You don't know how much I hate
my job on days like this, Jeb.
If it were my choice...
I'd be giving you a promotion.
But with the economy the way it is...
Are you firing me?
You can hold your head up, Jeb.
You've done a good job here.
I-I don't believe this.
I... I thought this was just an evaluation.
I'm sorry.
I really am.
Be calm, people. Stay back.
Everybody stay back. Just get back.
Everybody stay back.
Oh, my God, there's someone in there!
Please, stay back!
Keep your distance.
Jeb.
Can I help you?
Jeb?
Hey.
Jeb.
What's up?
Agent Reyes?
Yeah, hi.
Uh... uh, Monica Reyes.
Frank Potter, New Orleans PD.
Trying to quit the habit.
Yeah, I tried to quit smoking myself once.
I hated that damn gum.
Well, anyway,
you, uh, want to see the victims?
Well, on the phone, you said you had reason to believe
the killings might be satanic ritual murders.
Right. Let me show you.
This is Jeb Dukes' work area.
I found this among his personal effects.
What can you tell me about the killer, Detective?
Anything?
31 years old,
college grad, lived alone.
There's some who felt he had a dark side,
which could explain that there.
Can I look in there?
Sure.
You're the expert.
Does it tell you anything about
why he might've killed those people?
The fact is, a killer like this is usually pushed
over the edge by what we call a stressor--
a catalyzing event-- an emotional breakdown,
the breakup of a relationship,
or sometimes when someone's been fired.
This guy was fired by the two victims.
Well, that's most likely what drove him to murder.
Yeah, but what about all these images,
these devil pictures?
It's Marilyn Manson.
Marilyn Manson?
Your kids listen to him.
They probably buy his CDs at K-Mart.
I don't think there's anything satanic
going on here, Detective.
Agent Reyes?
Okay, okay, it's some rock group.
But you don't think
this has anything to do with Satan or evil or...?
Personally... I'd look into his gum.
Agent Reyes?
Did you find something?
Mulder? What?
I was just about to jump in the shower,
but I was waiting for the pizza man.
You got something going on with the pizza man
I should know about?
The pizza man?
Well, correct me if I'm wrong,
but you just said you were waiting
for the pizza man to jump in the shower.
No, what I mean was,
the pizza man's usually late, and so...
You want to come in?
Thank you.
I feel like I'm stuck in an episode of Mad About You.
Well, uh, yeah, but small technicality.
Mad About You was about a married couple,
and we just work together.
Yeah, well, you know what I'm talking about.
I do, I do.
What-what I'm trying to say is that, uh... we have no good
reliable information on this man.
I mean, what I am saying is,
the pizza man... is not above suspicion.
Ah, I see.
Is that for me?
Yeah. Nice package.
Thank you.
What's the occasion?
Oh. Uh, I was going through some stuff after my mother died,
and, um, it's just an old family keepsake,
and I wanted you to have it.
Well, I'm touched.
Little Caesar, I presume?
Hi.
Just, uh, give it to the man
with the funny look on his face.
Yeah, it's $29.08.
What'd she get on it, a tank of gas?
Scully? Scully!
Call 911.
That Scully? Dana?
She's got what? Abdominal pains?
Her doctor is Dr. Speake.
Oh, he's been called.
She.
Who are you?
The husband? No.
Then you wait outside.
Agent Mulder, what happened?
How'd you find out?
I was dropping something off; the landlord told me.
Are you the husband?
Me? No.
Excuse me.
Mulder.
Special Agent Fox Mulder?
Speaking.
Agent Mulder, my name is Monica Reyes.
We never met.
Not since you've been alive, I should say.
Who?
Special Agent Reyes.
I know this is out of the blue,
but I have a case I need your help on.
It involves a certain phenomena.
I can't help you, Agent Reyes, for so many reasons.
I think you should contact Agent Doggett at the X Files.
I can't call Agent Doggett because it involves him.
I'm in New Orleans, but I can be in D.C. in a few hours.
It's important, Agent Mulder.
Very.
Call me when you get here.
They're telling us not to worry.
They're running some tests.
Agent Mulder.
Agent Reyes?
You're taller than I thought.
You keep on alluding to a time that we've met,
and I don't remember.
I was there
when they found you in the woods.
You were...
uh...
Yeah, I'm not surprised you don't remember.
Yeah.
Um, I-I have somewhere I have to be,
if we could cut to the chase.
As I said before, it involves Agent Doggett,
the death of his son.
I don't know if you're familiar at all with that case.
No, I'm not at all familiar with Agent Doggett.
I-I wasn't aware of this.
You were the lead investigator?
Once it fell to the FBI.
Agent Doggett was with the NYPD at the time.
We worked it together.
We never caught the killer.
It was the hardest case I've ever had.
As in "stealing into the bathroom to cry my eyes out"
kind of hard.
I can't begin to imagine what it was like for John.
I couldn't bear to put him through this again,
but if it means we could catch his son's killer...
I just can't go to him
until I know if what I saw means anything.
You said this case involves some kind of phenomena?
I don't know if it was a psychic experience or what,
but when we found his son, I had a vision.
It was as if,
for just a moment...
...the body was changed.
Changed?
Into what?
Ashes.
It looked like ashes.
The thing of it is,
Agent Doggett told me he saw it, too.
Although he spent the last few years
convincing himself he didn't--
that even if he did, it didn't mean anything.
What do you think it means?
I can't shake the feeling that it's a clue,
that it could somehow point to who's responsible
if only I let it.
And now I've seen it again--
a thousand miles from here, a seemingly unrelated case--
and I've had the same vision.
There has to be a reason for it, a reason it's happening now.
Sir, immediate family only.
You fellas just don't listen.
You have to go now.
Hey! Hey!
You stay out of my life! Take it easy!
Stay out of my business! Take it easy, Agent Doggett!
You want to get something on me, you ask for it!
I don't want to get calls about you going behind my back!
You got that straight?!
I don't want anything on you!
I was asked to look into this file.
Who asked you?!
Agent Doggett.
What are you doing?
Is this you?
Is this you looking into this?
Yes.
I asked Agent Mulder. You asked him what?
There's nothing in there for him to bother with!
Why don't you just calm down, Agent Doggett,
and let her explain the connection to you.
The connection? To what?
I was going to tell you, John.
I was in New Orleans on a case--
a shooting.
Something that I saw connected back to Luke.
A vision.
Not this again.
You're not going to make something out of nothing.
Bob Harvey.
Does that name mean
something or nothing to you?
Bob Harvey was a suspect in the death of my son.
We questioned him,
but then we realized he wasn't our man.
Agent Mulder pointed it out.
Bob Harvey was killed last night in a car crash,
fleeing the police near a shooting in New Orleans.
He died in front of the building
where the shooting occurred.
What's the connection?
That's it.
That's it?
And then there was the vision.
No, there's no connection.
I don't care what you saw, you leave it alone.
And you leave it the hell alone.
I know there is something here.
Good.
Hi.
Is your mommy home?
Mom!
Mia?
Katha Dukes?
Yeah.
Sorry about the late hour.
My name is Monica Reyes.
I'm with the FBI.
I believe that we're all born good, uncorrupted,
and life itself does the corrupting.
But, you know, someone like Jeb...
he just isn't capable of this.
Are you close to your brother?
Very.
Jeb lived here in the house with us till he went down South.
He loves his niece.
Does the name Bob Harvey mean anything to you?
Did Jeb ever have any dealings with him?
No.
I think I'd know. Why?
No reason.
It's the answer I was kind of expecting, actually.
Hello?
Katha?
Yes?
Katha, it's Jeb.
I really can't talk right now.
It's been a very bad day here.
Listen, it wasn't me that killed those people, all right?
It was somebody else.
I'm telling you, it was somebody else.
You're going to have to call back later.
Hi.
I'm sorry to bother you.
I got a flat tire back a ways.
What are you doing, Agent Doggett?
I was, um...
I just came by to see how you're doing.
I'm, uh... I feel all druggy.
Do you mind?
Thank you.
They say you're stabilized,
but we've been worried about you.
Who's "we"?
You know...
me and Agent Mulder and...
What's wrong, Agent Doggett?
You don't seem too good yourself.
You worked with Agent Mulder for how long?
A long time.
Mm.
You never believed in any of this stuff,
this paranormal or whatever you call it.
So what changed your mind?
I realized it was me.
That I was afraid.
Afraid to believe.
Why do you ask?
Agent Doggett, why do you ask?
Some other time.
Agent Mulder?
I was looking for Agent Doggett.
Well, that'd make sense.
It's not my office anymore.
But old habits die hard.
What are those?
Cases involving images like you described.
People close to crimes who experience visions of death
disassociated from reality.
And what did you find?
Absolutely nothing.
These visions are so random
as to have absolutely no significance
to the cases they're supposed to pertain to.
You're wrong.
I think I know these files.
And I know what I saw.
There's a reason these things are happening.
There is something at work here, and it all began
with the man killed in the car crash-- Bob Harvey.
I think that's a coincidence.
I think that life is full of them.
And full of patterns--
things we see, but can't comprehend.
You believe that. Why can't you believe this?
I think there's an opening coming up in this office soon.
You might want to apply.
Is that why you won't help him?
I have a, uh, sick friend in the hospital,
and, uh, I think I should go see her.
I hope she gets well.
This office down here needs
at least one person with an open mind.
You'll say anything, won't you?
Only when I think I'm right.
What am I doing here?
Been asking myself that same question, Agent Doggett.
But it seems the tenacious Agent Reyes
does not want to let go of this one.
Of what?
She's got a murder victim out here,
a woman found shot.
She thinks it's by the same man who killed
those two people down in New Orleans-- this Jeb Dukes.
What does she want from me?
She wants to know if you see it, too,
what she's been seeing.
I told you, there's no connection.
Agent Doggett.
I'm sorry, Agent Reyes.
I don't see it.
I think you do.
You're just afraid to go there.
Whew. Man, you just keep shooting
till you hit something, don't you?
You'd rather blind yourself to the connections, but I can't.
You keep talking about these connections.
Connections to what? To who?
What if this is a thread of evil connecting through time,
through men, through opportunity,
connecting back to you.
In India, in Africa, in Iran,
in the Middle East, in the Far East,
most of the world, they take it as a given.
They see evil in death
the way other people see God in a rose.
I saw Elvis in a potato chip once.
You know what I'm talking about.
Yes, I do.
I do.
But if this man doesn't see it, he doesn't see it, right?
You awake?
Yeah.
What did the doctor say?
That I had a partial abruption.
Which means that my placenta
started to tear away from the uterine wall.
They're going to need to monitor me for awhile.
But you're going to be fine?
Yeah.
Where have you been?
I've actually been out in the field with Agent Doggett
and this, um, female agent from New Orleans.
Agent Reyes.
Yeah.
I like her.
You're nothing at all alike.
Well, then neither are you and I.
So this is a case you're working on?
Yeah.
Actually, one that involves Agent Doggett's son,
the son who died.
Yeah, he's never talked to me about him,
but I know something.
Are you able to help him at all?
You can't help a man who can't help himself.
He's worth the effort, Mulder.
All right, you got a half an hour
to play in your room before Mommy has dinner ready.
Mia?
Okay.
What are you doing here?
I'm coming home.
The FBI was here, Jeb.
I didn't do what they said, Kath. It wasn't me, okay?
It wasn't.
What is that on your face?
What?
Is that blood?
I don't know how that got there.
I need the truth, Jeb.
Look, please,
believe me, Katha, it's not me.
Okay?
I need help.
Please.
Mom?
Is that Uncle Jeb?
Yeah, sweetheart.
Yeah, it is.
It's me.
Jeb Dukes, middle name Larold.
No, Larold.
Okay, thanks, anyway.
What are you doing, John?
I'm looking into this case.
You're looking in the wrong way.
There are a hundred agents in this building
who can phone canvass.
Ah, but there's only two who can solve crimes
with mental telepathy-- you and me.
So we'll just read the tea leaves on this one,
and there it is, right?
Case closed? John...
Damn it, Monica, you want to find this guy,
I'm trying to find him.
What do you want from me?
I want you to be honest with yourself
about what you saw that day.
Honest about what your feelings tell you.
Feelings don't solve crimes.
What the hell does it matter what my feelings are?
How the hell's that going to get the job done?
I'm not talking about the job, John.
What are you scared of?
Why does it scare you?
I got to believe
that I did everything I could to find my son.
You did do everything to find your son.
I got to believe that I did everything I could to save him.
To get him back safe, to not let him down.
I got to believe that I did everything humanly possible,
'cause if I can't believe that,
then these other possibilities that you talk about,
that Mulder talks about, that Agent Scully talks about,
if they're real...
if they're real, then...
that's something else I could've done to save my son.
Monica Reyes.
Katha?
Katha, wait.
Jeb Dukes' sister.
He's there at the house with her.
This guy somehow has some link to my son,
and I'm damn sure going to find out what it is.
"As it happened, Hansel and Gretel
"had overheard everything that their parents had said.
"'Shh,' said the boy.
"'I'll find a way out,
I promise you, and when at...'"
Mia, honey?
Can you come here a minute, please?
But Uncle Jeb's reading to me.
That's okay, I just need you a minute.
Can you... can you just come here?
Who's here?
She just wants to talk, Jeb.
I just want you to
tell her what you told me; she can help you.
Who?
I said who, damn it!
Come on, baby.
Uncle Jeb! You lied to me!
Come on, Jeb. Just get back. Mommy!
Go!
Mommy!
Let me go, Uncle Jeb!
Mommy, help!
Let me go! Let me go! Help!
Right there, right there! Hands in the air!
Federal agent! I'm armed, I'll shoot!
You drop the gun, you drop the gun! Let go of the girl!
Mommy! I'll shoot her, I swear!
I just need to talk to you.
Mommy.
Mommy! Mommy!
I won't hurt you.
You stay back. Mommy!
I said stay back!
Mommy!
Mia! Mia!
What have you done?!
This man needs help!
You're not going to die on me now.
Agent Doggett...
You hear me? You're going to make it.
You hear me?
John...
No, no, the parade stops here.
Now, if you want to save him,
let the doctors do their work, okay?
Who's the immediate family member here?
I am.
Okay, come with me.
I'm going to need you to fill out
some information for me, all right?
There is nothing more you can do.
You can't tell me that now.
Maybe saving this girl was the reason.
Maybe that's what this was all about.
Maybe that's what I saw and why I saw it.
For that kid.
Go home, John.
There's nothing here for you to do.
Agent Doggett.
She just fell back to sleep.
I just wanted to check and see how she's doing.
Anyways, I'm here with this other thing.
We, uh, we caught this killer, Jeb Dukes.
He's in the ICU.
He may not make it.
And now you're wondering
if there really was a connection.
You know, when I, uh...
I first came to work at the FBI, I worked at Violent Crimes.
And I saw... I saw the worst of humanity.
I saw monsters.
And I wondered how they became that way,
how these men became so evil.
I know there were psychological explanations--
victims of their environment, victims of their parents--
but the scientific explanations were never truly satisfying,
and I began to think about evil like a disease.
You know, that it goes from man to man or age to age.
Most of us walk around thinking
that we're incapable of any acts of evil,
and we are.
You know, we can stifle
that momentary urge to kill or to hurt.
We have some kind of immunity to it,
but I think it's possible that there's...
...an occurrence in somebody's life,
a tragedy or a loss,
that leaves them vulnerable,
hurts their immunity to evil.
And all of a sudden,
at that point in their lives
when they're weakened, they're open to evil,
and they can become evil.
If that were true, then what you're saying is-is...
this man we wheeled in here tonight is infected with evil.
Same evil that killed my son.
You really believe that, Agent Mulder?
Uh, I'm not really a good test for questions like that.
I'll believe almost anything,
you know? But the, uh...
the pisser is you may never know.
It may be like Agent Reyes says.
It could be random and meaningless--
who it affects, who it goes to.
What if it isn't?
Well, then you'd be seeing something
that I don't, Agent Doggett.
Somebody!
Doctor!
Let's go.
Jeb!
Push one gram of epi.
Right here.
Call it.
I'm sorry.
10:57 p.m.
No, no, no.
You killed him.
Drop the weapon!
No!
Drop it!
I need a doctor!
Oh, my Lord.
I need a doctor stat.
It's over. It's over now.
It's never over.
Mulder, you never fail to surprise me.
I just wish I felt like eating it right now.
That's cool.
We can just wait for the cheese to congeal
and eat it later.
You miss your regular pizza man, don't you?
Yes.
That's okay. He's coming by later.
Bet you forgot about that,
didn't you?
No, I didn't, actually.
Thought about it a lot
while I was lying in my hospital bed,
wondering what on earth you could have given me.
And?
Oh, my God.
Oh, Mulder.
Is it what you imagined?
Not even close.
Oh, my, that's the wrong doll, actually.
But then, that's the other gift that you gave me, Mulder.
Courage... to believe.
I hope that's a gift I can pass on.