(Dark and stormy night. Creepy music. An older (1950s?) style car, looks like a hearse, pulls up in front of an even older spooky old rural house with a weathervane in the shape of a bat, pointed west. An even older (late 60's) dour-looking gentleman, TALL GEORGE, gets out of the car. He is dressed in a suit. Sound of thunder. He goes up the porch steps and enters the house. Sound of creaking steps as he makes his way through the dark house.)

QUICK CUT TO:

(Upstairs: an ELDERLY WOMAN in bed hears the creaking and wakes up suddenly. She gasps for breath.)

ELDERLY WOMAN: Land sakes, George, what are you trying to do?

(He opens the bedroom door.)

TALL GEORGE: (very deep voice) I was trying to be quiet.

ELDERLY WOMAN: Quiet? I smelled you on the stairs. 39 years, I'm still surprised that embalming fluid of yours doesn't wake the dead.

TALL GEORGE: (morbidly) Didn't wake old Zeke McPherson tonight, God rest his soul.

ELDERLY WOMAN: Well, you go outside and take those clothes of yours off so I can rest mine.

(He smiles and pauses.)

ELDERLY WOMAN: George!

TALL GEORGE: (resigned) I'm going, Tahoma, I'm going.

(Reluctantly, TALL GEORGE goes back downstairs and out onto the porch. He begins removing his suit. Just as he drops his trousers, he notices something above him.)

TALL GEORGE: What the hell? What the hell is that?

(Thunder crashes and a flash of lightening illuminates a figure hanging from the porch rafters. The eyes of the human-like, bat-like creature open. TALL GEORGE steps back in horror, but is tripped up by the pants around his ankles. The BAT THING flies at him and he begins screaming.)

CUT TO:

(TAHOMA, GEORGE's wife in bed. She hears the sounds and gets out of bed and goes out to the porch to investigate.)

TAHOMA: George?

(Sounds of the BAT THING growling and feeding. She recoils in horror at the sight of the BAT THING's bloody feast. She screams as it turns and attacks her. On the roof, the weathervane swings in the wind.)

(X-Files office. Sad music. SCULLY is alone. She picks up and holds MULDER's desk nameplate thoughtfully. Just as she is about to put it away in the middle desk drawer, she hears male voices cheerfully making their way down the hall.)

MALE AGENT 1: (voice) So, this is where the bad kids are banished to.

MALE AGENT 2: (voice) Put me down here I'd probably cook up a lot of crazy ideas, too.

(Sound of the men laughing. They come around the corner into the doorway, DOGGETT leading. They stop when they see SCULLY. Uncomfortable pause. DOGGETT is holding a cup of coffee. He wasn't expecting to see her.)

SCULLY: Good morning.

DOGGETT: Morning. (to the men) Um... I'll catch you guys later.

(The other two leave silently. DOGGETT joins SCULLY in the office.)

DOGGETT: Some friends... they're just curious.

SCULLY: I'm not here to be a curiosity, Agent Doggett. I'm here to work.

DOGGETT: I am, too, Agent Scully. I've been here all weekend and early this morning went over every X-File in the cabinet there. Just left to get some coffee.

(He holds up his Styrofoam cup. SCULLY blinks, perhaps a little surprised.)

SCULLY: Well... do you have any questions?

DOGGETT: (understatement) Just a few. Maybe first you could tell me where your area is here and… uh…. where mine's going to be.

SCULLY: This is my partner's office, Agent Doggett. You and I will just be using it for a while.

(Pause while she sets MULDER's nameplate down firmly on the desk. DOGGETT gets the message.)

DOGGETT: So, where do we get started?

(SCULLY starts the slide projector. DOGGETT turns out the overhead light. Blocking- wise, the rest of the scene plays identical to the office scene in The Pilot 1x79, except this time, SCULLY is running the projector. First slide is probably of TALL GEORGE. We can't see it.)

SCULLY: Homicides: Two … in Idaho. White male, 62, undertaker by profession, he was killed on his front porch about ten feet away from his wife.

(She advances the projector to the next slide.)

DOGGETT: Holy god.

(It is a close-up of TALL GEORGE's face and neck, torn and bloody. DOGGETT winces as he examines it.)

SCULLY: Cause of death was blood loss from numerous deep wounds … from bites. Any thoughts, any questions?

(DOGGETT walks closer to the image.)

DOGGETT: "Bites"?

SCULLY: On his head torso and hands. Two of his fingers are missing... eaten off.

(SCULLY seems to enjoy "testing" DOGGETT.)

DOGGETT: By what, an animal?

SCULLY: These were murders. The, uh, bites on his wife appear to be human.

(She advances to the slide of the dead woman.)

DOGGETT: (disturbed) I've seen some violent crimes, I mean, some seriously screwed up stuff, but, uh... this is extreme. Is there demonstration of motive?

SCULLY: Not according to local P.D.

DOGGETT: Is there any pattern, uh … ritual or anything?

(SCULLY shakes her head.)

DOGGETT: I have to admit, Agent Scully, I'm at a loss.

SCULLY: Well, that's a good place to start.

(TALL GEORGE's house. Hearse is still in the driveway. Full crime investigation underway. SCULLY and DOGGETT [DOGGETT driving] pull up in their blue Idaho rental car and get out. They are met by the Detective in charge. DETECTIVE YALE ABBOTT is a large red-haired man.)

DETECTIVE ABBOTT: You the folks from the FBI?

SCULLY: Yeah.

DETECTIVE ABBOTT: Yale Abbott, Cassia County Sheriff's.

SCULLY: Hi. Agent Scully. This is Agent Doggett.

(DETECTIVE ABBOTT shakes SCULLY's hand politely, then turns his back on her, focusing all of his attention on the manly man, DOGGETT. If it were MULDER with her, this would not seem odd. SCULLY shifts uncomfortably, and looks around his shoulder.)

DETECTIVE ABBOTT: We like to think we can handle our own problems around here but a couple hotshots up in the county seat seem to think this is beyond us. Not that we don't appreciate your coming out all this way to give us a hand.

DOGGETT: Well, I hope we can. I have to admit I'm a little baffled by what I've seen.

DETECTIVE ABBOTT: Oh, really?

SCULLY: Understand, Detective, that we've seen cases like yours regularly on our unit. Agent Doggett has only just been assigned to the X-Files.

(DETECTIVE ABBOTT turns to her, his attitude condescendingly polite.)

SCULLY: I can assure you that there's nothing baffling about human bite marks.

DETECTIVE ABBOTT: Well, that's just what I was getting around to, ma'am. We're not so sure now that these bites are human.

(He leads them up to the porch.)

DETECTIVE ABBOTT: The bodies were discovered by neighbours, so there was contamination of the general crime scene. My boys did a real damn good job of separating the various shoe prints and pulling these. Come on over.

(He shows them a dusted animal-like footprint with four toes.)

DETECTIVE ABBOTT: Right there, see that?

DOGGETT: What is it?

DETECTIVE ABBOTT: It's not human, I know that.

SCULLY: It's not quite animal, either.

DETECTIVE ABBOTT: There's only four toes.

SCULLY: That's not an unheard of birth defect. Uh, no more rare than polydactylism.

(Both men look at her, then at each other.)

DETECTIVE ABBOTT: What did she just say?

DOGGETT: I assume she means it could be human.

(DOGGETT looks to SCULLY.)

DOGGETT: Is that a fair assumption?

(SCULLY stands, as do the men. She is irritated.)

SCULLY: I say that assumption is the problem here. A strange print is found and immediately the most important piece of evidence is just thrown out to try and force an explanation. Maybe this print can help explain those bite marks.

DETECTIVE ABBOTT: How?

SCULLY: I'm not quite sure yet.

DETECTIVE ABBOTT: (sarcastically to DOGGETT) She's not quite sure yet.

(DOGGETT doesn't like DETECTIVE ABBOTT's tone, but is reluctant to defend SCULLY too strongly.)

DOGGETT: Well, I have to say I've worked a lot of homicides but if the victims laid out here for any time at all in a setting like this, it'd be pretty remarkable if they didn't attract animals.

(Pause.)

SCULLY: (quietly frustrated) I think that post-mortem predation is definitely a consideration here, but I only see one print and if it were an animal there would be numerous prints all over here and in the yard.

(They turn to the deputies and technicians standing in the yard. Sheepishly, the DEPUTIES look down at their feet and begin carefully stepping aside, searching for any clues they may have inadvertently contaminated.)

SCULLY: You agree, Agent Doggett?

DOGGETT: I'm going to go take a look around.

(DOGGETT goes into the house. While DETECTIVE ABBOTT speaks, SCULLY looks up at the porch rafters. One of the beams is deeply scored as if by large claws.)

DETECTIVE ABBOTT: You know I got two old folks in the morgue mauled beyond recognition. I have no motive to go on, no intent. There's not one shred of evidence that cries out for a human explanation, yet you stand there telling me flat out that what we're looking for is a man. Thanks for everything, Agent Scully. We'll take it from here.

(He starts to leave.)

SCULLY: I'm sure your explanation will mollify all those hotshots down at the county seat, Detective and relieve any general anxiety about what this thing might be … but only until it strikes again. And one more thing: I never said that what you're looking for is a man.

(He leaves. DOGGETT calls to SCULLY from inside the house.)

DOGGETT: Agent Scully.

(She joins him at the foot of the stairs.)

DOGGETT: Is that a second print?

(On the bottom step is another footprint like the one on the porch.)

SCULLY: It could be but I'm not sure if it tells us anything.

DOGGETT: Well, maybe there's no prints in the yard because whatever made these didn't go through the yard. It came through the house.

SCULLY: Well, if anything, I'd say this print leads up the stairs.

(DOGGETT goes upstairs and looks under the bed.)

DOGGETT: Think I've got another partial here.

(Really interesting shot from under the bed of DOGGETT crouching and SCULLY from the knees down as she steps beside him.)

DOGGETT: You know, there is a more obvious explanation.

SCULLY: Mm-hmm.

DOGGETT: The more basic answer is what we're dealing with here is simply a man. A psychotic killer with a deformed foot. You're familiar with the principle of Occam's Razor?

SCULLY: Yeah. You take every possible explanation and you choose the simplest one. Agent Mulder used to refer to it as "Occam's Principle of Limited Imagination."

SCULLY: Unless you have a simple explanation as to how a killer with a deformed foot leaves a print only every 25 feet.

DOGGETT: No.

SCULLY: Or to what he'd even be doing up here.

DOGGETT: I don't know. I'm trying to figure it out just like you are.

(DOGGETT tries to open the bedroom window. It is painted shut. SCULLY goes into the small closet. All dark suits and white shirts. She looks up.)

SCULLY: (softly) Agent Doggett.

(He joins her in the closet. They both look up at the open hatch to the attic. Creepy music. DOGGETT gets a chair. SCULLY stands on it, then he boosts her up into the attic.)

SCULLY: Dark up here.

DOGGETT: What do you see? Agent Scully?

(DOGGETT stands under the hatch making no move to join her in the dark attic. He looks a little nervous. Very funny.)

SCULLY: Right now, not a heck of a lot.

(DOGGETT hauls his manly self up into the attic with her. SCULLY is looking at a partially shaded window. She tries to open the shade, but it doesn't cooperate.)

SCULLY: If there was anything up here it might have gone out that window.

(DOGGETT pulls a small Mag-Lite out of his pocket and turns it on.)

DOGGETT: You ever carry one of these?

SCULLY: (pause, dryly) Never.

(They both begin looking around the attic. DOGGETT spots two mutilated fingers on an old table. They are slimy, bloody, and in the shape of a vee.)

DOGGETT: "V" for victory.

SCULLY: What?

DOGGETT: You said the male victim was missing two fingers? Well, how did the fingers get up here?

(SCULLY looks at the fingers and reacts to the smell.)

SCULLY: Well, from their smell, I'd say they were regurgitated. Recently.

DOGGETT: By what?

(SCULLY looks up at the attic rafters and sees some deep gouges in the wood.)

SCULLY: I saw those on the porch, too.

DOGGETT: Looks like, to me... I don't know. Like it was... it was...

SCULLY: Hanging there?

(A LITTLE OLD LADY, MRS. MCKESSON opens the attic window of her house and picks up an old photo album, dusts it off, and sits down to look through it. The name "Ariel" is on the front of the album. She sobs sadly as she looks at the baby pictures on the first page. Unfortunately, also in the attic with her is the BAT THING. It is hanging from a rafter. Its eyes open. MRS. MCKESSON gasps as she hears it growl. It flies at her and she screams.)

CUT TO:

(SCULLY dressed in scrubs pulls a sheet over the body of TALL GEORGE and takes off her latex gloves. She looks tired.)

DOGGETT: You're still here.

SCULLY: Yeah. Well, I was waiting for some lab results and then I wanted to take another look at the body.

DOGGETT: Why? What did you find?

SCULLY: Nothing that will allay anyone's fears about what killed this man or his wife.

DOGGETT: "What"? You mean "who" killed them.

SCULLY: Well, to be honest, what I found here leans more towards an animal explanation. The, uh, scratches on the body match the four-toed prints that we found. And the bites have fang-like tears. What I thought were marks left by human molars are now inconclusive because of enzymes that were found in the bites which are clearly inhuman- - anticoagulants which … are found solely in the saliva of bats.

DOGGETT: Bats.

SCULLY: Yeah. I can't exactly explain it but I realize that I owe the Detective an apology.

(SCULLY looks like she would rather eat her own toenail clippings before apologizing to DETECTIVE ABBOTT.)

DOGGETT: Well, I'm not so sure about that. Montana headline circa 1956. The story's the same as what you told me.

(He shows her an old newspaper. The Montana Press Telegram. "Hunters kill Human Bat!" Three men are proudly holding a dead BAT THING creature between them as they might hold a deer.)

SCULLY: (reading) "The creature was taken to the county coroner who confirmed it was neither man nor animal."

DOGGETT: Two days later, the county coroner was disemboweled by something with sharp teeth and four-toed claws. Something that ate several body parts and regurgitated them elsewhere.

SCULLY: Did they ever find it?

DOGGETT: Five men died or disappeared and then the killing stops. Doesn't say why. But 44 years later it appears that it's back and killing again.

CUT TO:

(MCKESSON attic. MRS. MCKESSON lies dead and bloody. With a growl, the BAT THING hops into view and snarls menacingly, then hops out of frame again.)

(Later that day. DETECTIVE ABBOTT's team and DOGGETT and SCULLY are investigating the attic. Latex gloves on hands, [definitely not Mulder!] DOGGETT examines deep scratches on the window sill. DETECTIVE ABBOTT joins him.)

DETECTIVE ABBOTT: You see those marks, right? And the ones over here on the rafter?

(DOGGETT looks at similar marks on the rafter.)

DETECTIVE ABBOTT: If you ask me, those look like claw marks. I don't care what kind of a savage he is, what did this isn't human.

DOGGETT: Well, if I may speak for Agent Scully, I think we're both prepared to concede that point, Detective.

DETECTIVE ABBOTT: Then you know what this thing is?

DOGGETT: I've got a newspaper article I want to show you.

(SCULLY is coming up the attic stairs.)

SCULLY: Agent Doggett...

DOGGETT: (pulling out the article) A rather strange account from 1956…

SCULLY: I found something. A photo album. I think it's our first break on this case.

DETECTIVE ABBOTT: What is it?

(SCULLY has the photo album that MRS. MCKESSON was looking at. It is bagged in plastic.)

SCULLY: The victim's daughter-- Ariel-- her dead body was pulled from the river here last week.

DETECTIVE ABBOTT: I got that call. Had to come tell Mrs. McKesson the bad news. You trying to say there's some kind of connection?

SCULLY: Well, you not only told her mother that her 62-year-old daughter was dead but that her body had been horribly and inexplicably burned. A daughter who, by the way, she hadn't even seen in over 40 years. Since 1956, to be exact-- which is the date your article says those first killings started.

(DOGGETT glances at his newspaper article.)

DETECTIVE ABBOTT: Do you see the connection?

DOGGETT: I'm not, uh... sure where you're going with this, Agent Scully.

SCULLY: The daughter is the connection.

DETECTIVE ABBOTT: How is that?

SCULLY: I don't know exactly but these killings only started up since her burned body has been found.

(DETECTIVE ABBOTT stares at SCULLY in disbelief.)

DETECTIVE ABBOTT: Honest to god. You just jump at whatever explanation is the wildest and most far-fetched, don't you?

SCULLY: Well, I suggest that you jump at it, too because her body may have been burned for a reason and you're going to want to exhume it in order to find out why.

DETECTIVE ABBOTT: You want me to dig up a dead body when I have real people out there whose lives are in real danger?

DOGGETT: Hey...

(DOGGETT steps between DETECTIVE ABBOTT and SCULLY. He speaks softly to DETECTIVE ABBOTT. DETECTIVE ABBOTT doesn't looks pleased, but he glances from DOGGETT to SCULLY, then leaves without a word. SCULLY watches him go, then turns her attention to DOGGETT. She is not happy.)

SCULLY: What did you say to him?

DOGGETT: (uncomfortable, avoiding eye contact) Well, I told him to dig up the body. Isn't that what you wanted?

SCULLY: What else did you say to him?

DOGGETT: Well, I told him that you were … um … a... leading authority on paranormal phenomena and who are we to argue with an expert.

SCULLY: Look, I am not an expert. I am a scientist who happens to have seen a lot. I am just making a leap here.

DOGGETT: Well, I am sure you have your reasons.

SCULLY: Look, so, so, what, you told him to exhume the body when you don't even necessarily believe me yourself?

(DOGGETT sighs.)

DOGGETT: I told you I spent the weekend looking through that cabinet full of X-Files and I saw how pretty much every X-File broke-- with a leap. Now, maybe I'm just an old- fashioned cop but I don't take leaps. In my experience leaps only get people killed.

SCULLY: Well, I'd say that you're taking a pretty big leap believing in that article... about a human bat.

(She looks at him directly. He nods and walks away.)

(Unknown location. Old barn-type of building full of small bats. A man with kerchief almost completely covering his face enters. He is carrying a small wire cage. He walks over to where several small bats are hanging upside down. They squeal as he grabs two of them and gently places them in the cage. He leaves the barn and goes to a nearby rustic cabin and enters. He closes the front door on which is nailed the body of a dead bat.)

(Foggy graveyard. Night. Spooky. DETECTIVE ABBOTT pulls up near a gravesite where two GRAVEDIGGERS are removing a coffin. He gets out his car and goes to them.)

DETECTIVE ABBOTT: I don't know how you do it. Called the judge's order in a half ago. You guys are fast.

GRAVEDIGGER 1: Yep, we're really fast when someone's done most of our work.

DETECTIVE ABBOTT: What are you talking about?

GRAVEDIGGER 1: (spits) We got out here, somebody had already dug up the box. All we had to do was haul it out. I don't know what they were using but they scratched up the wood on the lid real good. See?

(The lid of the coffin is deeply gouged.)

DETECTIVE ABBOTT: Let's get this down to the morgue. I think the sooner, the better.

(The GRAVEDIGGERS carry the coffin to their truck, load it in, then drive away. DETECTIVE ABBOTT continues to look around. He notices something in a large hole of a tree trunk. It is the BAT THING. The BAT THING opens its eyes and looks at DETECTIVE ABBOTT.)

DETECTIVE ABBOTT: God!

(DETECTIVE ABBOTT begins running away. The BAT THING launches itself after him – a single leap carrying it several yards. It lands on DETECTIVE ABBOTT and begins attacking. DETECTIVE ABBOTT screams and manages to get away for a moment, but the BAT THING's next leap catches him again and we hear DETECTIVE ABBOTT screaming and the BAT THING feeding. That's what happens when you mess with Scully, bud.)

(Morgue. SCULLY, in scrubs, watches as DETECTIVE ABBOTT's body is wheeled in. CLOCK INDICATES THAT IT IS 1:07 AM. She looks up as DOGGETT enters. The SHERIFF'S DEPUTY sticks his head in and addresses DOGGETT.)

SHERIFF'S DEPUTY: I want a word with you.

(DOGGETT glances at SCULLY, then follows the SHERIFF'S DEPUTY into a room with several other deputies. They look rather hostile.)

SHERIFF'S DEPUTY: Look, we listened to you. The Detective listened to you. We could have been out hunting this thing down, Agent Doggett.

DOGGETT: You should be doing that now.

SHERIFF'S DEPUTY: Now? Now's too late for the Detective, isn't it? Look, we don't need you telling us what to do or your partner. She's the one responsible for this.

DOGGETT: Nobody's responsible for this except for whatever did it.

SHERIFF'S DEPUTY: Look, I don't care who she is or what she is, she's not touching that body. We don't need her far-out theories. She's not welcome here.

(The DEPUTIES leave the room. DOGGETT rejoins SCULLY in the morgue.)

SCULLY: What happened to the lynch mob?

DOGGETT: You hear all that?

SCULLY: I heard enough.

DOGGETT: Things have taken a little turn.

(He pulls the sheet over the body.)

SCULLY: I don't think so, Agent Doggett.

DOGGETT: Well, you can think what you want but I think this looks bad for the FBI.

SCULLY: It was unavoidable.

DOGGETT: How do you figure that?

(SCULLY uncovers a badly burned female body on another table.)

SCULLY: This is the body pulled from the river. She died of natural causes-- congestive heart failure-- but her body was only burned afterwards.

DOGGETT: By who, and why burn it?

SCULLY: Well, obviously to cover something up.

DOGGETT: Yeah, but what?

SCULLY: That's what I still don't know.

DOGGETT: Look, we know what we're looking for. We should be out there looking for it. We're not going to catch it standing here speculating.

SCULLY: Look, it kills like an animal, but with purpose. It stalked the detective for the same reason that it stalked the old woman and the undertaker. Each of those victims had had contact with this burnt body. The undertaker prepared it. Her mother ID'd it and the Detective got the call when she was found.

DOGGETT: Well, who else would have had contact with it?

SCULLY: The, uh, man who found her in the river. (looks at the file) A, uh, Myron Stefaniuk.

DOGGETT: Stefaniuk?

SCULLY: Yeah.

DOGGETT: One of the hunters in the photo in 1956 was Ernie Stefaniuk.

SCULLY: There's an address in his file. I hope we're not too late.

(An old man, MYRON STEFANIUK, is kneeling beside the riverbank hauling in a rope/raft contraption between the main shore and the shore of an island in the middle of the river. He stops and stands as DOGGETT and SCULLY pull up beside him and get out of their car.)

DOGGETT: Mr. Stefaniuk?

SCULLY: Myron Stefaniuk?

(MYRON STEFANIUK looks at them warily.)

MYRON STEFANIUK: That's me.

(SCULLY looks relaxed. DOGGETT, being the manly man he is, has one hand resting casually on his gun.)

SCULLY: (relieved sigh) Good. Sorry. You gave us a bit of a scare. We went to your home up the road and we couldn't find you.

MYRON STEFANIUK: Why would that scare you?

DOGGETT: Well, sir, we work with the FBI and we have reason to believe that your life may be in danger.

MYRON STEFANIUK: I'm in danger?

SCULLY: Well, we're investigating some murders, sir, that we believe may be connected to the burnt body that you found recently.

MYRON STEFANIUK: I fished it out of the river. What have I got to do with anything?

DOGGETT: Well, we're not saying for sure that you do.

SCULLY: It may just be your connection to the body.

MYRON STEFANIUK: There is no connection. I just fished it out of the river.

SCULLY: Well, sorry, sir, but that may be enough.

MYRON STEFANIUK: It's nonsense. Leave me alone.

DOGGETT: Ernie Stefaniuk. Lived in Montana in 1956. Do you know him?

(This stops MYRON STEFANIUK. He slowly turns back to them.)

MYRON STEFANIUK: Ernie was my brother.

DOGGETT: He was one of three hunters that killed a man that was half animal.

MYRON STEFANIUK: Please! That was a long time ago.

DOGGETT: Do you know where we can find him to talk with him, sir?

MYRON STEFANIUK: My brother's dead. That thing killed him.

DOGGETT: Well, I have a newspaper story that says your brother disappeared.

MYRON STEFANIUK: That was 40 years ago. Leave it alone! Leave me alone!

(Upset, MYRON STEFANIUK gets into his old pickup and drives away.)

(Later, SCULLY and DOGGETT are sitting in their car watching MYRON STEFANIUK through binoculars. He is filling five gallon gas cans from a tank in his yard with a plastic siphon.)

SCULLY: You know, we've been out here for nine hours. The only thing this man seems to be in danger of is terminal loneliness.

(DOGGETT chuckles at her joke.)

SCULLY: (depressed) Maybe I'm wrong. Maybe this is all just a... a grand coincidence and we're wasting our time out here.

DOGGETT: You were so sure before.

SCULLY: Yeah, I was sure of the facts as I had deduced them scientifically. Maybe I'm... I'm trying to force them into shape. Maybe I'm manufacturing a theory.

DOGGETT: Well, what happened to taking a leap?

SCULLY: Maybe I'm just trying too hard.

DOGGETT: To do what? To be Mulder?

(She thinks seriously about that.)

DOGGETT: You know, I'm not Oxford educated. About all I know about the paranormal is men are from Mars and women are from Venus. But I don't think you're wrong, Agent Scully.

SCULLY: What makes you say that?

DOGGETT: Well, I'm no Fox Mulder, but I can tell when a man's hiding something. Myron Stefaniuk fishes a woman out of the river who's been gone for 40 years. He has a brother he hasn't seen in over 40 years. A brother who just happened to hunt down some kind of creature over 40 years ago.

SCULLY: Well, what does he have to hide?

DOGGETT: Well, that's what I'm hoping this good cop work is going to show us.

(SCULLY raises her binoculars again. Inside the barn, MYRON STEFANIUK loads the last of the gas cans into the back of his truck which full of other supplies also. He closes and locks the tailgate, then pushes the large sliding doors of the barn open. As he gets into the truck, starts the engine and drives away, the camera pans up to show the BAT THING hanging from the rafter. It's eyes open.)

(Short time later, MYRON STEFANIUK places the gas cans on the raft and begins hauling them across to the island in the middle of the river.)

(Night. DOGGETT is rowing a small boat toward the island. SCULLY is in the stern of the boat, flashlight in hand.)

DOGGETT: You there!

SCULLY: Stop right there!

(The MASKED MAN we saw earlier collecting bats has been getting supplies from the raft. He runs back into the woods.)

SCULLY: I see him.

(Gun out, SCULLY leaps out of the boat and follows. DOGGETT is a few steps behind and has to splash through the water.)

SCULLY: Stop where you are! Put your hands up and out! Now, turn around, slowly.

DOGGETT: Are you Ernie Stefaniuk? Are you Ernie Stefaniuk?

MASKED MAN: (terrified, gasping) Yeah.

(DOGGETT pulls down the mask. The old bearded man turns away from the light.)

(Later, they are in his cabin. DOGGETT looks at the bat nailed to the door.)

ERNIE STEFANIUK: How's a man supposed to live when his fear becomes obsession? You'd do the same thing. Who wouldn't who wanted to live?

DOGGETT: You never left the island?

ERNIE STEFANIUK: 44 years-- I wouldn't dare knowing it was out there. That it could come back for me.

DOGGETT: You know something about it? About what this thing is?

ERNIE STEFANIUK: I know on the evolutionary ladder bats are real close by the apes and just as we came from the apes so might a man, sprung from a bat. To live and hunt like a bat but with the cold-blooded vengeance of a man.

SCULLY: Even if that were true, sir, how could it possibly find you out here on an island?

ERNIE STEFANIUK: I needed to cut off all contact. Communication could be only one-way. My brother helped me. (holding back tears) And then there was my wife.

DOGGETT: It was her body your brother pulled in.

ERNIE STEFANIUK: (crying) She gave up everything to be with me. I forbade her to tell her mother. 44 years on six acres of island, she made only one demand. To be buried in consecrated earth. She was a Catholic her whole life. (breaks down crying)

(SCULLY and DOGGETT look at each other.)

SCULLY: Mr. Stefaniuk... it's killed four people. All of whom would have had traces of your scent through various degrees of contact with your wife's body.

ERNIE STEFANIUK: My brother?

DOGGETT: Your brother's okay, Ernie.

ERNIE STEFANIUK: But he had contact with Ariel's body. It'll come after him, too.

SCULLY: He's all right. We spoke with him earlier today.

ERNIE STEFANIUK: Today? Today, he might have been fine but this thing hunts likes a bat. It only attacks at night.

(DOGGETT and SCULLY look at each other. They both start for the door.)

DOGGETT: Stay here. Stay with him.

(SCULLY looks reluctant, but she stays. Manly man leaves.)

(DOGGETT goes back down to the boat and picks up the oar floating in the water. The BAT THING jumps out of the woods and lands on DOGGETT. It screams as they wrestle in the water. DOGGETT manages to fight it off in a frenzy of water and wings, but then he sinks under the water, unconscious.)

(Inside the cabin. SCULLY and ERNIE STEFANIUK wait. SCULLY is looking out the window.)

ERNIE STEFANIUK: I still don't understand.

SCULLY: What's that?

ERNIE STEFANIUK: How'd you find me out here?

SCULLY: We followed your brother.

ERNIE STEFANIUK: No, I mean who figured it out?

SCULLY: I was sure that what we were looking for was something other than a man. Uh, the detective who was running the case didn't believe that, and...uh, … he's dead.

ERNIE STEFANIUK: But your partner, he believed it?

SCULLY: I think he does now.

ERNIE STEFANIUK: So it was you who figured it.

(SCULLY is not comfortable taking the credit for this.)

SCULLY: Well, I … I made the connections but it was Agent Doggett that got us out here.

ERNIE STEFANIUK: You ought to be wishing he hadn't.

SCULLY: Excuse me?

ERNIE STEFANIUK: The moment you stepped foot here... You're marked now, you know that.

SCULLY: Sir, I'm here to protect you.

ERNIE STEFANIUK: And how are you going to do that? You thought of everything... Except that.

SCULLY: Well, this thing, Mr. Stefaniuk is … uh … still flesh and blood. It can be killed.

ERNIE STEFANIUK: What do you think? It's just going to come walking through the door, there? It's waited 44 years. It'll wait out there as long as it takes until you can't stand it anymore. How long can you wait, huh? A lifetime? To live in fear like this, a young woman-- are you prepared to sacrifice family, children and spend your life terrorized by a monster?

(A loud beeping sounds from a monitor on the table. They move toward it. It displays a radar sweep.)

SCULLY: What is that?

ERNIE STEFANIUK: (nervous) It's ground radar. The sensor's set at ten feet high. Anything big enough to set it off is coming in through the trees.

(They hear a thumping on the roof. SCULLY draws her gun and points it at the roof. She fires through the roof nine times, then five more times.)

SCULLY: You hear it?

ERNIE STEFANIUK: No.

(SCULLY puts a new clip in her gun.)

SCULLY: Maybe I got it. Maybe I killed it.

(She opens the door and looks out. She sees nothing.)

SCULLY: If you've got a gun, get it.

(She closes the door and goes outside and looks up at the roof. She sees nothing.)

(Inside the cabin, ERNIE STEFANIUK loads an old shotgun with shaking hands. He starts as a stick of firewood rolls out of the fireplace. He looks at the fireplace in terror.)

(Outside, SCULLY continues to look around.)

(Inside, ERNIE STEFANIUK, slowly peers up the chimney. He sees nothing and steps back. He turns to the BAT THING right behind him.)

(Outside, SCULLY hears him scream and sees a shotgun blast explode through the roof. She runs back inside and sees the BAT THING attacking ERNIE SETFANIUK. It looks up at her, its mouth bloody. SCULLY fires five shots into its back. It flies out of sight. As SCULLY looks for it, she is startled by DOGGETT's entrance.)

DOGGETT: Agent Scully.

(The BAT THING flies at DOGGETT knocking him to the ground. DOGGETT fires eleven shots at it as it flies away, screaming. SCULLY helps him up.)

DOGGETT: You okay?

SCULLY: Yeah. I'm okay. But you're not, Agent Doggett. I got you.

(SCULLY gently helps DOGGETT lie down and begins checking his injuries. DOGGETT loses consciousness. SCULLY looks up into the trees at the sound of the BAT THING screeching defiantly at her.)

(X-Files office. SCULLY is alone. She picks up MULDER's nameplate again. DOGGETT enters. As a manly man, he has fully recovered from his wounds.)

DOGGETT: Sorry I'm late. I received a fax up in my old office from Ernie's brother, Myron Stefaniuk.

SCULLY: He's alive? Where is he?

DOGGETT: He doesn't say. He sent this from a small storefront business just across the state line in Wyoming. He's gone into hiding.

SCULLY: Do you believe it, Agent Doggett?

DOGGETT: Believe it?

SCULLY: That this thing is still out there and someday it's going to come after us?

DOGGETT: (not ultra-confident) I'm pretty sure I hit it, Agent Scully. Pretty sure you hit it, too. The guys upstairs were making some noise about this case-- about what's in our field report.

SCULLY: Yeah. You'll get used to it.

(She picks up the nameplate again.)

SCULLY: I, uh... I never had a desk in here, Agent Doggett but I'll see that you get one.

(DOGGETT is surprised, not sure what she is saying.)

DOGGETT: All right.

SCULLY: And I just want to say, um... thank you for watching my back.

DOGGETT: Well, I never saw it as an option. I'm sure you don't either.

(They look at each other a moment. DOGGETT crosses over to a file cabinet and begins looking through it. SCULLY looks at the nameplate again, opens the desk drawer, pauses, then places it inside and closes the drawer.)

[THE END]