the corner. He grabs him by the trenchcoat again but before he can pick him up, X points his gun in Skinner's face. Skinner as a big cut on his forehead.)

I've killed men for far less.

SKINNER: You pull that trigger, you'll be killing two men. Now I want to know where Mulder is.

(There is a knock on Mulder's door. Scully opens it and sees Skinner standing there, looking ragged and disheveled. Blood runs down the side of his face from the cut. His nose and lips are bloody.)

Agent Mulder took a commercial flight to Tacoma, Washington. From there, he caught a military plane to Deadhorse, Alaska.

(Scully looks at him, shocked. She motions for him to come in. He does so and walks over to the table.)

He used his F.B.I. credentials to charter a Rollagon all-terrain vehicle. It's still a ten-mile hike across the ice.

(He leans over and writes something down on a piece of paper.)

These are the coordinates of his final destination.

(He hands the paper to Scully.)

SCULLY: How did you get this?

SKINNER: Unofficial channels.

(Mulder looks at a small digital control he has that charts his location. Carrying a flashlight, he walks a little farther and sees the top of the submarine sticking out above the ice. He walks around and climbs up the ladder. He opens the hull door and climbs inside. The room is dark and quiet. He takes off his hood and unzips his coat. He shines his flashlight around the equipment. No signs of life. He shines it down on the floor and sees a man lying dead. Moving the flashlight more, he sees two more men slumped down on the floor. Suddenly, there is a bang and footsteps.)

MULDER: Hey!

(He runs after the noise, gun in hand.)

Stop!

(He walks down a ladder and looks tentatively down the hallway. There is another bang and he turns to see a man running down a hallway a few doors down. He runs after him and sees another ladder going down. He hears a clang to the left of him and goes toward it. There are a few more bangs and he spins around to see a man wedged in between a pipe and a wall. The man gasps.)

Who are you?

MAN: Lieutenant Terry Wilmer.

MULDER: Step out of there!

(The man slowly starts to move out of his spot.)

Come out!

(He moves out from between the pipe and the wall. Afterwards, the man is sitting down at a desk, the flashlight in front of him, shining in his face. Mulder is standing in back of him and to the right. When the man speaks, it is very shaky, like whimpering.)

What happened to you?

MAN: I don't know. We, uh... we just lost power. We, we... we drifted under the ice for days. Then, um... then we hit a...

(He turns his head towards Mulder, who points his gun.)

MULDER: Don't look at me, face forward!

(The man turns back.)

MAN: We hit a shallow patch and punched through, okay? That's what happened.

MULDER: So why did you run?

MAN: A man came. He, um... he sealed most of the men below decks without any air and, uh... and then he started to execute the rest of us.

(Mulder moves directly behind him. The man is crying.)

Every... they're all dead. I, uh... I thought you were him, I didn't know if you were him.

MULDER: How is it you managed to survive?

MAN: I hid under the body of a chief petty officer, okay? I, uh... I played dead.

(Mulder flips a switch and the submarine regains power. The man looks around and hears a clicking. He looks to see that Mulder has handcuffed him. Mulder holds the gun to the back of the man's neck.)

What's this for? What are you, crazy?

MULDER: No. I'm just tired and you're not getting back to your ship until I get the truth. Now tell me where my sister is.

MAN: I don't know what you're talking about.

MULDER: Base of the neck! Now, you tell me how I can find her and I'll let you get back to your ship before it's destroyed!

MAN: Please... please...

(His voice suddenly changes to a very strong tone.)

You're making a really big mistake.

(He tosses Mulder across the room. The man stands and Mulder looks up at him. The man suddenly grows taller and his features change. He is the Alien Bounty Hunter. Mulder looks on in awe as the Bounty Hunter tugs at the handcuff and tosses Mulder back the other way.)

ALIEN BOUNTY HUNTER: If I wanted to, I could've killed you many times before.

MULDER: Where is she?

(The Bounty Hunter throws him back down to the floor.)

ALIEN BOUNTY HUNTER: Is the answer to your question worth dying for? Is that what you want?

MULDER: Where is she?

(Mulder is thrown back to where he was. He groans and coughs.)

Just tell me where she is.

ALIEN BOUNTY HUNTER: She's alive. Can you die now?

(The Bounty Hunter starts dragging him out the door, knocking over the chair. Mulder grabs his gun off of the floor and shoots the Bounty Hunter in the back. The alien leaks green and looks back at Mulder, who screams in pain as the toxic gases attack him. Mulder is dragged up the hull and thrown onto the floor. The assassin starts to climb back down, looks at Mulder and closes the hull, snapping the handcuffs in two. Mulder tries to hang on but drops down to the ice and tumbles beneath the wing. He groans and coughs, his face discolored from the cold and the poison. The riding lights come on. The wing turns and assumes a vertical position. The sub starts to sink, the wing speeding down at Mulder, about to chop him in half. With the last of his strength, he rolls out of the way.)

SCENE 15
EMERGENCY ROOM; EISENHOWER FIELD

(Scully bursts into the emergency room. Mulder is sitting in a tub, an oxygen mask on. The people are talking in the background.)

NURSE: No change in B.P. or pulse.

(Scully looks at Mulder and holds up her badge.)

SCULLY: I'm Dana Scully, I'm Agent Mulder's partner. What are his vitals?

(The doctor walks over to her.)

DOCTOR: He's suffering from extreme hypothermia.

SCULLY: No... you've got to get him out of the tub.

DOCTOR: He's dying, he's lost all his body heat.

SCULLY: You've got to listen to me! If you keep him in there, you're going to kill him! The cold is the only thing that's keeping him alive.

(Mulder flatlines.)

NURSE: His heart stopped!

DOCTOR: Give me one amp of epinephrine in a cannula!

SCULLY: You don't know what you're dealing with here! Agent Mulder has been exposed to a retrovirus resulting in hyperviscosity syndrome.

DOCTOR: I want you out of my E.R. right now. Nurse!

(A nurse walks over to her.)

NURSE: Yes, doctor. Ma'am...

SCULLY: His blood has thickened...

NURSE: Ma'am...

SCULLY: That's why his heart is failing!

(The doctor spins around.)

DOCTOR: No, his heart is failing because he's lost all his body heat!

SCULLY: No, the only thing saving him right now is the hypermetabolic state induced by the cold. Now, if you don't do what I'm saying, you are going to kill him!

(The doctor stares at her for a second. She takes off her coat.)

Let's get him out of that tub now.

(The doctor holds an oxygen mask over Mulder's mouth as Scully readies the defibrillators.)

MAN: A hundred joules, charged and ready.

SCULLY: Clear!

WOMAN: Clear.

(She puts the defibrillators down on Mulder's chest and they go off. Still no pulse.)

No rhythm.

MAN: Charge?

DOCTOR: No.

SCULLY: Clear!

WOMAN: Clear.

(Scully tries again. A slight pulse picks up.)

DOCTOR: I'm picking up a faint pulse.

(Scully puts the defribillators down.)

SCULLY: I want a digoxin 0.1 milligram I.V. Hang a heparin drip at 1,000 units per hour. And get him two units of fresh frozen plasma now.

(The nurse runs off to do so.)

DOCTOR: This patient's not even in...

SCULLY: He's going to make it.

(She runs her hand through his hair.)

MAN: Let's get the plasma going. Okay, let's get a second line ready.

OTHER MAN: Push the adrenaline...

(Later, Mulder lays on his hospital bed, oxygen tube in his nose. Scully sits at his bedside. We hear her voice over the scene.)

SCULLY: Transfusions and an aggressive treatment with anti-viral agents have resulted in a steady but gradual improvement in Agent Mulder's condition. Blood tests have confirmed his exposure to the still unidentified retrovirus whose origin remains a mystery. The search team that found Agent Mulder has located neither the missing submarine nor the man he was looking for.

Several aspects of this case remain unexplained, suggesting the possibility of paranormal phenomena... but I am convinced that to accept such conclusions is to abandon all hope of understanding the scientific events behind them. Many of the things I have seen have challenged my faith and my belief in an ordered universe...

(Later, a nurse opens the door to Mulder's room for Scully, who sits down at his bedside. He no longer has the oxygen tube and is looking much healthier than before.)

...but this uncertainty has only strengthened my need to know, to understand, to apply reason to those things which seem to defy it. It was science that isolated the retrovirus Agent Mulder was exposed to, and science that allowed us to understand its behavior. And ultimately, it was science that saved Agent Mulder's life.

(Mulder groans. Scully looks up at him and smiles. He slowly turns to look at her.)

Hey. How you feeling?

(Mulder can only whisper.)

MULDER: Like I got a bad case of freezer burn. How did I get here?

SCULLY: A naval reconnaissance squad found and choppered you to Eisenhower Field.

(He nods.)

Thanks for ditching me.

MULDER: I... I'm sorry, I... I couldn't let you risk your life on this.

SCULLY: Did you find what you were looking for?

MULDER: No. No. But I... I found something I thought I'd lost. Faith to keep looking.

(She smiles.)

[THE END]

"Colony" - Episode 2x16 (videos,guide,stills,transcript)

2010-10-03T21:25:00.000-07:00

Videos
Colony - Trailer

Episode guide
(Source: http://xfiles.wearehere.net/episodes/2x16.htm )

2X16 Colony

Anonymous email postings draw the attention of Mulder and Scully to the deaths of two identical doctors, killed in arson attacks on abortion clinics up and down the north eastern states. With one outstanding feature, no bodies were recovered from the ashes. Mulder and Scully discover that someone is running newspaper adverts with a picture of the doctor, trying to find other look alikes across the country. When they manage to track one down, a doctor living in Syracuse, they get a local FBI Agent to protect the doctor until they can get there. But when they arrive agent Weiss tells them that the doctor is gone. On his return to Washington Mulder is called to Assistant Director Skinner's office, agent Weiss has been found dead in Syracuse and Mulder is held accountable. Taken off the case by Assistant Director Skinner, Mulder and Scully are approached by CIA agent Ambrose Chapel who makes claims that the doctors are Russian clones left over from the Cold War, planted in the US to carry out sabotage in the event of war. That the doctors are being killed off to cover the existence of the Russian's cloning program. Mulder is once again contacted by Assistant Director Skinner, who tells him he has a family emergency. When Mulder arrives home, his father Bill meets him on the porch. As they talk Mulder notices his mother, Teena talking with a young woman, when he asks his father who she is, Bill Mulder tells him that his long lost sister Samantha has been returned. Part One

Noteworthy Quote

Mulder: "Who is Mum talking to"

Bill Mulder: "Your Sister"

Credits

Story by:	David Duchovny
	Chris Carter
Writer:	Chris Carter
Director:	Nick Marck

Cast:

David Duchovny	Special Agent Fox Mulder
Gillian Anderson	Special Agent Dana Scully

Guest Cast:

Mitch Pileggi	Assistant Director Skinner
Brian Thompson	Pilot/Alien Bounty Hunter
Dana Gladstone	Dr Landon Prince/Gregor
Megan Leitch	Samantha Mulder
Peter Donat	William Mulder
Tom Butler	CIA Agent Chapel
David L Gordon	FBI Agent
Andrew Johnston	Special Agent Weiss
Tim Henry	Federal Marshall
Michael Mcdonald	MP
Capper Mcintyre	Jailer
Bonnie Hay	Field Doctor
Rebecca Toolan	Mulder's Mother
James Leard	Sergeant Al Dixon
Linden Banks	Reverend Sistrunk
Kim Restell	Newspaper Clerk
Richard Sargent	Captain
Ken Roberts	Proprietor
Michael Rogers	1st Crewman
Oliver Becker	2nd Doctor

Episode Stills

Transcript Colony 2x16
(Source: http://www.insidethex.co.uk/transcrp/scrp216.htm )

SCENE 1

(A mist surrounds the sky. Mulder talks over the scene.)

MULDER: I have lived with a fragile faith built on the ether of vague memories from an experience that I can neither prove nor explain.When I was twelve, my sister was taken from me, taken from our home by a force that I came to believe was extraterrestrial.

(A light shines down from the mist.)

This belief sustained me, fueling a quest for truths that were as elusive as the memory itself. To believe as passionately as I did was not without sacrifice, but I always accepted the risks... to my career, my reputation, my relationships... to life itself...

(A whirring sound grows louder as the light grows brighter. The light is coming from a helicopter. A man waves the helicopter down towards the landing pad as an army ambulance pulls up, sirens blaring. The back doors open up and man file out.)

MAN: Let's move out!

(The men scream to each other and a few take Mulder out of the helicopter. He is in some kind of bodybag on a metal stretcher. They run in with a nurse who is carrying an IV.)

NURSE: We need a frostbite bay, stat!

(They run into the ER.)

DOCTOR: All right, let's get ready, please!

(The medical officials put an oxygen mask on him and cut off his clothes. Beeping and talking can be heard.)

Basal temp's eighty-six degrees.

NURSE: Right eye dilated.

(She pulls up the other eyelid and shines a flashlight into his other eye.)

Left eye dilated.

DOCTOR: All right, people, let's get him into that tub or we're going to lose him.

(The nurse looks back at his pulse.)

On three... one, two, three...

(The doctor and some other people lift Mulder up. Scully runs in through the outside doors and is stopped by a security guard.)

SECURITY GUARD #1: Hold it...

SCULLY: An Agent Mulder was brought here tonight?

SECURITY GUARD #1: This is an authorized area, military personnel only.

SCULLY: I'm a federal agent!

(She tries to push past them but they stop her.)

SECURITY GUARD #2: Ma'am!

SECURITY GUARD #1: Hold on, you're not going anywhere until we can see some I.D.

SCULLY: There's no time for this.

(She shows her badge to both of them.)

A man is dying.

(Mulder is put him into a frostbite tank. The warm water covers most of his body. He talks over the scene.)

MULDER: What happened to me out on the ice has justified every belief. If I should die now, it would be with the certainty that my faith has been righteous. And if, through death, larger mysteries are revealed, I will have already learned the answer to the question that has driven me here... that there is intelligent life in the universe other than our own... that they are here among us... and that they have begun to colonize.

(Scully bursts into the emergency room. The people are talking in the background. Scully looks at Mulder and holds up her badge.)

SCULLY: I'm Dana Scully, I'm Agent Mulder's partner. What are his vitals?

(The doctor walks over to her.)

DOCTOR: He's suffering from extreme hypothermia.

SCULLY: No... you've got to get him out of the tub.

DOCTOR: He's dying, he's lost all his body heat.

SCULLY: You've got to listen to me! If you keep him in there, you're going to kill him! The cold is the only thing that's keeping him alive.

(Mulder flatlines.)

NURSE: His heart stopped!

DOCTOR: Give me one amp of epinephrine in a cannula!

SCENE 2
RESEARCH VESSEL ALTA; BEAUFORT SEA, ARCTIC CIRCLE; TWO WEEKS EARLIER

(The vessel moves along past icebergs jutting out of the water. A man climbs down from the upper look-out deck and opens up the door. The captain walks out.)

OFFICER: You got to see this captain, we got a UFO or something buzzing us.

(The captain puts on his hat and goes to the ladder.)

Right up here.

(The captain climbs up the ladder to the deck. The man follows. Two men are standing with binoculars. A circular light is hovering in the distance.)

It's been just hovering up there for about twenty minutes.

CAPTAIN: Could be a helicopter.

OFFICER: Not the way it flew over us.

(The man to their left stops looking through the binoculars.)

MAN: It's coming at us again.

(The light grows larger and races by the side of the ship.)

OFFICER: It's going to crash...

(They watch as the light crashes into a distant iceberg, exploding in a fireball.)

CAPTAIN: Reverse engines!

DECKHAND: Reverse!

CAPTAIN: We're going after it.

SCENE 3
WOMAN'S CARE FAMILY SERVICES AND CLINIC; SCRANTON, PENNSYLVANIA

(A doctor, Landon Prince walks down the hallway towards the lounge.)

WOMAN: Thank you very much.

NURSE: You're welcome.

(He walks into the lounge and pours himself a cup of coffee. Doctors and nurses are sitting around. The TV can be heard.)

ANCHORMAN: ...has been covering this story and files this report.

REPORTER: Two days ago, the crew of an ice cutter working the arctic circle thought they had seen a UFO when a strange aircraft plunged into the Beaufort Sea. But a short time later, they recovered what is now believed to be a Russian fighter pilot from the icy water where he miraculously survived the extreme arctic temperatures.

(Prince is paying attention now. On the TV, the crewmembers of the ship hoist the man up onto the boat with a pulley.)

The man was airlifted to a military hospital in Alaska where he was listed in stable condition. But while authorities have been trying to determine just who the pilot is, we've learned that he's apparently walked out of the hospital...

(The camera shows a clear shot of the pilot's face. Prince's expression becomes ghostly.)

...and is now listed as missing. Reporting from our field...

(Prince runs out of the lounge and down the hallway. He goes through the swinging doors and is grabbed by the pilot on TV, the Alien Bounty Hunter. The assassin slams the doctor up against the wall by the neck.)

ALIEN BOUNTY HUNTER: Where is he?

LANDON PRINCE: I don't know!

(The Bounty Hunter pushes him down onto the ground and kneels over him. He pulls his head back and takes out a small metallic tube, called a gimlet. A long, sharp point shoots out of the front of the tube and the Bounty Hunter poises to strike down with it. The doctor struggles against his attacker, but to no avail. The assassin shoves the point into the back of the doctor's neck, which leaks a green fluid and bubbles. The Bounty Hunter then gets up and rips off the cover to the electric box, which sparks and catches fire. The room burning behind him, he walks out nonchalantly as the alarm rings and the hallway fills with smoke.)

SCENE 4
X-FILES OFFICE; FBI HEADQUARTERS; WASHINGTON, D.C.

(Mulder is leaning over his desk when Scully comes in and takes off her coat.)

MULDER: I have been looking for you.

SCULLY: I was just down the street. Someone fired more shots at the White House last night.

MULDER: You got to wonder about a country where even the President has to worry about drive-by shootings.

(He walks over to his computer and sits down. She stands next to him.)

SCULLY: What are you working on?

MULDER: I found these in my e-mail this morning... three obituaries.

SCULLY: Sent by whom?

MULDER: Nobody I know but obviously somebody who knows me.

(He clicks on a few keys and the text box expands on the monitor.)

SCULLY: Why?

MULDER: The deceased are Doctor Landon Prince of Scranton, Pennsylvania...

(He expands another box.)

Doctor Dale Gayhart of New York City...

(He brings up the third obituary.)

...and Doctor Harvey Buchanon of Tea Neck, New Jersey. All worked in abortion clinics. They died in separate arson fires.

SCULLY: Sounds like the work of militant right-to-lifers.

MULDER: Sounds like it.

SCULLY: Why would somebody send them to you?

MULDER: It's taken me all morning to figure that out.

SCULLY: What did you find?

(Mulder walks over to his desk and hands Scully a picture of Prince.)

MULDER: This is the latest victim, Doctor Landon Prince. And these are the other two victims... Doctors Gayhart...

(He hands her another picture. The man is identical to Prince in every respect.)

...and Buchanon.

(She is given a third picture of another identical man.)

SCULLY: Triplets?

MULDER: Nope. I can't find any blood connection between them. In fact, I can't find any records on them at all. It's as if before they died, they never existed.

SCULLY: What?

SCENE 5
SCRANTON, PENNSYLVANIA

(Mulder and Scully are standing with the federal marshall, who is looking over a folder.)

FEDERAL MARSHALL: Doctor Prince performs legal, clinical abortions which seems to be having its own share of occupational hazards these days.

MULDER: You don't know anything else about him?

FEDERAL MARSHALL: Nah, he went about his work quietly. None of his family's come forward.

SCULLY: What about the man you arrested, this, uh, preacher?

FEDERAL MARSHALL: Reverend Calvin Sistrunk. He's got a motive, he's threatened these abortion docs before. He was carrying this when we arrested him.

(He hands Mulder a clip from a newspaper with an advertisement that has a picture of Prince and reads "Do you know this man? Call (212) 555-2884.")

We're hoping for an indictment.

MULDER: As soon as you locate Doctor Prince's remains.

FEDERAL MARSHALL: Yes... but that fact hasn't been released.

MULDER: Well, there have been two identical fire deaths. Neither body has been found.

FEDERAL MARSHALL: We're quite certain he was in the building. His car was in the parking lot. We found his keys in the stairwell where the fire was started. He's been missing since the incident. Could be we'll just be finding teeth and bone.

(The door opens behind Scully and an officer leads in Reverend Sistrunk.)

CALVIN SISTRUNK: Good afternoon.

(He sits down.)

FEDERAL MARSHALL: Reverend Sistrunk... these are Agents Scully and Mulder. They want to ask you...

CALVIN SISTRUNK: ...if Doctor Prince burns in hell's fire for his murder of the unborn? If his damnation is God's will?

MULDER: Is that what you think, Reverend?

CALVIN SISTRUNK: I guess it's a question of opinion.

MULDER: Well, it's my opinion that whoever killed Doctor Prince will also be linked to two other murders. How do you feel about that?

CALVIN SISTRUNK: There are those who endorse the killing of the heathen sinner in God's name, but I, sir, am not one of them.

MULDER: Have you been to New York or New Jersey in the past two weeks?

CALVIN SISTRUNK: No, sir.

(Mulder shows him the advertisement.)

MULDER: This clipping, where'd you get it?

CALVIN SISTRUNK: From the newspaper. Obviously, there are more of God's soldiers seeking this man for judgement.

MULDER: Which newspaper?

CALVIN SISTRUNK: The local paper, up in Binghamton.

SCENE 6
GLOBE AND MAIL; BINGHAMTON, N.Y.

(The woman at the desk is looking at the advertisement.)

WOMAN: Oh, yeah. I remember this one. The man who placed this payed cash.

SCULLY: Would you recognize his face?

WOMAN: I might.

(Scully shows her a mugshot of Sistrunk.)

No. That's not him.

MULDER: Do you have a record of his name or address?

WOMAN: No, we don't. He wouldn't sign anything. In fact, he called and asked to place that ad a second week, so we did but he never came back to pay.

MULDER: Thank you.

WOMAN: Sure.

(The agents walk away.)

SCULLY: I've got a bad feeling about this case, Mulder.

MULDER: What do you mean?

SCULLY: Well, nothing about it makes sense. We've got three deaths of identical victims, no bodies, a virtual non-suspect...

MULDER: Sounds just like an X-File.

SCULLY: You don't even know who sent you that information. I mean, we've been set up before.

(Mulder looks at a map. He goes over to it, Scully following.)

MULDER: If somebody really wanted to set us up, would they give us this little to go on? There's something bigger here, Scully. I'd be willing to bet there are more of these guys out there.

SCULLY: More victims?

MULDER: Unless we get to them first. The deaths follow a pattern... New Jersey, New York, Scranton...

(He puts his finger on the map and moves it to the next city as he says the name.)

...and then an ad is placed here in Binghamton looking for a man exactly like the others. The killer's moving in a northernly direction.

(He looks over at the woman.)

Uh, eh, uh... excuse me? Excuse me.

(She looks at him and they walk over to her.)

The, uh, number in the ad, is th... would that be a voice mail?

WOMAN: Yes, it is.

MULDER: How, how would you access that?

WOMAN: Well, you'd start by paying the bill.

(Mulder looks at Scully and takes out his wallet. He gives Scully the ad, who walks over to the phone. Mulder gives the woman his credit card.)

Dial the number, then press twelve-thirty six.

(Scully does so. The woman walks to the back. Mulder paces a little.)

SCULLY: There's twenty four messages responding to the ad. The first caller has seen the man in the photo in Syracuse.

(Scully takes a pen and pad out.)

MULDER: That's north.

SCENE 7
FBI FIELD OFFICE; SYRACUSE, N.Y.

(Agent Barrett Weiss picks up the phone.)

BARRETT WEISS: Special Agent Weiss.

MULDER: Yeah, this is Agent Mulder. I need to enlist your help.

BARRETT WEISS: Shoot.

(He takes out a pen and starts to write down what Mulder says. Cut to Mulder and Scully, who are walking out of the post office.)

MULDER: I'm heading your way with Agent Scully. We have reason to believe a man in your area may be in danger. His name is Doctor Aaron Baker, he's living somewhere in Syracuse. We need you to find him and sit on him...

(They get to their car. Cut back to Syracuse.)

...until we get there.

BARRETT WEISS: You got it. I'll call you back with an address as soon as I track him down.

SCENE 8
737 26TH STREET; SYRACUSE, N.Y.

(Weiss pulls up to the house, looks at his paper, then goes to the front door. He is about to knock when he hears talking.)

AARON BAKER: There were years, years when our people did get along, where we could share in the entire planet.

(Weiss looks through the window.)

But you seem to be...you seem to be unwilling to share.

(A man puts his hand on Baker's shoulder.)

I don't understand, I don't understand! You did not fail...

(Weiss starts back down the stairs. The Bounty Hunter throws Baker against the wall, holding him by the throat.)

ALIEN BOUNTY HUNTER: Your plans will not succeed.

(Weiss walks around to the back door. The Bounty Hunter slams Baker's face into the wall and flicks open his gimlet. As Weiss continues to sneak around the house, Baker falls to the floor, dead. Weiss slams open the door and points his gun at the Bounty Hunter, much to the assassin's surprise.)

BARRETT WEISS: Federal agent, drop your weapon! I said drop it!

(He hears a bubbling and looks down to see Baker's body turn into a green liquid, bubbling and oozing. The "body" starts to deteriorate. Weiss is reasonably confused.)

What the hell...

(The assassin raises his hand to throw the gimlet but Weiss shoots him three times in the chest. The assassin does not move, merely leaks the same green liquid that Baker and Prince had. Weiss stares at him in awe until he starts gagging and choking. He screams, holding his head. Mulder and Scully pull up to the house. They walk up the porch and knock on the door. Agent Weiss comes up behind them.)

Agent Mulder?

MULDER: Yes, Agent Weiss?

(Weiss takes out his badge.)

BARRETT WEISS: Yes, sir.

MULDER: Did you find Doctor Baker?

BARRETT WEISS: No, I'm afraid not. No one's home. There's two weeks worth of mail in the mailbox.

MULDER: Uh, we may already be too late but we should take a look around anyway.

BARRETT WEISS: Not much to see.

(Mulder and Scully walk around the house. Weiss puts his badge away and walks back to his car. Opening the trunk, he looks at the real Barrett Weiss, dead, naked except for his underwear, bound and gagged. His eyes, nose and mouth are inflammed. "Weiss" looks around, then his facial features and body mass change to that of the Alien Bounty Hunter's. The Bounty Hunter throws the keys down on the dead agent, then closes the trunk and walks away.)

SCENE 9
FBI HEADQUARTERS; WASHINGTON, D.C.

(Skinner, sitting at his desk, pushes a button on the phone and the secretary is heard on the other end.)

SECRETARY: Agent Mulder has arrived.

SKINNER: Send him right in.

(Mulder walks in.)

Agent Mulder, please have a seat.

MULDER: Sorry I'm late, I just flew in.

SKINNER: From?

MULDER: Syracuse.

(He sits down.)

SKINNER: Where you were doing what?

MULDER: Agent Scully and I were following up a lead on a case.

SKINNER: Did anyone authorize this investigation, Agent Mulder?

MULDER: No, sir.

SKINNER: Do you have paperwork on this case?

MULDER: No, sir. I'd assumed we had an understanding with respect to the X-Files.

SKINNER: I'm sure it doesn't surprise you, Agent Mulder, that the people I have to answer to aren't quite so understanding. Particularly when one of their field agents is found dead.

MULDER: What?

(Skinner stands.)

SKINNER: Special Agent Barrett Weiss.

(He tosses a photograph at Mulder of Weiss' body.)

Out of the Syracuse office. His body was found stuffed in the trunk of a car in front of a house that you sent him to.

(Mulder looks at the photograph in disbelief.)

MULDER: It's impossible... I spoke to Agent Weiss, I saw him at the house.

(Skinner pounds his fists on the desk and gets in Mulder's face.)

SKINNER: Save it, Agent Mulder, save it for your report because until this matter is cleared up, your butt and mine are in a sling and your investigation, official or otherwise, is terminated.

MULDER: Sir...

SKINNER: Don't underestimate the seriousness of this matter, Agent Mulder. A man is dead.

(Mulder stares down towards the floor as Skinner sits down.)

I want a full accounting on my desk in the morning.

(Mulder nods and walks out.)

SCENE 10
X-FILES OFFICE; FBI HEADQUARTERS; WASHINGTON, D.C.

(Mulder walks into the office to the phone's ringing. He throws his jacket across the room and picks up the phone, sitting down.)

MULDER: Mulder.

SCULLY: Mulder, it's me.

MULDER: Where are you?

(Cut to Scully, who is sitting at her desk in front of her computer, her glasses on.)

SCULLY: I'm at home.

MULDER: Agent Weiss is dead, Scully.

SCULLY: What?

MULDER: Somebody killed him and Skinner hit the roof. We're being grounded until he gets a full accounting.

(Cut back to Mulder.)

I just wish I knew what the hell was going on.

(Cut to Scully, who looks at the computer screen.)

SCULLY: Have you checked your e-mail this morning, Mulder?

MULDER: No, why?

SCULLY: Because I received something unsettling and I wondered if you'd gotten it too.

(Cut to Mulder, who starts typing on his computer.)

MULDER: What is it?

SCULLY: It's a digitally scanned photograph. There's another one, Mulder.

(A picture slowly comes up of another identical doctor.)

His name is Doctor James Dickens.

(Cut to Scully.)

And Mulder?

MULDER: Yeah?

SCULLY: He's right here in Washington.

(The e-mail message on her computer next to the picture reads:

"Mail 485723
DATE: -- Image enclosed
TO: D_Scully@FBI.gov
FROM: 82974@anon.server.ca

Dr. James Dickens, Washington D.C."

Cut to Mulder.)

MULDER: Stay where you are, Scully, I'll be right there to pick you up.

(He hangs up.)

SCENE 11
SCULLY'S HOUSE; WASHINGTON, D.C.

(Mulder pulls up and sees someone standing on the porch. They pass each other on the walkway and the man looks back.)

AMBROSE CHAPEL: Agent Mulder?

(Mulder looks back.)

My name is Ambrose Chapel.

(He walks up to Mulder, showing his badge.)

I work with the Central Intelligence Agency. I need to talk to you about the case you're working on.

(Mulder looks at his badge.)

MULDER: What case is that?

AMBROSE CHAPEL: The murder of certain identical victims. I have a story to tell, Agent Mulder. Believe me, you want to hear it.

(Inside, Scully and Chapel are sitting across from each other. Mulder is standing away from them.)

We've known of their existence for a decade. We had no idea they were in the country until last year.

SCULLY: Who are they?

AMBROSE CHAPEL: We're working on vague intelligence reports but it appears early in the Cold War, Soviet scientists stumbled onto genetic anomaly in sets of identical twins. They were able to isolate the specific DNA material that gave the twins their facial features, hair color, texture... and they were able to reproduce it.

(Mulder is behind Scully now, having walked around during Chapel's rant.)

SCULLY: Are you saying these men are clones?

AMBROSE CHAPEL: By all outward appearances.

(Scully and Mulder look at each other.)

MULDER: How did they get here?

AMBROSE CHAPEL: The program went by the codename "Gregor"... the name given to every clone. We believe the original Gregor came here sometime in the mid-70's on a German passport. Using that same document, they were able to bring a small cadre of clones into the country. Several of which have obtained strategic positions in the medical establishment.

MULDER: For what purpose?

AMBROSE CHAPEL: In the event of war, they would mobilize simultaneously at different facilities across the U.S. to contaminate blood supplies, sabotage pharmaceutical factories... essentially destroy the country's immune system.

(He takes a sip of water.)

SCULLY: If you've known about this for a year, why hasn't anything been done?

AMBROSE CHAPEL: Well, this is where the story gets perhaps even more incredible. In a secret agreement, someone is allowing the Gregors to be systematically eliminated by a man who I believe is a Russian spy killer in exchange for the absolute suppression of the program's existence and to obtain the science that created it.

MULDER: What's your business in this?

AMBROSE CHAPEL: I believe we share similar sentiments on our government's policies of denial which is why they've been trying to contact you.

SCULLY: Who?

AMBROSE CHAPEL: The Gregors. You've obviously got a reputation as someone who might protect them and bring these misdeeds to light.

(Mulder looks at Scully.)

MULDER: What makes you think we've been contacted?

AMBROSE CHAPEL: Your inquiries into their deaths...

(Chapel pulls out a piece of paper and Mulder picks it up.)

And your response to the ad I placed.

(On the paper is a copy of the same advertisement as in the newspaper. Mulder sits down.)

We're talking state-sanctioned murder. If we can find them first, maybe the truth can be known.

(Mulder and Scully look at each other.)

MULDER: We know where one of these man may be.

(Chapel smiles and nods slightly.)

SCENE 12
GERMANTOWN, MARYLAND

(A van is running outside. Dickens takes his briefcase off of a machine and looks at four large green vats. He pushes a few buttons and walks out. The name on the door is "3243 Edmonton." He gets in the van and looks at a young woman in the driver's seat.)

JAMES DICKENS: Okay, let's go.

(They drive off.)

SCENE 13
DICKENS' APARTMENT

(The van pulls up the apartment complex. They walk in and Dickens puts down his briefcase. Outside, Mulder, Scully and Chapel get out of a car. Dickens is hanging up his labcoat as someone knocks on the door.)

JAMES DICKENS: Who is it?

SCULLY: Agents Scully and Mulder, we're with the F.B.I.

(The woman grabs her coat and walks out of the room. Dickens opens the door and sees the two agents.)

MULDER: Doctor Dickens?

JAMES DICKENS: Yes?

MULDER: I believe you've been trying to contact us.

JAMES DICKENS: Uh...

(Chapel steps into view and glares at the doctor.)

SCULLY: May we come in, Doctor Dickens?

JAMES DICKENS: Um...

(He starts to back away from the door, staring at Chapel in fright.)

MULDER: It's okay, sir, there's nothing to be afraid of!

(Dickens turns and runs across the room. Mulder chases him. He jumps out the window and lands on the ground from about four stories up. The three look out the window at Dickens' body.)

SCULLY: I'll call the paramedics...

(She runs off. Dickens stirs.)

MULDER: He's moving... he's getting up!

(Dickens stands up, adjusts his glasses, and starts running. Mulder and Chapel walk away from the window.)

SCULLY: I'll call you back.

(She hangs up and goes to the window to see Dickens running down the street, followed by Chapel and Mulder. Mulder runs directly after him, but Chapel stops and turns right. Scully runs out the door as the woman watches her from behind the curtains. Dickens runs out into the street and Mulder follows. An oncoming car honks and crashes into Mulder, sending him flying up into the windshield, which cracks. Mulder rolls down off the hood and lands in the street, groaning and grabbing his side. Scully runs up to him and kneels down. He sits up.)

You okay?

(Mulder whispers as he talks.)

MULDER: Okay. I just got the wind knocked out of me. Don't lose him! Go!

SCULLY: Okay...

(She runs off as the driver gets out of the car and goes to Mulder.)

MAN: Are you all right?

(Dickens runs down an alley and looks at the fence in front of him. He looks back to see Chapel standing at the entranceway. Chapel slowly stalks towards him. Dickens looks around and sees a fire escape. He climbs up onto the dumpster and pulls down the ladder, a look of terror on his face. Chapel reaches up and grabs Dickens foot. Dickens gasps and is pulled down, but Chapel's face is no longer there, replaced by the Alien Bounty Hunter's. Scully runs down the alley and looks around, seeing no one. She takes out her gun and walks slowly down the alley. A man groans and she looks towards the dumpster, where Chapel stands up from behind it. She sighs in relief and lowers her gun.)

AMBROSE CHAPEL: He's gone.

SCULLY: Where?

AMBROSE CHAPEL: He blindsided me. Went up the fire escape before I could grab him. I'm going to go see if I can find a way up on the roof.

(He walks away. Scully watches him, warily, then looks around, walking to behind the dumpster. She steps in something and looks down to see a puddle of green liquid. She tries to wipe it off her foot and walks away. The puddle, clearly in the shape of a fallen body, starts to bubble and fizz as it turns into gas.)

SCENE 14
X-FILES OFFICE; FBI HEADQUARTERS; WASHINGTON, D.C.

(Mulder is walking to his desk as Scully walks in.)

SCULLY: How are you feeling?

MULDER: Like I should've used the crosswalk. A lot better than my phone.

(He sits down and waves his decimated cellular phone. She takes off her coat and puts down her briefcase.)

SCULLY: Maybe we should've dropped this case when you were told.

MULDER: Scully, if what our friend from the C.I.A. says is true, this could blow the lid off one of the biggest national security conspiracies ever.

SCULLY: Our friend from the C.I.A. is about as unbelievable as his story... as is everything about this case. I mean, whatever happened to "trust no one," Mulder?

MULDER: Oh, I changed it to "trust everyone." I didn't tell you?

(He stands and pulls out a folder from a stack.)

I ran a full background check on this guy. Ambrose Chapel is a seventeen-year veteran, special intelligence clearance. He's the real thing, Scully.

(He hands her the folder. She opens it and looks at it. There is a picture clipped onto the file.)

SCULLY: Why would a man with his experience need our help... and how could he let a man that he's been looking so hard for slip away so easily? You know, that doctor wasn't running away from us, Mulder, he was running away from Agent Chapel.

MULDER: I think you're being overly paranoid about him, Scully.

SCULLY: Paranoid. Have you stopped to consider that maybe it was Agent Chapel who killed that field agent in Syracuse?

(Mulder walks to his desk.)

MULDER: Is that what you want me to put on my report to Skinner? Because I would be more than happy to have you explain that to him.

SCULLY: Damn it, Mulder, that is not my job.

(She throws down the folder.)

You'll pursue a case at the expense of everything, to the point of insanity, and expect me to follow you. There has to be somewhere to draw the line.

MULDER: Three identical men are dead. A fourth identical man is alive and on the lam. If the pursuit of this case seems like insanity to you, feel free to step away from it.

SCULLY: An F.B.I. agent died because of our pursuit of this case.

MULDER: Those are the risks we take. You either accept them or you don't. We all draw our own lines.

(He sits down. Scully stares at him, then looks away.)

SCULLY: I have to show you something.

(She reaches into her briefcase and pulls out a shoe with a part of the sole melted off.)

I got these a week ago.

(She hands the shoe to Mulder and sits down on his desk.)

I stepped in something last night that ate clean through the sole. Now, maybe I'm being paranoid, but it was in the exact spot where this man Chapel said the doctor escaped.

(Mulder is pushing a pencil through the hole.)

MULDER: Why don't you send it to our lab guys for analysis?

(He hands the shoe back.)

And while you're at it, why don't you arrange for an autopsy bay?

SCULLY: An autopsy bay?

MULDER: In putting together my report for Skinner, I came across something I think you'll appreciate. Whoever killed that field agent in Syracuse was so clever, no clear cause of death can be established.

(Scully looks at him in disbelief.)

SCENE 15
AUTOPSY BAY; FBI HEADQUARTERS; WASHINGTON, D.C.

(Agent Weiss is layed out on an examining table with a sheet over him. Scully is reading off of a clipboard. Mulder is standing off to the side.)

SCULLY: There's no penetrating knife or gunshot wounds. No ligature marks or abrasions from strangulation. The toxicologocial is clean... and the blood work... well, the blood work is strange.

(Mulder looks over her shoulder at the file.)

MULDER: Strange how?

SCULLY: Well, there's evidence of polycythemia, excessive production of red blood cells.

(Mulder walks around to the other side of Weiss.)

MULDER: How excessive?

SCULLY: Extremely. The doctor who made this report has it in here that the blood was curdled like jelly. As if something caused the blood to thicken or clot prior to death.

MULDER: Due to what?

SCULLY: Possibly a coagulating agent introduced into the body, but it would've shown up on the toxicological.

(Mulder walks back over.)

MULDER: Didn't Agent Chapel say something about these doctors being able to contaminate the blood supply? Couldn't one of those contaminants have been used to kill this man?

SCULLY: I don't know, Mulder, I... there was a doctor's bag I took as evidence from the apartment.

(A man walks in.)

MAN: Agent Mulder?

MULDER: Yeah?

MAN: Assistant Director Skinner's been looking for you.

MULDER: All right, I'll be right there.

(The man walks out.)

Check the bag. See if you can find anything that'll connect.

SCULLY: Well, Skinner's going to want to know why you didn't file your report. What're you going to say?

MULDER: Just the truth. I got hit by a car.

(He smiles and walks out.)

SCENE 16
ASSISTANT DIRECTOR WALTER SKINNER'S OFFICE; FBI HEADQUARTERS; WASHINGTON, D.C.

(Skinner is writing at his desk when Mulder walks in, carrying a folder.)

MULDER: I'm sorry this is so late. I had trouble with the, uh, data from the, uh, autopsy...

(Skinner walks over to him.)

SKINNER: That's not why I called you in here, Agent Mulder. Uh... your father's been trying to reach you. There's been a family emergency.

(Mulder looks at him, surprised.)

MULDER: Thank you.

(He walks out.)

SCENE 17
X-FILES OFFICE; FBI HEADQUARTERS; WASHINGTON, D.C.

(Mulder is on the phone, it is ringing. A woman picks up.)

MRS. MULDER: Hello?

MULDER: Mom?

MRS. MULDER: Fox. Is that you?

MULDER: Yeah, I, I didn't expect you to answer. Wha, what are you doing at Dad's? Is he all right?

MRS. MULDER: Yes. Let me put him on.

WILLIAM MULDER: Hello?

MULDER: Dad?

(He sits down.)

I got a message there was a family emergency.

WILLIAM MULDER: Yes, I received a very strange phone call this afternoon. I called your mother. We think it's important that you come up here as soon as possible.

MULDER: Can you tell me what this is about?

WILLIAM MULDER: I'll know more when you get here.

(He hangs up. Mulder, confused, hangs up as Scully walks in, carrying the briefcase.)

SCULLY: I didn't find anything much to go on but we've got an address.

(Mulder gets up.)

MULDER: Check it out, I'll call you as soon as I can.

SCULLY: Where you going?

MULDER: Home.

(Mulder grabs his coat and leaves. Scully looks at the tag on the briefcase which reads:

"NAME: Dr. James Dickens
ADDRESS: 3243 Edmonton Street.
CITY: Germantown.")

SCENE 18
3243 EDMONTON STREET

(Scully pulls up in front of the building, which looks to be one in a series of warehouses. She opens the door slowly and walks in, her gun in hand. She steps in something and looks down to see a lot more of the same green liquid on the floor. She keeps walking through it nonetheless and sees the giant room with the four large vats of the green liquid. One is pushed over with a resounding crash by Agent Chapel, better known as the Alien Bounty Hunter. The room is in complete shambles. The small bags with tubes attached that were in the vats litter the floor. Chapel looks down at one and steps on it, watching the green liquid pour out and smiling to himself. He hears footsteps and turns to see Scully's shadow moving back down the hall. Following the shadow, he sees the outer door close. He walks out just as Scully speeds away.)

SCENE 19
SCULLY'S HOUSE; WASHINGTON, D.C.

(Scully paces back and forth, the phone to her ear. Mulder's machine picks up.)

MULDER ON MACHINE: Hello, this is Fox Mulder. Leave me a message and I'll get back to you as soon as I can.

(It beeps.)

SCULLY: Mulder, it's me. I need to talk to you immediately. I've got some new information on this case.

(She walks over to the window and looks through the blinds. She sees a gray car parked outside.)

Mulder, I think I'm in danger. I'm in my apartment and I think I've been followed.

(She hangs up.)

SCENE 20
MARTHA'S VINEYARD; WEST TISBURY, MASSACHUSETTS

(Mulder gets out of his car and runs up the walkway to the front porch. His father sits in a chair off to the side.)

WILLIAM MULDER: Your mother needs some time.

(Fox looks at him as he lights a cigarette.)

MULDER: You said it was an emergency.

(William stands and walks over to him. Fox goes to hug him but William extends his hand. Fox shakes it, disappointed.)

WILLIAM MULDER: She wanted you to come. It's a difficult time. I appreciate your coming on such short notice.

MULDER: What is it, Dad?

(William takes a puff of his cigarette.)

WILLIAM MULDER: The certainty... becomes a comfort that allows you to move on.

(Fox looks through the window and sees his mother, crying, talking to someone.)

We bury our memories so deep after all that has been destroyed... never expecting...

MULDER: Who is Mom talking to?

(William takes another drag off his cigarette.)

WILLIAM MULDER: Your sister.

(Mulder looks in the window, then back at his father in disbelief. He runs into the house. The door slams shut behind him as he walks into the living room. His mother and the woman stand up. Samantha walks up to Mulder, and it is the same woman that we saw with Dickens.)

SAMANTHA MULDER: Fox.

(She nods. Mulder just stares blankly at her. At sunrise, Fox's mother is in bed and Fox closes the shades.)

MRS. MULDER: After all those sleepless nights, now I can hardly keep my eyes open.

(He fluffs her pillow. He lays her down and tucks her in.)

MULDER: You're exhausted. We all are. It's after 5:30.

MRS. MULDER: Oh, I just need a couple of hours.

(He turns off the lamp and kisses her forehead.)

MULDER: Try and get some sleep.

(He walks over and closes the other shades. She sits up.)

MRS. MULDER: Fox...

MULDER: Yeah, Mom?

MRS. MULDER: It is really her...

(She stares at him, waiting for a response.)

Isn't it?

MULDER: I... I don't see who else it could be.

(They stare at each other.)

Now go to sleep.

(Mulder walks out on the front porch and closes his eyes. The birds chirp and he looks to his right. Samantha is sitting in the chair, draped in a blanket. She smiles brightly.)

SAMANTHA MULDER: Is it too late for a game of Stratego?

(Fox laughs.)

MULDER: It's twenty-two years too late.

(He walks towards her.)

SAMANTHA MULDER: I don't think Dad can think of anything to say. He just... sat here.

MULDER: So much has happened. Where do you begin?

(She stands and looks out into the yard.)

SAMANTHA MULDER: I must have been nine or ten when I was returned. I had no memory. I was placed with a family who raised me as a daughter.

MULDER: Who were they?

SAMANTHA MULDER: I knew they weren't my parents but I didn't remember Mom or Dad..or you.

MULDER: But you came to remember... us.

SAMANTHA MULDER: I started having trouble several years ago. It was diagnosed as free-floating anxiety. Nothing worked for me. I hit rock bottom... until I underwent regression hypno-therapy. And it all started coming back...

(She starts to cry.)

The abductions, the tests...

(They hug and Mulder looks about to cry as well.)

I'm in danger, Fox.

MULDER: What do you mean?

SAMANTHA MULDER: You've been contacted. You know there's a man hunting my father and the other doctors.

MULDER: Your f... your father.

SAMANTHA MULDER: My adoptive parents. They're only visitors here... what people would call "aliens." A bounty hunter's been sent to kill them. You've met this man. His lies to you have caused others like my father to die. He won't stop until he's killed them all and anyone who tries to stop him. He'll come for me soon.

SCENE 21
SCULLY'S APARTMENT; WASHINGTON, D.C.

(Scully walks out of her bathroom, running suit on, takes her fanny-pack, and leaves. She closes the door and the phone rings a few seconds later. The machine picks up.)

SCULLY ON MACHINE: Hi, this is Dana Scully.

SCENE 22
MULDER'S APARTMENT; WASHINGTON, D.C.

(Mulder is on the other end.)

SCULLY ON MACHINE: Please, leave a message and I'll get back to you as soon as I can.

(The machine beeps.)

MULDER: Hey, Scully, it's Mulder, pick up the phone. Okay, if you're screening, pick up the phone, I need to talk to you.

(He sighs.)

All right, do not under any circumstances trust the C.I.A. agent. Your life may be in danger, now call me.

(He hangs up. Samantha sits, watching him.)

SAMANTHA MULDER: She may not be able to recognize him.

(She stands.)

He has the ability to disguise himself.

MULDER: Disguise himself how?

SAMANTHA MULDER: As anyone.

MULDER: As anyone? You got to be kidding.

SAMANTHA MULDER: No. You can't recognize him, but I can.

SCENE 23
BUS STOP

(Scully runs up to a bus stop as the bus pulls up. She gets in, deposits her change, and looks around. Not seeing Chapel, she pulls off her hood and sits down in the back of the bus. She looks at all the men and pulls her cellular out of her fanny-pack. She dials a number.)

MULDER ON MACHINE: Hello, this is Fox Mulder. Leave a message, please.

(It beeps.)

SCULLY: Mulder, it's me. I just left my aparment and I don't think I've been followed. I'm going to be staying at the Vacation Village Motor Lodge off the I-90 in Germantown. Now, by the time you reach me, I should have some very important information for you regarding this case.

(She hangs up. A few seats down, watching her, is the Alien Bounty Hunter.)

SCENE 24
3243 EDMONTON STREET

(Scully sneaks over to the building she was in before and takes out a small gun with a long metal stick in the front. She puts the stick into the keylock and pulls the trigger. The door unlocks. She slowly opens the door to the room and sees the lab is still in shambles. She splashes through the liquid on the floor and bends down at one point, looking at one of the small bags with the tubes attached. Picking up the tube, she sees a small alien-shaped figure in the bag. She stares at it. After a few seconds, it moves. She stands up, looking at it in awe as a man, looking exactly the same as the other clones before, looks at her through the barrels off to the side. She hears him moving around and looks at him. He starts running. She puts down the bag and gives chase.)

SCULLY: Wait.

(She takes out her gun and he stops at a wall.)

Stop! Federal Agent! Put your hands against the wall. Do it!

GREGOR CLONE #1: You won't shoot me.

SCULLY: Put you hands against the wall... now.

(He turns around.)

GREGOR CLONE #1: You cannot harm us.

SCULLY: Sir...

(The wall turns out to be a sliding door, which he moves to reveal a stairway and a few hallways.)

GREGOR CLONE #1: It's all right.

(Two more clones walk down the stairs and another comes in from the right.)

We are the last remaining. Unless you protect us, we are already dead.

(She stares in amazement. Later, there are police cars swarming outside. Scully is walking with another agent.)

SCULLY: These men are to be held in maximum security protective custody. No visitors, no press, no anybody... okay?

FBI AGENT: Yeah. Can I ask? Who are these guys?

SCULLY: I'll let you know when I figure it out myself.

(She walks away. He gets into one of the cars. There is a Gregor in different back seats to each car. Scully walks over to the first one, who looks back at her as they drive off. From the rooftops, the Alien Bounty Hunter watches Scully.)

SCENE 25
MULDER'S APARTMENT; WASHINGTON, D.C.

(Mulder plays back his machine. Samantha stands off to the side.)

SCULLY ON MACHINE: ...I should have some very important information for you regarding this case.

(It beeps. He dials a number. It rings.)

MAN: Vacation Village.

MULDER: Yeah, I need to speak to Dana Scully, please.

(Cut to the Vacation Village Motorlodge in Germantown.)

MAN: Just a moment.

(He scans down the guest list. Cut back to Mulder's apartment.)

I'm sorry, there's no one registered by that name.

MULDER: All right, I need her to call Fox Mulder as soon as she checks in, okay? Fox Mulder.

MAN: Fox Mulder.

MULDER: Yes.

(Cut to the Vacation Village Motorlodge.)

MAN: Will do.

(He hangs up and picks up a pencil and pad. The pencil tip breaks off.)

Now who's this message for?

(Scully walks in.)

SCULLY: I'd like a single for one night, please.

MAN: Uh... see what I got.

(Scully walks into her room and chainlocks the door. She goes into bathroom and starts running a shower. She grabs a towel and closes the door. The cellular phone inside her fanny-pack rings.)

SCENE 26
FEDERAL STOCKADE; TILESTON, VIRGINIA; 7:05 PM

(A guard walks down the hallway past the jail cells. A Gregor is seated in each one. He opens the door at the end and looks at another one. The federal marshall walks in.)

FBI AGENT: Whose post is this?

GUARD #1: Mine, sir, we're on changeover.

FBI AGENT: I'm going to talk to the prisoners.

(They walk over to the door.)

Oh, you want to get me a coffee... sugar and milk, no cream.

(The guard hands him the keys.)

GUARD #1: Do you want me to keep an eye open?

FBI AGENT: No, just get me the coffee.

GUARD #1: Yes, sir.

(The marshall unlocks the door and walks in. The guard locks the door behind him. The marshall walks over to the first clone's cell. He is sitting a pensive state but slowly looks up at the marshall. The marshall turns his hand around to reveal the Bounty Hunter's gimlet. It flicks open. The marshall is obviously the Bounty Hunter in disguise.)

SCENE 27
VACATION VILLAGE MOTORLODGE; GERMANTOWN, MARYLAND

(THE TIME IS 11:21. Scully is asleep. There is a knock on the door and she wakes up. Turning on the lamp, she gets out of bed.)

SCULLY: Who is it?

MULDER: Scully, it's me.

(She pulls back the curtain slightly and looks out the window. She walks over and opens the door.)

I got your message.

SCULLY: Where've you been?

(Her cellular phone rings.)

Hang on...

(She walks away from Mulder and picks it up.)

Scully.

MULDER: (on phone) Scully, it's me, where are you?

(Scully's body becomes tense.)

Scully? Are you there?

(She slowly turns to see Mulder closing the door.)

Scully?

(Her breathing becomes heavy as she stares at the Mulder standing in front of her.)

[TO BE CONTINUED ...]