The X-Files - 5.

German title: no change  

Japanese title: Gen-you
translation: Vision
(Somewhat of a Ninja term. A power that makes someone see things which don't exist.)

Spanish title: Locura de Dos
translation: Madness of Two

US Airdate: May 10, 1998

writer: Vince Gilligan

director: Kim Manners

STARRING:

David Duchovny as Special Agent Fox Mulder

Gillian Anderson as Special Agent Dana Scully

Mitch Pileggi as Assistant Director Walter Skinner

Guest Cast:

Brian Markinson as Gary Lambert

Dmitry Chepovetsky as Supervisor

Cynthia Preston as Nancy Aaronson

Brenda McDonald as Mrs. Loach

John Apicella as Greg Pincus

Roger R. Cross as the Field Agent

Grant Gladish as the SWAT Teamer

Steve Bacic as SWAT Commander

Leslie Jones as Ms. Starns

Nancy Kerr as The Nurse

Owen Walstrom as Mark Backus

Norma Jean Wick as The Newscaster

MULDER IS TAKEN HOSTAGE BY A MAN WHO CLAIMS HIS BOSS IS LITERALLY A MONSTER.

Gary Lambert works as a vinyl siding telemarketer in Oak Brook, Illinois. On the surface, Gary would seem to be a mild-mannered Everyman. But unbeknownst to his co-workers, Gary is convinced that his boss is an evil monster who preys on his own staff, turning them into the undead. One morning, Skinner summons Mulder and Scully to his office. He explains that the company Gary works for, VinylRight, received an anonymous, audio-taped manifesto, on which a man threatens to commit a violent act. As a result, the company wishes to have the threat investigated. Mulder is puzzled as to why Skinner is sending he and Scully to investigate. Skinner then explains that the maker of the

tape spoke of a monster threatening employees. Somewhat irked, Mulder tells Scully he will handle the case alone, labeling himself "Monster Boy."

When Mulder arrives at the company, he is greeted by office manager Greg Pincus, who plays him the taped message. Mulder's interest is piqued by a reference to "hiding in the light." He telephones Scully and asks her to investigate previous X-Files cases for such a phrase. Meanwhile, Gary grows concerned when a fellow employee, Nancy Aaronson, is summoned to Greg's office. When Nancy returns to her cubicle, Gary notices that, from his point of view, she appears to be dead.

Scully telephones Mulder when she finishes researching the files. It turns out that the phrase "hiding in the light" was also used by a deacon at a Lakeland, Florida church. The deacon was convinced that one of his parishioners was an evil presence. One Sunday, he entered the church for mass and opened fire on his flock. When Mulder returns to VinylRight, he finds a sea of deserted cubicles. Nancy's head peeks out from behind a wall and warns Mulder to take cover. Before he has time to react, Gary approaches--armed with an AK-47. Mulder slowly raises his hands into the air.

Scully flies to Illinois and joins FBI and SWAT team members who have surrounded the building. Inside, Gary uses his co-workers to form a human barricade. A SWAT team commander overrules Scully and dials Mulder's cell phone. Gary opens Mulder's jacket... and notices his gun within. Gary kicks Mulder in the head, knocking him to the ground. A hostage then charges Gary, but he swivels and opens fire, killing the man. Gary then speaks with an FBI agent, and demands that a television crew be sent into the building so he can broadcast his fears to the public. Using a closed-circuit system, the FBI fools Gary into thinking his image is being broadcast throughout the city. Addressing the camera, Gary raises his gun and points it at Greg. He instructs everyone to look at Greg... to look at "it." Mulder glances over his shoulder... and sees a monster where Pincus was standing. Suddenly, an Armored Personnel Carrier bursts through a wall. A SWAT team member opens fire, striking Gary.

Mulder cannot dismiss what he saw inside the office complex. After performing additional research, Mulder determines that five previous X-Files cases involve monster that went unnoticed by all accept the claimant. Scully reacts with incredulity when Mulder suggests that Gary was not insane, but actually saw the creature he described. Scully attributes Mulder's behavior to "folie à deux," a madness shared by people under tense conditions.

Meanwhile, Mulder follows Greg Pincus to the home of Gretchen Starns, one of his employees. As Mulder stands outside of the house, and gazes through a window, he sees the monster advance behind Gretchen, its insect-like mouth aiming for the back of her neck. The woman suddenly screams, prompting Mulder to shatter the window glass. The monster defies gravity by crawling over the house.

Gretchen lodges a complaint with the FBI, accusing Mulder of breaking into her home. During a meeting with Skinner, Mulder sees Pincus, in the form of the monster, advancing. Mulder draws his gun, but Skinner, believing Mulder has lost his mind, gains the upper hand. Mulder is then admitted to a mental institution. Later, at Mulder's prompting, Scully examines the back of the dead hostage's neck. There she discovers tiny puncture marks. At the hospital, a restrained Mulder listens in horror as the monster approaches the window to his room. Mulder calls for the nurse... only to realize that she is one of the monster's minions. Scully visits the hospital... and experiences a vision of the nurse as one of the living dead. She races to Mulder's room, where she discovers the creature crawling on the ceiling. She opens fire, but the creature escapes. Later, Scully meets with Skinner. She voices her belief that Mulder is of sound mind. She notes that an unidentified toxin was found in the dead hostage, and notes that Pincus has disappeared, along with the nurse and several VinylRight employees. After recovering from his ordeal, Mulder returns to work. Scully informs him she told Skinner the truth: the incident can only be explained as a "folie à deux."

Notes

The title translates as "a shared madness of two".

This page is not complete yet, thank you for your patience.

Quotes

____________________

(in Skinner's office)

Skinner: "I need you to go to Chicago as soon as possible to perform a threat assessment."

Scully: "A threat assessment for whom?"

Skinner: "VinylRight. They make siding. Their telemarketing hub in Oakbrook was the focus of an anonymous audio-taped manifesto, one which threatened violence. Apparently, several years back they had an incident in another office. A disgruntled employee with a gun. They feel they can’t be too careful."

Mulder: "Why can’t the Chicago field office take care of it?"

Skinner: "Because I prefer you did."

Mulder: (challenging) "Because the manifesto contains bizarre overtones ... claims of a paranormal nature?"

Skinner: "It speaks of a monster stalking employees. Your insight into such claims should aid in assessing the threat, if any, posed by this person."

Mulder: (sarcastically) "Monsters. I’m your boy."

(now we see Mulder and Scully walking down the hall outside Skinner's office)

Mulder: "I must’ve done something to piss him off."

Scully: "What do you mean?"

Mulder: "Get stuck with this jerk-off assignment or have I finally reached that magic point in my career where every time somebody sees Bigfoot or the Virgin Mary on a tortilla I get called to offer my special insight on the matter?" (rubs his forehead showing his still taped fingers)

Scully: "You’re saying 'I' a lot. I heard 'we'. Nor do I assume that this case is just a waste of our time."

Mulder: "Not yours, anyway. There’s no reason both of us should go to Chicago. I’ll take care of it."

Scully: "Mulder..."

Mulder: "I’m monster boy, right?"

____________________________________________________________

Mulder, in the telemarketing office, calls Scully in their office

Scully: "Scully."

Mulder: "Hi. It’s me. I need you to check on something."

Scully: "What?"

Mulder: "It’s a phrase, 'hiding in the light'. It’s on this tape that I’m looking into."

Scully: "On the case that’s a total waste of time?"

Mulder: "Yes, and I didn’t say that it wasn’t. Uh, 'to hide in the light' or 'hiding in the light' ... some form of that. I think it’s in an old case file somewhere that I got hidden away."

Scully: "Which one? There’s hundreds."

Mulder: "I’m not sure, but I appreciate it." (he hangs up)

Scully: (to herself, not pleased) "Hiding in the light." (gets up to go look for the file)

____________________________________________________________

Mulder's listening to the tape, his cell phone rings

Mulder: "Mulder."

Scully: " 'Hiding in the light.' That was a phrase spoken by one Jerrold Resnick to a Lakeland,

Florida police investigator on August 9, 1992."

Mulder: "What was he describing?"

Scully: "Well, Mr. Resnick was a deacon of his local church and apparently he was concerned that there was an evil presence amongst his fellow parishioners and that he alone was aware of that fact."

Mulder: "He was trying to warn them?"

Scully: "Not as such. He showed up for mass one Sunday with four handguns and he began wounding people saying, "The afflicted ones wouldn’t bleed." He committed suicide a week later in his cell."

Mulder: "Scully, at the risk of you telling me 'I told you so' I think it’s time for you to get down here and help me."

Scully: "I told you so." (Mulder hangs up)

____________________________________________________________

Mulder's being held hostage, along with the other telemarketing employees, but his cover hasn't been blown yet

Gary Lambert: "Who are you, anyway?"

Mulder: "My name is Mulder."

Gary: "You said that already. What are you doing here?"

Mulder: "Applying for a job."

Gary: (snickering) "Oh, man, did you come to the wrong place."

Mulder: "I get that. Why should we be afraid of Mr. Pincus, Gary?"

Gary: "Because he’s a monster ... only you can’t see that because he’s clouded all your minds but he means to take us all one by one ... harvest our souls ...

(Mulder unbuttons his jacket while Gary’s back is turned)

 ... make us into zombies ... robots made out of meat." (cocks rifle)

Pincus: " Oh, God almighty ..."

Mulder: "Gary, I want to believe that you’re protecting us, but, uh, I’m kind of afraid of that rifle. It makes it hard for us actual people to concentrate on what you’re saying."

Gary: (to Mulder) "Why are you talking to me like I’m a three-year-old? Don’t act like you understand what I’m talking about, because you don’t ... but you will."

____________________________________________________________

In the XF office, Mulder is drawing red lines on a map connecting cities and writes the date 5/10/98. Scully enters and is surprised to see him there

Scully: "Mulder, why didn’t you take the day off?"

Mulder: "Close the door. There was a reason the phrase 'hiding in the light' seemed so familiar to me. I found it or variations of it in five other X-Files. 'Hiding in plain view', 'Hiding in the open', 'Lurking in the open.' All to describe some sort of manifestation of evil which goes unnoticed be everyone except the claimant in each case."

Scully: "Have you slept?"

Mulder: "Seven cities in all dating back ten years. VinylRight has offices within 50 miles of 4 of those cities. Greg Pincus has worked for VinylRight for ten years."

Scully: "What exactly is it you think you have here?"

Mulder: "What if Gary Lambert was right?"

Scully: "Mulder, you’re not serious."

Mulder: "Just bear with me for a moment. What if such a creature existed that could camouflage itself by clouding the minds of its victims? There are antecedents for it in nature. In the insect world, mantids are said to hypnotize their prey."

Scully: "No."

Mulder: "What if it could induce a visual hallucination ... a sort of temporary conversion disorder?"

Scully: "Well, what you’re describing would be more like some kind of a visual agnosia, an inability to recognize what’s before one’s eyes."

Mulder: "Only Gary Lambert could see through it somehow, as could the others ... maybe because of some heightened adrenaline level of maybe just because he knew where to look somehow."

Scully: "Mulder, he was disturbed."

Mulder: "Yeah, but did he see it because he was disturbed, or was he disturbed because he saw it?"

Scully: "He was mentally ill. This monster was a sick fantasy ... a product of his dementia."

Mulder: "I saw it, too. (worried, really asking her) Does that make me disturbed? Demented? Does that make me sick, too?"

Scully: (pauses before answering) "No. No, I mean, this ... this kind of thing is not uncommon.

You ... you went through a terrible ordeal and sometimes people in close associations under tense conditions, the delusions of one can be passed on to the other."

Mulder: "Folie A Deux? It’s not that, Scully. It’s not Helsinki Syndrome either. What I saw was real, and there may be a way to prove it."

Scully: "How?"

Mulder: "Lambert pointed out certain individuals he said had been victimized by Pincus, turned into zombies. The man he shot, Backus was one of them. If you would autopsy the body ..."

Scully: "No. No, absolutely not."

Mulder: "Scully, if this is all in my mind I would be very grateful if you would prove that."

Scully: "Mulder, I am not going to serve the delusions of Gary Lambert, a madman, by giving credence to them."

Mulder: "Then I’ll prove it without you." (gets up to leave)

Scully: "Mulder ..."

(Mulder goes out the door)

____________________________________________________________

Scully's reluctant autopsy

Scully: "Let’s start with the photos. In fact, let’s just do photos. External exam only."

Lab Guy: "This guy came a long way just to have his picture taken."

Scully: "Knock yourself out."

(Lab Guy begins taking pictures as Scully turns away and dials her cell phone)

Lab Guy: "Case number 98-6522, Mark Backus 45-year-old Caucasian male. There are three one centimeter gunshot entry wounds on the left anterior chest wall with some burn stippling present."

Scully: (phone still ringing) "Come on, Mulder."

Lab Guy: "Judging from the corpse’s resolved rigor and fixed lividity as well as the decompositional bloating I’d place the time of death between 48 and 72 hours."

Scully: (turning, surprised) "No. This man died late yesterday afternoon."

Lab Guy: "Are you sure?"

Scully: "Absolutely."

Lab Guy: "Sure looks to me like he’s been dead longer than that." (we see the body uncovered and sure enough, he looks like he's been dead a long time)

____________________________________________________________

Mulder is strapped down to a hospital bed in Calumet Mercy Hospital. Scully pushes back the curtain and holds his hand which is strapped to the bed rail, she looks at him sadly

Mulder: "Five years together, Scully. You must have seen this coming. (laughs softly) Did you examine Backus’ body? What did you find?"

Scully: "More or less what we thought we’d find."

Mulder: "'More or less?' What is that supposed to mean?"

Scully: "The body showed signs of decomposition beyond what we expected to find which, in and of itself means nothing, really. Time of death is notoriously hard to quantify."

Mulder: "Or, that Lambert was telling the truth and that man was dead before he was gunned down."

Scully: "No, Mulder ..."

Mulder: "Scully .. When that monster, Pincus ... whatever the hell you want to call it ... when he attacked that woman last night he did something to the back of her neck. H-he bit her there, or he injected something in there. There’s got to be evidence of that. You got to check for that."

Scully: "Mulder, the case is over. There’s no more evidence to be gathered. There’s only my hope that you’ll be able to see past this delusion."

Mulder: (desperate) "*You* have to be willing to see."

Scully: "I wish it were that simple."

Mulder: "Scully, you *have* to believe me. Nobody else on this whole damn planet does or ever will. You’re my one in ... five billion."

(They look at each other, Scully still holding his hand)

____________________________________________________________

Scully, alone in Skinner's office

Skinner: "Agent Scully, I have to say I’m at a bit of a loss here. Do I infer correctly from this that you believe there’s some ... merit to Agent Mulder’s claims?"

Scully: "I believe that Agent Mulder is mentally sound and fit for duty. Aside from that belief, I can only present to you the few hard facts that I’ve been able to gather. That, as per Agent Mulder’s assertions a toxin has been found to have been injected into the spine of the shooting victim, Mark Backus. As of yet, we’ve been unable to identify it. Furthermore, Gregory Pincus has apparently disappeared without a trace along with half a dozen other key witnesses integral to this investigation ... among them, Agent Mulder’s nurse at the hospital and several VinylRight employees."

Skinner: "Men and women described by Mulder as zombies."

Scully: (sighs) "I can personally vouch for the fact that there was an intruder in Agent Mulder’s hospital room."

Skinner: "Describe this intruder."

Scully: (pause) "It was dark."

Skinner: "You must have gotten a glimpse. What did you see?"

(Now we see Scully join Mulder at the elevator)

Mulder: "What did you tell him?"

Scully: "The truth .. as well as I understand it."

Mulder: "Which is?" (they enter the elevator)