(The captain of the submarine runs down a hallway passing officers.)

OFFICER #1: Sir.

(He salutes. The captain keeps moving.)

OFFICER #2: Captain.

(He salutes as well. The captain goes to a ladder and climbs up it to the control room. He moves over to a man at the radar station.)

CAPTAIN: What have you got?

RADAR OFFICER: I'm not quite sure, sir. We picked up some paint approximately two minutes ago.

(The captain looks at the radar screen.)

CAPTAIN: Looks like the damn thing's just hanging there.

RADAR OFFICER: Yes, sir. It's approximately two-hundred meters below the ice. Looks to be about eighty meters across and it's noisy.

CAPTAIN: Noisy, how?

RADAR OFFICER: It's emitting radio signals across the spectrum but it's... it's just random noise, sir. We can't detect any pattern.

CAPTAIN: Get me Pacific Command on the satellite uplink.

RADAR OFFICER: Yes, sir.

(He stands and adjusts some controls. The captain gets on the phone.)

CAPTAIN: Yes, admiral. I don't know what we found but it appears to be some kind of craft.

(Some murmuring is heard through the phone.)

Yes, sir, that's correct.

(More murmuring.)

But we're on a cartography mission, admiral. My crew isn't prepared to...

(Murmuring.)

Yes, sir.

(More murmuring.)

Understood, sir.

(He hangs up and walks over to the control panel.)

Set a course heading 0-4-7.

(The man at the panel starts flipping switches. The captain moves back over to the radar officer.)

RADAR OFFICER: Toward the object, sir?

(The captain picks up the phone.)

CAPTAIN: Weapons room.

(A man is heard over the phone.)

MAN: Aye, sir.

Lock torpedoes on target. Prepare to fire on command.

RADAR OFFICER: Captain, shouldn't we at least attempt to identify this object first?

CAPTAIN: We have our orders, Lieutenant.

RADAR OFFICER: But, sir...

(A loud buzzing suddenly starts. The officers cover their ears and the ship rumbles. People scream to each other as consoles start exploding, knocking people and papers over. The buzzing grows louder. Finally, it stops.)

MAN: Everything's down, negative!

(People still scream to each other as the red warning lights come on.)

CAPTAIN: Reactor's gone down.

(He picks up the phone.)

MAN: Over here...

CAPTAIN: Engine room?

(The lieutenant stands up.)

RADAR OFFICER: That won't work, captain. We've only got battery power.

(The captain hangs up the phone.)

CAPTAIN: I'm going down there. Prepare to surface at once!

(He runs back down the stairs. The radar officer looks around.)

RADAR OFFICER: Surface into what? We're under thirty-two feet of glacial ice.

(Scully stands, ear to the phone. We see Mulder standing behind her, but Mulder is also on the phone.)

MULDER: (on phone) Scully? Are you there? Scully? What's going on?

(She slowly turns around and looks at Mulder. He mouths the words "who is it?")

SCULLY: No, sorry.

(She hangs up.)

MULDER: Who was that?

SCULLY: It's a wrong number. Where have you been, Mulder? I've been trying to get a hold of you.

MULDER: I, I was trying to reach you. I went by your house but you weren't there. I got here as quickly as I could.

SCULLY: Why didn't you call when you got my message?

MULDER: I, I, I did call. I, I couldn't get through.

(She turns around, grabs her gun and aims it at Mulder.)

SCULLY: Put your hands against the wall.

MULDER: Scully, what are you doing?

SCULLY: I said put your hands against the wall!

MULDER: What's wrong?

SCULLY: Do it!

MULDER: Scully, it's me...

(He turns around and puts his hands against the wall. Scully moves up to him.)

SCULLY: I don't know who you are.

MULDER: Okay, I'm going to take my left hand and reach into my pocket and get my I.D., okay? Just don't shoot me. I got shot once and I didn't much care for it.

SCULLY: I said keep your hands up.

(Mulder spins around and backhands her with his left then punches her with his right as he spins, sending her flying into the near wall. Her nose is bleeding. She slumps down against the wall as "Mulder" walks up to her.)

MULDER: Where is he?

(She reaches for her gun but Mulder grabs her by the throat and lifts her above his head against the wall with one hand.)

That was him on the phone, wasn't it? Tell me where he is.

SCULLY: I don't know what you're talking about.

(He throws her up and she breaks through a glass table. He looks down at her and his face morphs to that of his true identity, the Alien Bounty Hunter. Later, there is a knocking on the door.)

MULDER: Scully?

(He breaks open the door. The room is dark. He tries the light switch, but it won't work. Samantha is standing behind him in the doorway.)

SAMANTHA MULDER: He's been here.

(He picks up the lamp and turns it on. He looks down at the broken table. Samantha walks over to him.)

Your partner is alive.

MULDER: How do you know?

SAMANTHA MULDER: He took her to get me.

MULDER: There's no sign of a break-in. She wouldn't have just let him in.

SAMANTHA MULDER: She might not have known who he was. She might have thought it was you.

(They start walking back to the car.)

He's going to contact you. He's going to say he wants to make a trade, your partner's life for mine.

MULDER: Why, why does he want to kill you?

SAMANTHA MULDER: Because I know how to kill him.

MULDER: How?

SAMANTHA MULDER: By piercing the base of his skull.

MULDER: That would kill anybody.

SAMANTHA MULDER: Yes, but this is the only way to kill him and it must be precise. I'm fairly sure it'll work.

MULDER: Fairly sure?

SAMANTHA MULDER: He's got powers I've never seen before. If it doesn't work, there's a chance you could die.

MULDER: From what?

SAMANTHA MULDER: Their blood is toxic, human exposure to it is fatal.

(Mulder looks away, thinking.)

I know this must seem incredible to you...

MULDER: No, no, no, no, no... that's just it. It doesn't seem incredible at all. Now, how do we find him?

SAMANTHA MULDER: We don't. He'll find us.

(THE TIME IS 12:38. Mulder paces around his apartment as Samantha sits on the couch.)

SAMANTHA MULDER: He'll call.

MULDER: You're sure?

SAMANTHA MULDER: I know what he wants.

MULDER: And if he doesn't get it?

SAMANTHA MULDER: I know this is hard for you, Fox...

MULDER: No, it's not hard. It's unbelievable.

SAMANTHA MULDER: You don't believe me.

MULDER: After twenty-two years, why come back?

SAMANTHA MULDER: I've explained to you...

MULDER: No, no, you've explained only what you had to! I know next to nothing about these people you call your parents or about the man who wants to kill them.

(She stands.)

SAMANTHA MULDER: The men you've been seeking are the progeny of two original visitors, clones who have been attempting to establish a colony here since the late 1940's.

MULDER: A colony?

SAMANTHA MULDER: Loosely. The community, by necessity, is dispersed. There are clones identical to my parents living in virtually every part of the country.

MULDER: What are they trying to accomplish?

SAMANTHA MULDER: It's their belief that our stewardship of the planet is being forsaken, and that by default, they'll someday become the natural heirs.

MULDER: And in the meantime?

SAMANTHA MULDER: Through hybridization, they've been working to erase that aspect which has forced the community to scatter... their identical natures.

MULDER: All the clones worked in abortion clinics, why?

SAMANTHA MULDER: Access to fetal tissue. Though the biologies are incompatible, they finally found a way to combine human DNA with alien DNA.

MULDER: And this man... why has he been sent to kill them?

SAMANTHA MULDER: The experiments weren't sanctioned. It was considered a dilution of their species, a pollution of their race. So a bounty hunter was dispatched to destroy them and terminate the colony.

MULDER: That's a good story... but I've heard a lot of good stories lately.

SAMANTHA MULDER: I've got no reason to lie to you. I'm your sister, Fox, you have to trust me.

(They look at each other. There is a knock on the door. Mulder picks up his gun off the table, takes it out of the holster and walks to the door.)

MULDER: Who is it?

SKINNER: It's Skinner.

(Mulder looks at Samantha, who runs off to the side.)

Mulder?

MULDER: The door's open.

(Skinner opens the door and sees the apartment is dark. He walks in and looks at Mulder, who is sitting on the couch.)

Make yourself at home.

(Samantha takes a sharp object out of a kitchen drawer. It has a wooden handle with a long metal point sticking out of it.)

SKINNER: What's going on here, Agent Mulder? Why are the lights out?

MULDER: Orders from my opthamologist.

SKINNER: Are you all right?

(Samantha starts to sneak up behind him.)

MULDER: Yeah, I'm fine.

SKINNER: I've been trying to reach you and Agent Scully.

MULDER: I haven't checked my messages.

SKINNER: Are you aware that Agent Scully incarcerated four men with the federal marshal's office? And those men are now missing?

(Samantha flicks on the lights. Skinner turns around and Mulder stands, pointing his gun at Skinner.)

SAMANTHA MULDER: It's all right, it's not him.

(Mulder sighs in relief and puts the gun down.)

SKINNER: What the hell is going on here, Mulder?

(Both Fox and Samantha walk towards Skinner.)

MULDER: This is my sister, Samantha Mulder.

SKINNER: What?

MULDER: I haven't had time to explain, Agent Scully is missing.

SKINNER: What do you mean, missing?

(The phone rings. Mulder picks it up.)

MULDER: Hello.

(Cut to Scully, bruised and battered, blood over a good part of her face, standing in a phone booth. The Bounty Hunter skulks around the booth.)

SCULLY: Mulder, it's me.

(Cut to Mulder, looking up in shock.)

MULDER: Scully, where are you?

(He signals to Samantha, who picks up the phone and listens.)

SCULLY: I don't know, I'm... I'm in a telephone booth.

(Cut to Scully.)

He's got my gun, Mulder. He says he's going to kill me if you don't give him what he wants.

(Cut to Mulder. Skinner watches Mulder, unsure of what's going on.)

MULDER: Well, what does he want?

(Cut to Scully.)

SCULLY: A woman who's with you. He says you'll know what I'm talking about.

(Cut to Mulder, who's looking at Samantha. She nods.)

MULDER: All right, tell him we'll negotiate.

(Cut to Scully.)

SCULLY: He doesn't want to negotiate. He says he wants to make a trade.

(Cut to Mulder.)

MULDER: All right, let me speak to him.

(Cut to Scully.)

SCULLY: He wants you to be at Memorial Bridge at Bethesda in one hour.

(Cut to Mulder.)

MULDER: Scully, I need time, I need more time than that.

(Cut to Scully.)

SCULLY: Mulder...

(The Bounty Hunter presses down on the switch, hanging up. Cut to Mulder, who hangs up his phone angrily. Samantha hangs up as well.)

SKINNER: Where is she? What's this about a negotiation?

MULDER: We don't, we don't have any time. If I ever needed your help, your trust, I need it now.

(Mulder and Samantha drive onto the bridge and stop near the middle. Skinner and a sharpshooter are in the bushes. The sharpshooter is building his sniper rifle.)

SKINNER: Mulder's in position.

(He looks through his binoculars.)

MULDER: We just need to get him out of the car. Make him think we're going to make a trade. We just need one shot.

SAMANTHA MULDER: To the base of the neck.

MULDER: These guys can hollow out a dime at two-hundred yards.

(They look to see another car pulling up.)

And, Samantha. Do not take any unnecessary risks out there.

(She nods. He unbuckles his seatbelt and gets out of the car. The car pulls up and Mulder walks towards it. The Bounty Hunter steps out, gun in hand. He yanks Scully out and grabs her, holding the gun to her head.)

Scully?

(They walk slowly towards him.)

ALIEN BOUNTY HUNTER: Bring her out.

(Mulder stares at him, then looks back at Samantha. They look at each other, then Samantha gets out of the car and walks up to Mulder. They stare at each other. Samantha nods slightly, then starts walking towards the Bounty Hunter.)

SKINNER: Take your shot when you got it.

(Samantha and Scully look at each other.)

ALIEN BOUNTY HUNTER: Step close. Right up close.

(She slowly moves up to him. Through the rifle's scope, we see him push away Scully and grab Samantha. Scully runs over to Mulder.)

MULDER: Scully, you all right?

SCULLY: Yeah.

MULDER: Yeah?

SCULLY: I'm okay.

(The Bounty Hunter puts his gun away as Scully gets into the car. The Bounty Hunter slowly inches his way back towards his car. Mulder follows. In the scope, we see that Samantha and the alien are moving behind a column. Samantha looks at Mulder then spins around and attacks the Bounty Hunter with the same weapon she was going to use on Skinner.)

SHARPSHOOTER: I lost the shot.

(The Bounty Hunter grabs Samantha again. Mulder aims his gun.)

MULDER: There's no way out. We've got both sides of the bridge covered. Now let her go.

(He slowly walks towards them. The Bounty Hunter whispers in Samantha's ear.)

ALIEN BOUNTY HUNTER: Tell me where she is.

MULDER: Let her go!

(In the scope, the Bounty Hunter slowly moves into the shot. A shot rings off and the Bounty Hunter staggers. Samantha moans as the Bounty Hunter topples over the side of the bridge and they both plummet into the water. Mulder runs over to the side.)

Samantha! Samantha!

(Morning. Two scuba divers jump off a raft.)

RAFT DRIVER: Spread out.

(The divers move away from the raft.)

Clear!

(He drives off. A car pulls up next to Mulder who is leaning on the railing. Scully gets out.)

SCULLY: Mulder...

MULDER: You should be in the hospital, Scully.

SCULLY: I was discharged an hour ago and I asked to come here. Have they found anything yet?

MULDER: Nothing yet. You think she could've survived?

SCULLY: Maybe... but the water's thirty-six degrees.

MULDER: Well, maybe she went into hypothermic shock. I've heard about people who have lived after being stranded in water like this... eight to ten hours.

SCULLY: Mulder, why didn't you tell me on the phone that it was her?

MULDER: I couldn't tell you.

SCULLY: Why not?

MULDER: Cause you'd never let me go through with it.

SCULLY: Are you sure that it's your sister?

(He spins around and looks at her.)

MULDER: Why would you even question me on that?

SCULLY: Because back at the motel, Mulder, it was you but, but it wasn't you.

MULDER: Well, it was her.

(He starts walking. She follows him.)

SCULLY: Well, then who is this man and what does he...

MULDER: He's an alien.

(He opens his car door.)

SCULLY: Is that what you're going to tell Skinner?

MULDER: I already told Skinner, that was the easy part. Now I got to tell my father.

(He gets in.)

(Mulder opens the door and his father is standing there.)

WILLIAM MULDER: You didn't have me come all this way to give me good news.

(Mulder turns away.)

What is it, Fox?

MULDER: Samantha's gone... Dad. I lost her.

(William walks in.)

WILLIAM MULDER: What do you mean, you lost her?

MULDER: There was a man... he was holding my partner hostage in exchange for Samantha.

WILLIAM MULDER: You let this man take your sister. Isn't that what you're trying to tell me?

(Fox turns back.)

MULDER: I, I can't explain it to you, but, um... I believed I was doing the right thing, Dad.

WILLIAM MULDER: Was this your decision?

MULDER: Yes. I'll tell Mom.

WILLIAM MULDER: Do you realize what losing her again is going to do to your mother?

(They look at each other. Fox is about to cry.)

Do you?

(Fox tries to say something but can't. He looks down at the floor, crying.)

MULDER: I'm sorry, Dad. I'm sorry. I'm... I'm sorry.

(William goes to leave when he pulls an envelope out of his pocket.)

WILLIAM MULDER: Your sis... Samantha left this at the house for you.

(He puts it down on the table and leaves, slamming the door shut. Mulder walks over to the envelope and opens it. He takes out a letter and a keycard to a clinic that says 4A. The letter reads:

"If anything should happen to me or if we become separated, you must meet me here:
1235 91st St.
Rockville, Maryland")

(Mulder pulls up in his car. As he gets out of the car and walks up the stairs to the gate, his cellular phone rings. He takes it out and turns it on.)

MULDER: Mulder.

(Scully is on the other end.)

SCULLY: Mulder, it's me.

MULDER: Scully, she left a path in case we got separated. I think she's alive.

(Cut to Scully.)

SCULLY: Mulder, I think you should come back as soon as you can.

MULDER: Why? What'd you find?

SCULLY: It's your sister.

(In the background, a team of agents takes Samantha's body off of a raft.)

We just pulled her body out of the river.

(Cut to Mulder, who's face turns to a combination of shock and sadness. Cut back to Scully.)

Mulder, I'm so sorry.

(Cut back to Mulder.)

MULDER: Are you sure?

(Cut to Scully.)

SCULLY: Yeah.

(She sighs.)

You know... whatever you're feeling, you can't blame yourself.

(Cut to Mulder, who exhales deeply.)

MULDER: What about a second body? Did you find a second body?

(Cut back to Scully. The agents carry the body up the hill.)

SCULLY: No, not yet.

(Cut to Mulder.)

MULDER: I'll be there as soon as I can.

(He starts down the stairs slowly.)

(A female and male agent run around from the back of the FBI ambulance to Scully.)

FEMALE AGENT: Agent Scully? There's something you need to see.

SCULLY: What is it?

FEMALE AGENT: It's the body we pulled from the water. Something strange is happening.

(Scully and the two others run up to the truck. Scully swings open the doors to see Samantha, her face green and bubbling. The three look on in horror and disbelief as Samantha's face fizzes and starts to cave in.

(Mulder stands on the stairs, thinking. He turns back and runs the keycard down through the sensor. The door opens and he walks in. He looks around the room, which is full of boxes, and hears a beeping. He takes out his gun and walks towards the beeping. Stopping at a stairwell, he hears some noise downstairs, which is where he moves. He moves into a room where a person is standing at a desk. He points his gun.)

MULDER: Federal agent. Put your hands where I can see them and turn around. Slowly.

(The person turns around.)

Who are you?

(She takes off her goggles and doctor's mask. It is Samantha. Mulder lowers his gun.)

SAMANTHA MULDER CLONE #1: She's dead, isn't she?

MULDER: What the hell is going on?

SAMANTHA MULDER CLONE #1: Come, please. There's not much time.

(She opens a door.)

MULDER: Who are you?

SAMANTHA MULDER CLONE #1:Please.

(Mulder tentatively walks into the room and sees another Samantha clone standing at a computer, green vats all around her.)

MULDER: It was all a lie.

SAMANTHA MULDER CLONE #1: We needed your help. We knew you could be manipulated.

SAMANTHA MULDER CLONE #2: He'll be coming. We must hurry now.

MULDER: Who?

(Another Samantha clone walks up behind him, this one in a lab coat.)

SAMANTHA MULDER CLONE #3: The man who's been sent to kill us.

MULDER: He's dead.

SAMANTHA MULDER CLONE #1: How do you know?

MULDER: He was shot. In the back of the neck!

SAMANTHA MULDER CLONE #2: How did he die?

MULDER: He fell off a bridge... with one of you.

SAMANTHA MULDER CLONE #3: Then we don't know for sure. You could have been followed. Come with me.

(She walks out of the room.)

This way, Agent Mulder.

(Mulder looks at the first clone then follows her down the hallway to a door. The third clone slides her keycard down a sensor and opens the door.)

The rest of us are dispensable.

(Another clone steps out.)

She was the first. The one from which we all came. The one you must save.

(Mulder realizes that Samantha was indeed not Samantha, that they were all alien clones.)

MULDER: I'm not your savior.

SAMANTHA MULDER CLONE #4: You must help us. You have no choice.

MULDER: No, I... I do have a choice and my choice is to walk out of here.

(He starts to walk away.)

SAMANTHA MULDER CLONE #4: We know where your sister is.

(Mulder turns back.)

Ask yourself, Agent Mulder, how else would we know so much about her?

(A fire alarm goes off.)

SAMANTHA MULDER CLONE #3: He's here.

(She starts to walk away. Mulder turns back and walks down the previous hallway, gun in hand. He walks down a hallway flooded with smoke, coughing. He reaches a doorway and when he turns to go through, he is met with an open fist by the Bounty Hunter. Mulder goes down, nearly unconscious. The Bounty Hunter flicks open his gimlet and steps over Mulder's body. He looks down the hallway, then goes back the way Mulder came. Mulder groans on the floor. The fire trucks arrive. Firemen run around, some pulling out hoses, some running into the building as it burns. A fireman runs through some fire and comes across Mulder.)

FIREMAN: I found one!

(He kneels down and starts to help Mulder up, who is coughing.)

Sir, we're going to get you out of here.

MULDER: What about the others?

FIREMAN: We got real lucky. There are no others.

(He leads Mulder up the stairs.)

MULDER: No. Wait. There were women in here.

FIREMAN: We looked. You're the only one here.

MULDER: No. You've got to keep looking...

(Scully is typing up her report. We hear her speaking over it.)

SCULLY: After being treated for smoke inhalation, Agent Mulder was released from Samaritan Hospital in satisfactory condition. At his request, the abortion clinic where he was found has been searched repeatedly but the bodies of the women he insists perished there were not found. My report on this case remains incomplete. Many aspects continue to defy explanation including the identities of the identical men and women. Agent Mulder's claim of alien origins cannot be substantiated. The man suspected in their disappearances is still at large...

(A man in a quarantine containment suit is standing over Weiss' body, which has been dissected. Stitch marks run around Weiss' neck and down his chest. He picks up a scalpel off a tray. Scully can still be heard.)

SCULLY: ...and has now been charged with the death of F.B.I. Special Agent Barret Weiss, whose body has been quarantined at the U.S. Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases. Weiss' cause of death involved a thickening of the blood. It is now believed that he was subjected to a virulent strain of virus whose origin and behavior are also unexplainable.

(A man in a labcoat, Able Gardner, walks in with Scully, talking.)

It is my hope that further analysis of this contagion will aid in the solution of this case.

(Scully looks through a microscope at a sample of Weiss' blood, which has many long blue viruses in it.)

This is a retrovirus?

GARDNER: Yes, but none of us here have ever seen anything like it. Do you recognize it?

SCULLY: Was the thickening of Agent Weiss' blood an immunological response to the virus?

(Gardner walks around Scully to a computer.)

GARDNER: Apparently. When the body's exposed to it, it triggers a massive production of red blood cells. Now, take a look at this.

(A picture comes up on the screen of blood with a few blue viruses in it.)

We took a second culture and were able to control it's growth.

SCULLY: What did you do to it?

GARDNER: All we did was lower the temperature by five degrees fahrenheit.

SCULLY: So the virus is inhibited by cold.

GARDNER: Knocked out by it. For some reason, this retrovirus goes dormant at cold temperatures.

SCULLY: We pulled a body from the river yesterday that was chilled near freezing. When it started to thaw, it began to corrode.

GARDNER: Corrode?

SCULLY: If you find out anything else, you let me know as soon as possible.

(She walks out as the man in the containment suit works on Weiss in the back.)

(X walks around the side of the building and walks up to Mulder. He is wearing a tuxedo.)

X: You wanted to see me?

MULDER: How was the opera?

X: Wonderful, I've never slept better. I don't like these hasty public meetings, Agent Mulder.

MULDER: I'm sorry. I need your help.

X: It's over. The fat lady is singing.

MULDER: I need to know what you know.

X: Okay, they're all dead.

MULDER: No. One of them is alive, the one who was sent to kill them. Where is he?

X: A nuclear submarine located his craft in the Beaufort Sea five days ago. They were ordered to destroy it but they were disabled. An attack fleet left port from Anchorage this morning to make sure this man does not leave.

MULDER: I got to get up there.

X: You'll only win the war if you pick the right battles, Agent Mulder. This is a battle you can't win.

(He walks away.)

(Scully knocks on Mulder's door.)

SCULLY: Mulder, it's me, are you there?

(She looks down and sees two newspapers stacked. She kicks one, then unlocks the door and goes inside. Sitting down and putting her coat on the chair, she goes to his computer and turns it on. The modem dials a number. She looks at his window and sees an "X" in masking tape on it. The computer beeps and she sees a small box that reads:

"Message Notice
E-mail message waiting
Mulder, 000517"

She double-clicks on it and it expands to an e-mail to Scully with the heading:

"MAIL-238479
TO: Dana Scully, 001813
FROM: Fox Mulder, 000517"

We hear Mulder reading the letter.)

MULDER: Scully, when you get this message, I will be too far away for you to stop me, but where I'm going I cannot allow you to follow. I won't let you jeopardize your life and your career for reasons purely personal to me. You were right, Scully... you said a line has to be drawn somewhere. I'm drawing it for you here. I'll contact you when I can.

(She gets up.)

(Skinner sits at his desk, writing. Scully opens the door.)

SCULLY: Sir?

(He looks at her.)

I'm sorry to come unannounced, sir, but your assistant wasn't at her desk.

(He stands.)

SKINNER: What is it, Scully?

SCULLY: May we speak off the record, sir?

SKINNER: About?

SCULLY: Agent Mulder.

(He walks over and closes the door.)

He's gone.

SKINNER: Where?

SCULLY: I don't know, I was hoping that you could tell me or help me to find out.

SKINNER: When I spoke to Agent Mulder the day before yesterday, he said he was going to take some time off.

SCULLY: He told me the same thing but I don't think this matter with his sister is settled. Sir, is there any way that you can reach him through unofficial channels?

(He thinks about this.)

SKINNER: I can't help you, Agent Scully.

(He turns back towards his desk.)

SCULLY: Please?

(He looks back at her.)

SKINNER: Agent Scully, you and I both have a greater responsibility to consider and that is to the F.B.I. Agent Mulder's actions in this case are in violation of his duties, his oath of trust and bureau protocol. He's risked my position, your life.

SCULLY: Agent Mulder has saved my life!

SKINNER: If he wanted or expected you to the same, he would have told you where he was going.

(He walks back to his desk and sits down.)

Please close the door on your way out, Agent Scully.

(She stares at him for a few seconds, then leaves. Skinner picks up his pen to write, then slams it down and looks back at the door.)

(Scully turns on Mulder's desk light and shines it through the window on the "X." Later on, she falls asleep. There is a knock on the door and she wakes up. She opens the door and sees X standing there. X is surprised to see her.)

SCULLY: Where is Mulder?

X: Sorry, I must have the wrong apartment.

(He starts walking down the hall. Scully walks after him.)

SCULLY: Where's Mulder? I need to know, damn it!

X: I'm sorry, you've mistaken me for someone else.

SCULLY: I'm losing time!

(He presses the button on the elevator and gets in.)

X: I'm sorry. I can't help you.

(The door closes. X lets out a deep breath and looks down at the floor. The elevator stops and the door opens. X goes to leave but his path is barred by Skinner.)

Excuse me.

SKINNER: Did you tell her what she needed to know?

(X looks at him with a strange face, then goes to pull out his gun in realization. Skinner grabs him by his trenchcoat and slams him up against the back wall of the elevator.)

How hard do you want to make this?

X: No harder than it has to be.

(X headbutts Skinner then punches him with a right hand, knocking him back. X once again goes to pull out his gun but Skinner grabs him and punches him in the gut. He then delivers his own headbutt and throws him into the corner. He grabs him by the trenchcoat again but before he can pick him up, X points his gun in Skinner's face. Skinner as a big cut on his forehead.)

I've killed men for far less.

SKINNER: You pull that trigger, you'll be killing two men. Now I want to know where Mulder is.

(There is a knock on Mulder's door. Scully opens it and sees Skinner standing there, looking ragged and disheveled. Blood runs down the side of his face from the cut. His nose and lips are bloody.)

Agent Mulder took a commercial flight to Tacoma, Washington. From there, he caught a military plane to Deadhorse, Alaska.

(Scully looks at him, shocked. She motions for him to come in. He does so and walks over to the table.)

He used his F.B.I. credentials to charter a Rollagon all-terrain vehicle. It's still a ten-mile hike across the ice.

(He leans over and writes something down on a piece of paper.)

These are the coordinates of his final destination.

(He hands the paper to Scully.)

SCULLY: How did you get this?

SKINNER: Unofficial channels.

(Mulder looks at a small digital control he has that charts his location. Carrying a flashlight, he walks a little farther and sees the top of the submarine sticking out above the ice. He walks around and climbs up the ladder. He opens the hull door and climbs inside. The room is dark and quiet. He takes off his hood and unzips his coat. He shines his flashlight around the equipment. No signs of life. He shines it down on the floor and sees a man lying dead. Moving the flashlight more, he sees two more men slumped down on the floor. Suddenly, there is a bang and footsteps.)

MULDER: Hey!

(He runs after the noise, gun in hand.)

Stop!

(He walks down a ladder and looks tentatively down the hallway. There is another bang and he turns to see a man running down a hallway a few doors down. He runs after him and sees another ladder going down. He hears a clang to the left of him and goes toward it. There are a few more bangs and he spins around to see a man wedged in between a pipe and a wall. The man gasps.)

Who are you?

MAN: Lieutenant Terry Wilmer.

MULDER: Step out of there!

(The man slowly starts to move out of his spot.)

Come out!

(He moves out from between the pipe and the wall. Afterwards, the man is sitting down at a desk, the flashlight in front of him, shining in his face. Mulder is standing in back of him and to the right. When the man speaks, it is very shaky, like whimpering.)

What happened to you?

MAN: I don't know. We, uh... we just lost power. We, we... we drifted under the ice for days. Then, um... then we hit a...

(He turns his head towards Mulder, who points his gun.)

MULDER: Don't look at me, face forward!

(The man turns back.)

MAN: We hit a shallow patch and punched through, okay? That's what happened.

MULDER: So why did you run?

MAN: A man came. He, um... he sealed most of the men below decks without any air and, uh... and then he started to execute the rest of us.

(Mulder moves directly behind him. The man is crying.)

Every... they're all dead. I, uh... I thought you were him, I didn't know if you were him.

MULDER: How is it you managed to survive?

MAN: I hid under the body of a chief petty officer, okay? I, uh... I played dead.

(Mulder flips a switch and the submarine regains power. The man looks around and hears a clicking. He looks to see that Mulder has handcuffed him. Mulder holds the gun to the back of the man's neck.)

What's this for? What are you, crazy?

MULDER: No. I'm just tired and you're not getting back to your ship until I get the truth. Now tell me where my sister is.

MAN: I don't know what you're talking about.

MULDER: Base of the neck! Now, you tell me how I can find her and I'll let you get back to your ship before it's destroyed!

MAN: Please... please...

(His voice suddenly changes to a very strong tone.)

You're making a really big mistake.

(He tosses Mulder across the room. The man stands and Mulder looks up at him. The man suddenly grows taller and his features change. He is the Alien Bounty Hunter. Mulder looks on in awe as the Bounty Hunter tugs at the handcuff and tosses Mulder back the other way.)

ALIEN BOUNTY HUNTER: If I wanted to, I could've killed you many times before.

MULDER: Where is she?

(The Bounty Hunter throws him back down to the floor.)

ALIEN BOUNTY HUNTER: Is the answer to your question worth dying for? Is that what you want?

MULDER: Where is she?

(Mulder is thrown back to where he was. He groans and coughs.)

Just tell me where she is.

ALIEN BOUNTY HUNTER: She's alive. Can you die now?

(The Bounty Hunter starts dragging him out the door, knocking over the chair. Mulder grabs his gun off of the floor and shoots the Bounty Hunter in the back. The alien leaks green and looks back at Mulder, who screams in pain as the toxic gases attack him. Mulder is dragged up the hull and thrown onto the floor. The assassin starts to climb back down, looks at Mulder and closes the hull, snapping the handcuffs in two. Mulder tries to hang on but drops down to the ice and tumbles beneath the wing. He groans and coughs, his face discolored from the cold and the poison. The riding lights come on. The wing turns and assumes a vertical position. The sub starts to sink, the wing speeding down at Mulder, about to chop him in half. With the last of his strength, he rolls out of the way.)

(Scully bursts into the emergency room. Mulder is sitting in a tub, an oxygen mask on. The people are talking in the background.)

NURSE: No change in B.P. or pulse.

(Scully looks at Mulder and holds up her badge.)

SCULLY: I'm Dana Scully, I'm Agent Mulder's partner. What are his vitals?

(The doctor walks over to her.)

DOCTOR: He's suffering from extreme hypothermia.

SCULLY: No... you've got to get him out of the tub.

DOCTOR: He's dying, he's lost all his body heat.

SCULLY: You've got to listen to me! If you keep him in there, you're going to kill him! The cold is the only thing that's keeping him alive.

(Mulder flatlines.)

NURSE: His heart stopped!

DOCTOR: Give me one amp of epinephrine in a cannula!

SCULLY: You don't know what you're dealing with here! Agent Mulder has been exposed to a retrovirus resulting in hyperviscosity syndrome.

DOCTOR: I want you out of my E.R. right now. Nurse!

(A nurse walks over to her.)

NURSE: Yes, doctor. Ma'am...

SCULLY: His blood has thickened...

NURSE: Ma'am...

SCULLY: That's why his heart is failing!

(The doctor spins around.)

DOCTOR: No, his heart is failing because he's lost all his body heat!

SCULLY: No, the only thing saving him right now is the hypermetabolic state induced by the cold. Now, if you don't do what I'm saying, you are going to kill him!

(The doctor stares at her for a second. She takes off her coat.)

Let's get him out of that tub now.

(The doctor holds an oxygen mask over Mulder's mouth as Scully readies the defibrillators.)

MAN: A hundred joules, charged and ready.

SCULLY: Clear!

WOMAN: Clear.

(She puts the defibrillators down on Mulder's chest and they go off. Still no pulse.)

No rhythm.

MAN: Charge?

DOCTOR: No.

SCULLY: Clear!

WOMAN: Clear.

(Scully tries again. A slight pulse picks up.)

DOCTOR: I'm picking up a faint pulse.

(Scully puts the defribillators down.)

SCULLY: I want a digoxin 0.1 milligram I.V. Hang a heparin drip at 1,000 units per hour. And get him two units of fresh frozen plasma now.

(The nurse runs off to do so.)

DOCTOR: This patient's not even in...

SCULLY: He's going to make it.

(She runs her hand through his hair.)

MAN: Let's get the plasma going. Okay, let's get a second line ready.

OTHER MAN: Push the adrenaline...

(Later, Mulder lays on his hospital bed, oxygen tube in his nose. Scully sits at his bedside. We hear her voice over the scene.)

SCULLY: Transfusions and an aggressive treatment with anti-viral agents have resulted in a steady but gradual improvement in Agent Mulder's condition. Blood tests have confirmed his exposure to the still unidentified retrovirus whose origin remains a mystery. The search team that found Agent Mulder has located neither the missing submarine nor the man he was looking for.

Several aspects of this case remain unexplained, suggesting the possibility of paranormal phenomena... but I am convinced that to accept such conclusions is to abandon all hope of understanding the scientific events behind them. Many of the things I have seen have challenged my faith and my belief in an ordered universe...

(Later, a nurse opens the door to Mulder's room for Scully, who sits down at his bedside. He no longer has the oxygen tube and is looking much healthier than before.)

...but this uncertainty has only strengthened my need to know, to understand, to apply reason to those things which seem to defy it. It was science that isolated the retrovirus Agent Mulder was exposed to, and science that allowed us to understand its behavior. And ultimately, it was science that saved Agent Mulder's life.

(Mulder groans. Scully looks up at him and smiles. He slowly turns to look at her.)

Hey. How you feeling?

(Mulder can only whisper.)

MULDER: Like I got a bad case of freezer burn. How did I get here?

SCULLY: A naval reconnaissance squad found and choppered you to Eisenhower Field.

(He nods.)

Thanks for ditching me.

MULDER: I... I'm sorry, I... I couldn't let you risk your life on this.

SCULLY: Did you find what you were looking for?

MULDER: No. No. But I... I found something I thought I'd lost. Faith to keep looking.

(She smiles.)

[THE END]