The X-Files - 4.

4.2 Unruhe

German title:Unruhe
translation: Unrest

< Traverse City, Michigan >

(It is raining heavily outside a drugstore with a sign advertising "Passport Fotos While-U-Wait". A yellow Volkswagen pulls up in front. Inside are Mary and Billy. Billy looks around nervously, while Mary adjusts the rearview mirror and puts on lipstick.)

BILLY: It's just a damn passport photo. It's not the cover of 'Vogue'.

MARY: There's no reason I have to look like hell in it, is there? Now settle down.

BILLY: We're on a schedule here.

MARY: I know we're on a schedule here.

(Billy readjusts the mirror and spots something.)

BILLY: Act natural.

(A police car passes by.)

MARY: I'll be back in ten.

BILLY: Make it five. I'll be around back.

MARY: Relax, Billy.

(Mary gets out of the car, opens an umbrella and heads into the drugstore.)

(Inside, the druggist is preparing to take Mary's picture. Mary is pulling down a background screen.)

DRUGGIST: Lower it just a bit. Yep, that's it. Yeah ... big smile ... yeah ... hold it. (He snaps a picture of a smiling Mary) Big trip you got planned?

MARY: Oh, you know. Nothing special. Just good to have a passport.

DRUGGIST: Oh, it looks like it's clearing up. Might be a nice day after all. It's just going to take a few minutes. That comes to $6.95.

(A man in a yellow rain suit with hood enters the drugstore. Mary fumbles for her billfold.)

MARY: Great. I left my money in the car. I'll be back.

DRUGGIST: I'll be here.

(She opens her umbrella and heads back out into the rain. The man in the yellow rain suit walks past the counter but leaves without purchasing anything. Outside, Mary walks around back. The shadow of a hooded man appears on the back of her umbrella and grows larger. There is a bumping sound.)

MARY: Ow! Hey, you jerk!

(The hooded man, the same one in the drugstore, walks past. Mary examines her right shoulder and holds it as she stumbles down some steps toward Billy's car.)

MARY: What? Billy? Billy, someone did something to me, Billy.

(As she walks up to the driver's door of the car, she sees Billy slumped back in the seat, motionless, with much blood running down from his left ear. Mary groans, tries to support herself against the car, then drops the umbrella and falls to the pavement. She struggles to maintain consciousness, and dimly sees a car approach her and the hooded man get out of the car and approach her.)

(Inside, the druggist looks impatient.)

DRUGGIST: Shoot!

(He peels the picture from the film backing. Rather than the smiling Mary that he photographed, the photo shows an image of Mary screaming in terror.)

DRUGGIST: My God!

ACT I

< Long Lake Road, Northern Michigan, 5:10 AM >

(Mulder is driving while Scully is reviewing a file, which includes the photograph that the druggist took of Mary LeFante.)

MULDER: What are your thoughts on that, Scully?

SCULLY: Have the local police been contacted by this woman's abductor? No demand for ransom?

MULDER: No, unfortunately. It's going on three days.

SCULLY: Any additional leads?

MULDER: No, no hair and fiber evidence either. The rain washed it all away. The autopsy did come back on the dead boyfriend, though. It's a puncture wound through the left eardrum and into the brain, possibly from a long needle or awl.

SCULLY: I'm still not sure how you and I figure into this investigation.

MULDER: Don't you see the photo?

SCULLY: I assume that was taken by whoever it was who abducted her.

MULDER: It was taken by a sixty-five year old druggist moments before she was abducted. That's a passport photo from a local drugstore. The druggist who took that photo is the last known person to have seen Mary LeFante. Only he claims that wasn't the photo he was taking. He says the photo he was taking was normal in every respect. He only came forward to the police when he heard the woman was missing.

SCULLY: Well, whoever it was that took this photo was obviously privy to the woman's abduction.

MULDER: That is what you would think.

< In the drugstore >

(The druggist places the camera on the counter.)

DRUGGIST: The damndest thing. Here it is just like I left it. It was under lock and key.

SCULLY: Is that where you keep it?

DRUGGIST: Yes.

SCULLY: Mind if I take a look?

DRUGGIST: Yes, help yourself. At first I thought I did something wrong when I took the picture. You see, there's that piece of paper you have to pull off. You have to do that just right.

(Scully kneels behind the counter, where the film is kept. She notices that the druggist has a brace on his right leg.)

MULDER: I'm sure you did it just fine.

SCULLY: Your film's out of date.

DRUGGIST: (puzzled) Is that against the law?

SCULLY: No, I was just making an observation.

DRUGGIST: I don't get much call for passport photos, you know. The copy shop over at the mall does them cheaper. (the phone rings) Excuse me. I sure hope you find that young woman, safe and sound.

(Scully has noticed a space heater just below the shelf that holds the film. The druggist limps to the back of the store to answer the phone.)

MULDER: (smiling) So which one of us gets to use the stun gun on Bruno Hauptmann back there?

SCULLY: All right, so he doesn't exactly stand out as a suspect. Mulder, take a look at this. See this smeariness here. I'm thinking that it's heat damage. With the heater sitting under the film right there, the emulsion probably melted.

MULDER: So you think that would make it look like she posed screaming for a passport photo?

SCULLY: Plus, the film is two years out of date.

MULDER: Oh.

(Mulder is nodding with a slight smile on his face. Scully notices and sounds less and less convinced as she talks.)

SCULLY: The, the photographic chemistry could have changed. The, the dyes ... fade, they ... all right, so what's your theory?

MULDER: I'm not sure I have a theory.

(Officer Trott enters the store and approaches Mulder and Scully.)

TROTT: Excuse me. You the two FBI agents?

MULDER: Yeah, agents Mulder and Scully.

TROTT: Sorry to have brought you all the way from Washington. Afraid we may have wasted your time.

< the residence of Mary LeFante >

(A number of officers are conducting an investigation, taking pictures and collecting evidence. Mulder and Scully enter, led by Officer Trott into the kitchen.)

TROTT: Inspector Puett. These are agents Scully and Mulder. (Trott leaves.)

PUETT: Agents.

MULDER: Inspector.

PUETT: United States Postal Inspector. My office is investigating a mail theft - one which we've traced to your missing person, Ms. Mary Louise LeFante.

SCULLY: She was a postal employee?

PUETT: She works as a sorter at the Kurland Hills Branch. Not coincidentally, a number of unsigned credit cards in transit through that branch never made it to their respective owners.

(He shows them a bag of credit cards recovered at the scene.)

MULDER: Mary LeFante was intercepting them.

PUETT: And her recently deceased boyfriend was signing them. We ran him, he was into forgery, check fraud, you name it.

(Mulder is looking at a number of normal-looking photographs held by magnets on the refrigerator.)

SCULLY: Mary LeFante's passport photo. Do you know how soon she wanted to leave town? (Puett shakes his head) Did she know about your investigation?

PUETT: Probably, though we didn't focus on her specifically until this week after she came up missing.

SCULLY: And you think that she faked her own disappearance?

PUETT: Well, it looks that way to me.

MULDER: Yeah, but why would she stab her boyfriend through the ear? The magic was gone? Did you find a camera anywhere here?

(Puett shakes his head.)

(Mulder and Scully go upstairs into Mary's bedroom.)

SCULLY: So you're thinking this woman planted that photo of herself in the drugstore?

MULDER: What would be the point of that?

SCULLY: (shrugs, puzzled) I ...

(Mulder walks into the closet.)

MULDER: Here it is. (He emerges with a Polaroid camera.) Stand back, Scully, it's loaded.

(He puts his hand over the lens and snaps a photograph. He snaps several others as they talk.)

SCULLY: What are you doing?

MULDER: In the sixties, a bellhop named Ted Serios became kind of famous for taking what he called "thoughtographs". He claimed that by concentrating on an unexposed film negative, he could create a photographic representation of what he saw in his mind. He did landscapes, cathedrals, the Queen of England.

SCULLY: "Thoughtographs?"

MULDER: Also known as "skotographs." The literature on thought photography dates back almost to Louis Daguerre.

SCULLY: So that makes it legitimate?

MULDER: Look at that.

(The images on the prints are starting to emerge. Each one shows a distorted picture of a screaming Mary, not unlike the drugstore photograph. There are also several distorted skull-like images on each photo.)

SCULLY: Oh my God!

MULDER: I think he was here, Scully.

SCULLY: Who was here?

MULDER: Mary LeFante's abductor. I think he stalked her. (He walks out an exterior door onto a porch, toward the steps onto the porch and then to a window on the wall near the closet.) He could have come up right here. I think he came in here and he looked at her through the window, this close. Close enough to affect the film in that camera.

SCULLY: Psychic photography? Mulder, I think that it's obvious that somebody doctored these images and planted them to be found here. Maybe as some kind of a smokescreen.

MULDER: Meant to conceal what? This isn't about mail fraud, Scully, that's just incidental. What if ... what if ... someone had this ability? An image like this would be a peak into that person's mind.

SCULLY: Into their darkest fantasies.

MULDER: The fantasy of a killer.

< next to a highway in a nearby rural area >

(As cars go by, Mary LeFante, who was lying in some weeds by the side of the road, gets to her feet and walks toward the road. She is wearing a nightgown. Expressionless, she walks along the road. One car honks its horn at her, then a police car pulls up behind her.)

< a hospital >

(Mary LeFante is being wheeled through the hospital on a stretcher. A doctor, an orderly, and Mulder and Scully are by the stretcher.)

DOCTOR: She's completely nonresponsive. We did a preliminary tox screen on her found traces of morphine and scopolamine.

SCULLY: Twilight sleep.

MULDER: The dental anesthetic.

DOCTOR: It's basically a painkiller cocktail. It's also for women in labor.

MULDER: Would that account for her condition?

SCULLY: No, it wouldn't.

(Scully is examining Mary's pupils as they go through the hall.)

MULDER: What would?

SCULLY: (to the doctor) Give her a PET scan.

(a few minutes later, Mary is placed into the PET scanner by a technician.)

TECHNICIAN: All set.

(In the adjoining room, Mulder, Scully and the doctor watch as another technician operates a terminal that shows the results of a scan of Mary's brain. The scan shows the brain in blue, but there are large green areas and several red areas. Scully grimaces as she sees the results.)

SCULLY: Oh my God.

MULDER: What is it?

SCULLY: She's been given what's called a transorbital lobotomy. It used to be known as an icepick lobotomy. It involves inserting a leucotome through the eye sockets.

MULDER: So we're looking for a doctor? Someone with training?>

DOCTOR: Not judging by this.

SCULLY: Whoever did this, Mulder, did it wrong.

(Through the speaker, they hear Mary moaning from the examination room.)

MARY: un ... un ... unruhe ... unruhe ...

MULDER: (switching on the intercom) Mary?

MARY: un ... un ...

MULDER: We better go in there and get her.

(The doctor and technician go into the examination room and remove Mary.)

MARY: Unruhe ... un ... unruhe ...

(Officer Trott enters the adjoining room with Mulder and Scully.)

TROTT: We just got the call. There's been a second abduction.

< an unknown location >

(A light is switched on, showing a woman, apparently bound to a chair, with duct tape over her mouth. She moans and struggles. There is an unknown man with her who speaks in German. As she struggles, she watches him place a leucotome - a six-inch steel needle with a handle - on a metal table next to her.)

MAN: Unruhe. Hab keine Angst. Ich werde dir helfen. Du wirst deine Unruhe bald vergessen ... deine Unruhe vergessen.

ACT II

< the Midlothian Corporate Park >

(Scully drives up. She walks through a plastic-shrouded scaffolding, passing paramedics who are pushing a stretcher carrying a body. She finds Mulder in an office within the building. Other officers are investigating the scene.)

SCULLY: Mulder.

MULDER: Charles Selchik, certified public accountant (he motions to an outline of a body marked on the floor) ... dead from a stab wound through the ear ... cleaning crew found the body.

SCULLY: What about the missing woman?

MULDER: His secretary, Alice Brandt, age 32. Her family confirmed that she was working late last night.

SCULLY: What's her connection to the first victim?

MULDER: Apparently none, but if the M.O. remains the same ...

SCULLY: Yeah, the clock is running.

MULDER: Yeah. I keep thinking about that word that Mary LeFante was repeating - "unruhe." I checked the Michigan phone directory. It appears under three different spellings but none within 80 miles of here.

SCULLY: It might be significant as a word.

MULDER: That's what I've been thinking. Apparently in German, it means trouble or strife.

SCULLY: "Unrest."

MULDER: You took German in high school, Scully?

SCULLY: College.

MULDER: Unrest, huh?

SCULLY: I'm working on these crime scene photos from the first abduction. If we're lucky, we're dealing with someone who gets a vicarious thrill from returning to the scene of a crime.

MULDER: He wasn't there, Scully.

SCULLY: How do you know?

MULDER: It would have affected the photos. Trott, what did you find?

TROTT: Nothing much. There's no cameras or film here whatsoever. It's all just accountants' offices so I don't know why there would be.

SCULLY: Is that what we're looking for here, Mulder? More evidence of psychic photography?

MULDER: That may be the only evidence we get.

SCULLY: I've got a bureau forensics team coming up from Detroit.

MULDER: What's here for them to find? This guy is obviously very good at what he does. He's left behind no witnesses, no latent prints. The only thing he's left are those photos, which leads me to believe he doesn't even know that he has that ability.

SCULLY: We haven't found any new psychic photos here either.

(Scully sees something outside and looks down at a photo.)

SCULLY: Wait a second.

(She then walks to the window for a better look. She is looking at a sign over the scaffolding that she went through earlier.)

SCULLY: I want to show you something.

(She and Mulder are walking back through the plastic-shrouded scaffolding. They approach a distinctive sign for the Iskendarian Construction company.)

SCULLY: Right here. This. (she shows him a photo from the first crime scene that shows the same sign in the area) And look. It's the same company. What if the kidnapper was working construction at both sites? From these two vantage points, he would have been able to pick out the two women.

MULDER: You may be right, Scully, you should check it out. Let me know what you find.

SCULLY: Where are you going to be?

MULDER: I'll be back in DC. I want special photo to run this. I still think the answer is in here.

SCULLY: What if it's not, Mulder? This woman's time is running out.

MULDER: Well, that's all the more reason to fully investigate the one and only hard piece of evidence we do have. I'll be in touch.

< back at the unknown location where Alice Brandt is being held captive >

(The man is placing a nightgown, similar to the one that Mary LeFante was wearing when she was found, over Alice.)

MAN: Das ist fuer dich. Es ist wie das, das sie getragen hat.

(The duct tape over Alice's mouth comes loose.)

ALICE: Oh, get away from me! Get away from me you bastard! Let me go! No! No!

MAN: Shh ... shh ... (he puts a new piece of tape over her mouth) Bald... sehr, sehr bald.

< FBI Special Photographic Unit, Washington D.C. >

(Mulder and a technician are working on the photograph from the camera in Mary LeFante's house, displayed on a computer screen.)

MULDER: Can you get rid of the blurriness surrounding her, here?

TECHNICIAN: Yeah. I just need to mark a place where the blur comes to a point, and let the computer do its business.

(The skull-like images around Mary's face are now sharpened to show evil-looking heads with sharp teeth.)

TECHNICIAN: Bingo. Lord, look at that. This guy's an artist.

MULDER: Why do you say that?

TECHNICIAN: However he did this, however he put this together, it's seamless.

(Mulder points to another blurry image on the photo.)

MULDER: What about this face, here? Can you bring that up at all?

TECHNICIAN: Wait a sec ... Let's try ... I think I can sweeten it more.

MULDER: OK, do that.

(He has enlarged the area of interest, and as he works the area sharpens to show a man's face.)

< the Traverse City police station >

(Scully enters and approaches Officer Corning.)

SCULLY: What have you got?

CORNING: We're running the construction company employees. Eighteen workers overlapped on both job sites. We're checking the records now, but so far nothing.

SCULLY: What about day laborers?

CORNING: Mr. Iskendarian, there, says that his company doesn't hire workers off the books ...

ISKENDARIAN: I don't want any trouble with the IRS.

CORNING: ... but that his foremen might hire a little cash-only day labor without his knowledge. He's got seven job sites going now, as many foremen.

SCULLY: Gather officers to canvas. (to Iskendarian) Which foreman was working the Midlothian Corporate Park?

ISKENDARIAN: That job's finished.

SCULLY: Find out where he is today. I'll take that one. (She leaves.)

ISKENDARIAN: (to another officer) Can I use your phone?

< back in D.C. at the Special Photographic Unit >

(Mulder and the technician are still working on the photograph. Mulder is on his cell phone.)

MULDER: OK, thank you. (hangs up) NCIC shows no match for that man. (he points to two dark lines near the man's head) How about this shape up here?> What is that? (they zoom out and see that the lines curve around a large area at the top of the photo) Can you take that and flip it so that that's on the bottom? Is that a shadow?

(They enhance the contrast and the dark lines show an outline of a man, with very long legs)

TECHNICIAN: Yeah, it is. Somebody's shadow.

MULDER: It's the kidnapper's shadow. It's like he's looming over her, it's like he's standing over her, he means to pass judgement on her, like a god.

< outside an apartment building construction site in Michigan >

(Scully drives up, then walks into the building.)

SCULLY: Hello? Hello? (she walks up a stairway onto a balcony that surrounds an open area below) Hello? (she hears some noises and heads toward them) Hello?

(A man, Gerry Schnauz, emerges from a room wearing construction stilts.)

SCHNAUZ: Hi, can I help you?

SCULLY: Uh, I hope so. Are you the foreman?

SCHNAUZ: Yes, ma'am. Gerry Schnauz.

SCULLY: (flashes her badge) I'm Special Agent Dana Scully. I'd like to ask you some questions about the day laborers that you hire.

SCHNAUZ: What, is this some IRS thing?

SCULLY: No, sir, not at all.

SCHNAUZ: Well, my crew is at lunch if you want to talk to anybody, but everybody I've got on today is on the books, as far as I know.

(Scully's cell phone rings)

SCULLY: Excuse me. Sorry.

SCHNAUZ: Sure.

SCULLY: (turning and walking away, answering her phone) Scully.

MULDER: (on phone) Scully, I may have something for you on the kidnapper. It's something about his legs.

SCULLY: Yeah?

MULDER: They're unusually long, they're out of proportion. I'm thinking he's either very tall, or he's not but wants to be. Scully? Scully, are you there?

(Scully turns back to Schnauz, who is still on the stilts. She hangs up without saying anything to Mulder.)

SCULLY: Unruhe. (Schnauz suddenly looks nervous. Scully draws her gun.) Stand where you are!

(Schnauz darts out and uses the stilts to jump across the open area to the other side of the balcony, but he loses his balance and falls off the stilts. Scully runs around the balcony toward him.)

SCULLY: Don't move!

(Schnauz gets up and ducks down the stairs. Scully is on the balcony looking down at him.)

SCULLY: Stop or I'll shoot!

(Schnauz continues to flee, but Scully fires, hitting a support column just in front of him. Schnauz stops and raises his hands. Scully keeps a gun on him as she go down the stairs and approaches him. She spins him around so that he is facing the support column.)

SCULLY: Hands behind your head! DO IT!

(Schnauz complies. As he stands against the column, breathing heavily, Scully approachs from behind and checks him for weapons. As she reaches into the pocket of his construction apron, she gasps and draws her hand back quickly, finding a spot of blood on her finger. She reaches back in more carefully and pulls out a leucotome, which is identical to the one shown earlier on the table next to Alice Brandt.)

ACT III

< an interrogation room at the police station >

SCHNAUZ: Who?

SCULLY: Alice Brandt. The second woman that you abducted. That's her name, Gerry. Where is Alice Brandt?

SCHNAUZ: I don't ... I have no earthly idea what you're talking about.

SCULLY: Tell us where she is, Gerry.

SCHNAUZ: I'm sorry. This is a case of mistaken identity or something. I honestly ... honestly have no idea what you're talking about.

SCULLY: (showing him a plastic bag containing the leucotome) Explain this.

SCHNAUZ: We're running sheetrock today. I use that to start the holes in the sheetrock, to keyhole in all the fixtures.

SCULLY: No, you used this to kill the two men.

SCHNAUZ: What two men?

SCULLY: You used this on Mary LeFante.

SCHNAUZ: Who? What? Wait, a minute ago it was Alice Brandt. I don't believe this, I do not believe this is happening.

MULDER: You want to tell us about the first time you were arrested, Gerry? In 1980, you attacked your father with an axe handle. You beat him so severely that he spent the remainder of his life in a wheelchair.

SCHNAUZ: I was not jailed, I was institutionalized. I had a kind of chemical imbalance.

MULDER: Yeah, Gerald Thomas Schnauz, diagnosed and treated for a paranoid schizophrenic disorder six years in Melvoin Psychiatric Hospital, released 1986. So what you been up to since 1986, Gerry?

SCHNAUZ: Taking care of my father. Looking after him 24 hours a day. Making amends. He, uh, passed away January.

MULDER: Well, how did you feel about that?

SCHNAUZ: Sad.

MULDER: Says here that you have a sister. Where is your sister, Gerry?

SCHNAUZ: She passed.

MULDER: Actually, it says here she committed suicide in 1980. That was a bad year. What else happened in 1980, Gerry?

SCHNAUZ: Well, John Lennon got shot. Where the hell are you going with this? What are you, Sigmund Freud? Why don't you cut the BS?

SCULLY: Then why don't we get back to Alice Brandt. Where is she?

SCHNAUZ: (staring at Scully) You look troubled.

MULDER: Hey, Gerry. This your father?

(He shows Gerry the image of the man from the enhanced photograph.)

SCHNAUZ: (gasps) Where'd you get that?

MULDER: You left it for me. You left it like a fingerprint. Is this what you see when you close your eyes, Gerry?

(He shows Gerry the complete photograph. Gerry studies it carefully.)

MULDER: Is that what you see? Gerry ... tell me where Alice Brandt is.

SCHNAUZ: She's safe from the howlers. She's all right now.

MULDER: Gerry ... Tell me how I can find her.

< a rural area >

(A procession of police cars speed down a gravel road. They stop, and officers, with Scully and Mulder, head up a hill. There they find the body of Alice Brandt, clothed in the nightgown. Scully examines the body, noticing darkening around the eye sockets. Scully is visibly upset, then angry. She turns and walks quickly back down the hill leaving the rest around the body. Some minutes later, Mulder walks down and approaches their rented Explorer. Scully is sitting in the driver's seat, obviously ready to go. Mulder stands at the passenger window.)

MULDER: Hey, Scully, that word "unruhe", "unrest", is bothering me. Maybe he thought he was curing them somehow, saving him from damnation, from those things in the pictures, you know, he called them the howlers.

SCULLY: It's over, Mulder.

MULDER: Well, then that photo wouldn't be his fantasy. It would be his nightmare.

SCULLY: What the hell does it matter?

MULDER: Because I want to know.

SCULLY: I don't.

(She starts the engine. Mulder stares at her for a second, then gets in the car.)

< the police station >

(Gerry is being processed by Officer Trott.)

TROTT: OK, Gerry. All in here, your wallet, jewelry, everything.

(Gerry deposits his possessions in a tray. He is hand-cuffed to the table. The officer takes his fingerprints. Moments later, he takes a police photograph of Gerry.)

TROTT: Eyes straight ahead. (he snaps the photo) Step over to the table.

(Trott hand-cuffs Gerry to the table again, then steps over to the printer to collect the document that is being printed. The document shows the photo in the upper right corner. However, instead of being of Gerry, it shows Trott with a bullet hole in his forehead and blood splattered on the wall behind him.)

TROTT: (looking at photo) What the hell?

(Gerry lunges forward and grabs Trott's gun from his holster and points it at him. A shot is heard.)

(Later, Mulder is examining the document, which now has real blood stains on it. The body of Officer Trott is bagged on the floor. Scully enters, and Mulder motions her over.)

SCULLY: Mulder.

MULDER: This wound's in the wrong place. He was shot in the throat. He wasn't trying to save this victim.

SCULLY: We just got a report of a strong-arm robbery. It's at the drugstore where the first victim disappeared.

< the drugstore >

(Officers are examining the scene, while a paramedic attends to a wound on the druggist's head.)

SCULLY: (to the druggist) What happened?

(Meanwhile, Mulder goes to an automatic photo booth and inserts some money.)

SCULLY: (concluding her conversation with the druggist) Thank you. (she walks over to Mulder) It's Gerry.

MULDER: He took the passport camera and all the film in the store.

SCULLY: He also took morphine, scopolamine, hydrobromide and insulin syringes. He's making more twilight sleep.

MULDER: He wants to continue his work.

(The camera in the photo booth beeps and a flash goes off.)

SCULLY: You know, that job site that I arrested him at, Mulder. What if he's ... what if he's already picked out his next victim? There were ... there were apartment buildings on all sides.

MULDER: You think you interrupted his stalking?

SCULLY: Let's go.

MULDER: Hold on a second. You bring the car around. I just want to wait for this. I'll be right there.

(Scully walks around the side of the building and dials a number on her cel phone.)

CORNING: (on phone) Corning.

SCULLY: Corning.

CORNING: Yeah.

SCULLY: Send units to the 300 block of Belmont Avenue. Check all of the apartments in the vicinity of that job site. I think he's heading back there.

CORNING: Got it.

SCULLY: Thanks.

(She hangs up and walks to the Explorer. As she stands at the door and gets her keys, a hand emerges from beneath the car and injects something into her foot with a syringe. Scully cries out in pain, stumbles backward and falls to the pavement. She draws her gun but is unable to use it, slipping quickly into unconsciousness. Schnauz comes out from beneath the car and picks her up.)

(Inside the drugstore, Mulder examines the photo from the photo booth. It is similar to the previous ones but with an image of a screaming Scully. He runs out and around the building but doesn't see her. The Explorer pulls out from behind a truck and speeds away down an alley. Mulder chases on foot.)

MULDER: Scully! Scully!

(The Explorer turns at the end of the alley and speeds away.)

MULDER: Scully!

ACT IV

< the police station >

(Mulder is intently studying the picture of Scully that he got from the photo booth in the drugstore. In addition to the howlers, there are six finger-like objects surrounding the upper part of her face.)

CORNING: Sir? Agent Scully's Explorer just turned up. It's abandoned at a Park & Ride about 20 miles up the US 81.

MULDER: Any sightings?

CORNING: Uh, a report of an Audi stolen from the same lot.

MULDER: He's switching cars. He's going to do that two or three times. (looking back at the photograph) (to himself) He's got six fingers here...

CORNING: Sir?

MULDER: (to himself) He's got six fingers. (to Corning) What about his apartment?

SECOND OFFICER: Got a unit at his boarding house, but he ain't coming back.

MULDER: What about friends, relatives, co-workers? Does he have a summer house? A winter house?

CORNING: He doesn't seem to have much of anything. We're running a couple of phone numbers we found in his wallet but so far ...

MULDER: Let me see his wallet.

(Corning tosses it to him. Mulder removes a newspaper clipping from the wallet.)

CORNING: It's his father's obituary.

(The clipping shows a military honor guard surrounding a flag-draped casket at a cemetary.)

MULDER: (reading from the clipping) Recipient of the Bronze Star medal during the Korean War ... Gerald Schnauz, Sr., DDS. He's a retired dentist.

< at the former office of Gerald Schnauz, Sr. >

(Mulder kicks in the door and enters with several officers. The office has been deserted for some time. He sees a sign that says "Twilight Sleep. Ask your dentist about it." He breaks into another room that has a dentist's sink but the chair is gone. Mulder sees footprints in the dirt on the floor surrounding the former location of the chair.)

MULDER: He was here.

CORNING: Why would he take the chair?

< the unknown location where Alice Brandt was held captive >

(Scully is regaining consciousness. It is a small area with padding on the walls. She is tied to a dentist's chair with duct tape around her wrists and ankles. There is a dentist's table next to her with the leucotome. She sees the figure of Schnauz, wearing his construction apron, at the other end.

SCULLY: Let me go.

SCHNAUZ: Shhhh ...

(Schnauz walks over toward the chair. He starts tearing off more pieces of duct tape.)

SCHNAUZ: Es ist alles in Ordnung.

SCULLY: It's over, Gerry. Let me go right now.

SCHNAUZ: Ich werde dir helfen. Du wirst deine Unruhe bald vergessen.

(He starts to cover Scully's mouth with duct tape.)

SCULLY: Aufhoeren! [subtitle: Stop!] Ich habe keine Unruhe. [subtitle: I have no unrest.] Ich habe keine unruhe. (Ich bin gar nicht unruhig.) Ich brauche nicht gerettet zu werden. [subtitle: I don't need to be saved.]

SCHNAUZ: Yes you do. Everybody does, but especially you.

SCULLY: Why? Why me, Gerry? Do I remind you of your sister?> Why did your sister kill herself, Gerry? What did your father do to her?

SCHNAUZ: He didn't do anything. It was the howlers.

SCULLY: OK, then let's talk about the howlers.

SCHNAUZ: They live inside your head. They make you do things and say things that you don't mean, and all your good thoughts can't wish them away. You need help. You've got them - right there. (he touches Scully's face between her eyebrows) Don't you feel them?

SCULLY: I don't have them, Gerry.

SCHNAUZ: See? They made you say that, just now, because they know I'm going to kill them.

(He picks up the leucotome from the table.)

SCULLY: What if you're wrong, Gerry?. What if there are no such things as howlers? What if you made them up inside your head to explain the things your sister said your father did?

SCHNAUZ: Great. Now they got you talking like Sigmund Freud. (shouting) I am on to you! I know your tricks! (in normal voice) Besides, I've seen them, in that picture that your partner showed me. Pictures don't lie. You saw them too.

SCULLY: If there are such things as howlers, Gerry, they live only inside your head.

(Schnauz sighs, then backs off to the other side of the area. Scully struggles to reach the table with her left hand, but Schnauz returns with the camera from the drugstore and pushes the table away. He points the camera at Scully, but instead holds the camera at arms length, pointing at himself, and takes a picture.)

< back at Schnauz's father's dental office >

(Mulder is pacing the floor.)

MULDER: Six fingers, right. (Corning starts to talk to him) Why are there six? (to Corning) What?

CORNING: We've got the State Police looking as far south as Grand Rapids. Still no sign of him.

(Mulder takes a folder from Corning and frantically looks again at the photo from the drugstore.)

CORNING: Agent Mulder?

MULDER: Damn it!

CORNING: What do we do?

(Mulder looks at the photo from the obituary and counts the headstones surrounding the casket.)

MULDER: That's five headstones. And the father makes six. Come on! (He runs out.)

CORNING: (shouting to the other officers) Let's go! Let's go!

< at the cemetary where Schnauz's father is buried >

(There are six headstones, including Schnauz's father's, in a row. Mulder and the officers run up to them.)

MULDER: Fan out. Check the tree line.

(Mulder sees an opening in a hedge at the edge of the cemetary.)

< the unknown place where Scully is held captive >

(Schnauz is nervously looking at a series of photographs that he has just taken. He shows them to Scully.)

SCHNAUZ: Wh ... what does this mean?

SCULLY: It means you need help, Gerry.

(He studies the photos for a few seconds.)

SCHNAUZ: No, I think what it means is that I don't have much time left.

(He pushes the table up to the chair and moves toward Scully with duct tape.)

SCULLY: No, Gerry, stop!

(He puts the tape over her mouth, and Scully's cries are muffled. He picks up the leucotome, but hears the creaking noise of springs. He moves back to the door, while Scully, still gagged, continues to try to free herself. Schnauz looks out a peep hole and sees Mulder outside.)

(Mulder is outside a motorhome. The windows on the door and the rear of motorhome are all shuttered. He walks to the front and looks through the passenger's door window. He sees that the keys in the ignition are on a keychain with a large plastic tooth attached and realizes that it belongs to Schnauz.)

MULDER: (shouts) Scully!

(Scully pulls her left arm free, pulls the duct tape from her mouth and cries out.)

SCULLY: Mulder! I'm in here!

(Mulder tries to break into the door of the motorhome by throwing himself against the door. Inside, Schnauz moves toward Scully with the leucotome. Scully grabs Schnauz's arm with her free hand.)

SCULLY: Mulder! Help! Mulder!

(Outside, Mulder grabs a nearby piece of pipe.)

MULDER: Scully!

(He hits the door window twice with the pipe and it breaks. Mulder reaches inside, unlocks the door and enters. Scully and Schnauz are still struggling inside. Schnauz turns to Mulder, who shoots him once. Schnauz falls.

MULDER: (to Scully) Are you hurt? (Scully shakes her head) (to Corning, who has arrived at the door) Get an ambulance!

(Both Scully and Mulder are breathing heavily. Scully frees her other hand, and Mulder takes her left hand and helps her up. She walks past him to the door, shielding her eyes for a moment from the bright light outside. At the door, she turns to look back at Schnauz for a moment, then steps out.)

(Mulder has watched Scully leave. He then looks down at the photographs lying next to Schnauz. He bends over to pick one up. The photograph shows Schnauz lying on the floor of the motorhome, surrounded by photographs, very similar to his current posture.)

< Scully's apartment >

(At night, Scully is typing on her laptop computer, with only a single table lamp on. The case file, with all the photographs, is on the table next to the computer. She looks tired.)

SCULLY: Addendum to case report. After his death, a diary was found among Gerald Schnauz's belongings, written in the second person and apparently intended as an open letter to his father. It includes the names of his victims, the women he desired to save. My name is contained in the last entry. I have no further explanation for the existence of the photographs, nor am I confident one is forthcoming. My captivity forced me to understand and even empathize with Gerry Schnauz. My survival depended on it. I see now the value of such insight. For truly to pursue monsters, we must understand them. (She picks up the photo of herself and studies it somberly) We must venture into their minds. Only in doing so, do we risk letting them venture into ours?