"One Son"

Ick, someone needs a second decontamination shower!

The second of our tell-all two parters begins with Mulder not shooting Cassandra afterall (ooh, there's a shocker).  A SWAT team of men dressed in decontamination suits bursts open the door to Mulder's apartment and orders them all down, telling them they have been exposed to an unspecified organism.  Diana is one of the people there.

Mulder and Scully are taken to a decontamination facility in Fort Marlene where they shower off.  Both are completely naked, separated only by a steel wall that doesn't hide much (woo hoo!).  As the water stops, Mulder looks towards Scully (who can see full well over the wall to a naked Mulder) who is facing him and looks her up and down appreciatively.  Scully holds his look for a moment before turning away.

Diana offers them her feeble apologies for the whole incident which Scully doesn't buy because Diana won't let them see Cassandra.  After having a very biting back-and-forth conversation with the Fowl One, Scully stalks off into the locker area, Mulder following her.

Scully: Mulder, this stinks.  And not because I think that woman is a...  Well, I think you know what I think that woman is.

CSM wants to turn over Cassandra to the greys, but everyone else thinks that will just make matters worse.  Cassandra is what we thought: the first successful alien-human hybrid.

Mulder (wearing clothes that are far too small <g>) encounters Marita Covarrubias in the hallway by accident.  Tired and haggard, Marita tells him that she has been tested on for a vaccine by the CSM and his group and that if the greys find out about the government's success with Cassandra, alien colonization will undoubtedly begin.

Mulder arrives at the Lone Gunmen's place where Frohike proceeds to undo the dozen or so locks and chains on their door.

Mulder: The latest in home security.

Frohike: Hey, you get thru this, you gotta come through me.

Scully is there (in a black turtleneck, no less) to give him evidence that Diana is not on their side and is using Mulder.  She shows him evidence that while in Europe she was gathering/destroying evidence from MUFON chapters and made regular stops to Tunisia (remember all those corn crops in the movie?)  Unconvinced, Mulder tells her testily that she's reaching.

Quote of the Week:

Scully: Mulder, ask yourself why there is no information whatsoever on Special Agent Diana Fowley.  Why she would suddenly happen into your life when you are closer than ever to the truth.  I mean you... you ask me to trust no one and yet you trust her on simple faith. Mulder: Cause you've given me no reason here to do otherwise. Scully: (looks massively disappointed in him) Well then I can't help you anymore. Mulder: Scully, you're making this personal. Scully: Because it is personal, Mulder.  Because without the FBI, personal interest is all that I have.  And if you take that away then there is no reason for me to continue.

Wow!  Talk about laying it all out for him.  She basically purges the fact that without Mulder there and his friendship and support and trust, she would not continue with the FBI.  

In spite of this, Mulder pays a visit to Diana's apartment (in the Watergate Hotel Apartments, no less) and encounters CSM.  Mulder accuses him of the same things he's been accusing him of all along.  CSM reveals the following:

- they agreed to cooperate with the alien colonists to forestall an alien invasion and try to find a way to save the human race in the inevitable event of a takeover

- the Syndicate's members agreed to sacrifice their children and (in CSM's case) wives in return for the alien fetus which they needed to find out a way to create hybrids that could survive a holocaust.  Their children were going to be returned to them once it was successful (kinda like collateral)

- Samantha was abducted from his home, not the base, because Bill Mulder was reluctant and didn't realize that it was by necessity that each of their children (at least one) be given up.

- it is too late now, especially with the intervention of the faceless alien rebels, and colonization will begin, started by the bees, etc.  He gives Mulder the coordinates where it is all going to begin (El Rico Air Force Base) - being there and being injected with the hybridization genes is the only way he can survive and see his sister again.

CSM and Cassandra attempt to meet eye-to-eye.  Cassandra thinks he's a coward and tells him that the only way to save their son from the holocaust now that he has taken the wrong side is to kill him.  CSM, nearly in tears, tells her he can't and is trying to make up for what he has done and explain his rationale.  The Syndicate and their families (with the exception of CSM who has gone to get Cassandra) are injected in the Air Force Base with the genes and await their fate.  

Diana comes home to discover Mulder still in her apartment.  He tells her that fate has intervened where he thought he had been making choices and gives her the paper that CSM gave him with the name of the place where it will all begin.  Diana leans in to give him a kiss, which he does not respond to in any way (this was like the coldest kiss ever, thank god) and actually ends uncomfortably by distantly hugging her.  I thought it would have been more appropriate if he leaped back going, "Blech!  Patoo!  Patoo!  Augh, yechh!" but that's just me.

Spender realizes his mother is on and encounters Marita who tells him that she knows where his mother is being taken and tells him that their only way to survive is to go there.  Unfortunately, they can't leave the building.

A doctor in the building is attacked while transporting the original alien fetus by an alien rebel who then assumes his features and joins the men on the train with Cassandra.  Scully has convinced Mulder to come with her to the train yard to try to stop it all before going to the "safe" base.  They park their car on the track and fire shots at the train, but to no avail.  Skinner picks them up and demands to know what is going on.

Alex Krycek discovers that the alien rebels have stolen the fetus and tells a desperate Spender that it has all gone to hell.  CSM, Cassandra, and Diana Fowley (by car) arrive at the Air Force Base and wait with everyone.  Suddenly the bright alien light shines through and there is confusion - no one knows who contacted the aliens.  In actuality, it is the faceless rebel who was posing as a doctor and alien rebels enter and surround all of the people.  All of them, except CSM and Diana Fowley who escaped when they realized something was wrong.  Everyone, including Cassandra Spender, we assume, are burned alive because they have been injected with the hybridization genes.

Back in Washington, DC Kersh, Spender, Skinner, Mulder and Scully meet to see what will happen next.  Spender advises Kersh and Skinner to do everything in their power to get Mulder and Scully back on the X-Files because their dismissal is their fault.  Kersh demands to know why he hadn't heard these "answers" from Mulder before.  Mulder replies by saying, "They burned themselves with a decision made long ago by a group that thought they could sleep with the enemy."  As he says those last 5 words, he looks to Scully.  Symbolism anyone?  I think he's realized that Diana really is two-faced.  

Spender encounters his father while in his office and tells him that he hates him.  CSM says that he wished his son had honoured him the way Bill Mulder's son had.  Telling him it's the only way, he shoots Spender dead (we presume).  Wow!  What an ending.  It's a little sad since I was beginning to see potential for Spender.  Maybe as Mulder's sometimes sidekick (hee hee).  Well, no one ever really dies on X-Files anyhow.  Maybe we'll see him in the future...back from the dead just like his old man.

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