| 3X01: "The Blessing Way" | 3X02: "Paper Clip" | 3X03: "D.P.O." |
| 3X04: "Clyde Bruckman's Final Repose" | 3X05: "The List" | 3X06: "2Shy" |
| 3X07: "The Walk" | 3X08: "Oubliette" | 3X09: "Nisei" |
| 3X10: "731" | 3X11: "Revelations" | 3X12: "War of the Coprophages" |
| 3X13: "Syzygy" | 3X14: "Grotesque" | 3X15: "Piper Maru" |
| 3X16: "Apocrypha" | 3X17: "Pusher" | 3X18: "Teso Dos Bichos" |
| 3X19: "Hell Money" | 3X20: "Jose Chung's 'From Outer Space'" | 3X21: "Avatar" |
| 3X22: "Quagmire" | 3X23: "WetWired" | 3X24: "Talitha Cumi" |
We open on the burning boxcar where Mulder has apparently perished ("Anasazi"), with the Navajo Albert Hosteen speaking on voice over. He talks of memory being more valuable than history, and says history serves "only those who seek to control it." A squad of soldiers headed by the Cigarette-Smoking Man (CSM) descends on Albert Hosteen's home and roughs him and his grandson up, but neither will answer questions. Moments later, Scully comes to Hosteen's home to find the place ransacked. Scully travels to the boxcar at Hosteen's direction, but Mulder is nowhere to be found.
While driving away from the Navajo reservation that night, Scully's car is intercepted by a hit squad in a helicopter. Her printouts of the secret government UFO documents are taken, but she insists that Mulder has the digital tape. Satisfied, the hit squad leaves. Returning to Washington, Scully attends a hearing and is suspended without pay for her insubordination. Turning in her badge and gun and forced to remain available for questioning, Scully says that as far as she knows, Mulder is dead. Scully storms out of the hearing, and Skinner chases after her. He says that the men responsible for Mulder's death will be found. An acidic Scully is highly doubtful, saying that things are being covered up to perpetuate lies; she storms off, saying that Skinner overestimates his "position in the chain of command." Scully heads down to the X-Files office, where she looks for the digital tape, knowing Mulder stored it in his desk; but when she gets there, the tape is gone.
In New York City, the shadowy Consortium meets to discuss the leak of the digital tape. CSM insists that the files have been recovered, and that the "problem at the FBI" can be handled. Satisfied, the rest of the Consortium thinks that their "work" can now continue. Meanwhile, Scully walks to her mother's house, and then collapses in tears, saying that she's made a terrible mistake. Back at the Navajo reservation, several boys have noted buzzards circling in the boxcar quarry. Hosteen realizes that there was another tunnel leading out of the boxcar, remembering his discovery of an alien body as a child; traveling to the quarry, Mulder's barely-alive form is found buried in rocks. Mulder is taken to a hut to undergo a Navajo ritual called the "blessing way chant," in an effort to save his life.
In the middle of the night, a very drunk Frohike shows up at Scully's apartment, having heard news of Mulder's demise. He is beyond angry that Mulder is dead and that Scully is inches from being fired; all the tracks are being erased. He then shows Scully an article detailing the muder of The Thinker--the man who hacked the MJ files--the day after Mulder disappearred.
On the Navajo reservation, night falls and the blessing way chant begins. Hosteen expresses his concern that Mulder's spirit didn't want to return to the world of the living. In a dream image, Mulder is spoken to by his "holy people." First, Deep Throat comes forward; he comes forth to feel Mulder's intensity and drive, and encourages Mulder to go back to life to find the truth. We then cut to a hazy image where we see alien-like shapes being stuffed into a boxcar and exposed to hydrogen cyanide gas. Back in the dream, Bill Mulder comes forth to speak to his son; he feels the heavy weight of the lies he told to Mulder, and tells Mulder he is "the memory" without which "the truth will die." Mulder asks about Samantha, but Mr. Mulder says that she isn't here.
The next day, Scully heads back to FBI headquarters; stripped of her badge and gun, she's forced to come in the front entrance, and to her surprise, she sets off the metal detector. Skinner meets with Scully at her request; he brings the death of The Thinker to Scully's attention. Knowing The Thinker died after Mulder disappeared, she suggests comparing the ballistics data to that of the gun which killed Mulder's father--this would prove Mulder's innocence in his father's death. Skinner is resistant to help, saying the only evidence he wants to see is the digital tape; he says he was even forced to execute a search warrant on Scully's apartment to find it. When Scully leaves, CSM steps out from an adjoining room, and Skinner reports Scully doesn't have the tape. "Well, that's unfortunate for everyone," CSM says dryly.
Leaving the building, Scully becomes curious and has the metal-detecting wand run over her; the wand is set off around the back of her neck. She has an x-ray of herself taken, and a doctor tells her she has a piece of metal--possibly buckshot--in her neck. The doctor uses a local anesthetic and removes the metal fragment. Back at the Navajo reservation, Mulder experiences great fevers over the course of three days, but he finally awakens and asks for water. Mulder is ritually bathed and slowly regains strength. Back at the FBI, the doctor looks at the metal fragment from Scully's neck, and it's not buckshot--in fact, it looks like a computer chip under a microscope.
That day, Scully meets with her sister, Melissa; Melissa thinks that Scully needs to tap into her memories to figure out where the chip came from. Scully is very resistant, but finally gives in to her sister's wish and goes to see a hypnotist. Under hypnosis, Scully begins to remember her fear of abduction, strange men, a light, and loud sounds. When pressed for details as to whether or not she was tested upon, Scully becomes increasingly stressed and the hypnotic state is broken; filled with fear of her own memories, Scully leaves the hypnotist's office in a rush. Scully returns home just in time to see Skinner leaving her apartment building. Meanwhile, on the Navajo reservation, Mulder's healing is nearly complete; he is given a gift of sunflower seeds, which he asked for during his greatest fevers.
Scully calls Skinner, saying she saw him at her apartment, but Skinner denies any knowledge of the event--and we then see that CSM is sitting next to him. In a dream image, we see Mulder speaking of coming into the spirit world seeking answers, "a truth which was never to be spoken but now binds us together in dangerous purpose." He says he has returned from the dead to continue, but fears that he is too late, as the danger has grown. Suddenly, the dream shatters and Scully bolts upright in bed.
In Massachussetts, Scully attends the funeral of Mulder's father. After the ceremony, she meets up with Mulder's mother. Scully expresses her belief that Mulder is still alive, though she doesn't know why or how. Later, Scully is approached by the Well-Manicured Man (WMM), previously seen in the company of the Consortium. WMM tells Scully that he represents a Consortium whose interests would be damaged by the digital tape; he also assures her that Mulder is dead. He then warns her that her own life is in danger, saying that either two men will shoot her with an unregistered weapon, or she will be approached and killed by a close, trusted person. WMM says he is warning Scully because he feels her death will draw too much attention to the Consortium. Scully asks exactly what the Consortium does. "We predict the future," WMM says, "and the best way to predict the future is to invent it."
Elsewhere, Mrs. Mulder returns home from Mr. Mulder's funeral to find Mulder waiting in the house for her. Mrs. Mulder is brought to tears of joy, but Mulder says he needs help. He asks her to identify some old photos from 1972, where Bill Mulder is clearly seen in the company of CSM, WMM, and several others. Mrs. Mulder, however, says she can't remember anything. Mulder is convinced that there is a vital connection to Samantha's disappearance; he takes Mrs. Mulder's revolver and leaves the home.
That evening, Melissa calls Scully at home; when Scully tells her sister about her strange encounter, Melissa says she will come over. Scully then gets another phone call, which is a hang-up. Remembering WMM's warning, Scully calls Melissa, who has already left, and says that she will come over to Melissa's apartment instead. Panicked, Scully leaves to drive to Melissa's place, taking her personal sidearm with her. She is intercepted outside by Skinner, who says he has vital information. Edgy, Scully goes with him. The two go to talk in private at Mulder's apartment, and Scully draws her gun on Skinner, no longer willing to trust him.
Scully forces Skinner onto the couch and demands to know who "sent" him. Skinner professes the he's innocent. Back at Scully's apartment, Melissa arrives and lets herself in, only to be mistakenly gunned down by Alex Krycek and another assassin. Meanwhile, Skinner insists that he isn't here to kill Scully; he says he has the digital tape, having taken it from Mulder's desk. Suddenly, there is a noise as someone approaches Mulder's door. In the momentary confusion, Skinner draws his gun, and he and Scully are at a standoff. To be continued...
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We pick up with a voice-over from the Navajo, Albert Hosteen. He speaks of how animals are powerful symbols, and says that in the north, a white buffalo has been born. This oddity is the portent of a great coming change, and coincided exactly with the completion of Mulder's healing in the blessing way ritual.
We then cut back to the standoff between Scully and Skinner in Mulder's apartment ("The Blessing Way"). When the door bursts open, it turns out to be none other than Mulder. Mulder quickly draws his own gun, and Skinner is forced to back off. Scully, meanwhile, is shocked to see that Mulder is even alive. Scully explains the warning that someone she trusted would kill her. Skinner then proves his sincerity by producing the digital tape from his pocket; he is surprised when Mulder reveals the contents--Defense Department files on a secret international conspiracy to cover up the existence of extraterrestrial life. Skinner says that the tape is the only leverage available to bring the men in the conspiracy to justice.
Leaving to pursue other leads, Scully privately tells Mulder that she told his mother he was still alive; she says that she "just knew." Meanwhile, a distraught Mrs. Scully storms into a hospital, having heard that Scully was shot--but is even more shocked to learn that it was Melissa. Melissa has made it through her gunshot wound to the head, but she's in a coma. Elsewhere, Mulder and Scully meet with the Lone Gunmen, and Mulder shows them the old photo of his father. Byers dredges up Operation Paper Clip--a deal where Nazi war scientists were given amnesty in the US in exchange for their knowledge; Langly then picks out one of the scientists (really criminals) from the photo, standing right next to Mulder's father--Victor Klemper. Klemper was apparently responsible for hideous experiments on Jews, but his knowledge helped the US win the space race with the Soviets; he's also alive and well today, at government expense. Byers says that Paper Clip supposedly ended in the 1950s, but the 1972 photo seems to indicate the project didn't stop. Just then, an alarmed Frohike enters; having been scanning police radio frequencies, he tells Scully that Melissa has been shot and is in critical condition. Scully rushes out to go to her sister, but Mulder stops her, saying that if anyone wanted to kill Scully, Melissa's bedside is the first place they'd look.
In New York City, the Cigarette-Smoking Man (CSM), the Well-Manicured Man (WMM), and other Elders of the Consortium meet. The Elders and WMM are irritated at the botched attempt on Scully's life. CSM maintains that Mulder is dead, and the digital tape is secure. No longer willing to believe CSM, the Elders insist on physically seeing the digital tape.
Meanwhile, Mulder and Scully go to meet with Victor Klemper, who is now retired and passes his time running a greenhouse nursery. Klemper is surprised to hear Mulder's name, but admits a connection to Mulder's father. Scully takes Klemper to task for his old work as a Nazi; Klemper says he will only be remembered as a butcher, but that his experiments changed the course of history. In the end, Klemper says that he has confronted his demons. Mulder is not satisfied, demanding answers, and appealing to Klemper's desire for the truth to be known. He reminds the agents of a number, Napier's constant, and then directs them to an abandoned mine in West Virginia. Shortly thereafter, Klemper calls WMM in New York and tells him that Mulder is alive. Irritated at CSM's lies, the Consortium decides to take the matter into their own hands.
At the hospital, Mrs. Scully continues to wait at Melissa's bedside, while a strange man in a suit paces outside. Suddenly, a visitor arrives in Scully's stead--Albert Hosteen. Hosteen assures Mrs. Scully that Scully is all right; he goes to pray over Melissa, saying that she's weak. Meanwhile, Mulder and Scully have traveled to West Virginia and found an abandoned mine, right where Klemper said it would be. Inside the mine building, they find a series of locked doors tied to a keypad. Punching in Napier's constant, they eventually get one of the doors to open. At the door, Scully pauses, concerned at Mulder's mental state, having missed his father's funeral and now on the brink of discovering some dark secrets; but Mulder insists on proceeding.
Back in Washington, CSM is summoned by Skinner. Skinner says that he "may have located" the digital tape, and that he wants to work a deal. CSM becomes angry, saying that he doesn't make deals. CSM subtly threatens Skinner with bodily harm, but Skinner stands his ground. Meanwhile, going beyond the door, Mulder and Scully have turned up an enormous vault full of medical files. Scully says the files contain birth certificates, smallpox vaccination records, and a tissue sample container. Realizing the records are sorted by birth year, Mulder moves forward to 1964 and unearths a file on Scully--which contains a very recent tissue sample. He then charges further ahead and finds a file on his sister, Samantha. When he looks at the label, he notices that it's loose, and that another tag with his name on it is underneath--the file was originally his.
Suddenly, the lights in the tunnel extinguish. Racing back outside, Mulder sees a strange row of white lights rising up outside the mining building. Meanwhile, strange, vaguely alien figures race past Scully, knocking her flashlight away. An excited Mulder charges out of the building and sees a massive UFO floating through the sky. In the mine shaft, Scully chases after the alien figures, and sees them all walking toward a bright white light at the end of the tunnel.
The event is interrupted by the arrival of a government hit squad, leaving Mulder and Scully to run for their lives. Though both are nearly gunned down, the agents manage to escape their pursuers by exiting through a back door. They then travel to a small diner in western Maryland, where they meet with Skinner. Skinner says he has tried to negotiate a deal: reinstatement of Mulder and Scully and a guarantee of their safety--in exchange for the digital tape. Mulder doesn't want to deal, explaining what he and Scully found in the mine shaft. Scully, however, is unwilling to accept answers at the risk of their lives--she wants Skinner to make the deal. Skinner says he's been unable to copy the tape because of elaborate copy protection, but will go state's evidence to testify if necessary. In the end, Mulder leaves the decision to Scully, and she tells Skinner to make the deal, driven by her need to see Melissa.
Back at the hospital, Albert Hosteen has continued to pray over Melissa, despite the fact that her doctors say her condition is improving. Returning to the portent of the white buffalo, Hosteen reports that the baby buffalo stopped drinking it's mother's milk, and soon after, the mother died. Hosteen says that often, something must die in order for other things to live. Skinner then shows up and speaks to Mrs. Scully, carrying a message from Scully, reporting her safety. Noting the strange man outside the hospital room, Skinner goes chasing after him--only to be beaten up in a stairwell and have the digital tape taken from him.
Later, the two men who attacked Skinner are seen in the company of Alex Krycek in Washington. The other men leave the car at a convenience store, stopping for food. Suddenly, Krycek notes that the car's clock is flashing; panicked, he leaps from the car just seconds before it explodes. Mulder and Scully, meanwhile, has returned to Klemper's greenhouse, seeking more answers. Instead, they find WMM waiting, who says that Klemper suffered a heart attack and died yesterday. Recognizing WMM from the 1972 photo of his father, Mulder presses WMM for details. WMM tells the story of the 1947 UFO crash in Roswell, NM. He says that a body was recovered, and the timing coincided exactly with Operation Paper Clip; Nazi scientists began working to create an alien-human hybrid. Mulder's father objected to the project, and was duped into collecting records on Americans (through smallpox innoculations), supposedly for indentification in the even of nuclear war. Scully doesn't believe the story, thinking that WMM is just protecting his own interests, but Mulder counters that she cannot explain the recent records of abductees, including Scully and Samantha. WMM says Samantha was taken as insurance to prevent Bill Mulder from exposing the project; he then says that Mulder's own life is now in danger--he has become his father.
Meanwhile, Krycek calls CSM at Consortium headquarters in New York City. He assures CSM that he is alive and well, and plans on going into hiding. "If I so much as feel your presence, I'm gonna make you a very famous man," warns Krycek. CSM then reports to the Consortium that both Krycek and the digital tape were destroyed by a car bomb; he says he's going to meet with the FBI, saying that they no longer have the power to make a deal. In Connecticut, Mulder goes to visit his mother in the middle of the night. He asks her if his father ever asked her to make a choice. Mrs. Mulder is resistant, but eventually she admits she couldn't choose. Mr. Mulder decided, and Mrs. Mulder continues to hate him for doing it.
In Washington, CSM meets with Skinner, and Skinner proposes his deal: the digital tape for Mulder and Scully's safety. CSM calls Skinner's apparent bluff, but then Skinner drops a surprise: he brings out Albert Hosteen from a nearby room. Hosteen has memorized the tape's contents, and passed the information on to twenty other Navajos. Skinner says that if any harm comes to Mulder and Scully, the tape's contents are "available with a simple phone call." Furious, CSM walks out.
Mulder, meanwhile, meets Scully at the hospital, finding her sitting next to an empty bed. Scully tells Mulder that Melissa died during surgery on her brain, and then begins to cry, saying, "She died for me." Mulder notes that elements of fate are at play, and that he and Scully have both lost loved ones for the sake of finding the truth in the X-Files. "I've heard the truth, Mulder," replies Scully. "Now what I want are the answers."
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In St. Paul, MN, insurance salesman Clyde Bruckman reads the tabloid predictions of the psychic Stupendous Yappi; he dismisses most of the predictions as childish and obvious. Nonetheless, he decides to buy the tabloid. On the way out, he accidentally bumps into a quiet man known only as The Puppet. The Puppet goes to a fortune teller, and asks to know why he's going to do the things he will do; he cannot understand the glimpses of his own violent behavior in the future. Saying that he can't control his actions, he attacks and kills the fortune teller.
Three days later, the FBI is on the case, having found another victim, eyes and entrails put on display. Mulder thinks that the case is one of anthropomancy: vivisecting humans and divining the future by studying their entrails. Scully, who has profiled the killer, thinks that is why the killer targets fortune tellers; the current victim, who was primarily a doll collector, also read tea leaves. The investigation is interrupted by the media-blitz arrival of the Stupendous Yappi, who is supposedly helping the investigation with his psychic powers. Yappi says the killer is a white man with a tattoo who does not feel in control of his own life; but suddenly, he loses the vision--blocked by "negative energy" from Mulder. Yappi asks Mulder to leave the room, over Mulder's protests that he believes in psychic ability. "I can't take you anywhere," quips Scully. When Yappi finally leaves, Mulder says that Yappi's clues--that the body would be found near water and flashes of several letters--are so vague that they could later easily be seen as correct. The police detectives, however, are satisfied with Yappi's help.
Meanwhile, Clyde Bruckman pitches term life auto insurance to a young couple. He tells the man that he shouldn't buy a boat, because in two years he will be hit and killed by a drunk driver; he even goes so far to describe the make and model of the drunk's car. Losing the sale, Bruckman returns home; when he picks lettuce out of his refrigerator, he momentarily sees a head in the bag, and when he goes to take out his elderly neighbor's garbage, he sees the old woman's dog feasting on her entrails. The old woman also mistakenly gives Bruckman her cigarette lighter. Going to take the garbage out, Bruckman discovers the fortune teller's body in his dumpster, her body attacked with her own crystal ball. Police detectives think the "dumping" of the body matches Yappi's clue, but Mulder is doubtful.
Wondering who found the body, Mulder and Scully go to talk to Bruckman. Bruckman seems nonplussed about knowing that the fortune teller's eyes were cut out with a crystal ball shard, even though he found the body face down and never saw the missing eyes. He says all he knows about the killings is that someone is offing fortune tellers, ripping out their eyes and entrails; Scully counters that the entrail removal was a detail never released to the press, and Bruckman says he never reads the papers anyway. Suspicious, Mulder takes Bruckman along to the house of the tea leaft reader; he thinks that Bruckman has some strange insight into the crime. Mulder thinks that Bruckman is genuinely psychic, but Scully thinks it's just a routine. Relenting, Bruckman looks around the home; when he finds the place where the entrails were laid out, he becomes sick. When he emerges from the bathroom after throwing up, he proceeds to repeat almost exactly the clues offered by Yappi; he says the killer feels like a puppet. He cannot offer much further insight into the killer's motives, any more than he can speculate why the victim collected dolls--it could have been one moment of revelation, or a whole series of things. Perusing the dolls, Bruckman sees a vision of one of the dolls with a hideously deformed head. Bruckman then reports that another body will be found by the "fat little white Nazi stormtrooper" at a nearby lake.
The next day, a body is pulled out of the lake, exactly as Bruckman said it would be. Noting a nearby squat white propane tank, Mulder remembers Bruckman's clue; Scully protests that the human mind can fill in vague details--but ultimately concedes, "Yes, it looks like a fat little white Nazi stormtrooper..." Mulder cannot accept that Bruckman is the killer, and Scully cannot accept that Bruckman is psychic; she thinks that maybe he's just lucky. We then cut to a shot of Bruckman listening to lotto numbers on the radio--and losing.
Mulder come to see Bruckman again, and Bruckman has already suspected what Mulder knows and wants: Bruckman has a psychic gift, and Mulder wants his help on the case. Bruckman feels cursed by his gift: his psychic ability is limited, only being able to discern the manner in which people are going to die. He says that with or without his help, more bodies will be found before the killer is stopped; since the future is already written, there's no point in doing anything about it. Realizing his help may disturb future causality and result in his never being born, Bruckman quips, "So when do we start?"
Mulder takes Bruckman to police headquarters and begins giving him objects from the crime scenes; but Bruckman seems only able to determine how the manufacturer of the items is going to die, knowing nothing about the killer. Scully arrives with a piece of evidence: a key chain found on victims at all of the crime scenes. She says that the insignia on the chain belongs to a company that gives market forecasts based on astrology. When she begins to report data on the company's president, Bruckman is able to recite chapter and verse: name, address, marital status, income, health; by conincidence, Bruckman sold a policy to the company a few months ago. Bruckman also says that the president has been murdered.
At Bruckman's direction, the agents head to a remote wooded road to find the body. While searching in the nearby woods, Bruckman explains how he came to have his ability: it grew out of a fascination with the death of the Big Bopper (of "Chantilly Lace" fame)--all the remarkable events that had to occur for him to die in a freak plane crash. A few minutes of searching, the agents are unable to find the body. They return to their car and find it is stuck in the soft mud. While Scully hits the gas, Mulder gets out to push--and notices that the spinning tires have unearthed the hand of a buried body.
Later in the day, Mulder presents Bruckman with the only shred of evidence from the latest murder--a fiber from the killer's clothes. Bruckman is unwilling to help--until Mulder offers to buy insurance from him. The only thing Bruckman can say is that the killer will kill again, and thinks he's psychic. He has a vision from the killer's point of view: he sees Mulder walking through a dark kitchen, Mulder stepping in a pie fallen on the floor, and then getting his throat slashed. Bruckman says that he didn't get the information from the fiber, but from a letter he received just today from the killer. The letter says that the killer knows about Bruckman's ability, and the FBI agents--but the envelope is postmarked before Bruckman joined the investigation. Mulder wants to protect Bruckman, but the salesman insists he will be dead before the killer is caught anyhow.
Meanwhile, The Puppet is seen with a tarot card reader, having an accurate fortune of his murderous tendencies read. In the end, The Puppet saves the last card for the tarot reader--Death. He then attacks and kills the tarot reader. Elsewhere, Bruckman has been taken into protective custody in a hotel, and Scully stays with him. Curious, she asks if he has seen his own demise. Bruckman says he sees himself in bed with Scully: she's holding his hand, and tears are streaming down his face. When Scully asks how she dies, Bruckman replies, "You don't." Mulder comes in to relieve Scully on watch duty, and tells her lab analysis of the fiber found at the last crime scene is lace--chantilly lace, to be specific. That evening, Mulder relates some of his psychic dreams to Bruckman; Bruckman says the only dream he has is of lying naked in a field of red tulips, slowly decomposing in death.
The next day, Scully awakens Mulder, informing him of the fresh murder of the tarot card reader just a block from the hotel. The agents leave a police officer named Havez to watch over Bruckman; going down the hallway, Scully accidentally bumps into the hotel bellhop--who is heading for Bruckman's room with a knife on his tray. In the hotel room, Havez asks Bruckman how he's going to die, and is relieved when the answer isn't lung cancer. Havez goes to the bathroom, and just then the bellhop--now seen to be The Puppet--enters with room service. They are both shocked at the remarkable coincidence. The Puppet asks Bruckman why he does what he does, and Bruckman tells him flatly because he's a homicidal maniac. The Puppet moves to kill Bruckman, but Bruckman says he doesn't die now--and just then Havez walks in from the bathroom just in time to be stabbed.
At the tarot reader crime scene, Scully discovers a strand of chantilly lace under her fingernail from when she bumped into the bellhop, and she realizes that the bellhop is the killer. The two agents race back to the hotel to intercept him. Mulder chases The Puppet into the hotel kitchen and steps into a pie, exactly as Bruckman predicted. Realizing what is happening, Mulder whirls to find The Puppet coming at him with a knife; the two struggle, but Scully arrives and The Puppet is gunned down. "Hey! That's not the way it's supposed to happen," gasps The Puppet.
Scully reports that Havez is dead, but that Bruckman has disappeared. Returning to Bruckman's apartment building, they find a note taped on his door: he informs the agents that his elderly neighbor passed away, and asks Scully if she wants the neighbor's dog. Entering the apartment, the agents find that Bruckman is dead--having taken his own life by suffocation, placing a plastic bag over his head. Scully takes his hand to check for a pulse, and then sees condensation in the bag--tears streaking down Bruckman's face. She realizes that Bruckman's prophecy of his own end has come true.
Case closed, Scully returns home. Watching TV late at night, she sees a commercial for the Stupendous Yappi on TV, peddling his psychic abilities. She picks up her phone as if to call, but then, in disgust, she throws it at the TV screen.
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In a railyard in Knoxville, TN, a freight train pulls in, and the engineer detaches one of the cars. Time elapses until nightfall, at which time a group of Japanese doctors pull up in black sedans. They move into the car, which contains a mini-surgical lab. They change into scrubs and begin performing an autopsy; strange green fluid is seen running through an IV tube; the entire procedure is recorded on video. The autopsy is suddenly interrupted by the arrival of a commando team, which guns down all of the doctors and quickly works to reclaim the body--which appears to be alien.
In Washington, Mulder has obtained video of the autopsy through a mail-order company, which bills the footage as an "authentic alien autopsy." "You spent money on this?" Scully quips. What has Mulder alarmed is the entrance of a commando team just seconds before the video cuts off; thevideo was apparently captured by a man in Allentown, PA off of his satellite dish. The agents travel to Allentown to meet Steve Zinzser, the man who captured the video. His "studio" turns out to be his home; the agents find the back door busted open, and Zinzser strangled in his bed. Just then, Mulder detects someone running from the house; Mulder gives pursuit to the Japanese man and ultimately captures him, taking a bag the man is carrying. Mulder and Scully take the man into custody at an Allentown police station, but are unable to interrogate him, lacking a translator. Their wait is interrupted by the arrival of Skinner, who says the man is a Japanese diplomat who must be released. He encourages Mulder to drop the case and go back to Washington.
Privately, Scully tells Mulder that the case just doesn't make sense: why would a high-ranking Japanese diplomat be found in the home of a freshly murdered video pirate? Still seeking answers, Mulder produces the diplomat's bag from the trunk of his car, a piece of evidence he conveniently forgot to turn in. Inside the bag, the agents find a series of satellite photos and a list of Mutual UFO Network (MUFON) members in Allentown, with the name Betsy Hagopian circled. Scully stays behind in Allentown at Mulder's request to investigate, while Mulder dutifully obeys Skinner and returns to Washington--to have the satellite photos analyzed by the Lone Gunmen. The Gunmen say the photos are of a salvage ship, the Talapus, out of San Diego, and that the shots were probably taken by a Japanese satellite. Supposedly, the Talapus was searching the Pacific for a sunken Japanese submarine reportedly loaded with gold, but the sub was never found. More importantly, the Talapus never returned to San Diego--the ship is tracked to Newport News, VA, and then disappears. Mulder is intrigued because Newport News is only a Navy shipyard.
At the Japanese embassy in Washington, the diplomat who Mulder apprehended gets into his limo, only to have a garroting wire thrown over his neck; he is quickly strangled to death. Back in Allentown, Scully heads to the home of Betsy Hagopian, only to find that Betsy is not at home. Two women, however, answer the door; they both immediately recognize Scully as "one of us," though Scully has no recollection of either of the women.
The women, Lottie Holloway and Penny Northern, quickly place phone calls to gather the rest of their MUFON group; they are shocked to hear that Scully is investigating the murder of Steve Zinzser, who was a member of their chapter. When Scully expresses confusion at being called "one of us," by the MUFON members, Lottie asks Scully if she had an unexplained period of missing time in her life last year; Scully can only look back in shock, knowing it to be true ("Ascension"/"One Breath"). Meanwhile, Mulder has traveled to Newport News, where he meets with the Coast Guard harbormaster running the naval yard. The harbormaster remembers that the Talapus was stopped for contraband inspection, but apparently nothing came of it, and the ship put out to sea again immediately. Knowing this to be untrue, Mulder asks the harbormaster to check his records to find a destination or a heading.
Back in Allentown, Scully meets with the entire MUFON group; the women say that Scully may not remember her abduction because she was only taken once, whereas some of them have been taken many times. The group speaks of being taken to "the bright white place" and being tested on by strange men--and as they speak, small snippets of Scully's memory come back to her. Penny Northern says that all the women had their memories erased, but that they slowly come back, and regression hypnosis can help. But Scully is defensive and not ready to talk about the experience.
In Newport News, the harbormaster returns with information for Mulder, only to find that Mulder has taken off across the shipyard in search of his own answers. After a few minutes of searching, Mulder locates the Talapus, which is still in dock. His search of the ship is cut rapidly short by the arrival of a commando team in black sedans. Mulder narrowly escapes capture by hiding and then diving into the water. Meanwhile, the MUFON group tells Scully that her memories will come back to her slowly; still in denial, Scully wonders if the women aren't simply mistaken. But the women reveal that they all had an implant removed from the back of their neck, as did Scully ("The Blessing Way"). Fear rising, Scully makes motions to leave, and then returns to the origin of her visit: to see Betsy Hagopian. The MUFON women take Scully to a local hospital, where Betsy is being treated for an unknown cancer. The cancer results from the secret tests, and all of the abductees believe they will eventually die from cancer as well.
When darkness falls, Mulder finally emerges from the water at the shipyard. From a distance, he sees activity in a warehouse; moving closer and looking in a window, he sees a vast space full of men in clean suits spraying a large covered object with a strange mist. Later, he returns home to find his apartment door open. Suspicious, he draws his gun, and inside, finds Skinner waiting for him. Mulder's apartment has been ransacked, and Skinner arrived to talk with Mulder after all the confusion was over. Skinner reports that the Japanese diplomat Mulder arrested in Allentown has turned up murdered. The Japanese government believes the diplomat was killed for the briefcase he was carrying; Skinner knows Mulder has the case, and demands its return to get the State Department off his back. But Mulder says that Scully has the briefcase in the trunk of her car, and he hasn't seen her since leaving her in Allentown. Skinner says he's tired of the abuse, and leaves Mulder on his own in pursuing the case.
Mulder goes to see Senator Matheson, who is all-too-aware of Mulder's predicament; he urges Mulder to return the satellite photographs as a wise strategic move. To earn Mulder's trust, Matheson explains that four Japanese scientists were recently murdered in a boxcar in Knoxville while performing an autopsy--though he doesn't know on what. Matheson passes a list of the Japanese doctors' names to Mulder, saying that they are quite famous. When Mulder asks what he's on to, Matheson cryptically replies, "Monsters begetting monsters."
Back at the X-Files office, Mulder is doing some research when Scully returns from Allentown and reports on her creepy encounter with the MUFON women. Seeing some photos of Japanese doctors on Mulder's desk, Scully insists that she recognizes one of the men, a Dr. Takeo Ishimaru, from somewhere. Mulder says that it's impossible, since Ishimaru has been dead since 1965; during World War II, he was the head of a Japanese medical unit known as "731" which performed horrible medical experiments on prisoners of war. Mulder also reports that four of the men just turned up murdered the other day; he suspects the US government may be responsible, trying to stop the Japanese from developing their own alien-human hybrid. Just then, Mulder gets a fax of a picture of the autopsy railroad car; his theory is that the Talapus dredged a UFO up out of the Pacific ocean, and that the alien being autopsied was recovered from the same UFO. Mulder won't reveal his source, but he implies that the source is a believer (suggesting Senator Matheson).
Scully takes the chip from her neck and has a crime lab specialist, Agent Pendrell, analyze it. He says that it's clearly a microprocessor, and that it's top-of-the-line hardware. When questioned about a use, Pendrell can only speculate, but he does remember a case of chips being used to help Alzheimer's patients remember, read, and write--by direct electrochemical brain stimulation. Mulder, meanwhile, has traveled to Quinnimont, WV, in search of the secret autopsy railroad car. After a few moments, he finds the car; just then, an unmarked van pulls up with several sedans; men are seen dragging a vaguely alien form in a clean suit into the train car. Mulder moves closer, but the train is well-guarded, and he cannot get near it before it's pulled away.
Scully, meanwhile, has gone back to look at Mulder's alien autopsy video, and in a freeze-frame, she recognizes the supposedly-dead Dr. Ishimaru, having a brief flashback to her abduction. Mulder calls Scully and brings her up to speed, saying the boxcar has been hooked up to a passenger train; he needs to try and catch the car outside Cincinnati before it heads into Canada. Scully also reports her discovery of Ishimaru on the autopsy tape. Mulder rushes to an Ohio train station to try and catch the passengertrain. Shortly before his arrival, two Japanese men arrive to board the train; one of them, however, is followed into a bathroom and strangled by another man with a garroting wire.
Mulder arrives at the train station, only to have just missed the train. He rushes in his car to an overpass, hoping to catch the train further down the track. Meanwhile, Scully is paid a visit at her apartment by Mr. X; X says that Mulder is in incredible danger, and that Scully has to stop him from getting on the train. Scully calls Mulder to warn him, but Mulder says he can't miss his chance and has to get on. Mulder steps over the overpass railing and leaps onto the train, dropping his phone.
To be continued...
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In Perkey, WV, a large military truck full of soldiers busts into a compound labeled with the sign "Hansen's Disease Research Facility." The soldiers burst into a housing building and round up a bunch of hideously deformed people; a few elude capture by hiding under the building's floorboards. Outside, the deformed people are hauled away to a freshly-dug ditch, lined up, and gunned down.
Story note: during the credits, the closing tag line reads "Apology Is Policy" instead of "The Truth Is Out There."
Back on the passenger train ("Nisei"), Mulder has successfully leapt on top of the car and slowly works his way inside. In Washington, Scully demands answers from X, but X refuses to say anything beyond what Scully already knows. Furious, Scully tries to draw her gun, but X quickly disarms her, saying, "There are limits to my knowledge." He suggests that if Scully wants to know about what's in the boxcar, who killed her sister, and her own abduction, she should further examine the implant in her neck.
On the train, Mulder finds his way to the secret boxcar, but finds it locked behind a card reader and a keypad. Moving forward, Mulder enlists the help of the train conductor, who says he doesn't have access to the car either. The conductor does suspect the involvement of a Japanese passenger, Dr. Shiro Zama, whom he saw examining the car earlier in the trip. Zama supposedly had a companion, but seems to be traveling alone now. Zama doesn't answer knocks on his cabin door; when Mulder busts in, he finds that Zama isn't there. Mulder does, however, find a briefcase full of books written in Japanese; he has the conductor put the case in the train's safe, and passes an unloaded pistol, saying that Zama should be restrained if found.
Back in Washington, Scully has Agent Pendrell subject the chip from her neck to further tests. Pendrell has determined that the chip appears to be mimicking human memory functions; together, they conclude that the chip could very easily be used to record every thought a person had. Pendrell says the chip's manufacture is so far advanced that his testing essentially destroyed it, but that he did find the manufacturer's name imprinted; Scully guesses correctly that the company is Japanese. Pendrell's trace of the company has turned up no records, save for one shipment to Dr. Shiro Zama at a facility in Perkey, WV. Dr. Zama, meanwhile, is walking slowly forward through the passenger train; along the way, he passes the assassin who previously killed his comrade at the train station. Zama tries to hide in a bathroom, but the assassin forces his way in and strangles Zama. Seconds later, Mulder walks by, totally unaware.
Scully travels to West Virginia to check out Zama's research facility. She finds the place mostly deserted, except for a few deformed humans hiding under the floorboards of a building. Meanwhile, Mulder continues his search through the railroad cars, and on his return pass, turns up Dr. Zama's body in the bathroom. Scully, meanwhile, learns that the facility she's found is actually a leper colony; even though leprosy is treatable now, this colony was established for those who were too far deformed by the disease before a cure was found. The lepers also report that the colony has recently been "closed"; they know who Dr. Zama is, but say that he's left for good. They say they were hiding from Scully, suspecting she was a "death squad"; one of the men takes Scully to a mass grave, where dozens of bodies have been piled up. He says that Zama's experiments always left victims in worse condition than they started in. Their conversation is interrupted by the arrival of a helicopter; Scully tries to hide, but she is quickly captured.
Elsewhere, Mulder finds the train conductor and tells him to seal off the bathroom where Zama's body was found, and orders him to tell the engineer not to stop the train until the killer is caught. Heading back to the secret car, Mulder finds the locks undone and the door swinging open. He heads in to investigate; inside a compartment in theback of the car, he sees what appears to be an alien. Suddenly, he is attacked by the assassin with the garroting wire and is nearly killed. He is saved from certain death by the conductor, who holds the assassin off with Mulder's unloaded gun. The assassin says he works for the National Security Agency, but the conductor acts quickly, runs out, and seals both Mulder and the assassin in the car. This, meanwhile, has given Mulder time to draw his gun and hold the assassin at bay.
The assassin tells Mulder that the train car is wired with explosives, which armed as soon as he stepped into the car; apparently, Zama would have preferred its living cargo to perish if he couldn't get it out of the country. The assassin tries to tell Mulder that the smallest concussion (such as from a gun) could set off the explosives, but Mulder doesn't seem to care. Back in West Virginia, Scully is brought to speak with an Elder from the shadowy government Consortium. The Elder tells Scully that the compund they're on was one of the most horrible places on the planet, a human experimenting ground run by Dr. Zama. Scully suddenly realizes that Zama is actually the 731 head doctor, Ishimaru, who never died, but was brought to the United States after World War II to continue his work. Ishimaru, however, started performing his work in secret, which earned him the wrath of those who had given him amnesty. The Elder refuses to tell Scully exactly what Ishimaru exposed the lepers to, but says he can show her a place that will hopefully give her answers.
On the train, Mulder warns the conductor not to try and pry the door open, afraid of detonating the car. Mulder gets the assassin's key card, but the assassin doesn't know the code to exit--Zama only gave him the entrance code, and a wrong key sequence could detonate the car. Thinking the assassin is lying, Mulder swipes the card and is one keystroke away from finishing the number sequence when the assassin's cell phone rings. Much to his surprise, Scully is on the other end (with the Elder standing nearby), and wants to talk to Mulder. Scully says she is in West Virginia, and reports on Ishimaru's continuing experiments on lepers, lunatics, and the homeless; whatever Mulder has in the train car is not alien in nature. As proof, she reports that she's standing in a white train car, just like the one from Mulder's alien autopsy video--but she recognizes that she's been in the car before, during her abduction. She is sure there are no aliens, and goes so far as to say that the "UFO" Mulder saw in Virginia was really just a chunk of a Russian nuclear sub. They recall a recent Presidential apology for radiation tests on innocent subjects up until 1974--but the tests never actually stopped. Scully also says there's a bomb on the car, and that if it detonates, thousands will die from the hemmorhagic fever the test subject in the car has been exposed to. Mulder says he's already locked in the car, and Scully says he needs to get out immediately.
At Scully's direction, Mulder opens an air circulation vent in the train car's ceiling and finds the bomb inside; a counter is ticking down with just under two hours until detonation. Scully says "they" want to stop the train at the next stop, evacuate the passengers, and bring a bomb squad on; unwilling to play along, Mulder pretends his phone reception is breaking up and hangs up. Relaying information through the conductor, Mulder has the train engineer divert the train into a sparsely populated area and unhook the testing car. Mulder is bargaining that the car's cargo is important enough that he and the assassin will be rescued before the bomb detonates.
While Mulder's attention is diverted, the assassin picks up a scalpel off a nearby table. Mulder calls Scully on her cell phone and explains what he's done; but he also has no idea where he is. He returns his attention to the assassin in an attempt to determine what the living cargo of the car is, and why it's worth dying for: leper, alien, or otherwise. Under the threat of a gunshot wound to the stomach, the assassin finally tells Mulder that the being is a weapon: an attempt to create a being immune to nuclear, chemical, and biological agents. Mulder realizes that Ishimaru was trying to bring his perfect weapon back to Japan, and that the US government intervened, not wanting to share their knowledge; he's convinced that the car's passenger is an alien-human hybrid.
Scully, meanwhile, has gone to Mulder's apartment in a panic. Looking through Mulder's phone book, she tries to call Senator Matheson, but is unable to reach him. Desperate, she tapes an X into Mulder's window in an effort to contact Mr. X. She then runs Mulder's alien autopsy video again; becoming excited, she calls Mulder. By watching Ishimaru on the video, she's been able to determine the exit code to the car. Just as Mulder finishes punching in the code and the car opens, he is assaulted from behind by the scalpel-wielding assassin. Mulder is beaten nearly unconscious; but the assassin doesn't get very far, immediately gunned down by Mr. X. X comes into the car and drags a groggy Mulder out; the two have barely gotten away when the car explodes.
Mulder and Scully meet at the X-Files office a week later. The train car has disappeared, and Mulder cannot even contact Senator Matheson for help. Scully has turned up Zama's briefcase, but when Mulder looks through it, he realizes it's not the same case. Everything has been cleaned up without a trace. Scully thinks that Mulder is just chasing invisible aliens, and by so doing, is helping to perpetuate a lie surrounding the real and horrible truth of experimentation on humans. "And what they can't cover they apologize for," she says. "Apology has become policy." Mulder doesn't want an apology for all the lies, however; he wants an apology for the truth.
Elsewhere, a scribe is seen translating Ishimaru's journals into English, while the Cigarette-Smoking Man watches quietly, puffing on a Morley.
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In the small town of Miller's Grove, MA, an exterminator is hard at work exterminating cockroaches in the basement of Dr. Jeff Eckerle's home. The exterminator takes his job seriously, philosophizing at length about the hardiness of roaches, but in the end concludes that human development is far superior. Eckerle leaves the exterminator to work; spraying away, cockroaches suddenly swarm him. He writhes in agony and collapses.
That evening, Mulder travels up to Miller's Grove by chance to check out some UFO sightings. Scully calls him from her apartment, wondering where he's been: he reports that his apartment was being fumigated and decided to take a weekend off. Mulder asks Scully if she ever looked up at the sky and wondered if an alien on another planet was looking back and doing the same thing. Scully launches into a long scientific explanation about how the evolution of life was a fluke, and Mulder retorts with, "Scully, what are you wearing?"
Mulder suddenly sees a bright light and says he has to go. He is approached by Sheriff Frass, who wonders why Mulder is sitting in his car in a field. Mulder flashes his badge and asks about the UFOs; Frass said there were several phone calls about it. Noting that Mulder has his windshield wipers running to swat bugs off, Frass suspects cockroaches and becomes alarmed enough to reach for his gun. Suddenly called away by a radio report of "another roach attack,"Mulder becomes intrigued and follows along. Arriving at the scene, Mulder calls Scully and says that a dead exterminator was found in Dr. Eckerle's basement--apparently attacked by cockroaches. He says that the population of Miller's Grove has a lot of scientists, including Dr. Eckerle (an alternative-fuels researcher), so the call isn't a crank. What is disturbing is that the exterminator is the third victim in a day. Scully thinks that maybe the exterminator died of anaphylactic shock.
Meanwhile, three teens are experimenting in their home-made drug lab, snorting the fumes of cow dung to get high on the methane fumes. Suddenly, one of the teens sees cockroaches crawling into and under his skin. In a panic, he begins wildly scratching his arms, and then slashes them open with razor blades to get rid of the bugs. When Mulder calls Scully with the latest death report, Scully says there's a strange but identified syndrome where drug users think that bugs are infesting their skin and will cut themselves to remove them. At the crime scene, Mulder sights a cockroach and moves to pick it up, but it crumbles in his hand, just exoskeleton--but fragments are stuck in Mulder's hand, suggesting the skeleton was made of metal.
Mulder goes to the hospital, where he's treated by a Dr. Newton, who is chief resident and pathologist. Newton demands some answers from Mulder, concerned at the growing panic in the town, but Mulder doesn't know anything. Frass arrives, and his personal theory is that the new "killer" cockroaches may be the result of testing by the US Department of Agriculture at a site near the town, in much the same way that killer bees were accidentally introduced to the US. Newton excuses himself to the bathroom, and while sitting on the toilet, he is swarmed and killed by cockroaches. Quickly drawn to the scene, Mulder spots a cockroach, but it escapes down a sink drain. When Scully hears of the latest death, the forensic evidence suggests to her that Newton died of a burst brain aenurism, the result of straining too hard.
Later, Mulder heads out to the USDA research station, scaling a high fence and picking a lock to get into the testing house. At about this time, Scully calls Mulder back and says she's been doing some digging on cockroaches: there's no evidence of any breed of killer cockroaches, but that the pattern fits the introduction of a new species of cockroach to the country. When Mulder tells Scully about the USDA house, she warns him not to be "going trespassing onto Federal property again"--until Mulder announces he's already inside. The house interior looks like a typical, modern two-story suburban home, normal except for the moving walls, which suddenly burst forth with cockroaches. Suddenly, a light turns on, and Mulder abruptly hangs up on Scully.
Mulder finds himself face-to-face with the voluptuous Dr. Bambi Berenbaum of the USDA Agricultural Research Service; after showing his ID, he insists that she answer some questions. Berenbaum says she's researching cockroaches in hopes of finding a way of eradicating them, but that the USDA never told the townsfolk what they were doing, having deliberately infested a home with thousands of cockroaches. She's also never heard of an incident of cockroaches attacking people. Looking around, Mulder becomes intrigued by Berenbaum's pet project: she thinks that because when insects are subjected to an electrical field they glow intensely, UFOs may actually be insect swarms. Obviously drawn to Berenbaum, Mulder pretends that he likes insects, even though he's really fairly revulsed by them.
Night descends on the local hotel; down the hall from Mulder's room, a man is slowly being overrun by cockroaches while watching TV, though he doesn't notice immediately. Well into the evening, a disturbed Mulder finally calls Scully back to tell her that everything is all right, and what he found at the USDA site. Mulder says Berenbaum concurs with Scully's theory about a new insect species, and then prattles at length about the wonders of roaches. Scully, meanwhile, can only offer an exasperated (and somewhat jealous), "Her name is Bambi?" Mulder confesses, however, that he hates insects; he's not afraid, but when he first became aware of insects as a child, he was simply repulsed. Their phone conversation is suddenly interrupted by a scream down the hall. Some of the hotel guests, including the paranoid Dr. Eckerle (who no longer wanted to stay in his home), spot a now-dead man with cockroaches crawling all over him; but when Mulder arrives, the roaches are gone.
Mulder finally calls Scully back, and Scully is now insistent on coming up to Miller's Grove, convinced something odd is afoot. Mulder thinks the latest victim didn't die of shock, however--just of a heart attack induced by fright. He also tells Scully that all of her previous guesses as to causes of death were completely correct. Suddenly, Mulder spies a cockroach in an insect trap and hangs up. He has the roach taken to Berenbaum, who says she's never seen anything like it; further analysis under a microscope shows that the roach's exoskeleton is metallic and looks almost like a computer chip.
At Berenbaum's direction, Mulder goes to visit a local scientist, Dr. Alexander Ivanov, who specializes in studying artificial intelligence by making robots that behave like insects. The wheelchair-bound Ivanov feels that AI schemes that try to mimic the human brain are too complex--which is why he turned to insects. He explains that his grant is from NASA; his objective is to create robot space probes to explore other worlds. He also feels that when extraterrestrials visit the earth, the probes that they send will probably be mechanical. When Mulder shows Ivanov the metal cockroach legs, Ivanov is stupefied, saying he cannot even comprehend what he's looking at.
Scully, meanwhile, has made it to the outskirts of Miller's Grove. When she stops into a convenience store to get a map, the whole store has broken into mass hysteria. Cars are colliding with each other and people are clearing shelves at top speed. Attempting to restore order, Scully flashes her badge and assures everyone that things are under control. Two women, however, continue to struggle over the last can of bug killer; they knock over a candy display and spill chocolates onto the floor. Someone misidentifies the chocolates as roaches, and everyone runs out of the store in a panic. Mulder, meanwhile, shares a drink with a stunned Ivanov and then departs. Spying a roach in the hallway, he picks it up and tells it, "Greetings from planet earth."
Mulder takes the roach back to Berenbaum, but she says it's just a normal roach. Scully calls Mulder from the convenience store and says she has a new lead. Dr. Eckerle, the alternative-fuels researcher, is experimenting on extracting methane from manure, which he regularly imports. Since roaches are dung eaters, the alternative-fuels plant may be the source of the infestation. Mulder explains Ivanov's robotic probes theory, and Scully thinks (of course) that Mulder is nuts.
Mulder and Berenbaum drive over to the alternative-fuels plant. Going inside, Mulder finds piles of dung swarming with roaches--and a very frightened (and armed) Dr. Eckerle hiding in terror in his office. In his increasing paranoia, Eckerle thinks that Mulder himself may be an insect. Mulder tries to talk Eckerle down before he blows up a plant full of methane by firing his gun. Scully, meanwhile, arrives at the scene; unable to locate Mulder, she rings him on the cell phone. The chirping sound of the phone sets Eckerle off, and he begins firing wildly; the plant bursts into flames, and Mulder and Scully barely escape before the whole place explodes, showering the agents with manure. Mulder summarizes the situation succinctly: "Crap."
Fire crews and Sheriff Frass arrive not long thereafter; Frass reports that Eckerle's body will probably never be found. He says that the mass hysteria also started several other fires and lead to several injuries--many from insecticide poisoning. Fortunately, the roaches are gone. Ivanov arrives, wondering if he could examine the metal roach legs again--but Mulder says they've crumbled to dust. Berenbaum speculates that the roaches may have grown wings in their last molting stage and flown back to their point of origin. Intrigued, Ivanov and Berenbaum move away, engrossed in conversation. Scully quips, "By the time there's another invasion of artificially intelligent dung-eating robotic probes from outer space, maybe their uber-children will have devised a way to save our planet." Slightly annoyed, Mulder retorts, "You know, I never thought I'd say this to you, Scully, but you smell bad."
Mulder returns home and writes up his case report, reiterating Ivanov's theory of insect probe exploration of space. He further speculates that other civilizations may have already developed such probes; he wonders if aliens would be revulsed by primitive humans. Suddenly, Mulder spies a roach on his desk. Alarmed, he squishes it with a thick stack of X-Files.
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The story opens at a supermarket in Virginia, where Robert Modell is shopping for groceries. He picks up some unusual items--like a few dozen high-protein drinks. At the checkout counter, he notices that he's being followed. FBI agents sack him and he is arrested by agent Frank Burst--Modell appears to be the mysterious man "Pusher" they are after. Agent Burst, a county cop, and Modell ride off to the county lockup. At an intersection, Pusher begins lulling the cop driving the car with statements about how calming and tranquil the blue color of his uniform is. The cop looks down the street, where a large truck is rolling their way; suddenly, the truck vanishes from his view. He pulls out into the intersection. Pusher braces himself, Burst sees the truck, screams, and we hear the horrible crunch of impact.
Burst talks with Mulder and Scully. He tells them that someone called Pusher called the FBI and confessed to dozens of murders--murders which no one considered murders, but suicides. But Pusher knew too many details about each of the crime scenes. Burst relates what happened after Pusher was picked up at the grocery store. Mulder suggests that perhaps Pusher somehow wills people to do things. Viewing some slides from the crime scene, Mulder finds the first of Pusher's clues. The word "Ronin" (or samurai without a master) written in blood.
Mulder and Scully head to the FBI library and begin searching through American Ronin magazine. They talk briefly with Holly, an FBI records person, who was mugged in Georgetown the previous weekend; she drops off more magazines and then leaves. Mulder suggests his theory of forcing the will again; Scully wonders why, especially why he would will an accident when he was in the car. Mulder thinks that he just didn't want to go to jail. In the Ronin magazine, Mulder finds an ad "I solve problems. OSU" dating through the timespan of the murders. Looking up "osu" in the Japanese-English dictionary, Mulder discovers that "osu" is the Japanese verb "to push." The agents run down the phone numbers in the ads and trace them to a pay phone in a park.
Mulder and Scully stay late on stakeout, but with no luck. Finally, one of the phones rings. Mulder answers, and sure enough, Pusher is on the other end. He's been watching them for several hours; he wants Mulder to prove his worth, taking the whole thing as a kind of game. Following the next clue, Mulder dials back the last number from the pay phone and connects to a golf course.
The next day, we find Pusher at the golf course, whacking out balls on the driving range with a bunch of Japanese business-types. He senses the FBI agents moving in and hurries to leave. He hides out in the pro shop's maintenance shed; one of the FBI agents finds him. Pusher then wills the agent into dousing himself in gasoline and igniting himself, directly in front of Mulder and Scully. Pusher heads to his car to escape, but Mulder stops him; Pusher is slumped over the wheel of his car, sweating and exhausted. Pusher laughs and bets Mulder five bucks that he gets off.
In court, Pusher--aka Modell--admits that he called the FBI, but that it was just a drunken phone prank. On the stand, Mulder espouses his theory that Modell willed people to their death. While talking, Modell influences the judge's mind and he is released. He then tries to taunt Mulder out of five dollars, making good on his bet. Mulder tells Scully that Modell "put the whammy" on the judge. Scully asks: "Please explain to me the scientific nature of the whammy."
For her own part, Scully has done some research on Modell; but Mulder's amazing profiling abilities have already figured most of it out. He was an average student and served in the army, wanted to be in special forces, but got washed out; he served as a supply clerk instead. Scully informs Mulder that Modell also applied to the FBI, but failed the psych tests, acutely egocentric and caught in dozens of lies. Scully thinks that Modell is just a little man who wants to be big; plus, if he had all these psychic abilities, why isn't he in special forces right now? Mulder thinks that maybe the ability came to him more recently.
Meanwhile, Modell heads to FBI headquarters, writes the word "PASS" on a piece of paper, sticks it on his lapel, and casually strolls past the security guards. He then heads to the FBI computer records division, where he encounters Holly (previously seen dumping off magazines for Mulder and Scully) and gets her to pull up Mulder's personnel record. In his own twisted way, he sympathizes with the fact that Holly was mugged. Unawares, Skinner strolls into the office; not recognizing Modell, Skinner tries to restrain him. Modell convinces Holly that Skinner was the man who mugged her; out of her mind, Holly maces Skinner and Modell escapes.
Under questioning, Holly tells Scully and Skinner that she didn't know what she was doing; she is remorseful and almost in tears. Mulder, meanwhile, has reviewed the security tapes and sees Modell entering and leaving unnoticed. Scully finally begins to accept Mulder's theory, though she doesn't know quite how Modell did what he did. Skinner sends Mulder and Scully out to pick Modell up for criminal trespass.
Modell, one step ahead as usual, is not at home when the FBI raids his house. Mulder finds Modell's refigerator full of protein drinks; Scully finds prescription medicine: Modell has temporal lobe epilepsy. Scully says that one of the things that can cause epilepsy this late in life is a brain tumor; Mulder says that the formation of brain tumors is linked with the development of psychic abilities. He thinks that Modell drinks the protein drinks to replenish his energy. Scully says he would never have enough energy to play games with the FBI; Mulder agrees that Modell isn't strong enough, and says maybe he just wants to go out in a blaze of glory.
The phone rings, and Frank Burst answers. The FBI team begins running a phone trace. Modell talks to Burst and actually wills him into a cardiac arrest over the telephone while the team finishes the trace. Just to show that he's still just playing the game, Modell gives Mulder the phone number, which agrees with the traced number. He only wants a worthy adversary: Mulder.
The FBI traces the phone to a pay phone, which is down the street from Fairfax Mercy Hospital. Scully then notices that Modell's prescription medicine is from Fairfax Mercy Pharmacy; they deduce that he needs regular treatment. Mulder and Scully charge over to the hospital with a SWAT team in tow.
Scully finds out that Modell is scheduled for an MRI at almost precisely the time they arrive. Mulder decides to head into the building alone, without his gun, to minimize the chances of anyone being hurt. He wears a headpiece that has a radio and a camera so that Scully and the SWAT commander can monitor his movements. Entering the hospital, Mulder hears two shots and heads into the MRI lab. The MRI technician and a security guard both lie dead on the floor; the guard's gun is missing. Examining Modell's MRI through Mulder's camera, Scully sess that Modell does indeed have a brain tumor, and he is dying. When Mulder turns around, Modell is standing directly behind him, gun in hand. He rips the headset off of Mulder; Scully panics and heads for the hospital.
Scully then heads in alone without her gun to stop Modell from whatever he has planned. She finds Modell and Mulder seated at a table, the gun between them. Modell has decided to play a game of Russian roulette with Mulder. The first pull against Modell comes up blank. Scully goes into screaming hysterics when Modell wills Mulder to pull the trigger on himself; thankfully for Mulder, another blank. Mulder then trains the gun on Scully; Modell says that it's her turn, everyone has to play. Scully tries to talk Mulder down; she just barely reaches him and he manages to tell her to run before it's too late. Scully takes off and pulls a fire alarm; this snaps Mulder out of his trance. He turns and fires the gun on Modell, blowing him away. The SWAT team storms into the room; an engraged Mulder is still pulling the trigger of the empty gun.
We then cut to Mulder and Scully in a hospital room. Modell is in a coma from which he will never awaken. Mulder finds that Modell was never being treated; he only used the MRIs to gauge his life and never had his tumor operated on. Scully wonders why. Mulder suggests it was like Scully said--he was always a little man, and this was finally something that made him big. Scully reaches out, squeezes Mulder's hand, and says that they shouldn't let him take up another moment of their time.
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As the episode opens, we see an electrician, Roky, working on some power lines. In a car, two teenagers, Harold and Chrissy drive by and have a short chat about their first date. Suddenly, the car's engine dies, a bright light blinds them, and two alien-like creatures are seen walking towards the car. As the aliens drag the two teens back to the spaceship, a third alien, bathed in red light, appears. One alien says to the other (in English), "Jack, what is that thing?" and the other replies, "How the hell should I know?"
We then cut to Scully having an interview with world-renowned author Jose Chung; we learn that Mulder has refused the interview and Scully has only granted the interview because Chung is one of her favorite authors. Chung hopes that by writing a book about an alien abduction, he will start a new literary genre. Scully wants the truth; Chung suggests from his interviews that the truth is very subjective.
The FBI wasn't on the case for a few days. The girl, Chrissy, reappeared the following morning with signs of physical abuse and all her clothes on inside out. Scully suggests she looked more like a victim of date rape. She gave a statement to the police and was then "visited" by aliens that night. Harold shows up at Chrissy's house, apologizing and saying he did all he could. Chrissy's father called the police and had Harold apprehended; Harold maintains they were both abducted by aliens. Detective Manners, the local cop on the case, grills Harold severely and asks him if he would take a lie detector test; Harold takes such a test and passes it.
Mulder and Scully arrive and question both Harold and Chrissy. Mulder becomes convinced that Chrissy is suffering from "post-abduction syndrome." With the girl's parents' permission, Mulder has the girl hypnotized. Scully speculates that hypnotism may have therapeutic value, but that it has never been shown to enhance memory. Under hypnosis, Chrissy begins seeing her questioners as aliens. She recalls being bound to a table on a spaceship, surrounded by small gray aliens with large heads and eyes. She sees Harold on a table but unconscious, and hears the aliens arguing with one another. The leader speaks to her without moving his mouth, telling her that what they're doing is for the good of her planet; Chrissy feels the alien stealing her memories. Mulder says that all of the information is a typical alien abduction; Scully thinks that it's a little too typical. Suddenly, Detective Manners bursts into the room and berates Mulder for screwing up the case. Mulder argues that Chrissy has corroborated Harold's story; Manners says the two stories couldn't be "more bleepin' different."
[Note: one of the more humorous and unconventional aspects of this episode is Detective Manners, whose profanities are near-legendary. As Scully recalls the story, all of Manners' expletives are replaced by "bleep"s and "blank"s.]
In Harold's version of the story, he and Chrissy are held in cages on the spaceship. In the beginning, Chrissy is unconscious. In the next cell over, Harold sees an alien casually smoking a cigarette. Chrissy awakens, Harold promises to protect her, and then the cage opens, there is a bright white light, and Chrissy is sucked away. Harold recalls the alien repeating over and over, "This is not happening" in English. Harold is then sucked out of the cage; the next thing he remembers is falling and waking up on the ground. Under an intense questioning from Scully, Harold admits that he and Chrissy had sex; for Scully, this explains Chrissy's physical condition. Manners then bursts into the interrogation room, saying an eyewitness to the abduction has come forth.
Mulder and Scully then interview Roky, the electrical lineman. He reports seeing the whole incident and then rushing home to write it down. While writing, he two men in black suits arrive in a black Cadillac, abruptly pulling into Roky's garage. Mulder surprises Roky by guessing the identity of the Men in Black, who are prevalent in appearing after UFO sightings. They inform him that UFOs are often just the planet Venus; the first Man in Black strongly suggests to Roky that he only saw Venus and not a UFO. The Man in Black berates the human race at length for its scientific illiteracy and then tells Roky he's a dead man if he reports seeing anything other than the planet Venus.
Later, Mulder and Scully read over Roky's manuscript. He reports seeing the situation much as was shown at the beginning of the episode. The alien bathed in red light, whom Roky refers to as "Lord Kinbote," comes forward and speaks to Roky. Lord Kinbote tells him that he is important to the survival of his race; Roky then recalls traveling to the center of the earth, Lord Kinbote's home. The fantasy grows increasingly elaborate and outlandish, leaving everyone (even Mulder) with the impression that Roky is delusional, if not completely nuts.
Mulder has Chrissy rehypnotized; now she recalls seeing men in Air Force uniforms and doctors grilling her. It seems that a doctor is trying to hypnotize her. The Air Force types argue what questions to ask her; finally, a man tells the doctor to wipe her mind and give her the "usual alien abduction rigamarole." The doctor tells her what she's going through is for the good of her country. After the hypnosis session is over, Scully thinks that this version of the story is more absurd than the first one. Just then, Detective Manners pops in again, reporting that someone has found a dead alien body.
We then cut to Chung interviewing a teen, Blaine, who seems bent on being abducted by aliens; he wants to be abducted by aliens. He recalls heading out into a field in the middle of the night, the same night that Harold and Chrissy were "abducted," and stumbles across an alien body. He calls the police and then reports that the cops, including Manners, showed up with two "men in black"--who turn out to be Mulder and Scully. Mulder hoots excitedly at the discovery, and the body is taken away. Blaine reports that Scully threatened him, saying that he never saw this and if he ever told anyone that he was a dead man. Cutting back to Scully's interview with Chung, she says that what Blaine said is preposterous and that she never threatened him; she even says that they allowed him to view the autopsy.
Blaine makes a video of the autopsy, which was later turned into a cheesy alien autopsy video hosted by the Stupendous Yappi (first seen in "Clyde Bruckman's Final Repose"). The video was edited up to remove all the important details; Scully finds a zipper on the "alien," and finds that it's actually a human in an alien suit.
The "alien" is eventually identified as an Air Force major; shortly thereafter, more Air Force types show up to reclaim the major, who is apparently AWOL from his base. The Air Force folks want to see the body for verification. Mulder cleverly says no, but they can talk to the other pilot, whom they also have in custody; he thus dupes the Air Force into revealing the name of a second pilot, Lieutenant Jack Shaeffer. When they head down the hall to view the body, the morgue is empty and the body is missing.
Meanwhile, Blaine is visited by the Men in Black, who rip open his VCR and take the alien autopsy tape. He is then knocked unconscious and comes to just in time to be grabbed by Mulder, who demands to know where the tape is. Blaine says the Men in Black took the tape, and Mulder tells Blaine if he's lying that he's a dead man--probably more elaborate fantasy from Blaine's point of view.
Scully says that as Mulder returned to the hotel, his account of things gets "a little . . . odd." As Mulder drives along, he swerves and barely misses a man walking in the middle of the road. The man turns out to be none other than the missing pilot, Lieutenant Jack Shaeffer. Shaeffer grabs Mulder by the shoulders and repeatedly says, "This is not happening. This is not happening."
In Mulder's account, he and the pilot go to a diner and talk at length. Shaeffer reports the military is interested in using UFOs as spy planes because they cause the enemy to hesitate. He suggests that most alien abductions are actually fronts put forth by the military to cover up their UFO pilot program. "Abductees" are taken back to a military base, brainwashed, and hypnotized; they are released, completely convinced they were abducted. Mulder wants to know, then, who abducted Shaeffer. Shaeffer firmly believes that he, his copilot, Harold, and Chrissy, were actually abducted by aliens. Suddenly, Air Force personnel burst into the diner to take Shaeffer away. Mulder stops Shaeffer, asking him if any of it was real; Mulder can't believe it was all fake memories implanted by the government. Desperate, he asks Shaeffer about the third alien. Shaeffer replies, "Who, Lord Kinbote?" just before he's dragged away.
Chung finds this especially odd, because he was friends with the cook of the diner. The cook recalls Mulder coming into the diner alone, ordering a slice of sweet potato pie and asking a question. Mulder then proceeds to ask one question per slice of pie until he's eaten an entire pie, pays for his food, then leaves.
Mulder returns to the hotel, where he finds the Men in Black waiting in Scully's room. Scully then walks in with a bowl of ice, saying the Men in Black wish to speak with him. The first Man in Black tells Mulder that most alien abductions are a simple hoax perpetrated by the government to throw the true seekers off the track. Mulder counters that the Men in Black are also said to behave strangely so that anyone recalling a conversation with them would sound like a lunatic. He then recalls seeing the second Man in Black--who looks exactly like Alex Trebek. Scully then confesses that she doesn't remember any of this, but was quite surprised to find Mulder in her room the next morning. Mulder, for his part, finds the ice tray full of water from melted ice. The phone rings, and it's Detective Manners: "Someone just found your bleepin' UFO."
Manners, Mulder, and Scully head to the scene, where the military has a downed experimental aircraft. They were keeping the whole thing secret because of the experimental nature of the project. They see the two Air Force pilots being carried away in body bags. Manners, totally confused, says it for all of them: "Bleep."
Later, Mulder visits Chung at his office, and asks Chung not to write the book, saying that the whole incident deals with alternate reality and perceptions humans cannot yet understand, and could easily be told in a way as to make the people involved look foolish. He then relates to Chung who owns his publishing house (a military contractor) and suspects a conspiracy on the part of the military-industrial-entertainment complex to discredit UFO seekers. Chung shakes his head and says that the book will be written. Chung wants to know from Mulder what really happened to Harold and Chrissy. Mulder replies, "How the hell should I know?"
Time elapses, and the book is published. Scully reads. Blaine continues to seek for aliens, taking over Roky's old job as a linemen. Roky relocated to California, preaching New Age soul-searching enlightenment babble. Chung refers to FBI agent "Diana Lesky" who is "noble of spirit and pure at heart," but "nevertheless a federal employee," and also to agent "Reynard Muldrake, a ticking time-bomb of insanity" who has such a warped psyche from seeking the unknown that he cannot receive any pleasure out of life. Chrissy has taken her alien abduction as a sign to help improve her own world, and has invested herself in dozens of humanitarian and environmental causes. As the episode closes, Harold visits Chrissy at her window, telling her that he still loves her. Chrissy roughly blows him off. Chung continues his narration, saying that some people are not interested in extraterrestrials, seeking only meaning in other humans. "For although we may not be alone in the universe, in our own separate ways, on this planet, we are all alone."
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Last Update: 13 September 1999
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