MulderThis is an FBI fleet sedan from our Kansas City field office requisitioned by two seasoned agents there driven into a tree at 43 miles an hour by the female agent in a novel effort to kill her male counterpart. Now, you might think I'm going to suggest psychokinesis-- pk-- someone or something controlling the agents with remote, mind-bending power.
Mulder
Both agents sustained critical injuries. Their stories eerily similar ...
[Two slides of the woman who looks like Scully lying in full body cast in the hospital.]
Mulder
...as if they temporarily lost control of their minds unable to alter their behavior.
[Two slides of the man who looks like Mulder, also in full body casts]
Mulder
You may think that I'm going to say it's past lives unresolved or fate, stalking the agents like an animal ...
Mulder
No, the interesting thing about these agents is they had worked together for seven years previously without any incident.
Mulder
Yeah, but they are not ... romantically involved if that's what you're thinking.
Not even I would be so farfetched.
[Mulder smiles slightly. The next slide shows that the two agents are in the same hospital room, with their matching injuries.]
Mulder
You have any ideas, Scully, any thoughts?
What I'm thinking, Mulder, is how familiar this seems. Playing Watson to your Sherlock. You dangling clues out in front of me one by one. It's a game, and... and, as usual, you're, you're holding something back from me. You're not telling me something about this case.
Mulder
(finger to his mouth, pretending to think hard about it) Hmm...
Okay, so these agents were investigating something. (Mulder chuckles) Something... much like what they themselves were almost killed by. Uh, something they came into contact with. Uh... Third party? (Mulder, playing with her, holds up two fingers) Two third parties. Twins? Relatives? A doppelganger? (Mulder shakes his head and taps his nose) A corporeal likeness that appears unbidden from the spirit world the sight of which presages one's own death or... a double, conjured into the world by a technique called bilocation... (Mulder stops teasing and looks up at her in awe as she continues) which in psychological terms represents the person's secret desires and impulses committing acts that the, uh, real person cannot commit himself... or herself? (he smiles at her; she's annoyed) Mulder, the slide, please! (He finally advances the projector to show a slide of the Kansas driver's license of Betty Templeton. Scully proudly claps her hands.) Yes!
Mulder
(pouting) Don't go thinking I'm going to start doing the autopsies.
Mulder
Who is it?
Mulder
(lets her in; she goes and sits on the bed) What's wrong, Scully? You look sick.
I don't know what's wrong.
Mulder
Come in.
I, um... I was starting to get ready for bed and I started to feel really dizzy - vertigo or something - and then I just... I started to get chills.
Mulder
You want me to call a doctor?
No, I just... I just want to get warm. Thank you. (she climbs under the covers, he tucks her in before crawling in next to her and spooning with her)
Mulder
It's not worth it, Scully.
Mulder
I want you to go home.
Oh, Mulder, I'm going to be fine.
Mulder
No, I've been thinking about it. Looking at you tonight, holding that baby... knowing everything that's been taken away from you. A chance for motherhood and your health and that baby. I think that... I don't know, maybe they're right.
Mulder
The FBI. Maybe what they say is true, though for all the wrong reasons. It's the personal costs that are too high. There so much more you need to do with your life. There's so much more than this. There has to be an end, Scully.
Mulder, if any of this is true...
Mulder
If it is, or if it isn't, I want you to forget about it, Scully.
Mulder
You're not going back out there. I'm not going to let you go back out there.
What are you talking about?
Mulder
It has to end sometime. That time is now.
Mulder
Scully, you have to understand that they're taking abductees. You're an abductee. I'm not going to risk... losing you.
I won't let you go alone.
Mulder
Hi.
Mulder
Thanks.
(shuts the door) Can I take your coat?
Mulder
No, I can't stay. I gotta get back to the office for a while.
Obviously you've had some time to think about my request.
Mulder
Um, it's.. it's not something that I get asked to do every day. Um, but I am absolutely flattered. (she is embarrassed) No, honestly.
Okay, if- if you're trying to politely say "no," it's okay. I, I understand. (avoids eye contact)
Mulder
See what's weird is.. this sounds, and this sounds really weird, I know, but I, I just wouldn't want this to come between us.
(very hurt, pretends otherwise) Yeah. I know... I, I understand. I do.
Mulder
(realizes she doesn't understand what he's saying; reaches out to touch her cheek but stops himself) Well.. the answer is "yes."
(she is overjoyed, and they smile at each other then embrace) Um... Well, I'll call Dr. Parenti and... (Mulder nods and smiles) I assume that he'll want to meet you and go through the, uh, the donor procedure.
Mulder
Ah, at that part, I'm a pro.
Mulder
Look, Scully, I need to make sense of what happened to me. So that I can stop it. Because if I can't stop it, it could happen to anyone. It could happen to you. And who's to say it's going to stop there?
Mulder, if you go down the X-Files will go down, too. I mean, theoretically, they could put you in prison for what you're doing here.
Mulder
Yeah, well, compared to where I just was, prison would be a Princess cruise.
[Mulder closes the laptop and removes the hard drive.]
Mulder
I'm going to book myself on that Princess cruise.
I'll book it for you. (takes the harddrive - and the responsibility - from him. He covers up the boxes, smiles and follows her.)
[Frohike opens the door of Scully's apartment for Mulder. They both smile.]
You know, it's really not fair. You've been dead for six months and you still look better than me. But not by much. (they hug tightly, Mulder laughs softly)
Mulder
Melvin. I'd be a whole lot happier to see you if you'd just take your hands off my ass.
(embarrassed, lets go and steps back) Sorry.
I think it goes without saying that we're all, uh, tremendously relieved.
(smiling) And not just because we got big questions about your involvement in a certain... blessed event.
[Langly glances significantly at Scully. Mulder appears surprised and looks over at her; she ignores his look and the comment.]
Mulder
(on radio) Frohike? Langly? Byers? Let's go. I'm dying out here.
(on radio) Well, let us just finish our cappuccino and biscotti, and we'll see what we can do.
[All three Gunmen are held up by harnesses in what looks like an elevator shaft filled with wires.]
(on radio) You can start walking now, Mulder.
Mulder
Is the system bypassed?
Mulder
Great.
[Mulder knocks on Scully's door]
Mulder
(startled) What?
I was just about to get in the shower, but I was waiting for the pizzaman.
Mulder
(mockingly suspicious) You got something going on with the pizzaman I should know about?
(chuckling) The pizzaman?
Mulder
Correct me if I'm wrong, but you just said you were waiting for the pizzaman to jump in the shower.
No, what I mean was, the pizzaman's usually late, and so..
Mulder
(squints like he doesn't understand)
..Do you want to come in?
Mulder
Thank you.
[turns and walks back into the apartment, doesn't see Mulder placing a gift under the pillows;] I feel like I'm in an episode of Mad About You.
Mulder
Yeah, well, small technicality.. Mad About You was about a married couple, and we just work together.
Well, you know what I mean.
Mulder
I do, I do. And what I am saying is that we do not have much information about this man. And what I am saying [pointing at Scully's tummy] is that the pizzaman is not above suspicion.
[Knock on Scully's door]
Mulder
Little Caesar, I presume?
[Scully nods, sits down with her present. Mulder opens the door, and turns to squint suspiciously at Scully.]
(to deliveryman) Hi. Just give it to the man with the funny look on his face.
PPizzaman
Yeah, it's 29.08.
Mulder
29.08? What'd she get on it, a tank of gas?
[Doggett is called to look at a body at a crime scene to see if he was a 'vision' of it appearing burned/ashen.]
Sorry, Agent Reyes - I don't see it. (turns and begins walking away)
I think you do.. You're just afraid to go there.
Mulder
Whew.. Man, you just keep shooting 'til you hit something, don't you?
You'd rather blind yourself to the connections, but I can't.
You keep talking about these connections - Connections to what? To who?
What if this is a thread of evil, connecting through time.. though men, through opportunity - Connecting back to you? ..In India, in Africa, in Iran, in the Mid-East, in the Far East, most of the world - they take it as a given. They see evil in death the way other people see God in a rose.
Mulder
I saw Elvis in a potato chip once.
(To Mulder) You know what I'm talking about.
Mulder
Yes, I do. I do. But if this man doesn't see it, he doesn't see it, right?
We, uh, we caught this killer, Jeb Dukes. He's in the ICU - He may not make it.
Mulder
And now you're wondering if there really was a connection? (Doggett gives him a slight look) ..You know, when I uh, I first came to work at the FBI, I worked at Violent Crimes. And I saw.. I saw the worst of humanity - I saw monsters. And I wondered how they became that way, how these men became so evil. I knew there were psychological explanations - victims of their environment, victims of their parents - but.. the scientific explanations were never truly satisfying, and I began to think about evil like a disease. You know it goes from man to man or age to age. Most of us walk around thinking we're incapable of any acts of evil, and we are - You know we can stifle that momentary urge to kill, or to hurt. We have some kind of immunity to it. But I think it's possible that there's.. an occurrence in somebody's life; a tragedy or a loss that.. leaves them vulnerable - hurts their immunity to evil. And all of a sudden, at that point in their lives, when they're weakened - they're open to evil, and they can become evil.
If that were true, then what you're saying is.. this man when wheeled in here tonight is infected with evil - The same evil that killed my son.. You really believe that, Agent Mulder?
Mulder
Uh, I'm not really a good test for questions like that - I'll believe almost anything, you know? But the uh.. the pisser is that you may never know. It may be like Agent Reyes says, it could be random and meaningless - who it affects, who it goes to.
Mulder
Well then you'd be seeing something I don't, Agent Doggett.
Agent Mulder - I understand that you have more than just a proprietary interest in these cases, but I can't help it if you're not assigned to this unit anymore. ..I didn't see any reason to pursue this oil worker case.
Mulder
Oh, well maybe you missed the fact this worker's corpse washed ashore at Port Aransas, Texas - Massive flash burns on 90% of his body.
I read the report, Agent Mulder, if you're insinuating I didn't.
Mulder
Then you must also know that this man was not the only man to disappear from the Galpex-Orpheus platform that night, but one of two men; The communications officer is also missing.
The company attributes that to an explosion on the rig - a "blowout" - which is what they say caused Simon de la Cruz's burns.
Mulder
Burns the M.E. said in his report were not inconsistent to exposure to high levels of radiation.
"Not inconsistent" - That's not exactly what I'd call a ringing endorsement.
Mulder
These files include the same kind of radiation phenomena. Tissue destroyed by exposure to -
- Black oil. ..Five years ago you and Agent Scully investigated a case of a World War II plane salvaged from the bottom of the Pacific Ocean - Where a substance was brought to the surface which you describe as a highly contagious virus of extraterrestrial origin, that has radioactive properties and can take over a man's body. And is a part of an alien conspiracy to colonize the planet, if I'm not mistaken.
Mulder
(slightly bemused) And you'd love to help, but you left your lightsaber at home.
The X-Files · 847 quotes
