'Don't unlock doors you are not prepared to go through, Agent Scully.' --X. 'Nothing happens in contradiction to nature, only in contradiction to what we know of it.' --Scully. Herrenvolk

In Herrenvolk, Jeremiah Smith takes Mulder to a bee colony maintained by clones of a younger Samantha and others. The Bounty Hunter shows up and kills everyone, of course. X is eXecuted. Just before dying, he directs Mulder to his next informant, Marita Covarrubias, at the United Nations. Cancer Man has the Bounty Hunter save Mulder's mother, because "the fiercest enemy is the man who has nothing left to lose," but we all know better.

'What science may never be able to explain is our ineffable fear of the alien among us. A fear which often drives us, not to search for understanding, but to deceive, inveigle and obfuscate; to obscure the truth not only from others, but from ourselves.' --Scully. Teliko

For me, I estimate their works and them So rightly, that at times I well nigh dream I too have spent a life the selfsame way--- Tread once again an old life's course. Perchance I perish'd in an arrogant self-reliance An age ago; and in that act, a prayer For one more chance went up so earnest---so Imbued with better light let in by Death--- So free from all past sin---that it was heard... That life was blotted out---not so completely But scatter'd wrecks enough remain to wake Dim memories; as now, when once more seems The goal in sight again: all which is foolish Indeed, and only means---the form I bear, The earth I tread, and not more clear to me. The Field Where I Died from Robert Browning's "Paracelsus"

Tunguska/Terma: Krycek is back! And he gets quite a beating from just about everyone. He also loses his left arm. Mulder and Krycek travel to Tunguska, where they are captured and Mulder is exposed to the "black cancer" with other prisoners. The Russians were experimenting on a vaccine to drive the "black cancer" out of the body, which is what saves Mulder.

Scully: Refusing an assignment? That makes it sound like you're my superior. Mulder: Do what you want. Don't go to Philadelphia. But let me remind you that I worked my ass off to get these files reopened, you were just assigned. This work is my life. Scully: And it's become mine. Mulder: You don't want it to be? Scully: This isn't about you. Or maybe it is indirectly, I don't know. I feel like I've lost sight of myself, Mulder. It's hard to see--let alone find--in the darkness of covert locations. I mean, I wish I could say that we're going in circles, but we're not. We're going in an endless line, two steps forwards and three steps back. While my own life is standing still. Mulder: All this because... because I didn't get you a desk? Scully: Not everything is about you, Mulder. This is my life. Mulder: Yes, but it's... Never Again

For the first time I feel time like a heartbeat, the seconds pumping in my breast like a reckoning; the numinous mysteries that once seemed so distant and unreal threatening clarity in the presence of a truth entertained not in youth, but only in its passage. I feel these words as if their meaning were weight being lifted from me, knowing that you will read them and share my burden as I have come to trust no other. That you should know my heart, look into it, finding there the memory and experience that belong to you, that are you, is a comfort to me now as I feel the tethers loose and the prospects darken for the continuance of a journey that began not so long ago, and which began again with a faith shaken and strengthened by your convictions. If not for which I might never have been so strong now as I cross to face you and look at you incomplete, hoping that you will forgive me for not making the journey with you. --Scully. Memento Mori

Scully finds out she has inoperable cancer in Memento Mori. Skinner makes a deal with Cancer Man in exchange for a cure for Scully--which will not come soon or easily. But it will cost Skinner, in Zero Sum.

Tempus Fugit: Max is back. Apparently, a stealth military plane intercepts a "UFO" as it is trying to "borrow" Max in mid-air. Mulder goes for a swim and finds the "UFO" in a nearby lake. Is that an alien? Maybe. Maybe not. Remember Jose Chung? Ah, Pendrell gets shot.

Max: Pendrell dies. Mulder recovers a bag with the object Max died for, and he speculates it is an alien power source. His flight is intercepted and he loses the bag.

Scully: I actually... I was thinking about this gift that you gave me for my birthday. You never got to tell me why you gave it to me or what it means, but I think I know. I think that you appreciate that there are extraordinary men and women and extraordinary moments when history leaps forward on the backs of these individuals. That what can be imagined can be achieved. That you must dare to dream. That there is no substitute for perseverance and hard work, and team work, because no one gets there alone. And that, while we commemorate the greatness of these events and the individuals who achieve them, we cannot forget the sacrifice of those who make these achievements and leaps possible. Mulder: I just thought it was a pretty cool key chain. Max

Demons gives us more non-answers about Samantha's "abduction," in what may or may not be real flashbacks. Great.

In Gethsemane, Scully announces her cancer is spreading. One of her brothers FINALLY shows up. Kritschgau tries to convince Mulder and Scully that they've been fed lies all along. Mulder is presumed dead, victim of a self-inflicted gunshot wound to the head.

We do not learn much here, but Mulder's beliefs are being seriously shaken.

Mulder: You have no opinion? Scully: This is your holy grail, Mulder, not mine. Mulder: What is that supposed to mean? Scully: It just means that proving to the world the existence of alien life is not my last dying wish. Mulder: How about Santa Claus or the Easter bunny? This is not some selfish pet project of mine, Scully. I'm as skeptical of that man as you are, but proof, definitive proof of sentient beings sharing time and existence with us, that would change everything. Every truth we live by would be shaken to the ground. There is no greater revelation imaginable, no greater scientific discovery. Scully: You already believe, Mulder. What difference will it make? I mean, what will proof change for you? Mulder: If someone could prove to you the existence of God, would it change you? Scully: Only if it had been disproven. Mulder: Then you accept the possibility that belief in God is a lie? Scully: I don't think about it, actually. And i don't think that it can be proven. Mulder: But what if it could be? Wouldn't that knowledge be worth seeking? Or is it just easier to go on believing a lie? Scully: I can't go with you, Mulder. Gethsemane

Kritschgau: The lie you believe, that they have cleverly led you to believe, agent Mulder... is that there is intelligent life other than our own, and that we have had contact with these lifeforms. Mulder: So you're saying this has all been orchestrated--a hoax? Kritschgau: Which you've been used to perpetuate. Mulder: You come by this knowledge... how? Kritschgau: Working for the DOD, Watching a military-industrial complex, that operated unbridled and unchecked during the cold war, create a diversion of attention from itself and its continued misdeeds, by confabulating enough believable evidence to convince passionate adepts like yourself that it really could be true. Mulder: And just by chance you run into agent Scully? Kritschgau: That's just like you, agent Mulder. Suspicious of everything but what you should be. I ran the DOD's Agitprop Arm for a decade. I can show you records of disinformation dating back to the Korean War, before you were even born. Mulder: Why come to me now? Why not four years ago? Kritschgau: I have a son who is very sick. He served in the gulf war. The lies are so deep--the only way to cover them is to create something even more incredible. They invented you. Your regression hypnosis, the story of your sister's abduction, the lies they fed your father. You wanted to believe so badly. And who could have blamed you? Mulder: And the thousands of UFO Sightings? Kritschgau: Above top-secret military aircraft, concept-designed to feed hysteria. Mulder: Evidence of alien biology? Kritschgau: Unclassified, but naturally occurring biologic anomalies science will eventually explain. Mulder: The body that was found? Kritschgau: Meticulously constructed out of bio-materials created through the hybridization of differentiated cells--what are called chimeras. Frozen into place over the course of a year, using sediment and materials that would bear out its age. Poured through a small channel drilled in the rock above. Mulder: They would know that the body would be carbon-dated, that it would be proved a fake. Kritschgau: The body will never be tested, agent Mulder. Mulder: What do you mean? Kritschgau: You were only meant to see it, to make you believe the lie. So that you might finally commit and go public with the news. Mulder: [to Scully] This man is a liar. Kritschgau: You can see for yourself, agent Mulder. The body is already long gone. Scully: I'm sorry, but the facts here completely overwhelm any argument against them. Mulder: Facts overwhelmed by the lies created to support them. Scully: Mulder, the only lie here is the one that you continue to believe. Mulder: After all I've seen and experienced I refuse to believe that it's not true. Scully: Because it's easier to believe the lie, isn't it? Mulder: What the hell did that guy say to you, that you believe his story? Scully: He said the men behind this hoax, behind these lies, gave me this disease to make you believe. Gethsemane

Proceed to Season 5.



X-Files 101
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