X FILES LYCEUM
302 PAPER CLIP

"You may keep one of your children."
"Bitte?" asked Sophie.
"You may keep one of your children," he repeated.
"The other one will have to go. Which one will you keep?"
"Take the baby!" she called out. "Take my little girl!"
The (Nazi) aide...led her away into the waiting legion of the damned.
William Styron Sophie's Choice

MULDER'S APARTMENT
LONE GUNMEN'S OFFICE
46^TH STREET - NEW YORK CITY
WEST VIRGINIA
CHARLOTTE'S DINER - MARYLAND
The Lone Gunmen inform Mulder and Scully the resume of one of the men on the photograph of Consortium members that Mulder found in his father's basement while Scully's sister tries to hang onto life.

SCULLYVISION

Clearly, Scully is in another world at the start of this episode. Everything she had taken for granted doesn't exist. After WMM's warning at William Mulder's funeral, she has been operating one step behind. We could tell that taking control of Skinner as he entered Mulder's apartment wasn't easy for her, one should respect and trust their superiors, but that time had passed. Because she is still who she is in her soul, even at this trying time, when Skinner pulls his own gun on her, Scully's first reflex is not to shoot him. She's angry and upset, demanding the truth, but does not take that shot. This episode shows her journey of trying to get things back to where they were before. To make matters more shocking for Scully at the moment of the face off with Skinner, she knows that there is someone out in the hall, and she knows that someone was going to come to kill her. That she didn't change the aim of the gun from Skinner's heart and not fire it shows a lot of control.

When Mulder burst through the door, a lot of the load Scully had been carrying lessened, but she kept an eagle eye on Skinner. She had hoped, and even literally dreamed, that Mulder was still alive, and now that he was, she had even more strength. Maybe it was the load of all she had been carrying since Mulder's presumed death that made her let him take control of the situation. He was fresh, while she was clearly tired. In the hallway, she was clearly grateful that Mulder was back, giving a sigh of relief. Her joy was obvious though restrained-not surprising given the situation-and then she went straight to business.

With everything going on, Scully forgot about the one thing she had taken for granted, her family's safety. Frohike reveals that he had heard on the police scanner about a shooting at Scully's apartment. With the punch in the stomach that the news of her sister, Scully wants to rush to the hospital to be by her side, full of fear that her sister will die, but also full of guilt that the bullet was meant for her.

Once it is revealed that a member of the Consortium was one Victor Klemper, Nazi doctor who experimented on Jews during World War II and had escaped the Nuremberg Trials, both Scully and Mulder are disgusted and appalled. Mulder because he is Jewish and his father worked with the man, and Scully because she's a doctor and a human being. It is Scully who throws barbs at the monster in the greenhouse and challenges his motives, methods and history, not at all scared of him, and tells him exactly what she thinks of him. In this trilogy Scully has stood up to the toughest of men, Skinner, WMM, and now the Nazi. Eventually, she even disagrees with Mulder about whether or not Skinner should cut a deal for the DAT tape.

Before seeing Mulder enter the mine, Scully has to make sure that Mulder isn't going to be depressed by what they find. In another parallel of Mulder's family life to Scully's, she's worried about his familial relationship and the memories he will have of his father if they find anything out behind that door, knowing how it would affect her. Her love for her father is still strong.

She is not at all happy to find her own file in the mine. It's not clear if these files are of the public at large or of abductees. Now that she has seen aliens, is she ready to accept it?

This episode began with Scully not trusting Skinner. It ends (almost) with Scully and Mulder calling the one person they can trust, Skinner. Scully's journey of trust has come to a head. With her partner, his sister is missing and he needs to find her. For Scully, her sister is sick because of her and she needs to be there for her.

Scully now has two deaths in her family that she will have a hard time reconciling. She never knew if her father was ever proud of her, and now she will never know if Melissa heard her apology.

MULDERVISION

Of what might be more important information than the information on the DAT tape for Mulder at this time when he had lost his father and just finding out how deep he was in the conspiracy is an old photograph he found in the basement. It was taken in 1973, the same year that Samantha was abducted. It is a picture of the Consortium members.

Mulder makes the connection that Klemper had been exacting the same torturous experiments on aliens as he had in WWII and had seen the aftermath of it in the boxcar where the Consortium obviously wanted to get rid of the evidence of the victims in a manner not too far afield from how it was done in Nazi Germany.

While Scully only makes judgmental barbs at Klemper, making the man clam up if anything else, Mulder strokes Klemper's ego to get information to help them. It is only then that he gives them a huge clue as to where to look next, the combination to something at the Mine in the background of that photograph.

He gets a personal clue in the mine. His sister's file was originally his. The mind boggles when thinking about the circumstances that lead to Samantha's abduction. Little Fox was originally tagged to be taken, but at the last minute (it seems) Samantha was taken instead. By whose choice? Mulder believes it was his father's choice, and confronted his mother about it, who again, was not helpful. Samantha's abduction is now known not to have been a random act. Mulder's quest is now not only where is Samantha, but who decided she would be taken, and why.

Mulder has been given many clues in this trilogy of how the never-ending questions could be answered. He has the DAT tape files in his possession, needs to know who killed his father and needs to know what happened to his sister. He knows that all could be answered soon if he keeps going, but lets Scully make the determination to hand it all back so she can see her sister. If he could see his just one more time, he would give the world. He needs to give that to Scully. This was an extremely altruistic thing to for him to do.

KRYCEKVISION

Krycek followed orders which went wrong, but not by his own hand. Much has been said about Krycek's use of goons to hold Skinner down as he belted him. What are 'friends' for? He needed that DAT tape, and got it. The extra punch was because Skinner wasn't knocked out yet, and therefore still a threat to give them chase. Then the Consortium, or rather CSM, was going to have him killed with the car bomb. Since Krycek always does look at the bigger picture, and things around him, he was able to save himself. Armed with the details of the Consortium's secret, Krycek turns the tables on the CSM and makes sure that sorry incident with the car bomb won't happen again. First and foremost, he's concerned about saving his cute little butt, and then it's who best serves his side of the issue. He's now armed with the DAT files, and he's in the driver's seat of who he will align with next.

SAMANTHAVISION

It is a startling revelation that Bill Mulder was about to expose the evil deeds of the consortium and they took one of his children to prevent that from happening. Equally shocking is the idea that they were given the "choice" and Teena Mulder couldn't choose so Bill sacrificed their daughter.

We learn of these things from the Well Manicured Man and from Teena Mulder. Are we to believe either? Teena, always eager to defer truth, and/or responsibility, is likely to lie about her part in the atrocity. As far as WMM, he's honest enough to admit he would do or say anything that ultimately benefits himself. Truth be damned.

Another possibility is that the evil ones said "choose" and the Mulder's said "take Fox." The evil ones set up a file on Fox then realized that by choosing Fox, the Mulder's were in essence saying that he wasn't their most valuable child. Wising up, the evil ones then took the favorite child and thus had to change the file name from Fox to Samantha.

Regardless, this stunning information about Samantha's disappearance raises the question for Mulder of his families participation. It could serve to reduce his survivor's guilt at not being chosen or not protecting his sister but at the cost of now having to face the possibility that his own parents were involved.

Of course, we can hardly point the finger of blame at Teena or Bill if in fact they were in a true "Sophie's Choice" situation: if you choose one you can keep one, if you refuse to make the choice, you'll lose both.

Paper Clip gives us one possible hopeful clue regarding Samantha. It is a recent tissue sample case in her file rather than an old one, hinting that she may still be alive.

CARTERVISION

More insight into the inner workings of the Consortium. When Victor Klemper, obviously out of the loop for a long time, calls to tell them that Mulder was alive and had just left, he talks to WMM. Because Klemper had just given a huge clue to the Scully and Mulder's information gathering process, he doesn't care that the truth is revealed. That he called WMM tells us that WMM was either Klemper's closest business associate in the room full of Consortium members, or also wants the truth to come out. Because they aren't at all civil on the phone, the first part is probably not the case. Because Klemper did warn WMM, now we know that the Well Manicured Man, Victor Klemper, Deep Throat, and X (who isn't a full fledged member, but does belong in some capacity) want the truth to be known. Fat Man and CSM don't. Krycek of course is an enigma. WMM also covers his tracks by having Klemper killed, or by doing it himself.

A major clue to the inner workings of the secret is Small Pox Vaccinations; the scars were seen on the aliens in the boxcar and tissue samples and vaccination information is contained in all the files at the mine.

NOT NAUGHTY MULDER

My heavens! Much pooh pooh about nothing regarding all this Mulder porn stuff. Why all the fuss about Mulder telling Frohike that he's going to have to wait for his video collection? I suspect that we're talking films like "It's a Wonderful Life." In fact, I'd go so far as to say that Mulder is a lot like George Bailey. Clearly Frohike would like to own the classics too, don't you think? Okay, okay, maybe there is an Abba in Concert tape or two in there, but hardly anything seedier than that!

OH COME ON!

When Margaret rushes to the hospital because of a call saying her daughter had been shot, and finds out the daughter shot was Melissa, would she really describe Melissa as "Dana's sister"? A mother would more than likely say, "She's my other daughter."

Why did Scully and Mulder get into Skinner's car in Maryland, don't they have their own car? How did they get there?

THINGS LEARNED
or All I Ever Needed to Know I Learned From the X Files

Napier's Constant is the root of all logarithms. I'm sure that will come in handy one day in some way.

It all comes down to family.

SFX

We (and Mulder) got to see an alien ship, different from any others the show has hinted at. Instead of being triangular, this one was square and contained short grays. Nice work on the making of the ship and also showing how it moves, its lighting, sound and shadows.

Quite a job to not only find pictures of the Consortium members for that photograph, but also by making it look natural.

RECURRING CHARACTERS
Skinner
Melissa
Margaret
Krycek
CSM
WMM
Lone Gunmen
Albert
Fat Man
Strughold is mentioned

WRITER
Chris Carter

To start the third part of this trilogy with Albert retelling the lore of coming change was appropriate. Nice angle that a Nazi doctor who experimented on innocent people and aliens, is now continuing his work with flowers.

With all that Scully and Mulder had seen and done, all the imposing elements that went into this trilogy, it's poetic that it all comes down to them being safe and needing to see an ill sister.

This episode takes what happened in the previous two far reaching episodes and ties all the loose ends (that it can) down to Scully and Mulder sitting quietly in Melissa's hospital room now more committed than ever to finding the truth. Excellent. Going from the season two ender of "is Mulder dead" to finding out all these hints of the truth and piling up the corpses, to Scully and Mulder quietly grieving as they hold each other is perfect. The opening's warning of one thing has to die for another to live has happened. Melissa died while Scully and Mulder to be able to continue what is clearly now both of their quest.

DIRECTOR
Rob Bowman

The opening scenes of weather shown with Albert's voice over was perfect to set the scene and the theme of man controlling nature, trying to cover the truth; a monumental job at best. Even though this episode's events are bigger than both Scully and Mulder, Mr. Bowman expertly makes it all very personal. Either by the easy emotion churned by seeing Melissa in the hospital to the way Scully and Mulder are filmed as they interrogate Victor Klemper. He used the backdrop of beautiful flowers to Klemper, Scully and Mulder talking about heinous things.

THE USUAL THINGS
Flashlights
Guns
Mulder and Scully Break a Law by entering the mine
Cell Phones
Scully Drives!
Mulder's porn fixation
Aliens

Side note: They first hired boys to play the aliens, but they spent too much time playing with their big alien heads, so switched to girls.

POINT/COUNTERPOINT

On the drive back from Maryland:

SCULLY: Mulder, we should have looked for your file in that mine.
MULDER: My file? I wasn't abducted.
SCULLY: Those weren't files of abductees, those were files of all of us. You heard that man who is well manicured.
MULDER: I didn't look at his nails.

~~~~~

JOHN: What a wimp! Why did little Ratboy Alex have to have Skinner held down while he punched him out?
JO: You guys are all alike. A stud appears on screen, and you instantly start searching for the most remote thing to criticize. Admit it John, you're just plain jealous. Get over yourself.
JOHN: How could I possibly do that?

ATHENAEUM
Part 3 of 3

Melvin Frohike could just about die. Mulder was alive and well and probably home watching his videos. Left empty handed again, Frohike was now back in the old library for a third time. The last time he was there he had fallen asleep and unbeknownst to him, Krycek had pointed his gun right at his head. Krycek would have taken the shot, but suddenly realized that the bullets for his specialty luger cost nearly four bucks a piece. He couldn't afford to waste even one, so he had holstered his gun and left the snoring Frohike alone. Now Frohike was back again because he had previously spotted a room in the back which just might be for X-rated stuff. Anything to get his mind off not getting to keep Mulder's video collection. His fingers were crossed.

When he entered the room, his disappointment quickly gave way to curiosity. Apparently this room housed top secret government documents. He quickly found the file marked "Project Paper Clip." He pulled the heavy file off the shelf, but suddenly found himself surrounded by three men, Krycek being one of them.

"Put the file back Frohike," demanded Krycek.

"Or what? Your two buddies will hold me down so you can pummel me? You coward."

Krycek smiled and the two men grabbed Frohike. "Okay, okay." Frohike put the file back and was ushered out of the room. "Hey, no pushing."

Back in the main room, the two thugs disappeared. Krycek turned to Frohike. "I will now tell you what is in that file."

"Like I'm supposed to believe you?" smirked Frohike.

"My father was a Russian agent after World War II," Krycek began. "He knew that as soon as the Nazis were defeated, it would be the perfect opportunity for his country to jockey for position as the next great world power. More importantly, he knew that everyone else knew this as well. He had no doubt that the Americans would scoop up all the Nazi brain power in order to arm themselves against the communists. So he defected, or so the Americans believed. He actually became a double agent and helped round up those German scientists who had helped Hitler damn near conquer the world."

"Krycek, you are so full of crap," grumbled Frohike, while secretly believing him.

"Believe it or not, the original plan was to debrief the scientists, find out what they knew, and send them back to Germany. Soon, however, the War Department realized the extent of the scientists' knowledge and expertise. They decided to hang on to their prize. With the discovery of the foo fighters, or flying discs, along with laser beam weaponry in German military bases, the War Department decided that NASA and the CIA must take control of not only the technology but the scientists that had created it. US law, however, prohibited Nazi officials from immigrating to America."

"And?"

"So, in 1946, President Truman authorized Project Paperclip, a program to bring selected German scientists to work on America's behalf during the Cold War."

"Ah ha! A presidential cover up! You are starting to get my attention K-man."

"Not quite a cover up. Truman expressly excluded anyone found "to have been a member of the Nazi party." Since most of the scientists were Nazis, their files were cleansed of all Nazi references, apparently without Truman's knowledge. By 1955, more than 760 German scientists had been granted citizenship in the US and had been given prominent positions in the American scientific community. Clearly many of them contributed to the success of the Apollo Space program, and ultimately to the victory in the Cold War. Project Paperclip was stopped in 1957, when West Germany protested to the US that they were being robbed of their scientific skills."

"Good story, Krycek. But whatever happened to your old man?"

"He loved the freedom and the good life here so much that he really did defect but then he quit the CIA and became an actor specializing in dominatrix videos."

"Oh. Well, uh Alex, my man. You wouldn't happen to have any samples of his work around would you?" asked Frohike.

Krycek reached for his gun but remembered the cost of those bullets. He called for the two thugs instead. By the time they arrived, however, Frohike had scrambled up the stairs and was nearly half way home. He would have to settle for watching that damn Abba video one more time.

"Oh well," Frohike mused "there are far worse things to do than watching Agnetha and Frida and trying to figure out who is more of a babe."

QUOTES

ALBERT HOSTEEN To the Navajo, the earth and its creatures have great influence over our existence. The stories passed from generation to generation help us to understand the reason for our tears of sadness and our tears of joy. Animals like the bear, the spider and the coyote are powerful symbols to our people. When the FBI man Mulder was cured by the holy people, we were reminded of the story of the Gila monster, who symbolizes the healing powers of the medicine man. In this myth, the Gila monster restores a man by taking all his parts and putting them back together. His blood is gathered by ants, his eyes and ears by sun, his mind by Talking God and Pollen Boy. Then lightning and thunder bring the man back to life. At the end of the ceremony, when the FBI man had been healed, we heard the news from other Native Americans in the northern plains that a great event had taken place. Like the Navajo, these people have their own stories and myths. One of these stories tells of the white buffalo woman who came down from the heavens and taught the Indians how to lead virtuous lives and how to pray to the creator. She told the people she would return one day, then she turned into a white buffalo and ascended into the clouds, never to be seen again. But on this day, when the holy people had given the F.B.I. man a miracle, a white buffalo was born and every Native American knew, whether he believed the story or not, that this was a powerful omen and that great changes were coming.

SKINNER Drop your weapon! Put it down, Scully!
SCULLY No way.
SKINNER I said put it down!
SCULLY I said no! You're setting me up!
SKINNER I'm trying to help you.
SCULLY Then put your weapon down and sit down.
SKINNER Not a chance.
SCULLY You said you weren't here to kill me, Skinner, now prove it.
SKINNER I didn't come here to have a gun shoved in my face either.
SCULLY Damn it, Skinner!
Mulder bursts in. Needless to say, both Scully and Skinner are shocked he's alive.
MULDER Drop your weapon!
SKINNER What the hell is this? What are you pulling here?

SCULLY I was warned that somebody would kill me... someone I trusted.

MULDER Your cigarette smoking friend killed my father for that tape, and then he killed me.
SKINNER What are you talking about?
MULDER I was a dead man. Now, I'm back.
SKINNER What is on this tape?
MULDER Defense department files that weren't supposed to exist. The truth about our government's involvement in a global conspiracy of silence about the existence of extraterrestrial life.

MULDER There are truths out there that aren't on that tape.

SCULLY I went to your father's funeral. I told your mother that you were going to be okay.
MULDER How did you know?
SCULLY I just knew.

MARGARET My daughter was brought here. I'm trying to find her.
DOCTOR Okay, all right, what's her name?
MARGARET Scully. Dana Scully.
DOCTOR Melissa Scully?
MARGARET No, no... that's her sister. (See Oh Come On!)

MARGARET Missy? It's Mom.

BYERS Are you familiar with a post-World War II project known as Operation Paper Clip?
MULDER Our deal with the devil. The U.S. government provided safe haven for certain Nazi war criminals in exchange for their scientific knowledge.

BYERS The man standing next to your father is one of those criminals, though not the most famous of the bunch. Werner von Braun, designer of the V-2 rockets that leveled London, may be the most notorious, but Victor Klemper certainly takes the prize for the most... evil Nazi to escape the Nuremberg trials.
SCULLY What did he do?
LANGLY He experimented on the Jews... drowned them, suffocated them, put them in pressure chambers. All in the name of science.
BYERS Together with Von Braun, Klemper helped us win the space race. Using his scientific data on the effects of high-altitude flying, we were able to put astronauts on the moon before the Soviets.
LANGLY One giant step for mankind.
SCULLY What would he be doing in a photo with your father?

FROHIKE Unbelievable! We thought you were history.
MULDER You're going to have to wait a little longer for my video collection, Frohike.

FROHIKE I was scanning the police frequency when I heard the report of a shooting.
He takes his hat off and looks at Scully.
FROHIKE Agent Scully...
SCULLY What? What is it?
FROHIKE Your sister's in critical condition.

MULDER Scully, wait. Scully! Scully, wait! Scully!
SCULLY I have to go there, Mulder.
MULDER You can't go.
SCULLY That bullet was meant for me.
MULDER If they're trying to kill you, that's the first place they're going to look.
SCULLY Those bastards...

CSM There was a mistake. It will be rectified.
WMM By whom? By whom will this be rectified? Your ridiculously ineffectual assassins?
CSM These men are professionals.
WMM This is not a profession for men who make mistakes. My God, you presume to make us believe you can simply fix it with enough bullets?

CSM Mulder's dead. I took care of it myself.
WMM And the computer tape containing the stolen files you tell us was recovered... you can show it to us?
CSM I wasn't aware that my honesty was in question or doubt.

MULDER When you came to this country, you did some work for our government.
VICTOR I'm an old man now. History bores me.
SCULLY Because it escaped you or because you escaped it?
VICTOR Freud, Salk, Crick, Watson... these will be the names they celebrate at the end of the millennium. Great scientists. And Klemper? He will be remembered only as a butcher.
SCULLY History may be the only justice you'll ever know.
VICTOR Do you know my work? Do you know what we accomplished?
SCULLY As a Nazi or for the blood money we paid you?
VICTOR We were young men caught in a fervor but our experiments changed the world.
SCULLY For a lot of innocent Jews.

MULDER What is this work that my father was involved in?
VICTOR I have no answer for you.

VICTOR There are some things you don't have to know.

VICTOR Do you know the formula of Napier's constant?
SCULLY Yes, why?
VICTOR The photo was taken at the Strughold Mining Company in West Virginia and that is all I will tell you. The rest you can find out yourself.

VICTOR How are you, old friend? It's been far too many years.
WMM What is it, Victor?
VICTOR Oh, I was just paid a visit by the son of one of our old colleagues.
WMM What did you tell him, Victor?
VICTOR I told him that you were the most venal man I've ever met. Beyond that, I told him nothing.

ALBERT My name is Albert Hosteen. I was asked to come here and help with your daughter.
MARGARET There must be some mistake.
ALBERT Is your daughter the FBI woman?
MARGARET Dana?
ALBERT Yes. She's very sorry she can't come here to comfort you.

ALBERT She is weak.
MARGARET She's getting better. She has the best doctors, they're watching her around the clock.
ALBERT If it's all right, I would like to pray over her here.

SCULLY What do you think your father would have been doing here?
MULDER I don't know. He never came home wearing a miner's cap.

MULDER I'd like to try door number one, Monty.

SCULLY Positive. Napier's constant is the basis of all natural logarithms.
MULDER I think with a crowbar and a small nuclear device, I might be able to get through one of these things.

SCULLY Whatever we find in here... I don't think you've had time to process everything that you've been through.
MULDER I'm okay, Scully.
SCULLY You weren't even able to go to your father's funeral and if something in here were to cast doubt on the kind of man he was... I, I just know how it would affect me.

SKINNER I may have located the digital tape that you're looking for.
CSM You may have located it?
SKINNER Yes, although there's a great chance it may fall into the hands of people who want to use it for purposes not your own.
CSM You want to work a deal? Is that what this is? Let me tell you something. I don't work deals.
SKINNER I just thought you should know of certain potentialities.
CSM Do you have the tape?
SKINNER As I said, I may have located it.
CSM Do you have the damn tape?!

MULDER Lots of files.
SCULLY Lots and lots of files.

MULDER What's in these files?
SCULLY Standard medical forms. These are birth certificates, small pox vaccination certificate and then there's this.
MULDER What is this?
SCULLY It's an old tissue collection cassette, the new ones are plastic.
MULDER Do all these files contain the same materials?
SCULLY Yes, exactly.

MULDER What year were you born?
SCULLY 1964, why?
MULDER Let's go find 1964.
SCULLY You're looking for a file on me?

SCULLY That's a recent tissue sample. What the hell is going on here, Mulder?

SCULLY That's your sister's file.
MULDER Take a look at this, Scully. This file was originally mine.

SKINNER This place isn't even on the map. How'd you get here?
MULDER You'd be surprised what's not on the map in this country and what our government will do to keep it that way.
SKINNER How's that?
MULDER Last night, we were chased by some kind of hit squad driving what looked an awful lot like CIA fleet sedans.
SKINNER Well, I may be able to negotiate a deal that would guarantee your safety.
SCULLY What kind of deal?
SKINNER I'll turn over the digital tape in return for your reinstatement.
MULDER No, sir. I need that tape. I need those files.
SKINNER I'm talking about a way to save your lives.
MULDER And I'm talking about an elaborate conspiracy against the American public. Do you know what we found last night?
SKINNER What?
SCULLY An extremely elaborate filing system of medical records.
MULDER Locked inside a mountain vault.
SKINNER For the purpose of?
MULDER I don't know. But the answer's got to be on that tape, in those files.
SKINNER Is that answer worth your lives?
MULDER It's obviously worth killing us for.
SKINNER In your wildest dreams, what do you possibly hope to find, Agent Mulder?
MULDER Why they killed my father... and what happened to my sister... and what they did to Agent Scully.
SCULLY I think we should let him make the deal, Mulder. Look... those answers mean nothing if we're going to be hunted down like animals. We are operating so far outside of the law right now, we've given up on the very notion of justice. We've turned ourselves into outsiders. We have lost our access and our protection.
MULDER What makes you think there's any such thing as justice, Scully?
SCULLY Then what good are those answers to anybody but you, Mulder?
MULDER What we found last night...
SCULLY Look, I want exactly what you want. But I need to see my sister.

ALBERT For two days, I had prayed for the FBI woman's sister. Her doctor said she was getting better and her mother, who would not leave her bedside, was able to sleep. But word had come from my brothers in the north that did not give me hope. The white buffalo calf had survived, but after a day, it would no longer drink its mother's milk. On the third day, the mother buffalo laid down in her stall and would not get up. They said the men could do nothing for her. That night, she died. My father taught me when I was a boy that this is how life is. That for something to live, another thing must often be sacrificed. This was my fear now for the young woman.

ALBERT That man you just saw, he's been very curious about this room.

SCULLY Where's Victor Klemper?
WMM Oh, poor Klemper. They found him yesterday, here among his flowers. Apparently, his heart had given out.

MULDER You're one of the men in this photo. You knew my father.
WMM Yes. Since we were young men.
MULDER You were involved in this project. You know why the medical data was being collected.
WMM Yes, I do, indeed. In 1947, a spacecraft was reportedly recovered in New Mexico. No doubt you know of this and of the reported recovery of a body at the site. These incidents not only coincided with the end of World War II, but an ignominious project which brought Nazi scientists and war criminals to this country to exploit their knowledge.
SCULLY Operation Paper Clip.
WMM Yes, you know of it already. And you must also know the work of Doctor Joseph Mengela, the Nazi angel of death.
SCULLY Mengela thought that he could produce a super-race through genetic engineering.
WMM As did many of his colleagues at the Institute of Hereditary Biology and Racial Hygiene.
SCULLY Like Victor Klemper?
WMM Poor Victor. He loved his orchids. Did you know that he was able to create some of the most beautiful hybrids?
MULDER Klemper was trying to create an alien-human hybrid. That's what I saw in the boxcar. He was using human test subjects.
SCULLY Mulder, wait.
MULDER My father was involved in this?
SCULLY The technology wasn't there, Mulder. DNA wasn't even identified until 1944. This is all a lie.
WMM When your father realized what the medical data was being used for, he objected strenuously.
MULDER He collected those files?
WMM With the threat of nuclear holocaust in the 1950s, the government instructed men like your father to gather genetic data on the general populous for the purpose of post-apocalyptic identification.
MULDER The vaccination records. They took tissue from everyone who received a small pox inoculation.
WMM Hundreds of millions of Americans.
MULDER So that Victor Klemper had access to a DNA database of nearly everyone who was born since 1950.
SCULLY Mulder, this man is telling you everything that you want to hear but it's a fabrication, it is pure science fiction. There were no experiments with aliens.
WMM Why would I lie to you?
SCULLY Like you said before, to protect yourself and the continuation of the Nazi agenda... human tests.
MULDER Why was your file there, Scully?
SCULLY I don't know.
MULDER There were current records on file.
SCULLY Yes, but records of what, Mulder?
MULDER Of abductions! Of abductees. They took my sister. Why?
WMM They took her as insurance because your father threatened to expose the project.
MULDER Why her? Why not me?
WMM It's not for me to say but your life in danger now too. You also threaten to expose the project. You have become your father.
MULDER Why are you telling me this?
WMM It's what you want to know... isn't it?
MULDER Is there more?
WMM More than you'll ever know.

KRYCEK I'm alive. Isn't that a surprise?
CSM Yes, good, good, good. Uh, where are you?
KRYCEK Somewhere that you will never find me, you double-crossing son of a bitch.
CSM Are you sure?
KRYCEK I'm sure of this... if I so much as feel your presence, I'm going to make you a very, very famous man. You understand?
CSM Yes, thank you. I'm going to report that to the group.

MULDER Mom, listen to me. When Samantha... before she was gone, did Dad ever ask you if you had a favorite? Did he ever ask you that?
MRS. MULDER Fox, please...
MULDER Mom, did he ever ask you to make a choice?
MRS. MULDER Don't do this...
MULDER Mom, listen to me! I need to know! Did he make you make a choice?
MRS. MULDER No. I couldn't choose. It was your father's choice and I hated him for it. Even in his grave, I hate him still.

SKINNER I have the tape you've been looking for.
CSM Really?
SKINNER I'm prepared to hand it over or destroy it in exchange for Mulder and Scully's safety and for their reinstatement here.
CSM What did I tell you, Mister Skinner? I don't negotiate. Especially not with punks like you who think they can bluff me.
SKINNER Bluff you?
CSM You haven't got any tape. You haven't got any deal. You can't play poker if you don't have any cards, Mister Skinner. You ever wonder what it would be like to, uh... die in a plane crash? Of botulism? Even a heart attack's not uncommon for a man your age. You think I'm bluffing?
SKINNER I'm not finished yet. Albert?
Albert walks in.
CSM What is this?
SKINNER This is where you pucker up and kiss my ass.
CSM Now, listen, you...
SKINNER Now, you listen to me, you son of a bitch! This man's name is Albert Hosteen. You should remember that. Because if Agents Mulder and Scully come down with so much as a case of the flu, Albert is prepared to recite, chapter and verse, file for file, everything on your precious tape.
CSM It's a nice try, Skinner.
SKINNER I'm sure you're thinking Albert is an old man and there are plenty of ways you might kill him too. Which is why, in the ancient oral tradition of his people, he's told twenty other men the information on those files. So unless you kill every Navajo living in four states... that information is available with a simple phone call. Welcome to the wonderful world of high technology.
CSM You're bluffing.
SKINNER Am I?

SCULLY It happened three hours ago. She went into surgery and, uh... the damage to her brain was worse than they had hoped. Her blood pressure started to rise and... she slipped away. She died for me and I tried to tell her I was sorry but I don't think she'll ever really know.
MULDER Oh, she knows. Melissa knows.
SCULLY You were right. There is no justice.
MULDER I don't think this is about justice, Scully.
SCULLY Then what is it about?
MULDER I think it's about something we have no personal choice in. I think it's about fate. Skinner told me that he talked to you, that you were insistent about coming back to work. Now, if Melissa's death is...
SCULLY I need something to put my back up against.
MULDER I feel the same way. We've both lost so much... but I believe that what we're looking for is in the X-Files. I'm more certain than ever that the truth is in there.
SCULLY I've heard the truth, Mulder. Now what I want are the answers.

END