(We open in a snow storm. Two heavily bundled humans are running through the snow, following strange looking tracks which lead into a cave. They enter and, once inside, we see sparks fly as they whack a couple of rocks together and light torches with the fire. Like all good horror movie duos, they split up to continue their search. Soon after, one of them hears a strange shriek-type noise in the distance, but ignores it and moves on. He then encounters an ice wall, which holds a frozen human. Suddenly, the tracker is attacked by a creature we can't quite see, due to fast camera cuts. The creature and human roll around in combat, the creature slashing the man until he kills him. The man's friend appears and stabs the creature with something (looks like a stake, maybe his comrade's torch?) and the creature disappears into the darkness of the cave. The man looks down at his friend's lifeless form, then starts to look around for the creature. They find each other, a battle ensues, the man stabs the creature several times and finally kills it. From out of its wounds seeps a black oil which takes on a life of its own as it changes direction and begins to flow towards the man. It enters his body, crawling under his skin from his feet on up to his eyes. The man starts to moan and cry out in pain as the camera pans upwards leaving us in darkness.)

(The darkness is now the view from underneath a boy, Stevie, as he falls through the earth, landing in an underground cavern. His three friends look down upon him.)

KID 1: Hey, Stevie, you ok?

STEVIE: I got... I got... (coughs) I got the wind knocked out of me.

KID 2: Looks like a cave or something.

(Stevie looks around and then wanders deeper into the cavern.)

KID 1: Stevie? What's going on?

(Stevie reappears with something in his hands, which he holds up for the others to see.)

STEVIE: It's a human skull!

KID 2: Toss it up here, dude!

STEVIE: No way butt-wipe, this is mine. Anyway, there's bones all over the place, man.

(Stevie admires the skull, then he looks down and sees a puddle of black oil under his right shoe.)

STEVIE: What the...?

(Suddenly, he drops the skull and grabs his stomach, looking ill. The black oil begins to crawl up his body and onto his face, creeping underneath his skin.)

KID 1: Stevie?

KID 2: Hey, Stevie, you okay?

(As he looks up, we see his eyes cloud over with the oil.)

KID 2: Hey man, let's get out of here.

(The boys run away from the hole. The camera pans back to show that the scene is happening in a suburban area outside a large town. Fade to later the same day as fire trucks, marked as "Blackwood County Fire Dept.", pull up to the scene.)

FIRE CHIEF: (looking down hole) Give me a fourteen footer!

(A ladder slams down onto the bottom of the hole.)

FIRE CHIEF: (on his radio) Captain Miles Cooledge, got a rescue situation in progress. I'll be the whole town HC. Rope's in the hole, (to his men) let's go, two down.

(Two men climb down into the hole and crouch by Stevie, who is lying down in the dirt in the cavern.)

FIRE CHIEF: (talking to radio) What ya got, TC? Talk to me. (static on radio) Do ya see the boy? Talk to me. (static) Come back, TC, do ya see the kid? (static) Jerry, check TC's radio. (he whacks the radio) TC? (static) Glen, South, in the hole.

(A black helicopter flies in and lands at the scene as some of the firemen watch and wonder. Four men in biohazard suits exit and carry a person-sized container towards the hole. The fire chief starts to walk towards the helicopter as a man, Bronschweig, exits the chopper.)

BRONSCHWEIG (to the fire chief, indicating the crowd that has gathered to watch the proceedings) Get those people out of here!

(The chief and one of his men yell at the crowd to "Get back!" and they slowly move out of the way. Both the chief and Bronschweig start to walk towards the hole.)

FIRE CHIEF: I sent four men down there for the boy. Report is, his eyes have turned black. Now we've lost communication with my men.

(The men in suits carry the container, which now has the boy in it, to the helicopter, Bronschweig looks at the boy then follows the men to the helicopter, standing and watching them load him on.)

FIRE CHIEF: What about my men?

(Bronschweig turns and looks at him as the copter starts to take off.)

FIRE CHIEF: What about my men??

(Several tanker trucks and semi-trucks pull up to the scene.)

FIRE CHIEF: What the hell is this?

(Bronschweig watches, and then walks behind one of the trucks where no one else can hear. He dials a number on his cell phone.)

BRONSCHWEIG (in phone) It's Bronschweig. Sir, the impossible scenario that we never planned for? Well, we better come up with a plan.

(The scene opens with FBI agents on the federal building's roof. A helicopter lands and out comes Darius Michaud.)

FBI GUY: We've evacuated the building and been through it bottom to top. There's no trace of an explosive device or anything resembling one.

MICHAUD: Have you sent the dogs through yet?

FBI GUY: Yes, sir.

MICHAUD: Well, send 'em through again.

(He begins to walk away, towards the edge of the roof, facing another building across the street.)

FBI GUY: (to other FBI agents) All right guys, let's do it again.

(Michaud looks at a building across the street where a lone person is walking on the roof. Cut to the other building where we see Scully talking on her cell phone.)

SCULLY: Mulder, it's me.

MULDER: Where are you, Scully?

SCULLY: I'm on the roof.

MULDER: Did you find anything?

SCULLY: (irritated voice) No I haven't.

MULDER: What's wrong?

SCULLY: Well, I just climbed up 12 floors, I'm hot, I'm thirsty and to be honest, I'm wondering what I'm doing up here.

MULDER: You're looking for a bomb.

SCULLY: Yes, I know that, but the threat was called in to the federal building across the street.

MULDER: I think they have that covered.

SCULLY: Mulder, when a terrorist bomb threat is called in, the rational purpose of providing that information is to allow us to find the bomb. The rational object of terrorism is to promote terror. If you'd study the statistics, you'd find the model behavioral pattern for virtually every case where a threat has turned up an explosive device; and if we don't act in accordance with that data, if you ignore it as we have done, the chances are great that if there actually is a bomb, we might not find it. Lives could be lost .... Mulder. Mulder?

(he appears behind her)

MULDER: Boom.

SCULLY: (startled) Jesus, Mulder!

MULDER: Whatever happened to playing a hunch, Scully? The element of surprise, random acts of unpredictability? If we fail to anticipate the unforeseen or expect the unexpected in a universe of infinite possibilities, we may find ourselves at the mercy of anyone or anything that cannot be programmed, categorized or easily referenced. (he pops a sunflower seed into his mouth) What are we doing up here, Scully? It's hotter than hell.

SCULLY: I know you're bored in this assignment, Mulder, but unconventional thinking is only gonna get you in trouble now.

MULDER: What makes you think I'm bored?

SCULLY: You've gotta quit looking for what isn't there. They've closed the X-files. There's procedure to be followed now ... protocol.

MULDER: Maybe we should call in a bomb threat to Houston. I think it's free beer night at the Astrodome.

(Scully attempts to open the door)

SCULLY: Aww, now what?

MULDER: It's locked?

SCULLY So much for anticipating the unforeseen. (Mulder tries to open the door and it opens easily, Scully smiles.) ... I had you.

MULDER: No, you didn't.

SCULLY: Oh, yeah. I had you big time.

MULDER: You had nothing. Come on, I saw you jiggle the handle.

(They exit the stairwell, next to the elevator at the bottom floor, a group of children is being led into the elevator.)

SCULLY: I saw your face, Mulder. There was a definite moment of panic.

MULDER: You've never seen me panic. When I panic, I make this face.

(Mulder's face registers no emotion.)

SCULLY: That was the face.

MULDER: You didn't see that face.

SCULLY: I saw that face. (she smiles) You're buyin'.

MULDER: What? Coke, Pepsi, saline IV?

SCULLY: Something sweet.

(Mulder heads down to a room containing the vending machines, passing a man on his way out. He puts money in the machine, pushes a button, then another, then all of them, nothing comes out. He whacks the side of it, then shakes the machine, angry at losing his money. He happens to look beside it and notices that the machine is unplugged. He tries to open the door, it's locked. He calls Scully on her cell phone (555-0113). Cut to the lobby, where Scully is standing, waiting for her drink.)

SCULLY: (answering her phone) Scully.

MULDER: Scully, I found the bomb.

SCULLY: (smiling) You're funny. Where are you, Mulder?

MULDER: I'm in the vending room.

(Mulder pounds on the door)

SCULLY: Is that you pounding?

MULDER: Yeah, you gotta get somebody to open that door.

(Scully tries the doorknob, but it doesn't turn)

SCULLY: Nice try, Mulder.

MULDER: Look, Scully, it's in the soda machine, you've got about fourteen minutes to evacuate this building.

(Cut back to Scully outside of the vending room, she looks down at her watch.)

SCULLY: Come on, Mulder ... (slight laugh)

(The camera pans to show that the machine is now open and filled with explosives. A timer is ticking down.)

MULDER: Thirteen fifty-six, thirteen fifty-four, thirteen fifty-two, thirteen fifty. You see a pattern emerging here, Scully?

(Scully looks down and realizes that the key hole has been welded shut.)

SCULLY: Hold on, Mulder, I'm gonna get you out of there.

(We see Mulder standing in front of the machine, "panic" written all over his face. Cut to Scully as she rushes back to the lobby and gives orders to the security guard.)

SCULLY: I need this building evacuated and cleared out in 10 minutes! I want you to call the fire department and have them block off the city center in a one mile radius around the building!

GUARD: Ten minutes?

SCULLY: (she points at him with her phone) Don't think! Just pick up that phone and make it happen! (on her cell phone) This is Special Agent Dana Scully, I need to speak to SAC Michaud, he's got the wrong building!

(Numerous police cars and firetrucks pull up to the building. Michaud exits a car and begins to hastily walk towards the building. Scully comes out to meet him.)

MICHAUD: Where is it?

SCULLY: He found it in the vending room. He's locked in with it.

(Cut to Mulder sitting in a chair in front of the vending machine, staring at the bomb, still making his panic face. His phone rings, startling him. He lets out the breath he was holding and answers it.)

MULDER: Scully, you know that face I just showed you? I'm making it again.

SCULLY: Mulder, move away from the door, we're coming through it.

(Scully and the bomb team cut through the door with a torch. The door is kicked open and everyone piles into the room.)

MULDER: (to Michaud, as he points at the bomb) Tell me that's just soda pop in those canisters.

MICHAUD: (looking at bomb) It's just what it looks like. A big I.E.D. (pauses) Ten gallons of Astrolite. Okay, get everybody out of here, clear the area.

FBI GUY: Come on, let's go.

(Everyone leaves except Michaud, Mulder and Scully)

MULDER: Somebody's got to stay with you.

MICHAUD: (irritated) I just gave you a direct order. Now get the hell out of here and evacuate the building!

SCULLY: Can you defuse it?

MICHAUD: Yes I can.

MULDER: We got less than four minutes to find out if you're right.

MICHAUD: Did you hear what I said? (Mulder nods) Get out.

SCULLY: Come on, Mulder.

(She starts to leave, Mulder hesitates, looking at Michaud, then turns to follow her out. Cut to outside the building as people pour out onto the street. Cut back to Michaud sitting passively in the chair in front of the bomb. Cut to Mulder and Scully running out of the building. Mulder slows down and looks back.)

SCULLY: Mulder, what are you doing?

MULDER: Something's wrong.

SCULLY: Mulder ...

(Scully grabs Mulder by his arm.)

MULDER: Something's not right.

SCULLY: Mulder, get in the car, there's no time!

POLICEMAN BY CAR: Go on, get in the car!

(They get into the waiting police car. Shot of inside the building with Michaud sitting waiting for the bomb to go off, his face in his hands. Cut to the cop car as it drives off, Mulder turning in his seat to look at the building. The bomb explodes, sending Michaud flying backwards. The building is destroyed, cars are sent flying, Mulder and Scully's police car's windows explode as the car rocks from the blast, mucho Big Screen Destruction. Mulder and Scully slowly get out of the car and look at the damage.)

MULDER: Next time, you're buying.

(Scully is sitting in the office before a review board. Assistant Director Jana Cassidy is speaking to her. Assistant Director Walter Skinner is seated on the panel as well.)

CASSIDY: In light of Waco and Ruby Ridge, there is a heightened need at the Attorney General's office to place responsibility as early as possible for the catastrophic destruction of public property and loss of life due to terrorist activities. Many details are still unclear, but we're under some pressure from the Attorney General to give an accurate picture of what happened so that she can issue a public statement. We know now that five people died, in the explosion. Special ...

(Mulder enters the room, late, and Cassidy pauses, looking up at him, as do Scully and Skinner.)

CASSIDY: .. Special Agent In Charge Darius Michaud, who was trying to defuse the bomb, three firemen from Dallas and a young boy. I'd like to begin this interview ...

MULDER: Excuse me, excuse me, the firemen and the young boy, they were found in the building?

CASSIDY: Agent Mulder, since you weren't able to be on time for this hearing, I'd like you to step outside so that we can hear Agent Scully's version of the facts so that she will not be paid the same disrespect.

MULDER: We'd been told the building was clear.

CASSIDY: You'll get your turn, Agent Mulder, please step outside.

(Mulder looks at Scully, then leaves the room. He is now seated on a bench in the hallway, eating sunflower seeds, husks and all. Skinner leaves the hearing room and joins him in the hallway. Mulder stands up.)

SKINNER: Sit down, they're still talking to Agent Scully.

MULDER: About what? (he sits back down)

SKINNER: They're asking her for a narrative, they want to know why she was in the wrong building.

MULDER: She was with me.

SKINNER: You don't see what's going on here, do you? There's forty-five million dollars worth of damage to the city of Dallas. Lives have been lost. No suspects have been named. So the story that's being shaped ... is that this could have been prevented.

MULDER: They want to blame us?

(Skinner sits down next to him.)

SKINNER: Agent Mulder, you and I both know that if it looks bad, it's bad for the FBI. Blame has to be assigned somewhere

(Mulder looks down at the ground, then looks up at Skinner.)

MULDER: If they want somebody to blame, they can blame me, Agent Scully doesn't deserve this.

SKINNER: She's in there right now saying the same thing about you.

MULDER: I breached protocol. I broke contact with the SAC. I ignored a primary tactical rule and left him alone with the device.

SKINNER: Agent Scully says it was she who ordered you out of the building, that you wanted to go back in.

MULDER: No.

(Both men stand as Scully leaves the hearing room and walks over to them.)

SCULLY: (to Skinner) They're asking for you, sir.

SKINNER: Thank you. (he leaves)

MULDER: Whatever you told them in there, Scully, you don't have to protect me.

SCULLY: All I told them was the truth.

MULDER: They're trying to divide us on this and we can't let them.

SCULLY: Mulder, they have divided us. They're splitting us up.

MULDER: What? What are you talking about?

SCULLY: I have a meeting with OPR day after tomorrow for remediation and reassignment.

MULDER: But they're the ones who put us together.

SCULLY: Because they wanted me to invalidate your investigations into the paranormal. But I think this goes deeper than that now.

MULDER: This is not about you, Scully. They're doing this to me.

SCULLY: They're not doing this. (pause as she collects her thoughts) Mulder, I left behind a career in medicine because I thought that I could make a difference at the FBI. But it hasn't turned out that way. And now if they were to transfer me to Omaha or Cleveland, or some field office, it just doesn't hold the interest for me that it once did. Not after what I've seen and done.

MULDER: (realizing what she's saying) You're quitting.

SCULLY: Maybe you should ask yourself if your heart's still in it, too.

(Skinner comes back out for Mulder)

SKINNER: Agent Mulder, you're up.

SCULLY: (to Mulder) I'm sorry.

(Mulder begins to walk back to the boardroom)

SCULLY: Mulder. (she hands Mulder his jacket, which he left on the bench) Good luck.

(Mulder enters the hearing room. Scully pauses for a moment, then turns and leaves the building.)

BARTENDER: (filling a glass) I'd say this just about exceeds your minimum daily requirement.

(Mulder empties the glass and as he sets it down he knocks over some of the numerous other glasses on the bar.)

BARTENDER: Whoa, you've gotta train for that kind of heavy lifting. Poopy day?

(Mulder points his two index fingers at her, then points one finger on the bar as a sign that he wants another. She clears away all the empty glasses and places one on the bar to be filled. While he waits, Mulder looks over his shoulder and notices a man at the bar watching him.)

BARTENDER: So, whaddya do?

MULDER: What do I do?

BARTENDER: Mmm hmm.

(Mulder takes a sip from his new drink, puts it down and begins his tale.)

MULDER: I'm the key figure in an on-going government charade, the plot to conceal the truth about the existence of extraterrestrials. (The bartender looks up at the last word, stops wiping down the bar, he now has her full attention.) It's a global conspiracy, actually, with key players in the highest levels of power, that reaches down into the lives of every man, woman, and child on this planet. (he laughs) So, of course, no one believes me. I'm an annoyance to my superiors, a joke to my peers. They call me Spooky. Spooky Mulder, whose sister was abducted by aliens when he was just a kid and who now chases after little green men with a badge and a gun, shouting to the heavens or to anyone who will listen that the fix is in, that the sky is falling and when it hits it's gonna be the shit-storm of all time.

BARTENDER: Well. I would say that about does it, Spooky. (takes the drink away from Mulder)

MULDER: Does what?

BARTENDER: Well, looks like eighty-six is your lucky number.

(Mulder takes some money out of his wallet)

MULDER: You know, one is the loneliest number.

(Mulder looks over his shoulder again and sees the man is no longer at the bar. He then gets up, wavers a bit, walks to the men's room and finds it out of order. He knocks on the women's door and it's occupied. He goes out the exit into the alley and relieves himself just above a poster for the movie "Independence Day". The man from the bar, Dr. Kurtzweil, walks outside.)

KURTZWEIL: That official FBI business?

MULDER: What?

KURTZWEIL: Bet the Bureau's accusing you of the same thing in Dallas. Standing around holding your yank while bombs are exploding.

MULDER: (annoyed) Do I know you?

KURTZWEIL: No, but I've been watching your career for a good while, back when you were just a promising young agent. Before that.

(Mulder continues his business, then turns his head towards Kurtzweil, annoyed that he's still standing there.)

MULDER: You come out here for a reason?

KURTZWEIL: Yeah, I did.

(Kurtzweil unzips his pants, steps up to the wall and begins to relieve himself. Mulder starts to walk inside.)

KURTZWEIL: My name is Kurtzweil, Doctor Alvin Kurtzweil.

MULDER: Am I supposed to know that name?

KURTZWEIL: An old friend of your father's.

(Mulder turns back around to look at Kurtzweil)

KURTZWEIL: Back at the Department of State we were what you might call fellow travellers, but his disenchantment outlasted mine.

MULDER: All right.

(Mulder goes back into the bar, Kurtzweil quickly zips up and follows him inside. Mulder walks to the coat rack where his jacket is hanging and starts to put it on.)

MULDER: How'd ya find me?

KURTZWEIL: I heard you come in here now and again, figured you'd be needing a little drinkie tonight.

MULDER: You a reporter?

KURTZWEIL: I'm a doctor, but I think I mentioned that. OB-GYN.

MULDER: You've got something to tell me, you've got as much time as it takes for me to hail a cab.

(Mulder and Kurtzweil are outside now, Mulder is raising his hand to hail a cab.)

KURTZWEIL: There's something you don't know about the bombing in Dallas.

MULDER: What's that?

KURTZWEIL: SAC Darius Michaud never tired, or intended, to defuse that bomb.

MULDER: (skeptical voice) He just let it explode in his face, huh?

KURTZWEIL: What's the question no one's asking? (Mulder puts up his arm to hail a cab.) Why that building? Why not the federal building?

MULDER: The federal building was too well guarded.

KURTZWEIL: No. They put the bomb in the building across the street because it did have federal offices. The Federal Emergency Management Agency had a provisional medical quarantine office there, which is where the bodies where found. But that's the thing ... the thing you didn't know. The thing you'd never think to check. (pause) Those people were already dead. (Mulder looks at him.)

MULDER: Before the bomb went off?

KURTZWEIL: That's what I'm saying.

MULDER: Darius Michaud was a twenty-two-year veteran of the Bureau.

KURTZWEIL: Michaud was a patriot. The people he was loyal to know their way around Dallas. They blew that building to hide something, maybe even something they couldn't predict.

(A Yellow Cab pulls up)

MULDER: You're telling me they blew up that entire building just to hide the bodies of those firemen.

KURTZWEIL: (nods) And one little boy.

MULDER: I think you're full of shit.

KURTZWEIL: (laughs) Do you?

(Mulder enters the cab and closes the door, looking at Kurtzweil as he stands on the curb.)

MULDER: Arlington, please. (the cab pulls away, Kurtzweil still standing on the curb watching him leave. As the cab drives off, Mulder seems to be contemplating their conversation, then he comes to a decision.) Actually, you know, let's go to Georgetown. Let's go to Georgetown...

(In the darkness of her bedroom, Scully lies awake in bed, staring at the ceiling. She hears knocking on her door. She gets up and answers it, finding Mulder on the other side.)

MULDER: Awww, I woke you ... ( he walks in) Did I wake you?

SCULLY: No.

MULDER: Why not? It's three in the morning...

SCULLY: Are you drunk, Mulder?

MULDER: I ... I ... I was until about 20 minutes ago, yeah.

SCULLY: Was that before or after you decided to come here?

MULDER: What exactly are you implying?

SCULLY: Go home, Mulder.

MULDER: No, get dressed, Scully.

SCULLY: It's late.

MULDER: Get dressed.

SCULLY: What are you doing?

MULDER: Just get dressed, I'll explain on the way.

(Two black helicopters fly across the moon. The area below them is a "hive" of activity as tanker trucks and tractors criss-cross the landscape, punctuated by large white tented domes. The copters land and a figure emerges from one, his clothes flapping in the copters' blades' backwash. He walks a short distance from the copter, stands and places a cigarette in his mouth. From behind his head, we watch him light his ciggie as he stares at two large white tents. Finally, the camera reveals his identity .... it's the Cigarette Smoking Man (hereby known as CSM, although I prefer to call him Cancer Man). Cue the audience's boos or cheers depending on your allegiance. He starts to walk toward the tents. Cut to inside one of the tents, many men, computers, readouts, equipment, a cylinder being wheeled by, then we see a hole in the ground, reinforced by steel as a man in a white bio-hazard suit climbs out. Another man helps him remove his head gear, revealing that it is Bronschweig. He looks over and sees CSM smoking his cigarette. CSM steps over some equipment and walks to Bronschweig.)

CSM: You've got something to show me?

(Scene cuts to inside the hole, CSM now in a bio-hazard suit, climbing down the ladder, Bronschweig already at the bottom.)

BRONSCHWEIG: We brought the atmosphere back down to freezing in order to control the development, which is like nothing we've ever seen.

CSM: Brought on by what?

BRONSCHWEIG: Heat, I think. (they begin to walk down a staircase towards another area in the hole.) The coincident invasion of a host, the fireman, in an environment that raised his body temperature above ninety-eight point six.

(They open the door of the other area where more men in biohazard suits are working, the air inside giving off a steam associated with extreme cold. Bronschweig pulls back a curtain, showing a man covered in goo, barely breathing. CSM looks shocked.)

CSM: This man is still alive.

BRONSCHWEIG: Technically and biologically. But he'll never recover.

(The camera pans down the man's body. We can see something moving inside his chest.)

CSM: How can this be?

BRONSCHWEIG: The developing organism is using his life energy ... digesting bone and tissue ... we've just slowed the process. (CSM keeps looking at the body in shock, his mouth agape.) Do you want us to destroy this one, too? Before it gestates?

CSM: No, no. We need to try our vaccine on it.

BRONSCHWEIG: And if it's unsuccessful?

CSM: Burn it, like the others.

(Nighttime, an overhead camera shot shows cars driving along a road. Cut to inside The Bethesda Naval Hospital as Mulder and Scully walk down a hallway and reach a security desk.)

CLERK: ID and floor you're visiting, please.

MULDER: We're going down to the morgue.

CLERK: That area is currently off limits to anyone other than authorized medical personnel.

MULDER: On whose orders?

CLERK: General McAddie.

(Mulder signs the sign-in book, not sure what name he uses!)

MULDER: General McAddie is who requested our coming down here. We were awakened at three AM and told to get down here immediately.

CLERK: I don't know anything about that.

MULDER: Well, call General McAddie. (he starts to walk away.)

CLERK: I don't have the number. (Mulder stops.)

MULDER: Well, then call the switchboard, they'll patch you through.

(Clerk starts to fumble through some papers.)

MULDER: Jesus, you don't know the switchboard number?

CLERK: I'm calling my C.O.

(He picks up the phone on his desk, Mulder puts his hand on the receiver's button, cutting him off.)

MULDER: Listen, son, we don't have time to dick around while you demonstrate your ignorance of the chain of command. The order came directly from General McAddie, you call him. We'll conduct our business while you confirm authorization.

(Mulder and Scully walk off, leaving the clerk standing with his phone in his hand. Knowing when he's beaten, the clerk believes Mulder.)

CLERK: Why don't you head on down and I'll confirm authorization.

MULDER: Thank you. (quietly to Scully) Why is a morgue suddenly off limits on the orders of a general?

(They arrive in a room full of bodies on gurneys, wrapped up with sheets and tied with ropes. Mulder stops at one of them and looks at its toe tag.)

SCULLY: This is one of the firemen who died in Dallas?

MULDER: According to the toe tag. (he starts to untie it.)

SCULLY: And you're looking for ...?

MULDER: Cause of death.

SCULLY: I can tell you that without even looking at him. (she picks up a paper near the body's head and reads aloud.) "Concussive organ failure due to proximal exposure to source and flying debris." Mulder, this man's already been autopsied, you can tell by the way he's been wrapped and dressed.

(Mulder pulls back the covering sheet. It sticks to a gooey substance which covers the body.)

MULDER: Does this fit the description you just read me?

(Scully walks around to join Mulder on the other side of the gurney, looks down and is shocked at the sight.)

SCULLY: Oh my God. This man's tissue, Mulder ...

MULDER: It's like jelly.

SCULLY: There's been some kind of cellular breakdown. (she snaps on a pair of latex gloves, slides and pushes her fingers gently along the body.) It's completely edematous. There's been no autopsy performed here, no Y-incision, no internal exam.

MULDER: You're telling me the cause of death on that report is false? That this man didn't die from an explosion or from flying debris?

SCULLY: Mulder, I can't tell you what killed this man. I'm not sure anybody else could claim to either.

(Mulder and Scully wheel the body into the lab.)

SCULLY: Mulder, you knew before we got here this man didn't die at the bomb site.

MULDER: I've been told as much.

SCULLY: You're saying this is a cover up? Of what?

MULDER: I don't know, but I have a hunch that what you're gonna find won't be categorized or easily referenced.

(Mulder walks over by the door.)

SCULLY: Mulder, this is gonna take some time. Somebody's going to figure out sooner or later, that we're not even supposed to be here.

MULDER: We are being blamed for this man’s death, I'd like to know what he died of, wouldn't you?

(Mulder leaves the autopsy room.)

(Scene cuts to a street, a garbage truck loading up as a taxicab drives past. Inside the cab is Mulder.)

MULDER: (to cab driver): Think that's it up here.

(He's pointing to an apartment building swarming with cops. Cut to Mulder entering an apartment, cops are all over the place. He looks around, flips through a couple of magazines on a table marked as "National Gynaecology & Obstetrics" and "Obstetrics & Gynaecology". A detective passes by and looks at Mulder.)

DETECTIVE: Excuse me. Can I help you?

MULDER: Is this Dr. Kurtzweil's residence?

DETECTIVE: You have some kind of business with him?

MULDER: Yeah, I'm looking for him.

DETECTIVE: You're looking for him for what?

(Mulder pulls out his FBI badge and shows it to him.)

DETECTIVE: (over his shoulder to another detective) The feds are looking for him too. (to Mulder) Real nice business he's got, huh?

(Mulder is looking through a bookshelf.)

MULDER: What’s that?

DETECTIVE: Selling naked pictures of little kids on his computer. (Mulder stops and looks at him, obviously surprised by this development. He looks down at two books in his hand.) You looking for him for some other reason?

(The first book in Mulder's hand is called, "The Four Horsemen Of The Global Domination Conspiracy", the other, “Countdown to the Apocalypse”, both written by Kurtzweil.)

MULDER: Yeah .. (pause) I had an appointment for a pelvic examination. (He looks up at the detective, gives him a goofy grin and the detective laughs.)

DETECTIVE: You want a call if we turn up this Kurtzweil?

MULDER: (gives the detective a tap on the arm.) No, don't bother.

(Mulder leaves the apartment, then exits the building. He stands outside looking around, sees Kurtzweil standing at the entrance to the alley. He motions to Mulder to come closer. Mulder enters the alley.)

KURTZWEIL: See this crap? Someone knows I'm talking to you.

MULDER: (sarcastically): Not according to the men in blue.

KURTZWEIL: Well, what is it this time? Kiddy porn again? Sexual battery of a patient?

MULDER: They want to discredit you, for what?

KURTZWEIL: Because I'm a dangerous man. Because I know too much about the truth.

MULDER: Oh, that end-of-the-world apocalyptic garbage you write?

KURTZWEIL: You know my work? (he smiles hopefully, but Mulder gives him a slight snort and smile, then turns and starts to walk away.) I was right about Dallas, wasn't I?

MULDER: (he stops and turns around.) How? How were you right?

KURTZWEIL: Are you familiar with the Hanta virus, Agent Mulder?

MULDER: Yeah, it was a deadly virus spread by field mice in the southwestern United States several years ago.

KURTZWEIL: According to the newspaper, FEMA was called out to manage an outbreak of the Hanta virus. Are you familiar with what the Federal Emergency Management Agency’s real power is? FEMA allows the White House to suspend constitutional government upon declaration of a national emergency. Think about that! What is an agency with such broad-sweeping power doing managing a small viral outbreak in suburban Texas?

MULDER: You're saying it wasn't such a small outbreak.

KURTZWEIL: No, I'm saying it wasn't the Hanta virus.

MULDER: Well, what was it?

(Another police car pulls up to the front of the building. Mulder and Kurtzweil walk farther into the alleyway.)

MULDER: What was it?

KURTZWEIL: When we were young men in the military, your father and I were recruited for a project. They told us it was biological warfare, a virus.

MULDER: What killed those men?

KURTZWEIL: What killed them I won't even write about! We have no context for what killed those men, or any appreciation of the scale at which it will be unleashed in the future.

MULDER: A plague?

KURTZWEIL: The plague to end all plagues, Agent Mulder. A silent weapon for a quiet war. The systematic release of an indiscriminate organism for which the men who will bring it on still have no cure! They've been working on this for fifty years! While the rest of the world have been fighting gooks and commies, these men have been secretly negotiating a planned Armageddon!

MULDER: Negotiating with whom?

KURTZWEIL: I think you know. The timetable has been set. It will happen on a holiday, when people are away from their homes. The president will declare a state of emergency, at which time all government, all federal agencies, will come under the power of the Federal Emergency Management Agency. FEMA, the secret government.

MULDER: And they call me paranoid.

KURTZWEIL: Go back to Dallas, Agent Mulder, and dig. Or we're gonna find out along with the rest of the country, when it's too late.

(Back at the morgue, Scully is conducting the autopsy. She cuts out a piece of the ribcage and holds it up to look at it. It's clear. All of a sudden, she hears footsteps and sees a soldier and two policemen silhouetted in the frosted window of the autopsy room. The soldier opens the door, looks around, but finds no Scully. The scene cuts to inside the refrigeration room where the bodies are being kept, Scully's slowly closing the door behind her. She removes her mask and gloves. Her cell phone rings, echoing off the walls, making it sound twice as loud as usual. She grabs it quickly and punches the button to answer, cutting off the noise.)

MULDER: (over phone) Hey, Scully, it's me...

SCULLY: (whispering): Yeah?

MULDER: Why are you whispering?

SCULLY: (whispering): Mulder, I can't really talk right now.

MULDER: What did you find?

SCULLY: Evidence of a massive infection.

MULDER: What kind of infection?

SCULLY: I don't know.

MULDER: All right, listen to me. I'm going home and then I'm booking myself on a flight to Dallas. I'm going to get you a ticket too.

SCULLY: Mulder ....

MULDER: I need you there with me. I need your expertise.

SCULLY: Mulder, I have a hearing tomorrow...

MULDER: I can get you back in time for that hearing, maybe with evidence that will blow it away.

SCULLY: Mulder, I can't! I'm way past the point of common sense here.

MULDER: This has nothing to do with common sense. Scully? Are you there? Scully? (she has hung up on him. He slams the phone down in anger, opens the door to the phone booth and the scene cuts to the soldier opening the door to the refrigerated room where Scully is. He walks in, the sound of his boots echoing off the walls, and the camera pans down to show us Scully's hiding place: on the floor under one of the gurneys. A substance drips down from above, ewwwww.)

(The scene cuts to an airplane landing. Next we see Mulder walking down a hallway with the Field Agent.)

FIELD AGENT: I'm afraid what you're looking for amounts to a needle in a haystack. This explosion was so devastating there hasn't been much that we've been able to put together just yet.

(They've now entered the lab area, specimens lie on the tables and men in lab coats are working on them.)

MULDER: Well, I'm looking for anything out of the ordinary really. Maybe something from the FEMA offices where those bodies where found?

FIELD AGENT: Well, we weren't expecting to find those remains, of course, and we sent 'em off to Washington.

MULDER: Well, anything from those offices that you haven't send off to D.C. yet?

FIELD AGENT: Some bone fragments turned up in the sift this morning. We thought we had another fatality but we found out FEMA recovered them from an archeological site out of town.

MULDER: Have you examined them?

FIELD AGENT: No, they're just fossils, as far as we know.

(Scully enters and stands by the doorway, Mulder sees her. He points at her and says to the field agent .... )

MULDER: I'd like you to let this person take a look at them, if you don't mind.

(The field agent turns around, sees Scully and turns back to Mulder)

FIELD AGENT: (sighs) Just let me see if I can lay my hands on what you're looking for. (he walks off)

(While the field agent is collecting the samples, Scully walks over to where Mulder is standing and they talk quietly.)

MULDER: I thought you said you weren't coming.

SCULLY: I wasn't planning on it. Particularly not after spending a half an hour in cold storage this morning. But I got a better look at the blood and tissue samples I took from the fireman.

MULDER: And what did you find?

SCULLY: Something I couldn't show to anybody else. Not without causing the kind of attention I'd just as soon avoid right now.

(She looks over Mulder's shoulder at the field agent, seeing if he's on his way back before continuing.)

SCULLY: But, what those men were infected with contains a protein code that I've never seen before. What it did to them, it did extremely fast.

MULDER: How was it contracted?

SCULLY: That I don't know. But, unless it can respond to conventional treatment, it could be a serious health threat.

(The field agent returns with the fossils.)

FIELD AGENT: Like I said, these are just fossils, but they weren't near the blast center so they're not going to tell you much.

MULDER: (handing Scully a vial containing some bone fragments) Right, right, why don't you check this out.

(Scully looks through the microscope, ominous music swells in the background and she looks up at Mulder, her eyes wide. Mulder turns to the field agent.)

MULDER: You said you knew the location where these were found?

FIELD AGENT: Show you right on the map.

(He walks off towards the map, we presume, as Scully and Mulder look at each other. Mulder's lip curls slightly in a yeah-sure-it-was an-archeological-dig sneer.)

(The camera pans up with a child as he climbs a slide and stands at the top, looking over a fence. The music swells again as we see the other side of the fence. Three large white domes stand in what appears to be endless desert. Next we see under one of the domes as someone removes a silvery tube from a hole (oxygen pump, I believe) as a person-sized container is swung over the hole via a winch. Bronschweig appears in a bio-hazard suit and looks at some gauges at the top of the container. He speaks to the men moving the container.)

BRONSCHWEIG: I want all of these settings checked and recalibrated. I want a steady, negative two degrees Celsius throughout the transfer of the body after I've administered the vaccine.

(Bronschweig's hood is pulled up. Next we see him with his head fully covered by a see-through helmet at the bottom of the ladder leading into the hole. He walks down the stairs he led Cancer Man down, picks up the vaccine and turns to face the fireman's body. The chest area is empty, the alien entity once encased there is gone! Bronschweig's eyes swell to twice normal size and the music alerts us to his horror. He looks anxiously around the room for the alien, then whips off his headgear to get a better view. Finding nothing, he races towards the ladder and yells up to the men at the top.)

BRONSCHWEIG: It's gone!

ONE OF THE MEN AT THE TOP: What?!

(Bronschweig begins climbing the ladder.)

BRONSCHWEIG: It's left the body, I think it's gestated!

(He stops climbing as he hears a noise and looks off to the side.)

ONE OF THE MEN AT THE TOP: What's the matter?

BRONSCHWEIG: Wait ... I can see it. (he climbs back down and stands at the bottom. We can see a figure glistening in the darkness.) Oh ... Jesus .... Lord ....

ONE OF THE MEN AT THE TOP: Ya, ya see it?!

BRONSCHWEIG: So much for little green men. (he begins to fumble with a pouch on his hip, taking out the needle and a small bottle with the green liquid vaccine.) I need you down here!

(The two men at the top of the ladder look at each other, one nods and the other races away from the hole, we assume he's going for a bio-hazard suit. Down in the hole, Bronschweig fills the needle with the vaccine and stands looking for the alien, but he keeps hearing noises and is not sure where they're coming from. He twists his head from side to side, trying to narrow it down. Suddenly we see a clear view of the alien, behind him, straight out of a '50's B-movie, looking like a guy in a cheap suit, missing only the zipper up its back. Personal opinion, natch. Its claws appear from out of its hand, somewhat like a cat. Bronschweig sees him, he hears the alien's blood-curdling and hair-raising screech and in a flash the alien is all over him like a cheap suit, slicing his face with his claws. Bronschweig manages to stab the alien with the needle, it screams again and then Bronschweig drags himself back to the ladder and holds onto to it for dear life. A group of the men have now gathered at the top of the hole, one in a bio-hazard suit.)

BRONSCHWEIG: Help! I need help!

(Suddenly the top part of the ladder is pulled aside, the cover is placed on and Bronschweig, who has begun climbing his end of the ladder, looks up.)

BRONSCHWEIG: What are you doing?!

(The hole starts to be covered with dirt.)

BRONSCHWEIG: What are you doing?! Ohhh ....

(From the darkness, the alien grabs him and pulls him down. We hear a scream ....)

(The scream was the playful yell of a small child playing in a lovely British garden with his friends. They run around for a moment or two then a woman, possibly the nanny, claps her hands as they run off. The camera pans to a man seated on the terrace of what appears to be a huge mansion, watching with a smile. It's the Well-Manicured Man (WMM). He sips his tea and gives a small chuckle at the goings-on. A servant appears from out of the mansion.)

SERVANT: Sir, you have a call.

(WMM looks disappointed. He walks inside and picks up a phone.)

WMM: Yes?

CSM (voice on the phone): We have a situation. The members are assembling.

WMM: Is it an emergency?

CSM: Yes. A meeting has been set, tonight in London to determine a course.

WMM: Who called this meeting?

CSM: Strughold. He just got on a plane in Tunis.

(From the garden comes a child's yell, not a playful one and WMM turns towards the window to look. He hangs up the phone and runs over to the window. One of the children is lying down and holding his leg. Concern on his face, WMM begins to quickly go outside to see what has happened.)

(We see the outside of a building, The Royal Albert Hall, in the background. A black car pulls up in front and WMM gets out. A servant holds the car door open for him.)

WMM: Has Strughold arrived?

SERVANT: Yes, they're waiting in the library, sir.

(They enter the building and walk into a room where a group of men, usually known as The Consortium but now called The Syndicate since the movie's release, are gathered. In front of them, a monitor is showing a frozen image of Mulder and Scully as they entered the morgue. Strughold stands up.)

STRUGHOLD: We began to worry. Some of us have travelled so far and you are the last to arrive.

WMM: I'm sorry. My grandson fell and broke his leg.

(Pregnant pause while nobody answers "Gee, sorry to hear that.")

STRUGHOLD: While we have been made to wait, we watched surveillance tapes which have raised more concerns.

WMM: More concerns on what?

STRUGHOLD: We have been forced to reassess our role in Colonization by new effects in biology which have .... presented themselves.

FIRST ELDER: The virus has mutated.

WMM: Into what?

STRUGHOLD: A new extraterrestrial biological entity.

WMM: My God!

STRUGHOLD: The geometry of mass infection presents certain conceptual reevaluations for us about our place in the Colonization.

(WMM begins to walk towards Strughold, barely containing his anger and amazement at their foolishness. Well, just a guess there!)

WMM: This isn't Colonization, this is spontaneous repopulation! All our work! .... If it's true, they've been using us all along! We've been labouring under a lie!

BARNEY MILLER GUY: It could be an isolated case.

WMM: How can we know?!

STRUGHOLD: We're going to tell them what we've found, what we've learned by turning over a body infected with the gestating organism.

WMM: In hope of what? Learning that it's true? That we are nothing but digestives for the creation of a new race of alien life-forms?! By cooperating now, we are but beggars to our own demise.

STRUGHOLD: Cooperation is the only chance of saving ourselves.

CSM: They still need us to carry out their preparations.

STRUGHOLD: We'll continue to use them as they do us. If only to play for more time, to continue work on our vaccine.

WMM: (shakes his head) My lateness might just as well have been absence. A course has already been taken!

CSM: There are complications. (he looks at the surveillance video and WMM looks as well) Mulder saw one of the infected bodies that we destroyed in Dallas. He's gone back there again. Someone has tipped him.

WMM: Who?

CSM: Kurtzweil we think.

WMM: No one believes Kurztweil or his books. He's a toiler, a crank.

FIRST ELDER: Mulder believes.

CSM: Then Kurtzweil must be removed.

STRUGHOLD: As must Mulder.

WMM: Kill Mulder, we take the risk of turning one man's quest into a crusade.

STRUGHOLD: Then you must take away what he holds most valuable. That with which he can't live without.

(The scene cuts to Scully, looking out on a vast desert.)

(Scully turns to face Mulder. We see houses behind him.)

SCULLY: I don't know, Mulder. I don't see any evidence of an archeological or any other kind of a dig site.

MULDER: This is where he marked on the map. Where he said those fossils were unearthed. (the camera pulls back to show our heroes as tiny figures in the left corner of the screen, the sky above huge and cloudy, the houses dwarfing them.) You're sure those fossils were infected with the same virus you saw at the morgue?

SCULLY: Both sets of bones were porous, as if the virus or the causative microbe were decomposing it.

MULDER: And you've never seen that virus before.

SCULLY: No.

(He looks down, dejected, then his gaze wanders to the side.)

MULDER: Look at that.

(They walk over to an oasis in the surrounding desert, a brand new playground.)

MULDER: That look like new grass to you?

SCULLY: Looks pretty green for this climate.

MULDER: Uh huh.

(They reach the playground, Mulder bends down and picks up a piece of the sod.)

MULDER: Ground's dry about an inch down. This was laid recently.

SCULLY: The equipment looks brand new too.

MULDER: No irrigation system. Somebody's covering their tracks.

(They both look around for any kind of clue and see 3 kids riding towards them on bikes.)

MULDER: Hey! Hey!

(Mulder and Scully walk towards the kids and they stop their bikes.)

SCULLY: Do you boys live around here?

KID: Yeah.

MULDER: You see anybody diggin' over there?

KID: We're not supposed to talk about it.

SCULLY: You're not supposed to talk about it? Who told you that?

KID 2: Nobody.

MULDER: Nobody? The same nobody that built that playground? Nobody buy you those new bikes, too?

SCULLY: I think you better tell us.

KID: We don't even know you.

SCULLY: Well, we're FBI Agents.

KID: You're not FBI Agents.

MULDER: How do you know?

KID: Cause ya'll look like door-to-door salesmen. (laughs)

MULDER: (he pulls out his badge) Hey, you wanna buy a badge?

(The kids all look at his impressive badge and spill the beans.)

KID: They left about an hour ago, going that way.

(He points, then the other two kids point in the same direction.)

(The camera pans stylishly alongside Mulder and Scully's brand new Oldsmobile Intrigue. Next we see inside as they chat.)

MULDER: Unmarked tanker trucks. What are archeologists hauling out in tanker trucks?

SCULLY: I don't know, Mulder.

MULDER: And where are they going with it?

(Scully's consulting her map.)

SCULLY: That's the first question to answer if we're going to find them.

(The stylish Intrigue screeches to a halt at a Stop sign.)

MULDER: What are my choices?

SCULLY: About a hundred miles of nothing in both directions.

MULDER: Well, which way do you think they went?

(Scully puts down the obviously useless map.)

SCULLY: We've got two choices. One of them's wrong.

(Mulder looks left down the long highway.)

MULDER: I think they went left.

(Scully looks to her right.)

SCULLY: I don't know why, I think they went right.

(They look at each other, Mulder looks to the right-side highway then begins drumming his fingers on the steering wheel as he stares straight ahead. The car takes off with a squeal. As usual, Mulder's taking a leap of faith and forging straight ahead. The road's unpaved and they leave a cloud of dust as they bump along.)

MULDER: Five years together, Scully. How many times I been wrong? (she rolls her eyes, thinking, do you want a list?!) Never. (she looks at him in shock and mild humour.) Not driving anyway.

(The car races ahead, towards we know not where. Miles and miles of nothingness. Soon, time has passed and nighttime has settled. The crickets chirp and the car suddenly stops. They've reached what appears to be a dead end. Scully undoes her seat belt, shoots Mulder a disgusted look, exits the car and slams the door shut. Ouch, be nice to that Intrigue, Scully, cost The Big Boys a lot of dough! Mulder gently closes his door as he exits. Scully stands in the beams of the car's headlights and turns around to properly berate him.)

MULDER: I was right about the bomb, wasn't I?

SCULLY: This is great, this is fitting.

MULDER: What? (he pulls out the map.)

SCULLY: I have to be in Washington, D.C. in eleven hours for a hearing, the outcome of which might possibly effect one of the biggest decisions of my life, and here I am in the middle of Nowhere, Texas chasing phantom tanker trucks!

MULDER: We're not chasing tanker trucks, Scully, we're chasing evidence. (still consulting the useless map.)

SCULLY: Evidence of what exactly?

MULDER: That bomb in Dallas was allowed to go off, to hide something. Bodies infected with a virus you yourself detected!

SCULLY: Mulder, they haul oil in tanker trucks, they haul gas in tanker trucks, they do not haul viruses in tanker trucks!

MULDER: Well, they may be hauling a virus in these tanker trucks.

(She looks at him quizzically.)

SCULLY: What do you mean? .... Mulder? .... What are you not telling me? (he is folding the map elaborately, avoiding her stare and her question.) Mulder?

MULDER: (hesitant) The virus may be extraterrestrial.

(She stares at him with her mouth open, he gives a small grin, looking like a little kid about to be yelled at by his mommy.)

SCULLY: (rolls her eyes and turns her head) I don't b ... Mulder, I don't ...

(Her words are cut off by the sound of a train crossing's warning bell, which is a good thing for young ears out there in Movieland. Ask me by email what she actually said before the movie's rating was changed, hoo boy! Anyway, as the train approaches, they both turn to look and then Mulder walks towards the tracks.)

SCULLY: What? (she holds her arms out by her sides, asking what the heck he's getting worked up about) Mulder, what?!

(She stands behind him as they both watch the train go by. Its cargo includes white unmarked tanker trucks. He turns to face her, their eyes meet and together they race back to the car and hop in, a team again and off in pursuit of The Truth once more. The car follows next to the train as it races towards its destination. Soon, the car stops and Mulder and Scully get out, looking at something we can't see yet.)

SCULLY: What do you think they are?

MULDER: I have no idea.

(They continue to stare at the unseen sight, then begin to walk towards it. The camera now pans over the crest of the hill Mulder and Scully have begun to walk down and we see white domes appearing to glow in the middle of a desert, surrounded by a cornfield. Out of the darkness of the night, they arrive at the cornfield and walk through it.)

SCULLY: This is weird, Mulder.

MULDER: Very weird.

SCULLY: Any thoughts as to why anybody would be growing corn in the middle of the desert?

MULDER: Well, those could be giant Jiffy-Pop Poppers.

(They arrive at the huge domes, look at each other then proceed. Mulder opens one of the dome's doors and a blast of air from inside shoots out. They enter, Mulder's tie askew from the wind, Scully's raven locks flowing in the breeze. When they close the door behind them, fans on the ceiling suddenly blast on, startling them. They walk further in. Inside the dome it's all metal, stark and futuristic. The sound of Scully's boot heels echo in the structure as they walk along a raised walkway. To either side of the walkway are box-like structures, they appear to be grids from the camera's eye view above.)

SCULLY: It's cool in here. The temperature's being regulated.

MULDER: For the purpose of what?

SCULLY: Mulder, I think we're on top of a larger structure here. This is some kind of a venting system.

(Mulder stops and turns to Scully.)

MULDER: You hear something? You hear that?

(He steps down off the raised walkway, towards the grids and she follows behind him.)

SCULLY: I hear a humming...

MULDER: Umm-hmm. (agreeable noise.)

SCULLY: Like electricity, high voltage maybe...

(Mulder puts his fingertips on one of the grids, then bends down and places his ear on it, listening.)

MULDER: Maybe...

(As he listens, Scully looks up towards the roof.)

MULDER: Maybe not.

(He lifts his head and follows her gaze to the roof. Suddenly, flaps in the roof open up.)

MULDER: Scully?

SCULLY: Yeah?

MULDER: Run!!

(The vents in the floor grids begin to blast open one by one, hundreds of bees pour out into the air, seeming to head for the roof's open vents, but clouding the air with their quantity. Mulder and Scully grab their jackets and pull them over their heads as they run towards the door which led them in. Mulder has a good lead on her and twists around as he runs to see where she is.)

MULDER: Scully!

SCULLY: I can't see!

(Mulder turns back and runs towards Scully.)

MULDER: Grab my hand!

(He grabs her arm and they run toward the door, stopping before they exit to stamp their feet under the doorway's fans to remove the bees from their clothing. They finally run out the door, Scully's hair a tangled mess as they brush themselves off.)

MULDER: Did you get stung?

SCULLY: I don't think so.

(Their attention is drawn to a strange sound. They both walk away from the dome and stare into the corn. A light appears, could it be a UFO?! Nope, it's the searchlight from one of two black helicopters! Mulder and Scully begin to run through the crops to escape the copters. Huge Big Screen action as the camera pans over the helicopters, the lights play over the corn as they seek out our heroes, Mulder runs, Scully runs, Scully crouches in the tall corn, Mulder soon follows suit, then calls out to her as he can't find her.)

MULDER: Talk to me, Scully! Sculllllllyyyyy! Dammit! Scully! Scully! Scully! Scully! (he runs from crouching spot to crouching spot, calling her name in desperation.)

SCULLY: Mulder! (she tries to follow the sound of his voice.)

MULDER: Sculllllllyyyyy!

SCULLY: Mulder!

MULDER: Can you hear me?!!!!

(He continues to run, calling her name again and again.)

MULDER: Scully! Scully! Scully!

SCULLY: Mulder!

MULDER: Scully! Scully, talk to me!!!

(Scully pops out of the corn, not far from him, they run towards each other, then as a team they begin racing towards their car. Suddenly, Scully turns around, noticing the silence.)

SCULLY: Where'd they go?

(The helicopters have disappeared. Mulder grabs her shoulder, pushing her onwards.)

MULDER: Come on.

(They climb back up the hill. The domes and corn are silent again.)

(We see A.D. Jana Cassidy looking at some papers then checking her watch. Scully is late for her hearing. In the hallway, A.D. Skinner stands watch, his hands on his manly hips (sorry, personal opinion!). Scully arrives, brushing down her unruly suit. She spots a mirror and after a glance at Skinner she quickly straightens herself up as best she can in the mirror. Skinner enters the hearing room.)

SKINNER: She's coming in.

(He holds the door open for Scully as she enters the room and walks swiftly to her seat, her hair still not quite in place.)

A.D. CASSIDY: Special Agent Scully?

SCULLY: Yes, I apologize for making you wait. I have new evidence.

A.D. CASSIDY: Evidence of what?

(Not answering the question, as she doesn't really know herself, Scully pulls an evidence bag out of her briefcase and holds it up. She speaks cautiously, knowing she'll be taken to task for her actions.)

SCULLY: These ... are fossilized bone fragments that I've been able to study ... that were gathered at the bomb site in Dallas.

A.D. CASSIDY: You've been back to Dallas?

SCULLY: Yes.

(The scene cuts to Casey's Bar as Mulder arrives and seeks out Kurtzweil who is seated in a booth. Mulder slides into the booth, all wide-eyed and nervous about the news he brings. They speak softly, to keep the curious at bay.)

KURTZWEIL: You found something?

MULDER: Yeah. On the Texas border, some kind of experiment, something they excavated and was brought there in tanker trucks.

KURTZWEIL: What?

MULDER: I'm not sure ... a virus, I think.

(Kurtzweil appears stunned, it's hard to tell as he's always so bug-eyed and excited. The scene cuts back to the hearing.)

SCULLY: .... and I also have reason to believe that ... there may have been some involvement by Special Agent In Charge Michaud.

A.D. CASSIDY: Those are very serious allegations, Agent Scully...

SCULLY: Yes, I know.

(Back to Casey's Bar)

KURTZWEIL: You saw this experiment?

MULDER: Yeah, but we were chased off.

KURTZWEIL: What did it look like?

MULDER: There were bees ... corn crops ...

(Kurtzweil appears shocked/excited/confused, you choose. Back to the hearing.)

A.D. CASSIDY: ... and you have conclusive evidence of this? Something to tie this claim of yours to the crime?

SCULLY: Nnn ... not completely conclusive. I hope to but we are ... in the process of ... we're working towards gathering that evidence...

(During this hesitating speech, the camera shows us something poor Scully can't see. Somehow, through the huge fans and shaking off at the domes, the corn field chase, the run for their car, the drive to the airport, the airplane ride, the drive to the hearing and even Scully's last suit brush off ... a single dedicated bee has managed to hide under the collar of Scully's jacket and it now begins its slow ascent up and over her shoulder towards the back of her neck.)

A.D. CASSIDY: Working with ...?

SCULLY: (hesitating): ... with Agent Mulder.

(Back to Casey’s Bar.)

MULDER: What are they?

(Kurtzweil pauses as he doesn't have a sweet clue.)

KURTZWEIL: What do you think?

MULDER: A transportation system. Transgenetic crops that are polygenically altered to carry a virus.

KURTZWEIL: That would be my guess.

(He dabs his mouth on a napkin, looks around, gets up and starts to walk away. Mulder is stunned and gets up to follow him.)

MULDER: Guess? What do you mean "your guess"?! Hey!

(Mulder grabs Kurtzweil's shoulder and turns him around to face him.)

MULDER: You told me you had answers!

KURTZWEIL: Yeah, well, I don't have 'em all!

MULDER: (disgusted): You didn't know my father?

KURTZWEIL: Like I told you, he and I were old friends.

MULDER: (angrily): You've been using me! You've been using me to gather information for your god-damned books!

(Kurtzweil is looking left and right to see if anyone is paying attention as Mulder's voice has risen.)

KURTZWEIL: Lower your voice!

(Kurtzweil leaves through the back exit. Mulder follows him into the alley.)

MULDER: Kurtzweil? Kurtzweil!

(Kurtzweil stops and turns to Mulder.)

KURTZWEIL: Yeah, well, you'd be shit out of luck if it wasn't for me! You saw what you saw 'cause I led you to it! (he stabs Mulder in the chest with his finger for emphasis.) I'm putting my ass on the line for you ...

MULDER: Your ass?! I just got chased through Texas by two black helicopters!

KURTZWEIL: And why do you think it is you're standing here talking to me? These people don't make mistakes!

(Kurtzweil walks off leaving Mulder to ponder it all. Mulder hears footsteps above him on the fire escape. He looks up and we see it's The First Elder, not sure if Mulder can tell as the sun is in his eyes. Mulder stalks off, appears to open the doorway to the bar and next we see him enter his apartment.)

(Mulder goes right to his desk and pulls open a drawer. He fumbles around for something, then pulls out a family photo album we've never seen before. When did this dysfunctional family ever take the time to capture a Kodak moment?! Apparently quite often as Mulder thumbs through a few pages and finds what he's looking for .... a picture taken at a family picnic ... a young Kurtzweil stands with a grin on his face and a drink in his hand. Mulder stares at the proof in his hand. Kurtzweil DID know his father, he told him the truth. Mulder sits and stares for a moment, there's a knock on his door, Scully doesn't wait for an answer and opens the door. She stands there looking like she's been figuratively and literally put through the wringer. Her jacket is undone and her shirt is untucked.)

MULDER: What's wrong?

SCULLY: Salt Lake City, Utah. Transfer effective immediately.

(Mulder turns his body away from her, throws his head back, his eyes to the heavens with a this-can't-be-happening attitude.)

SCULLY: I already gave Skinner my letter of resignation.

MULDER: You can't quit now, Scully.

SCULLY: I can, Mulder. I debated whether or not even to tell you in person, but ...

MULDER: We are close to something here! (he finally turns in his chair to look at her) We're on the verge!

SCULLY: You're on the verge, Mulder. Please don't do this to me.

(Mulder leaps out of his chair and walks over to Scully.)

MULDER: After what you saw last night, after all you've seen, you can just walk away?

SCULLY: I have, I did, it's done.

MULDER: I need you on this, Scully.

SCULLY: You don't need me, Mulder. You never have. I've just held you back.

(Mulder looks at her with that hurt puppy dog look in his eyes. She drops her eyes from his and turns to leave.)

SCULLY: I gotta go.

(He waits for a moment, then Mulder follows her out into the hallway.)

MULDER: You wanna tell yourself that so you can quit with a clear conscience, you can, but you're wrong!

(She stops and turns to face him.)

SCULLY: Why did they assign me to you in the first place, Mulder? To debunk your work, to rein you in, to shut you down.

MULDER: But you saved me! As difficult and as frustrating as it's been sometimes, your goddamned strict rationalism and science have saved me a thousand times over! You've kept me honest ... you've made me a whole person. I owe you everything ... Scully, and you owe me nothing.

(Through this speech, Scully looks at him in shock as his honesty flows out. Her eyes begin to fill with tears.)

MULDER: I don't know if I wanna do this alone... I don't even know if I can ... and if I quit now, they win.

(Scully's tears begin to silently flow. Her lovely bottom lip quivering with emotion, she falls into him, holding him tightly as his arms enfold her. She closes her eyes as her tears fall onto his shoulder. She pulls back and kisses him on his forehead, then gently rests her own forehead on his, still crying. Mulder slowly pulls her face back so he can look at her, his hands resting on the back of her head. She looks into his eyes, her hands resting on the back of his head as well. Her tears flow, her lip quivers, she sees something in his eyes which tells her they're both thinking the same thing, at least to me, anyway. They both lean in for The Kiss ... lips do touch for a brief, shining second ... then she suddenly grabs the back of her own neck and says ...)

SCULLY: Ow!

MULDER: (thinking he's done something wrong) I'm sorry.

SCULLY: Something stung me.

(Mulder reaches down and plucks out the bee, holding it in his fingers, its little legs squirming in the air.)

MULDER: Must've gotten in your shirt.

SCULLY: Mulder ... something's wrong.

MULDER: What?

SCULLY: I'm having lacinating pain in ...

MULDER: What?

SCULLY: ... my chest.

MULDER: Scully ...

SCULLY: My motor functions are being affected.

(She begins to fall into Mulder and he grabs her.)

MULDER: Scully ...

(Mulder gently but quickly lays her down upon the hallway floor)

SCULLY: My pulse is thready ... a funny taste in the back of my throat.

MULDER: I think you're going into anaphylactic shock.

SCULLY: No ... I have no allergy.

(Mulder runs into his apartment and grabs the phone. He dials 911 with the emergency button.)

MULDER: (on phone): This is Special Agent Fox Mulder, I have an emergency! I have an agent down!

(Next we see Scully being placed on a gurney.)

PARAMEDIC 1: Can you hear me? Can you say your name?

PARAMEDIC 2: She's got constriction in the throat and larynx.

PARAMEDIC 1: Passages are open. OK. Let's get her in the van right away. Look out. Coming through. Watch your back.

(Scully is loaded into the ambulance.)

MULDER: She said she had a funny taste in the back of her throat. But there was no pre-existing allergy to bee sting. Now the bee that stung her might have been carrying a virus.

PARAMEDIC 1: Virus?

MULDER: Will you tell that to the doctor?

VARIOUS PARAMEDICS VOICES: "... virus ... advise ... reaction ... stat!

MULDER: What hos ... what hospital are ... (the ambulance door closes, Mulder goes to the driver) What hospital are you taking her to?

(The ambulance driver just looks back at him. He pulls a gun and fires at Mulder's head. Mulder falls. Seconds later, another ambulance, the real one, pulls up. The scene cuts to an airport runway as a cargo plane lands. The ambulance pulls up, and soldiers move out a familiar-looking person-sized container. It's Scully! She's moved into the plane as we see Cancer Man lighting a ciggie, waiting inside the plane. The soldiers run off, the door closes and we see Cancer Man take a drag. The screen goes black, we hear voices.)

FROHIKE: What are you doing?

LANGLY: Reading his chart.

FROHIKE: Put it down.

LANGLY: I'll put it down when I'm ready.

BYERS: I think he's coming out of it.

LANGLY: He's coming to.

(The screen now shows a close-up view of our boys, The Lone Gunmen, as they hover over Mulder's hospital bed. Mulder is being fed oxygen through a tube in his nose, his head wrapped in bandages.)

FROHIKE: Hey, Mulder? Mulder?

MULDER: Oh my God. Cowardly Lion, Scarecrow, Toto!

(Frohike's not pleased with the joke, but at least his friend is all right. Mulder tries to sit up and winches in pain, holding his head.)

MULDER: What am I doing here?

BYERS: The bullet grazed your brow and (by itself?) your temporal plate.

LANGLY: A few centimeters to the left and we'd all be playing harps right now.

FROHIKE: You've been unconscious since they brought you in.

MULDER: (shooting up in the bed) Where's Scully?!

BYERS: We put together you called 911. That call must have been intercepted.

FROHIKE: Scully had a reaction to an Africanized honeybee we found in your hall.

(Frohike holds up a vial containing the bee.)

MULDER: I've got to get to her.

(Mulder attempts to stand up, is woozy and staggers a bit before sitting right back down. His door opens and Skinner walks in, going quickly to the staggering Mulder and helping to hold him up before he falls on his butt.)

SKINNER: Mulder, easy, easy. Look, you're staying right here.

MULDER: You don't understand, this goes all the way back to Dallas.

SKINNER: Tell me where she is, I'll find her.

MULDER: I don't know where she is! But I can think of someone who might.

SKINNER: You leave here unprotected, how far will you get? How far will they let you get? Because they'll know the minute you walk out of here!

LANGLY: What can we do?

(Mulder half-looks around at Langly, thinks a minute then formulates a plan.)

MULDER: You can strip Byers naked!

BYERS: What?!

(Mulder reassures him they haven't slipped into a gizzie-penned fanfic! [An old atxf newsgroup joke! ])

MULDER: I need your clothes.

(Mulder begins to tenderly remove his head bandage, winching again. Next we see Langly, Frohike, and Mulder, disguised as Byers, exit the room. The guard outside the room looks in and sees "Mulder" lying on the hospital bed and Skinner pacing beside him talking into his cell phone. The three men walk down a hallway, Mulder's suit just a teeny bit too small for him and he picks up his cell phone.)

MULDER: (into phone) It’s Mulder.

(Langly closes the exit door behind Mulder. Next we see Mulder running down a nighttime street, ditching his jacket as he runs. The scene changes to an alleyway as Kurtzweil walks along, his senses alert to any footsteps behind him. He goes to open what we assume is the alleyway door to Casey's Bar and is shocked to be confronted by .... The Well-Manicured Man!)

WMM: Dr. Kurtzweil, isn't it? Dr. Alvin Kurtzweil?

(Kurtzweil backs away, turns around and begins walking quickly down the alley. A black car pulls into the other end of the alley, trapping him. The driver gets out, Kurtzweil stares in shock and concern and we cut to inside Casey's Bar as Mulder bursts in the door. He looks around the bar for Kurtzweil, but doesn't see him. Mulder leaves through the back door, entering the alleyway. He sees WMM and his driver slamming the trunk of their car closed. WMM turns to face Mulder.)

WMM: Mr. Mulder.

MULDER: What happened to Kurtzweil?

WMM: He's come and gone.

MULDER: I want to know where Scully is.

WMM: (holds up a small pouch) The location of Agent Scully and the means to save her life. (gesturing to the car) Please....

(Mulder contemplates this offer for a minute, then figuring he has nothing more to lose, he walks to the car as he and WMM never take their eyes off each other. They each open their own doors and enter the car. It takes off immediately. As they cruise past The White House, WMM hands Mulder the pouch.)

MULDER: What is it?

(As WMM speaks, Mulder opens the pouch and pulls out a small bottle of green liquid and a piece of paper with this written on it):

South 83 Deg Lat
East 63 Deg Long

WMM: A weak vaccine against the virus Agent Scully has been infected with. It must be administered within 96 hours. That leaves you little time to reach those coordinates.

MULDER: You're lying.

WMM: No. Though I have no means to prove otherwise. The virus is extra-terrestrial. We know very little about it except that it was the original inhabitant of this planet.

MULDER: (unbelieving) A virus...

WMM: What is a virus, but a colonizing force that cannot be defeated? Living in a cave, underground, until it mutates ... and attacks.

MULDER: This is what you've been conspiring to conceal? A disease?

WMM: No. For God's sake, you've got it all backwards! AIDS, the Ebola virus, on an evolutionary scale they are newborns. This virus walked the planet long before the dinosaurs.

MULDER: (smiling in disbelief) What do you mean walked?

WMM: Your aliens, Agent Mulder. Your little green men arrived here millions of years ago. Those that didn't leave have been lying dormant underground since the last ice age in the form of an evolved pathogen, waiting to be reconstituted by the alien race when it comes to colonize the planet -- using us as hosts. Against this we have no defense, nothing but a weak vaccine. Do you see why it was kept secret? Why even the best men, men like your father, could not let the truth be known. Until Dallas we believed the virus would simply control us, that mass infection would make us a slave race. Imagine our surprise when they began to gestate. My group has been working cooperatively with the alien colonists, facilitating programs like the one you saw, to give us access to the virus in the hope that we might be able to secretly develop a cure.

MULDER: To save your own asses.

WMM: Survival is the ultimate ideology. Your father wisely refused to believe this.

MULDER: But he sacrificed my sister. He let them take Samantha.

WMM: Without a vaccination, the only true survivors of the viral holocaust will be those immune to it - human alien clones. He allowed your sister to be abducted, to be taken to a cloning program, for one reason...

MULDER: So she would survive. As a genetic hybrid.

WMM: Your father chose hope over selfishness. Hope in the only future he had, his children. His hope for you was that you would uncover the truth about the project. That you would stop it, that you would fight the future.

(Mulder lets it all sink in. The driver's eyes look at him through the rear-view mirror. Darn good driver if he ain't watching the road!)

MULDER: Why are you telling me this?

WMM: For the sake of my own children. Once it's learned what I have told you, my life will be over.

(WMM looks ahead, possibly at the driver. Mulder looks at the driver.)

MULDER: Where's Dr. Kurtzweil? (no response) I'd like to get out of the car now. (to the driver) Stop the car!

WMM: Driver. (the car pulls to a stop in yet another alleyway.) The men I work with will stop at nothing to clear the way for what they believe is their stake in the inevitable future. I was ordered to kill Dr. Kurtzweil, as I was ordered to kill you.

(Suddenly, WMM grabs a gun (from his lap?) and shoots the driver in the back of the head, BLAMMO! Mulder recoils.)

MULDER: Ow!

WMM: Trust no one, Mr. Mulder.

(WMM opens his own door and exits, holding the door open.)

WMM: Get out of the car.

MULDER: Why? The upholstery is already ruined.

WMM: Get out of the car! (Mulder scoots over to WMM's door and exits the car.) You have precious little time. (Mulder slams the door shut angrily.) What I've given you the alien colonists don't yet know exists. The vaccine you hold is the only defense against the virus. Its introduction into an alien environment may have the power to destroy the delicate plans we have so assiduously protected for the last 50 years!

MULDER: What do you mean, "may" have?

WMM: Find Agent Scully. Only then will you realize the scope and grandeur of the project. Go. Go now!

(WMM points his gun in Mulder's face. Mulder starts to walk away, WMM opens his door again, a rat scuttles past, WMM reenters the limo, closes the door and it explodes, knocking Mulder off his feet. He sits on the ground watching the flames burn, then pulls out the pouch and checks to see that the bottle is still intact. It is. He puts it back in the pouch, gets up and after one last look at the burning car, begins to run for his life.)

(Through the vast whiteness of the snow-covered land we see a small black dot. It's Mulder driving a Sno-Cat. He wipes away the condensation forming on the inside of his window and squints his eyes to see where he's going. The camera shows his vehicle leaving tracks in the virgin snow. He whacks his gas gauge and it keeps flipping back to empty. He checks the coordinates again, stops the Sno-Cat and holds up a hand-held thingy which tells him he's at the exact place he's supposed to be. He looks out the window at a hillside, sighs and we next see him struggling up the hill. He reaches the top, slips a little, then hunkers down and looks at a base of some kind in the distance. He whips out a pair of binoculars and looks through to see more Sno-Cats lined up, one of them moving. It stops, he adjusts the power to see closer and spots Cancer Man in the vehicle. He puts the binoculars away and starts to walk towards the base. It soon turns into a jog as he gets closer, but he suddenly falls through the ice as it collapses beneath his feet. He falls quite a way through a snowy tunnel, then lands in an icy crevice. He takes a minute to catch his breath, stands up slowly and peers down a hole leading off from the crevice, steam rising from it. He positions himself so he can crawl down this hole and turns around at the end so he drops feet-first onto a huge metallic structure. It's a type of hallway and on either side of him are containers of some sort. He whips out his flashlight to investigate further. Wiping the snow away from one of the containers, a cryopod, he spots a prehistoric man encased in ice.)

(Meanwhile, back on the surface, a Sno-Cat drives up, Cancer Man seated inside, and it stops. Cancer Man looks at Mulder's abandoned Sno-Cat and takes a slow puff of his ciggie.)

(Back under the ice, Mulder finds stacks and stacks of these coffin-like cryopods, piled row upon row. He walks further into the structure and finds an area opened up, somewhat like a hospital's operating theatre. He stands in the middle and looks in awe at the huge structure before his eyes. Hundreds, more than likely thousands of these rows stand before him. Where to begin looking for Scully? A movement catches his eye near the bottom of the rows. A rack of these cryopods are moving as if on a conveyer belt. He looks through his binoculars, but I can't tell you what he sees, it's very vague! Must have seen something though as he springs into action. He begins to maneuver his way down to the moving cryopods, hanging by his hands, his feet dangling over the edge. Suddenly, he loses his grip and shouts ...)

MULDER: Oh, shit!

(... as he begins to fall helplessly. He falls down the side of a wall, sliding out of control until he lands harshly on a ledge, hanging by one hand as he teeters over the edge. A bottomless well of metal lies below, the belly of the beast-ship. Using his legs and feet to anchor himself, he makes his way around the edge-corner and ends up sitting, catching his breath. The flashlight in use again, he slides gently over a huge cylinder, landing on a walkway. At the end, he finds an empty cryopod ... containing Scully's clothes and her cross necklace. He grips the necklace in one hand and sets off determined to find her. He comes upon a rack of the cryopods, shining his flashlight from one to another, a frozen face in each caught by his beams. The eyes on each one are open in shock, their mouths held open by a tube, a picture of silent horror. Finally, the flashlight lands on his quarry .... Scully! Using his hand and then the butt of his flashlight, he begins to hammer at the ice keeping her captive.)

(Back above the ice, we see a Sno-Cat driving, then we cut to somewhere else inside the base, a flurry of activity as soldiers scurry about and Cancer Man barks instructions.)

CSM: Secure the station! I want everyone else down below! If you're not armed, arm yourselves! We have a breach!

(Cut back to Mulder who has now hauled off a piece of a nearby cryopod and is pounding on the ice as he desperately tries to save her from her ice-coffin.)

(Cut to Cancer Man hustling his men down some ladders.)

CSM: Let's go, let's go!

(Back to Mulder as he finally breaks through the ice releasing an ocean of goo which encased her naked body. He pulls away the few remaining shards of ice and stares at her face. Is he too late? Mulder unwraps the bottle of vaccine and fills the needle. He injects the vaccine into Scully and it's effect is immediate. Within the tube connected to her mouth a liquid appears to retreat from her body, the tube begins to shrivel and die.)

MULDER: Scully?

(As he goes to touch the now dead tube and pull it from Scully's mouth, a violent shaking takes over the ship, a reaction to the vaccine's unwanted intrusion.)

(Cut to Cancer Man in a room full of equipment and monitors. A man is seated in front of a monitor showing a graph of some kind.)

MAN LOOKING AT GRAPH: There's a contaminant in the system!

(Cancer Man looks at the graph in shock.)

CSM: Mulder has the vaccine!

(Back to Mulder. The cryopod hallway he's in begins to fill with steam as it shoots out from the floor and ceiling. Mulder turns back to Scully and sees her move. He grabs the tube and begins to drag it out of her throat. Once it's all removed, and it's a long sucker, so it takes a sec or two, Mulder stares at her, waiting for a sign of some kind.)

MULDER: Breathe! Scully, can you breathe?!

(Scully begins to cough, spitting out what's left of the slimy goo. Finally she starts breathing on her own, gasping for each sweet taste of oxygen. She tries to speak and barely manages a weak ..)

SCULLY: Cold ... I'm cold.

MULDER: I'm going to get you out of there.

(He starts to whack away at the ice with a metallic cylinder next to him, probably shaken loose by the rocking and rolling the ship is still experiencing.)

(Cut to the graph/monitor room, sparks flying from various machines as the men are tossed like ragdolls. It's time to give up the ship, boys.)

CSM: Abandon your posts! Evacuate!

(Cancer Man walks towards one of the ladders the men are now scrambling down. Another man stops and says ..)

MAN: What's happened?!

CSM: It's all gone to hell!

MAN: But, what about Mulder?!

CSM: He'll never make it!

Cut back to Mulder as he gently lifts a naked Scully out of the cryopod, her body glistening with goo, and lays her down on the floor. Next we see him carrying her. She's now wearing some of Mulder's clothing, right down to a pair of boots, don't ask me where THEY came from! He reaches the bottom of a metallic shaft, sunlight beaming down upon them.)

(Cut to outside as an alarm sounds and men race out from the domes, running for the various Sno-Cats. Cancer Man gets into one, his mouth dangling open in shock as it "all falls apart". The vehicles drive off.)

(Back to Mulder and Scully as he drags her up a ladder. Far below them, the defrosting has begun and water drips down the walls.)

(From above, we see the Sno-Cats leaving, one passing within inches of the top of a shaft leading to our heroes.)

(Cut to inside where Mulder and Scully have found a momentary resting place. Scully is coughing and weak. Mulder urges her on.)

MULDER: We gotta keep moving. Come on!

SCULLY: I can't.

MULDER: Yeah, you can.

(Mulder picks her up and carries her in a fireman's lift, over his shoulders. He walks down a row of crypods, all ominously dripping with water from the defrosting ice. He spots a vent.)

MULDER: Scully, reach up and grab that vent!

(Suddenly, he spots movement in one of the pods. The creatures within have begun to stir. The vaccine has affected the whole structure, as the bodies were all obviously attached to the one creature.)

MULDER: Scully, grab the vent! (no response) Scully?

(He looks at her face on his shoulder, she's passed out. Mulder slides her off his shoulders, placing her on the floor and checks for a pulse. The creatures nearby, still encased in the swiftly melting ice are now violently thrashing about and emitting their high-pitched screams. With one eye on the creatures and one eye on Scully, Mulder begins performing a mean version of CPR.)

MULDER: Please, breathe. Breathe ... breathe .... BREATHE!

(Scully begins to cough and splutter as she regains consciousness.)

MULDER: Breathe in, breathe in, breathe!

(She begins to try and speak, he has to place his ear almost on her mouth to hear.)

SCULLY: I had you big time.

(She smiles at him. No time for jokes, Scully, the aliens are coming! As Mulder pulls her to her feet, the ice-encased cryopods around them start to crack open as the creatures within begin to break free. He holds her up to the vent above her.)

MULDER: Grab the vent. Pull! PULL!

(Scully grabs the vent and pulls herself up. Mulder starts to climb up. One of the aliens breaks the pod and reaches out with its hand for Mulder. It grabs Mulder's leg. Scully stops and turns his head.)

SCULLY: Mulder!

MULDER: Keep moving, Scully!

(Mulder kicks it away and pulls himself up. They both climb through the tunnel, Mulder yelling encouragement from behind.)

MULDER: Go! Go! Come on!

(He keeps checking behind him as the alien screams continue, looking for any which may be chasing them. The light at the end of the proverbial tunnel gets brighter as they climb on.)

MULDER: Almost there, keep going!

(They pull themselves up to where Mulder first stopped after he fell through the ice, a slight turn in the vent. Just as Mulder clears the turn, an alien lashes out from behind but is cut off by the twist in the tunnel. They step over the part where Mulder first fell all the way down and make their way out the hole he originally made. Scully falls onto the snow, exhausted and Mulder perches next to her on one knee. He hears a sound and looks around for the origin. It's the ice ... it's cracking under their feet! He grabs Scully and throws one of her arms over his shoulder as they begin to run away. He stops for some ungodly reason and looks back seeing vents of steam starting to shoot out of the ice. They begin to run again as the ice begins cracking and falling away causing a huge crater to form. Suddenly the crater overtakes them and they disappear into the hole, but next we see them shoot into the air and slide off of the surface of the rising ship. They land on the edge of the crater. Mulder watches the spaceship as it flies overhead, his face glows with a heart-melting grin of childlike wonder and awe. Scully's face is turned towards the snow, too tired to move, as Mulder says, almost along with the audience ...)

MULDER: Scully, ya gotta see this! Scully!

(It's quiet, it's barely a mutter above a whisper, but we hear ...)

SCULLY: I see it.

(Spent from exhaustion, Mulder drops his head into the snow. Scully, finding the strength God gave 20 hearty men, scoots her body over to cover him from the freezing cold. She lifts his into her arms and cradles him as the camera pans back to show two lone figures perched alone on the edge of the bottomless crater left by the departing spaceship. Cut to Washington and don't start with me on how they got out of the Antarctic, there was extra gas can in the Sno-Cat, I don't know!)

(Scully is seated before the review board, her lovely face marked by the effects of her ordeal, frostbite and scratches.)

CASSIDY: In light report on the report I've got before me and in light of the narrative I am now hearing, my official report is incomplete -- pending these new facts I'm being asked to reconcile.

(While she speaks, we see a man entering the field office where the fossilized samples were kept. In the darkness of the closed office his flashlight lands on the tray containing the samples and he takes it away.)

CASSIDY: Agent Scully, though there is now direct evidence that a federal agent may have been involved in the bombing, the other events you've laid down here are too incredible on their own, and quite frankly implausible in their connections.

SCULLY: What is it you find incredible?

CASSIDY: Well, where would you like me to start?

(As we hear them speak, over the next couple of passages, we cut to somewhere in America's heartland as a freshly-painted tanker truck is prepared. The new sign painted on the side reads "Nature's Best Corn Oil". Next we see soldiers with flame torches setting a corn field ablaze.)

CASSIDY: So many of the events described in your report defy belief. Antarctica is a long way from Dallas, Agent Scully. I-- I can't very well submit a report to the Attorney General that alleges the links you've made here. Bees and corn crops do not quite fall under the rubric of domestic terrorism.

SCULLY: No, they don't.

CASSIDY: Most of what I find in here is lacking a coherent picture of any organization with an attributable motive. I realize the ordeal you've endured has clearly affected you. But the holes in your account leave this panel with little choice but to delete these references to our final report to the Justice Department--until which time hard evidence becomes available that would give us cause to pursue such an investigation.

(Scully stands up and walks over to the board, positioning herself directly in front of A.D. Cassidy. She places the vial containing the bee found in Mulder's hallway on the table, Cassidy picks it up and looks closely at it.)

SCULLY: I don't believe the FBI currently has an investigative unit qualified to pursue the evidence in hand.

(Scully then turns and leaves the room. Skinner looks at Cassidy, then the entire panel turns to stare at him. What are ya gonna do about THIS, Skinner?)

(Mulder is sitting on a bench by the reflecting pool reading a newspaper. He stares at a headline: "Local Hanta Virus Outbreak In Northern Texas Contained", looks up and sees Scully walking toward him. When she arrives, he hands her the paper.)

MULDER: There's an interesting work of fiction on page 24. Mysteriously, our names have been omitted. They're burying this thing, Scully. They're just going to dig a new hole and cover it up.

SCULLY: I told OPR everything I know. What I experienced, the virus, how it's spread by the bees from pollen in transgenic crops.

(He gets up and starts to walk away. She joins him.)

MULDER: You're wasting your time, Scully. They'll never believe you, not unless your story can be programmed, categorized, or easily referenced.

SCULLY: Well, then we'll go over their heads.

(He stops and turns to her.)

MULDER: No. No. How many times have we been here before, Scully? Right here. So close to the truth and now with what we've seen and what we know to be right back at the beginning with nothing.

SCULLY: This is different, Mulder.

MULDER: No it isn't! You were right to want to quit! You were right to want to leave me! You should get as far away from me as you can! I'm not going to watch you die, Scully, because of some hollow personal cause of mine. Go be a doctor. Go be a doctor while you still can.

SCULLY: I can't. I won't. Mulder, I'll be a doctor, but my work is here with you now. That virus that I was exposed to, whatever it is, it has a cure. You held it in your hand. How many other lives can we save? Look ... (she clasps his hand) ... If I quit now, they win.

(Hand in hand they walk off into the sunset .... sort of anyway.)

(A helicopter flies over the vast desert. We then see CSM walking next to a cornfield, a native man yelling something in Tunisian into the crop. From out of the corn comes Strughold. He walks over to CSM.)

STRUGHOLD: You look hot and miserable. Why have you travelled all this way?

CSM: We have business to discuss.

STRUGHOLD: We have regular channels.

CSM: This involves Mulder.

STRUGHOLD: Ah. That name, again and again.

CSM: He's seen more than he should have.

STRUGHOLD: What has he seen? Of the whole he has seen but pieces.

CSM: He's determined now. Reinvested.

STRUGHOLD: He is but one man. One man alone cannot fight the future.

CSM: Yesterday, I received this.

(From out of his pocket, he pulls a telegram and hands it to Strughold. He reads it then drops it to the ground and walks away. CSM looks down at the telegram. It reads:

"X-FILES RE-OPENED. STOP. PLEASE ADVISE. STOP."

CSM looks up, then walks away. The camera pans above the scene to show the huge cornfield in the middle of the desert ...)

[THE END]