"Rain King"

Won't you be my valentine?

Well, it definately makes up for Terms of Endearment!  I was beginning to worry about those X-Files writers.  It had been, what, one episode since there'd been a cute moment <g>?  I sense that we're getting a tad spoiled here :o).  Not that I'm complaining!

Sheila Fontaine signs a valentine to her fiancee, Darryl Mootz, while watching the weather channel.  Darryl returns home with a newspaper announcing to everyone their secret engagement, angry that she broke their promise not to tell anyone.  He suggests that maybe they should break the engagement.  The lack of rain has threatened the business.

Getting into his car, Darryl drives along the highway, knocking back beers and singing along to the radio when it starts raining...hard.  Ecstatic at this, Darryl cheers, but soon the rain condenses into pellets of hail, which pummel his windshield.  The windshield breaks as the hailstones grow in size until Darryl can no longer see and hits a pole.  Drunk, delirious, and not sure what to do, he tries to exit the car only to be knocked unconscious by...a heart-shaped hailstone.

Six months later, Scully and Mulder arrive in Kromer, Kansas in an airplane trying to be a mosquito (or vice-versa), greeted by the sheriff and a baton-twirling little girl.  At Mulder's pained-meets-amused look, Scully tells him, "Don't look at me, this was your idea."

The sheriff quickly mistakes Mulder and Scully for a couple ("If I'd known you'se bringin' the missus I would have arranged for fancier accomodations.") which Scully politely corrects.  It seemed to me that they find the constant confusion almost cute about their...uh, marital status.

The sheriff thinks that Darryl Mootz is the cause of the drought.  He accuses Darryl of trying to profit from his powers.  Mulder tries to convince Scully of this and tells her that this is ground zero for extreme weather.  They enter the offices of Darryl "Rain King" where they are greeted by his girlfriend/secretary.  Scully bulldozes/Bambi-eyes their way into getting her to give them a copy of their client list ("We usually just say please.") and they then drive to the television studio.

Sheila greets the agents as if they were a couple, asking them whether they'd been in a television studio before and calling Holman Hartz, the weatherman over to greet them as well.  "I couldn't be happier for the two of you," he tells Mulder and Scully, "Are you looking forward to a truly romantic getaway?"  Scully cuts in at this point, revealing who they really are, and the real Gundersons are found.  "It's like looking in a mirror," Mulder comments at the farmer and his plump (to say the least) wife.

Holman, interviewed by Mulder and Scully, says that there is no evidence to support the idea tht one man caused their whole predicament.  Prodded a little by Mulder reveals that he thinks, however, that Darryl is the real deal.

Arriving at another summoning of rain by the "Rain King", Mulder and Scully meet Darryl, sans half a leg (an injury suffered from the hail storm).  He drinks and dances like a lunatic to cheezy music until Scully, having had enough, sighs and walks out into the field.  Mulder characteristically follows her, wanting to know what she thinks.  "My Irish Aunt Olive has more Cherokee in her than Darryl Mootz," she says, and then it starts to rain.  Hmm...when was the last time they were standing out in the rain together?

Holman and Sheila discuss the reunion and Sheila confesses that she won't be able to sleep.  Neither can Scully, apparently, at the Cool View Motor Court, or Mulder.  Mulder goes to the window, witnessing a cow plucked from the pasture and dropped into his hotel room.  He dives out of the way but suffers a gash on his arm.

Scully comes up to check him but is intercepted by the hotel manager who says, "Oh, miss?  We moved your boyfriend's things into your room."  Does anyone sense a pattern emerging here?  Scully checks Mulder for head trauma, running her fingers through his hair endearingly.  Sheila approaches them, her eye makeup smeared, obviously upset.  She tells them that she is the one who has been causing all the weather disturbances.  Comforting her, Mulder says that she isn't the cause of the weather, that she's just had some bad luck.

The rain stops and Scully enters their now shared hotel room, grinning when she sees Mulder.  She tells him that they've got the next flight out of there, only Mulder now thinks that Holman is the cause of the weather and he needs to go to talk to him.

Holman, meanwhile, has been confessing into the mirror when the phone rings.  It is Sheila, who asks him about the reunion.  Thinking that she is about to reveal her love for him, he learns that Sheila, unfortunately, likes Agent Mulder.  

Mulder confronts Holman on his powers (the result of bottled-up emotions) and tells him that he needs help.  He knows that Holman loves Sheila and tells him that he has to let her know.  Phoning Scully, he finds out that their flight won't be leaving after all (fog caused by Holman needing advice).  The following conversation ensues:

Mulder: He needs dating advice.

Scully: Dating advice?  From who?

Mulder: Yours truly.  <long pause>  Hey, Scully.  Scully, you there?

Scully: I heard you.  Mulder, when was the last time you went on a date?

Mulder: I will talk to you later. <hangs up>

Scully: <sighs> The blind leading the blind.

Ah, so they haven't been seeing much of the opposite sex besides each other.  This is good news (not that we needed reassurance, but its always nice that there isn't any back stories going on there that are going to cause any kind of shipper trauma in the future).  

Mulder tries to help Holman, and Holman is incredulous about Mulder and Scully's still mostly platonic relationship.

Holman: You spend every day with Agent Scully.  A beautiful, enchanting woman!  You two have never... <Mulder shakes his head>  I must confess, I find that shocking.  I've seen the way you two gaze at one another.

Mulder is very defensive about this, calling his "friendship with Agent Scully" just fine and retorting that he does not gaze at Scully.  Holman gets up the nerve to tell Sheila his true feelings but she takes them the wrong way and says that she's in love with Mulder <ominous thunder>.  When Mulder comes across Darryl (who is desperate for money) harassing Sheila, he breaks them up.  Sheila congratulates him with a big, red kiss which Holman and Scully catch as they come around the corner.  Holman runs off as Scully's eyebrows leap to her hairline.  She has a Detective White reaction, basically saying nothing about it.  Mulder, trying desperately to act nonchalant, is smeared in red lipstick.

When the four of them find each other again at the reunion Scully and <nudge> Mulder convince Sheila to dance with Holman, who confesses his love for her.  Mulder and Scully sway to "The Things We Do For Love" trying to see what's going on (one of my favourite scenes).  Sheila runs off and Scully tries to console her in the bathroom.

Sheila: You love him, don't you?

Scully: Wh-

Sheila: You're jealous because Agent Mulder and I have a special connection and you're trying to divert me to Holman!

Scully: What?!

Another song begins and Holman sits dejectedly in the gymnasium.  Sheila questions Scully about Mulder, saying, "Not even a kiss?"  Scully shakes her head wistfully.  She then proceeds to offer the most blatant expression of her love for Mulder to date:

Quote of the Week:

Scully: Well, it seems to me that the best relationships...the ones that last...are frequently the ones that are rooted in friendship.  You know, one day you look at the person and you see something more than you did the night before, like a switch has been flicked somewhere.  And the person who was just a friend is suddenly the only person you can ever imagine yourself with.

Sheila emerges from the bathroom and asks Holman if it's true, if he really makes the weather.  He admits that it is and she kisses him, a kiss that ignites a blinding light that gleams off the disco ball and sends needles of light spraying across the dance floor.  Sunshine is there again and everyone is kissing and making up.

One year later, Sheila contentedly plays with her and Holman's baby as a bright rainbow shines outside over a perfect landscape.

This episode was more than any of us shippers could have asked for.  An admission of love, an obviously defensive Mulder (on the status of their relationship) and some flirting to go along with it.  I think Mulder is defensive because he doesn't want to risk messing up what they have until he's sure Scully loves him back the way he loves her.  If only he had heard that bathroom conversation!  Augh, the angst!

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