(Two surveyors walking through Canadian .... ooops North Floridian forest with survey gear. They speak using radios.)

SLOAN: All right, let’s shoot this, Marty.

MARTY: Hold it still. Hold it still, Sloan.

SLOAN: (fighting off bugs) I’d like to see you hold it still. The sooner they pave over this swamp, the better.

MARTY: It’s not a swamp. You’re standing in a forest with indigenous plant and animal species you’re obviously too ignorant to appreciate. Mark it and give me another position.

SLOAN: All right, let’s shoot this next one real carefully, Marty, 'cause this is where they’re gonna put the Blockbuster.

MARTY: You’re a real moron, Sloan, you know that?

SLOAN: Tree hugger.

MARTY: You should be sad to see the demise of an ecosystem that’s lasted a thousand years. We all should be. Give me four feet to your left.

SLOAN: I can’t.

MARTY: What do you mean you can’t?

SLOAN: I mean I can’t because it’s stuck.

MARTY: Then unstick it.

(SLOAN touches ground where his survey pole is stuck. Looks at his fingers covered in blood.)

SLOAN: This is weird.

(SLOAN sees two glowing red eyes open in ground. He begins to scream.)

MARTY: Sloan! Sloan!

(SLOAN has disappeared from the viewfinder. Movement in bushes coming toward MARTY. He starts to run. He hides behind log. Relaxes. Red eyes open in log. MARTY screams and disappears behind log.)

(Same forest. ASEKOFF family, FATHER and SON, LOUIS, and dog are hunting.)

FATHER: Louis, let Bo do the work.

LOUIS: (releases dog) How’s he know how to find a possum?

FATHER: Shhh. Animals sense things that we can’t. It’s how they survive.

LOUIS: Well, so is that how Bo knows how to hunt?

FATHER: Yeah. Our ancestors were hunters, too. But most of us have lost those instincts. That’s why we need a little help. (indicates shotgun)

LOUIS: Dad, what’s that?

FATHER: Surveyor’s equipment. Someone left his stuff out here. (dog barks) Stay close, Louis.

(FATHER sees dog looking at surveyor’s bloody jacket.)

LOUIS: What is it, Dad? Dad?

FATHER: Come here, Bo. (Pulls dog away.)

LOUIS: What.....

FATHER: Quiet. (hears rustling) Listen to me. I want you to take Bo, and I want you to run straight home.

LOUIS: What’s the matter?

FATHER: I want you to run straight home and I don’t want you to stop for anything.
(Loads shotgun.)

LOUIS: I just .....

FATHER: Louis? You understand? All right. Go.

(LOUIS runs off with dog.)

LOUIS: Come on, Bo, come on. (Pauses when he hears two shotgun blasts.) No, no. Come on, Bo. Come on. Come on! Come on! (Keeps running)

(Car driving on lonely road.)

MALE FBI AGENT (MIKE KINSLEY): Last year was something of a personal revelation. We were doing an exercise called team builders? Where we were given two minutes to build a tower out of ordinary office furniture.

FEMALE AGENT (STONECYPHER): When I stood on Mike’s shoulders and I put that electric pencil sharpener on top of the pile, we both knew, we could never have done it alone.

MULDER: (in backseat with SCULLY, to SCULLY) Kill me now.

(SCULLY tries not to smile.)

KINSLEY: You ever been to one of these team seminars, Agent Scully?

SCULLY: Ummm.... I think I went to a constructive problem solving course when I first joined the Bureau.

STONECYPHER: Oh, did you play that game where, um, you can’t use any negative words?

KINSLEY: I couldn’t believe how hard it was not to use the word "but."

MULDER: (In hell) I’m having that same problem right now.

(SCULLY again tries not to smile.)

STONECYPHER: Have you ever been to a team seminar, Agent Mulder?

MULDER: No, you know unfortunately around this time of year I always develop a severe hemorrhoidal condition. (SCULLY tries not to laugh.)

KINSLEY: Well, it builds muscles you didn’t even know you had.

STONECYPHER: Communication. That’s the key.

(MULDER and SCULLY look at each other.)

(They are stopped at a road block.)

OFFICER: Sorry, folks, it’ll be a few minutes.

KINSLEY: What’s going on, officer?

OFFICER: Got a little situation is all.

(MULDER opens car door and gets out quickly.)

MULDER: (quietly) Thank you, Jesus.

KINSLEY: Where’s he going?

(SCULLY watches MULDER leave. She looks worried.)

(MULDER Stretches.)

MOTHER (ASEKOFF): Oh, excuse me. Are you from search and rescue?

MULDER: No, I’m sorry, I’m not. I’m just stretching my legs.

MOTHER: They said they’d have word for us about what happened to my husband. I need somebody to tell me what’s going on.

MULDER: Just slow down. I - I don’t know what you’re talking about.

MOTHER: My husband, Michael, he was teaching our son to shoot, and he said the dog got spooked and then he heard gunshots and now he’s said they’ve found a jacket with blood on it, but they won’t tell me anything about my husband...

MULDER: I’ll try to find out who’s in charge, all right?

MOTHER: Oh, thank you.

(MULDER heads off into woods.)

STONECYPHER: Now where’s he going?

(SCULLY doesn’t answer, just follows her partner.)

KINSLEY: (looking at a cross section of a felled tree with dates on the rings) Hey, Stonecypher! Take a look at this. This tree was here twenty years before Ponce De Leon landed.

STONECYPHER: We’re going to be late for the wine and cheese reception.

(In woods at crime scene.)

OFFICER: Officer Fazekas?

MICHELLE: Yes? (Sees MULDER) Can I help you?

MULDER: My name is Fox Mulder. I’m an agent with the FBI.

MICHELLE: FBI? Who called you guys out?

MULDER: (showing badge) Nobody. We just got stopped at your roadblock. It sounds like you had a shooting.

MICHELLE: Shots were reported, but we have no evidence of anyone being shot.

MULDER: Well, what do you have evidence of?

MICHELLE: A survey team working these woods didn’t report in last night We found one man’s bloody jacket pretty torn up. And this morning, a boy got separated from his father.

MULDER: Separated by what?

MICHELLE: It looks, maybe, like some kind of animal attack.

MULDER: What kind of animal?

MICHELLE: I’m not sure yet. I followed good tracks for the two surveyors but the trails became confused as they moved into the brush. There was a third set of tracks leading away. I.... I couldn’t identify.

(SCULLY arrives and waits impatiently.)

MULDER: Couldn’t identify as the surveyors’?

(SCULLY checks watch.)

MICHELLE: As man or animal.

SCULLY: Mulder?

MULDER: Oh, just, uh ... (SCULLY give him "come on" look.) Hold on a second.

MULDER: (to MICHELLE) What about the boy’s father?

MICHELLE: I tracked him all the way down to where he fired the shots. The ground’s rocky, but from the depressions in the underlying soil, I can tell you that he entered the bushes from over there where I pick up another set of tracks – two distinctly different sets of tracks that from the way the ground’s upset that is probably where the man was attacked.

(SCULLY follows them.)

MULDER: But no other sign of him? Do you have panther in these woods?

MICHELLE: There’s panther. Bear

MULDER: But these tracks look like neither of those.

MICHELLE: No, sir.

MULDER: You know of a good motel in the area?

MICHELLE: Excuse me. I think we can handle this very well on our own. Thanks. (She leaves.)

SCULLY: Mulder? We’ve got this conference. They’re waiting.

MULDER: Yeah. How do I say this without using any negative words, Scully?

SCULLY: You want me to tell them that you’re not going to make it to this year’s teamwork seminar.

MULDER: Yeah, you see that? (Grabs her arms) We don’t need that conference. We have communication like that, unspoken. You know what I’m thinking.

(SCULLY shakes her head and watches him walk off.)

(Night. LOUIS is watching B&W version of The Invisible Man. MOTHER kisses him and shuts off TV)

LOUIS: He’s not coming back, is he?

MOTHER: Why would you say that?

LOUIS: Dad’s a good shot. If he hit what he was aiming at he’d be home by now.

MOTHER: You got to be brave, Louis. We both got to be brave. We’ll find out more about it in the morning. Get some sleep now.

(MOTHER clears dinner plates. Dog whimpers at door.)

(MULDER in hotel room with amazingly fast laptop looking at pages of predators. Knock at door.)

MULDER: It’s open. (SCULLY enters with tray of cheese and mini bottle of wine.) Who cut the cheese?

SCULLY: Since you won’t be making it to the conference ....

MULDER: Partaaayyy!

SCULLY: However, I must remind you this goes against the Bureau’s policy of male and female agents consorting in the same motel room while on assignment. (opens wine)

MULDER: Try any of that Tailhook crap on me, Scully, I’ll kick your ass. Pop quiz. What animal will attack the strongest leaving the weakest to escape? The answer is none. Not one of the over 4,000 species native to North America will attack the strongest when the weak is vulnerable.

SCULLY: Well, what does that have to do with anything?

MULDER: It makes me think that what we’re dealing with here is no ordinary predator.

SCULLY: I thought this was just a ploy to get out of the conference.

MULDER: I think what we stumbled upon here is something more that what local authorities realize. The scenario described by that boy sound to me like a primitive culling technique.

SCULLY: Mulder, we’re in Western Florida. The closest thing to primitive down here is living in a beachfront retirement condo.

MULDER: Those woods are as old as anything in the south and there’s 800 square miles of them. There’s no telling what’s alive out there. (Gets up to leave)

SCULLY: Where are you going?

MULDER: I got to check something out.

SCULLY: You know, Mulder, sometimes I think some work on your communication skills wouldn’t be such a bad idea.

MULDER: I’ll be back soon, and we can build a tower of furniture. (smile) ‘Kay?

(Puts on jacket and leaves. SCULLY drinks gulp of wine.)

(Asekoff residence again. Night. Dog barks at the door.)

MOTHER: What is it, Bo?

LOUIS: (Upstairs) Mom?

MOTHER: It’s all right, Louis. You go back to sleep now. (Looks out window, unlatches door, follows dog out, closing door behind her. Dog runs into bushes, barking.) Bo? Bo? Bo, where’d you get to? (Rustling in the bushes. She gets close.) Bo is that you? (Dog leaps up and barks at her.) Come on boy. Let’s go back in. (dog growls) All right, all right. You ... stay there tonight.

(She goes back to door, but deadbolt has been locked. She pounds on door.)

MOTHER: Louis? Louis? Louis?! Louis?!!! Louis!!!!

(Upstairs, LOUIS gets out of bed, goes into dark hall.)

LOUIS: Mom?

(He sees CREATURE running at him. He runs down stairs to back door. CREATURE follows. LOUIS crawls through the dog door. MULDER catches him.)

LOUIS: Ahhhhhh!!!

MULDER: What is it, Louis?

LOUIS: It’s in the house.

(Asekoff house, day. SCULLY enters Louis’ bedroom and takes Invisible Man tape out of the VCR. 7:03 am. I never had a VCR in my bedroom. She goes downstairs where MULDER and police are interviewing LOUIS and MOTHER. MULDER sees SCULLY.)

MULDER: (to others) Be right back.

SCULLY: How’s the boy?

MULDER: He’s still freaked out.

SCULLY: I think I might have some insight into this invisible creature he said was chasing him. (Shows MULDER the video tape.)

MULDER: The Invisible Man was invisible.

SCULLY: Right.

MULDER: Yeah, he said he was chased by a creature with glowing red eyes.

SCULLY: (Rolls eyes)

MULDER: Let me show you something. (Takes her to door.) Mrs. Asekoff said she went outside with the dog?

SCULLY: Mm hmm.

MULDER: But when she came back, the door was locked from the inside.

SCULLY: And?

MULDER: Look at this. We got some tracks here.

SCULLY: Where?

MULDER: Here, and here .... dried mud against the tile, tracked in from the outside.

SCULLY: That could have been brought in by the dog.

MULDER: No, no. You see, uh, the ball of the foot here? A large foot and I count five toes.

SCULLY: Wait a minute. I thought you said it wasn’t human.

MULDER: Well, I’m not saying it is. The weight distribution is all wrong. People walk heel to toe. Whatever this thing is it walks on the ball of its foot.

SCULLY: (pause) You’re putting me on.

MULDER: No. My dad and I were Indian Guides. I know these things.

SCULLY: So, if it’s not man and it’s not animal, what the hell is it?

MULDER: (Shakes his head.)

MICHELLE: (entering) Guess I’m a little late to this dance.

MULDER: I found some tracks – right here.

MICHELLE: Same as I saw before.

SCULLY: Where was that?

MICHELLE: In the woods. Weight distribution’s strange. They appear to be human, but whoever left these uses the balls of his feet more like an animal.

(MULDER nods at SCULLY. She glares back.)

MULDER: Well, whatever it is, it’s attacked three grown men, presumably in broad daylight disposing of its prey without detection. And it wasn’t shy last night about coming out of the woods to try again. What we’ve got here is a predator with low visibility and a high degree of motivation. And it’s got one advantage we don’t have – the entire Apilachacola National Forest.

MICHELLE: Then how do you stop it?

MULDER: By identifying it. Finding it before it finds somebody else.

(Road beside forest. JEFF GLASER the TECHHEAD is showing heat sensor machine thing. It has a camera and monitor that shows warm bodies.)

JEFF: It’s called FLIR for Forward Looking InfraRed. It was developed for chopper pilots in Vietnam. Detects body heat at 300 yards.

MULDER: That’s pretty sophisticated for government issue. (MICHELLE’S body appears on the monitor.)

MICHELLE: I see you two have met. Jeff’s our local Tech Head. Some people prefer searching with dogs, I prefer an extra pair of hands if I get in trouble. Are we ready to go, here? (SCULLY is having trouble on her cel phone.) Once we start in, you can put away your cel phones. The only communication in these woods is with short-wave radios. So stay close, maintain visual contact. If you get lost, initiate oral contact. That means holler. If nobody responds, sit down – don’t move. I will find you. Don’t go looking for me. I know it sounds obvious, but folks still get lost. (They enter forest.)

SCULLY: (on phone) Okay. I get you. Thank you. All right. (Hangs up) (To MULDER) Local PD has all their resources looking out for a transient, a drifter who’s wanted for a double homicide in Gasden, Alabama. They were amused when I told them what we were doing.

MULDER: I don’t think it’s a drifter, Scully, and we may be looking for two individuals.

SCULLY: Why do you say that?

MULDER: Well, that thing lured that woman out of the house last night to separate her from her son.

SCULLY: But for what purpose?

MULDER: Divide and conquer. If your enemy has greater numbers than you, you divide and conquer it to diminish those numbers.

SCULLY: What enemy would that be?

MULDER: Encroaching development. That’s what I suspected when I went to check on Louis and his mother.

SCULLY: You think this is about a housing tract?

MULDER: That survey team was staking out a new 100,000 acre plot. Civilization is pushing very hard into these woods. Maybe something in these woods is pushing back.

(As they walk, MICHELLE places small white pebbles to mark their path.)

SCULLY: Anything?

JEFF: No. No, nothing at all. Not even wildlife.

SCULLY: Isn’t that a little strange?

JEFF: Yeah. This forest is usually alive with sound. I’m not like an expert, but I’ve never seen it like this before.

SCULLY: Well, it sure is beautiful, though.

JEFF: Well, that’s what happens. People get to looking around, next thing they know, something eats ‘em.

SCULLY: What do you think killed those men?

JEFF: Nature is populated by creatures either trying to kill something they need to survive, or trying to avoid being killed by something that needs them to survive. If we become blinded by the beauty of nature, we may fail to see its cruelty and violence.

SCULLY: Walt Whitman?

JEFF: No. When Animals Attack on the Fox Network.

(CREATURE’S hand appears as it steals MICHELLE’S white stones.)

JEFF: Wait, I’ve got something. (MULDER and SCULLY draw guns.) It’s about twenty yards ahead.

MICHELLE: Where? I don’t see it.

JEFF: It’s just sitting there. (We see creature in the monitor.) It’s on the move! (They chase.) It’s moving fast! It’s ... it’s going to the right! (Chase.) Wait, wait. There’s two of them now. They’re moving in opposite directions. There and there.

(MICHELL and SCULLY run one way, MULDER and JEFF the other.)

MULDER: Where is it?

JEFF: It’s about 40 yards ahead of you!

MULDER: I don’t see it.

JEFF: Now it’s .. gone. I don’t know where it went.

(In another part of the forest ....)

SCULLY: What is it?

MICHELLE: I don’t know.

SCULLY: They’re trying to separate us – pull us away from the others. Let’s go back.

(They start back slowly, MICHELLE leading. As they pass a tree, we see a face and red eyes against the bark. Suddenly, MICHELLE goes down and vanishes.)

MICHELLE: Ahhhhh!

SCULLY: Michelle? Michelle?! (whisper)Jeez. (yells) Mulder, I need help! Mulder!

(MULDER and JEFF running.)

MULDER: Scully!!

SCULLY: (voice) Over here!

MULDER: (voice) Scully!

SCULLY: Over here!

MULDER: What happened?

SCULLY: I don’t know.

JEFF: Where’s Fazekas?

SCULLY: She was walking right ahead of me. She was right here, and then she was just gone.

JEFF: I’m getting no reading.

SCULLY: What the hell’s happening here?

MULDER: They separated us. That was on purpose. They divided us so they could go after her. She was in the lead and presumably the strongest. They take the strongest first.

JEFF: They take them where? That doesn’t make any sense. You can’t just disappear out here.

MULDER: You’re right. We got to find her.

JEFF: How we gonna do that?

MULDER: I don’t know! We’ll form a line and beat the bushes. Maybe you’ll pick up a signal.

JEFF: No, we need help. We need man power. (SCULLY pulls out cel phone.) That’s not going to work out here! We need to get out of here. Listen to me!

MULDER: The longer we wait, the less chance we have of finding her.

JEFF: This is nuts. This is loony tune, man. We got to go back out of the woods before it gets dark.

MULDER: Okay. You’re right. You go back. You leave me the FLIR and you go back.

JEFF: We got to go together.

MULDER: We have to find her.

JEFF: Yeah, but if we stay here, they may not find any of us.

SCULLY: Mulder, he’s right. We weren’t prepared for this. We have no way of telling them where we are. We don’t have any food. Michelle had our only water. Look, I’d like to find her, too, but I think the risks of that are just way too foolish.

MULDER: (pause) All right. We all go then. (to Jeff) You lead the way.

(Walking back.)

SCULLY: (to MULDER) I don’t have much faith that this device will do us any good.

MULDER: So far all it’s done is split us up.

SCULLY: Whatever it is that we were chasing did show up on the screen at first.

MULDER: What does that tell you?

SCULLY: Nothing.

MULDER: Mm hmm.

SCULLY: Except that we’re going in the right direction.

MULDER: Maybe it can regulate its temperature. Do you know of any animal that can?

SCULLY: Ticks. I’ve heard that they can halt their metabolism for up to 18 years, essentially going into suspended animation until something warm-blooded comes along.

MULDER: That’s interesting.

SCULLY: Why is that interesting?

MULDER: 30 years ago, the, uh, the town of Point Pleasant, West Virginia was terrorized for over a year by something – killing livestock and terrorizing the people. Witnesses described them as primitive looking men with red piercing eyes. Became known as the "moth men." I’ve got an X-File dating back to 1952 on it.

SCULLY: What would that be filed next to - - "The Cockroach That Ate Cincinnati?"

MULDER: No, "The Cockroach That Ate Cincinnati" is in the C’s. "Moth Men’s" over in the M’s.

JEFF: This isn’t the way.

SCULLY: What do you mean?

JEFF: Michelle always marks her route with little white stones.

MULDER: This is the same path. This is the way we came.

JEFF: I haven’t seen one of her stones for twenty minutes.

MULDER: That’s because you’ve had your nose glued to that screen the whole time.

JEFF: I’m telling you – we’re on the wrong trail! Somehow, we got off track. Oh man, this is not happening. This is not happening.

SCULLY: (seeing movement in the trees) Everybody stand still. There’s something out there.

(MULDER and SCULLY draw guns.)

MULDER: Where?

SCULLY: About 40 or 50 yards out.

MULDER: Jeff?

JEFF: Nothing. (Checks FLIR)

SCULLY: I saw it. The woods have gone silent again.

(Rustling behind them makes the turn.)

JEFF: I got it!

MULDER: Where?

JEFF: I got it on my screen!

MULDER: Where?

JEFF: About 30 yards ahead. It’s just sitting there. (MULDER enters trees.) What is he doing?

SCULLY: Talk to him.

JEFF: This is not a good idea!

SCULLY: Talk to him, Jeff!

JEFF: Uh, go to your right. (CREATURE is hidden against tree. ) It just disappeared.

SCULLY: Mulder, it’s not on the screen.

(MULDER sees camouflaged CREATURE near a log. It runs. MULDER pursues, fires five shots.)

MULDER: Scully, I lost it.

SCULLY: I got it. (Fires 6 times.)

MULDER: Did you hit it?

SCULLY: I don’t know. It just stopped.

MULDER: Where’s Glaser?

(SCULLY doesn’t see JEFF.)

(JEFF, running through woods disappears just like MICHELLE.)

MULDER: How many shots did you fire?

SCULLY: Six, maybe seven.

MULDER: Is that your only clip?

SCULLY: Yep.

MULDER: Don’t fire again unless you’re sure you’re gonna hit it. It may be trying to spend our advantage.

SCULLY: What the hell is it, Mulder?

MULDER: I don’t know. But what ever it is, it’s smarter than us – at least out here.

(MULDER gets jerked down.)

SCULLY: Mulder? Mulder!! (Runs toward where he was.)

MULDER: (voice in pain) Scully! Scully!

SCULLY: Mulder!!

MULDER: Scully!

(SCULLY sees MULDER wrestling with a CREATURE. She fires four shots. CREATURE runs off. SCULLY goes to MULDER. He is bleeding from the left shoulder. She stands over him, gun drawn.)

SCULLY: You okay?

(MULDER nods, weakly.)

(Forest. Night. SCULLY is trying to start a fire with what appear to be just two rocks over a stack of sticks. MULDER is huddled up against a log.)

SCULLY: You were an Indian Guide. Help me out here.

MULDER: Indian Guide says maybe you should run to the store and get some matches.

SCULLY: I would, but I left my wallet in the car.

(SCULLY sits beside him and picks up her gun.)

MULDER: What are you doing.

SCULLY: Trying to open my gun. (Her clip pops out.) If I can separate the shell from the casing maybe I can get the powder to ignite.

MULDER: Oh. And maybe it’ll start raining weenies and marshmallows.

SCULLY: Do I detect a hint of negativity?

MULDER: No. Yes ... actually. Yeah.

SCULLY: Mulder, you need to keep warm. Your body’s still in shock.

MULDER: I was told once that the best way to regenerate body heat was to crawl naked into a sleeping bag with some body else who’s already naked. (Snuggles closer.)

SCULLY: Well, maybe if it rains sleeping bags, you’ll get lucky.

(MULDER looks up at her.)

SCULLY: Have you thought seriously about dying?

MULDER: Yeah, once, when I was at the Ice Capades.

SCULLY: When I was fighting my cancer, I was angry at the injustice of it and its meaninglessness. And then I realized that that was the struggle – to give it meaning.
To make sense of it. It’s like life.

MULDER: I think Nature is supremely indifferent to whether we live or die. I mean, if you’re lucky you get 75 years. If you’re really lucky you get 80 years. And if you’re extraordinarily lucky, you get to have 50 of those years with a decent head of hair.

SCULLY: (chuckle) I guess it’s like Las Vegas. The house always wins. (She breaks the bullet open.) Oh! Ta-da.

MULDER: Go, girl.

(SCULLY gets up and sprinkles gunpowder on the pile of wood.)

MULDER: Hey, who did you identify with when you were a kid? Wilma or Betty?

SCULLY: I identified with Betty’s bustline.

MULDER: Yes! I did, too.

SCULLY: Could never have been married to Barney, though. The kids were cute.

MULDER: But where are they today?

(Gunpowder explodes in one bright flash, then is gone. The wood didn’t catch. MULDER smiles. SCULLY turns to him.)

SCULLY: Moth Men? Really?

MULDER: (nods) Yeah. But there seem to be only two of them.

(SCULLY sits back down and tries to pull MULDER onto her lap.)

MULDER: I don’t wanna wrestle.

SCULLY: (suppressing a laugh) Get over here. I’m going to try and keep you warm. ( MULDER lies in her lap. She accidentally rubs his wounded shoulder. It hurts him.) Sorry.

MULDER: One of us has got to stay awake, Scully.

SCULLY: You sleep, Mulder.

MULDER: If you get tired, you wake me.

SCULLY: I’m not going to get tired.

MULDER: Why don’t you sing .. something.

SCULLY: No ... Mulder.

MULDER: Well, if you sing something, I’ll know you’re awake.

SCULLY: Mulder, you don’t want me to sing. I can’t carry a tune.

MULDER: It doesn’t matter. Just sing anything.

(Loooong pause. SCULLY looks around.)

SCULLY: (slightly off key, no enthusiasm) Jeremiah was a bull frog ---

(MULDER’S eyes pop open.)

SCULLY: ... was a good friend of mine. Never understood a single word he said...

(MULDER or *Duchovny?* pulls up knees to hide his face.)

SCULLY: ... but I helped him drink his wine.

(Pause.)

MULDER: Chorus.

SCULLY: Joy .... to the world. All the boys and girls. Joy to the fishes in the deep blue sea. Joy to you and me.

(Camera pans over to a tree where we see glowing red eyes.)

(Forest. Morning. MULDER wakes alone.)

MULDER: Scully?!

SCULLY: (about 20 yards away, holds up her gun. She is eating.) Mmmm....over here.

MULDER: What are you doing?

SCULLY: I’m looking for food. I found some wild berries.

MULDER: I wouldn’t go far.

SCULLY: Mulder, you never left my sight. (SCULLY disappears.)

MULDER: Scully? (gets up and goes to where she was) Scully? Scully! Scully!?

SCULLY: (voice) I’m down here.

MULDER: Where?

SCULLY: (voice) I fell down a hole. (howel)

(MULDER looks down at SCULLY who is getting up off the bottom of a 10 foot deep hole)

MULDER: You all right?

SCULLY: Yeah, I landed on soft dirt .. kind of.

MULDER: What’s down there?

SCULLY: I don’t know. It’s pretty dark. ( She bumps into one of many hanging bodies.) Oh!

MULDER: Scully, what’s going on? Are you okay?

SCULLY: (Sees MICHELLE hanging.) I found Michelle.

MULDER: Is she alive?

SCULLY: (Checking MICHELLE) Not for much longer. Mulder, we have to get her out of here.

MULDER: Is there a way out?

SCULLY: I don’t know. I .. I’m in some kind of a chamber. There’s .. there’s like some kind of network. (She sees CREATURE at one end of chamber.) Mulder...

MULDER: Yeah?

SCULLY: I’m not alone. (Checks her back.) I don’t have my weapon. Mulder!?

MULDER: Hold on, I’m going to drop my gun down.

(MULDER drops gun, then hears rustling behind him.)

(SCULLY picks up MULDER’S gun, then jumps as he falls into hole behind her.)

SCULLY: Jeez!! Mulder, are you okay?

MULDER: (Holding his shoulder, rolling on ground in pain.) Don’t mind me.

(CREATURE begins moving toward them.)

MULDER: (rising) Scully!

(SCULLY fires three or four shots. They look at CREATURE’S body. Looks very human, but carved out of wood.)

SCULLY: Mulder, look. There has to be a scientific explanation for this.

(Later, MULDER and SCULLY are stacking dead bodies under the hole. A pole reads AD NOCTVM.)

MULDER: Too bad we don’t have any office furniture.

SCULLY: If they could see us now.

MULDER: Go, team. 20 more bodies and we’ll win the Honey-Baked Ham.

(SCULLY gives him a look.)

KINSLEY (MALE AGENT from car): (voice) Agent Mulder?1

MULDER: We’re down here!

SCULLY: We’re down here!

KINSLEY: What’re you doing down there?

(MULDER and SCULLY look at each other.)

MULDER: We’ve got injured people down here.

SCULLY: We need a ladder.

KINSLEY: Right away.

(KINSLEY runs toward rescue team, STONECYPHER (FEMALE AGENT) stands next to hole.

STONECYPHER: Hey, over here!

(Road next to forest. Ambulances. MICHELLE on gurney is loaded into ambulance. FATHER also on gurney is loaded into another ambulance. MOTHER kisses his hand.)

MOTHER: (to LOUIS) He’s going to be okay. He’s going to be fine. (Sees KINSLEY) Just a minute.

(MULDER stands by himself, shoulder bandaged. KINSLEY is surrounded by people. MOTHER shakes KINSLEY’S hand, then leaves. KINSLEY goes to MULDER next to crosscut of tree.)

KINSLEY: Well, we just got all the thanks when you did all the work.

MULDER: No, on the contrary, Agent Kinsley, we would never have gotten involved in this if not for you.

KINSLEY: Really?

MULDER: (looking at a tab on the crosscut - 1521 Ponce De Leon Lands Looking for Fountain Of Youth ) Yeah, you see this?

KINSLEY: Oh, yeah. I pointed that out to Agent Stonecypher on the drive down.

MULDER: There was something in the cave that Scully fell into ; an inscription - Ad Noctum.

KINSLEY: That’s, uh –

MULDER: It means "into darkness". The Spanish Conquistadors used to carve it on the posts that they would lash the natives to as a warning.

KINSLEY: So who’re you saying wrote this?

MULDER: Ponce De Leon came here 450 years ago looking for the Fountain Of Youth.

KINSLEY: You mean you think that these ... that - that - that- that body the one that Agent Scully shot? No -

MULDER: After 400 years in the woods don’t you think they might have adapted perfectly to their environment?

KINSLEY: You’re just making this up.

MULDER: Why do you say that?

KINSLEY: (Laughs uncomfortably) ‘Cause, you work on the X-Files, and you just want to write off your motel.

STONECYPHER: (coming up) Search and Rescue are still unable to find Jeff Glaser or the second predator that you reported.

MULDER: I wouldn’t be surprised if they couldn’t find either one of them.

STONECYPHER: Agent Mulder, I’m confused. Why would they come after the boy in the house that night?

MULDER: These predators have been in these woods for a long, long time. They would have perceived any encroachment on their territory as an enemy, even a little kid like that.

STONECYPHER: But that would mean that they’d come after any one of us that had gone into the woods, wouldn’t it?

MULDER: (nods, then looks around) Where’s Agent Scully?

STONECYPHER: Oh, she got a lift back to the motel to pack up both your things.

MULDER: She did? Excuse me. (Runs to KINSLEY’S car and drives off.)

KINSLEY: My jacket’s in that car. (STONECYPHER looks at him.)

(MULDER’s motel room. SCULLY enters with her suitcase. She goes into bathroom and closet and begins packing up MULDER’S things. These guys are really CLOSE to each other!!! Creepy music.)

(MULDER pulls up, gets out of car and bangs on SCULLY’S door.)

MULDER: Scully!? Scully!!!??

(SCULLY leans out of MULDER’S room.)

SCULLY: Mulder, what’s going on?

MULDER: (Entering his room, getting his suitcase) Let’s get out of here.

SCULLY: ‘Kay.

MULDER: You pack everything?

SCULLY: Yeah.

(MULDER looks around the room, closes the door. We see red eyes under the bed.)

[THE END]