Página PrincipalInternal dating: None given, but it snows at one point. Episode aired February 15th 1998
At five separate places in town, a cell phone rings, and an anonymous caller informs the person picking up that a man they have been seeking is in the Metro Diner. The last call is placed to two federal marshals, purportedly tipping them off to a Colombian drug lord's location.
The five groups of people converge on the diner and take seats. All carry guns and eye each other suspiciously. Completely oblivious, the man at the computer takes out a CD-ROM and inserts it into the drive. The computer prompts him to press "enter".
The marshals burst through the door, yelling for everybody to get down. Gunfire erupts, and before he is shot the man at the computer cries, "No!"
Credits roll: The Truth Is Out
There Mulder and Scully enter the diner, which is strewn with sheet-draped bodies. They have come due to the U.S. Marshals' deaths, which Mulder says was a set-up. There is no way the Colombian drug lord they were seeking would have been in the diner.
An exasperated Scully then asks why they are there at all.
Mulder pulls back the sheet on one of the bodies, revealing the man from the computer. His name is Donald Gelman, a Silicon Valley software pioneer missing since 1979. He wrote some of the first Internet software, although was never credited for it.
"I still don't see the connection," Scully says.
Mulder shrugs. "Maybe that's the point." He notices Gelman's laptop, the screen still showing its message for the user to press "enter."
The two agents leave the diner. Scully is skeptical about Mulder's theory that the night's actions were a hit on Donald Gelman. He was practically dead already, she argues. Mulder insists the plan was "genius."
In the car, Mulder removes his coat to reveal Gelman's laptop, which he has stolen from the diner. "Mulder, that's evidence," Scully protests.
"I hope so," Mulder replies.
He puts the CD into the car's player, and the CD-ROM activates. While all the lights on the car blink in rhythm, the old tune "Twilight Time" by The Platters plays.
Mulder and Scully take the CD and Gelman's laptop to the Lone Gunmen, who examine it. They talk about Gelman, about his genius. Gelman wrote some of the first viruses, Byers says with admiration. "He was a visionary." The CD is encrypted, the Gunmen say, with a password protection. There is some background information behind the song, lots of code, but they can't tell what it is.
Scully steps forward, "Anyone think to check his e-mail?"
Chagrined, the Gunmen do, to find a message waiting from someone named Invisigoth. "David missing. The hunter has become the hunted." The message includes the alpha-numeric ID of a shipping container.
Mulder and Scully head for the coast, and find the container. As they prepare to enter, a hand reaches out and zaps Mulder with a hand-held Taser. He falls back, allowing Scully to run in. She is attacked twice, yet manages to arrest her assailant, a young woman dressed in black leather.
Inside the shipping container is a massive array of computer equipment. The woman refuses to give her name, or explain who she is and what she is doing there. She is belligerent and hostile, telling Scully to "bite me" and claiming Mulder and Scully have no reason to be there and have violated her rights.
Behind the agents, a computer begins beeping. On the screen, an image grows steadily more enhanced--the end result being the exact shipping container they are standing in. Invisigoth explains that a DOD satellite is zeroing in on them. Scully is scornful, ignoring Invisigoth's insistence that they leave. Mulder watches the display, calling Scully's name, but is ignored.
When the container itself can be seen in the display Mulder finally succeeds in getting Scully's attention. The three leave, and get in the car. Scully backs away hastily, scraping the car on another container in the process. Just as they are out of range, a beam comes down from the dark sky, exploding the container.
Morning arrives and Mulder and Scully are in the car. Scully tells Invisigoth, "No more screwing around. We need a name."
The woman replies, "Invisigoth. You want my address? It's T-O-A-S-T."
"You said *it* was targeting us," Mulder says to Invisigoth. He adds that he thinks Donald Gelman created an AI, an artificial intelligence, and that was targeting them.
Invisigoth says that Gelman created an interlocking set of viruses fifteen years ago. The AI was released onto the Internet, "so it could evolve." As Invisigoth explains, Scully grows more and more skeptical, and finally pulls the car off the road. She and Mulder get out.
"You believe this load of crap?" she demands of Mulder.
Mulder mentions the explosion. Scully brushes him off, saying Invisigoth could have rigged the explosion herself. There is no DOD satellite capable of such targeting, Scully says, "We don't even have the technology. And even if some artificial intelligence was targeting us with an armed satellite, why isn't it doing it right now?"
"Because it doesn't know where we are," Invisigoth says, getting out of the car. But if she were to make a phone call, it would target her, as the AI monitors communications, able to recognize her voice. The AI knew to target the shipping container because someone tried to contact her over the Net. Only Donald and a man named David Markham knew where she was. David was the hardware part of their team, while Donald and Invisigoth did software.
The AI is loose on the Net, Invisigoth says, and it now displays intention. It no longer responds to its masters. "Either we kill it, or..." she cannot continue.
Mulder tells her Donald is dead. Invisigoth says David and she are next. Donald had written a group of viruses that could find and immobilize the AI, called Kill Switch. Mulder holds up the CD, "Twilight Time" and Invisigoth says that's the kill switch.
Mulder and Scully take Invisigoth to the Lone Gunmen. Immediately they identify her as Esther Narin. "You gonna off these cuffs or do I have to do this with my tongue?" she asks, while the Lone Gunmen stare at her, agog.
Esther loads the CD into Donald's computer. Scully asks biting questions about being zapped by particle beams and all, and finally asks why the AI didn't just zap Donald Gelman. Esther says it wouldn't do that to its creator--using crack dealers in a diner is its sense of humor.
The kill switch can't be loaded over the Internet anymore, explains Esther. The only way to kill the AI now is to find it's physical hardware, to feed the CD into its own CD drive. It would require a T-3 connector, among other things.
Mulder finds one such connector at an abandoned chicken farm in Fairfax County, Virginia. He goes there alone, leaving Scully and Esther with the Lone Gunmen. Scully dozes, and when she wakes, Esther is holding a gun on her.
Mulder calls Scully from the farm. She answers in the car, handcuffed to the steering wheel, Esther still holding the gun on her. Scully is disgusted with herself, and her responses are short. Esther takes the phone away in time to hear Mulder ask where they are going. "To see David," she says, then hangs up.
Behind the farm is an old trailer. Mulder approaches it through the woods, and as he nears, an alarm goes off. It stops shortly, but inside the trailer, a computer monitor watches him.
Scully and Esther arrive at the demolished remains of David's house. Esther gets out and wanders around in a daze. While she is out of the car, Scully manages to get her handcuff key out of her coat and unlock herself. She hides this from Esther, who gets back in the car, in tears. Esther hands Scully the gun and tells her to put her out of her misery.
She loved David. Together the two of them planned to leave their bodies and enter the AI, something Donald Gelman was against. As she tells Scully her story, the agent softens toward Esther, finally reaching a hand for her, comforting her by saying that perhaps David wasn't there when the place exploded.
At the trailer, Mulder pushes the doorbell, and the computer scans his fingerprints. FBI database information springs up on a screen, including his marital status, phone number (555-9335), and his history, which says:
1983-1986: Oxford University
1986: Quantico Academy
1988: Assigned to the Violent Crimes Unit
1990-Present: Assigned to the X-Files
Education: B.A. at Oxford, graduated summa cum laude, graduated Quantico with honors.
Mulder enters the trailer from underneath, by lifting a floor plate. He explores the place, finding David Markham's corpse, a virtual reality helmet still on the man's head. As he explores, he is pushed backwards onto a grid and two steel manacles clamp around his wrists. The computer shocks him, sparks flying as the electricity flows.
When Mulder "awakes" he's in an ambulance, surrounded by nurses and EMS techincians. One of them calls him a "crispy critter" and Mulder is aghast to see horrible burns around his wrists from where he was shocked.
In the next moment he is in an operating room, bright lights being shone on him by three buxom nurses, all wearing pristine uniforms and crosses. He is strapped down and he protests weakly against an injection, saying the nurses need to, "Call my doctor. Dr. Scully." An old doctor picks up a small saw, and turns the blade on.
Back in the car, Scully puts down her phone, saying she can't get through to Mulder. "It's the AI," Esther says. She was using Scully's phone before, and the AI knows it, and is deliberately interfering with the phone.
"Wait a minute," Scully says. Mulder told her in their brief phone conversation that he found the T-3 connector. Esther says if they can find it and cut if off, they can use that to kill the AI. She pulls out Gelman's laptop and logs onto the Internet, searching through Fairfax County for T-3s.
In the "hospital" Mulder awakens and is greeted by a blonde nurse. "I feel sick," he mumbles.
"That's the anesthetic," the nurse replies brightly. "You were injured and they had to operate." He was doing something dangerous and foolish, she says. "The good news is they were able to save the right one."
Mulder freezes. "What do you mean?" The nurse pulls back the blanket to reveal only a stump remaining of his left arm. He panics and grows hysterical.
"They'll come back," the nurse says. "They're evil, Fox. They want something."
"What do they want?" Mulder cries.
"I don't know," the nurse says, "but I'm afraid if you don't tell them they'll take your other arm."
Mulder begs her to help him, and she gathers his head into her arms, only to slam his head back onto the bed and smother him in a pillow, ignoring his cries.
Scully and Esther reach a bridge and are about to drive over it when Esther sees the computer screen change. They are being targeted again. The two women flee the car, and at Scully's urging, Esther throws the laptop into the river, just as it is exploded by a beam from above.
Mulder awakes, this time to three different nurses, rubbing his body. "I had a bad dream," he says, then smiles a bit. "Then I had a good dream."
"Those weren't dreams, Fox," says the same nurse. "You poor thing. But I warned you. Nurse Nancy warned you. You have to tell them where it is, Fox."
"Tell them what?" asks Mulder.
"About the kill switch," Nurse Nancy says coyly.
"Nobody asked me anything," Mulder protests.
"You've forgotten, Fox. I was there." She takes his face between her palms. "The doctor asked and he was very cross when you refused to answer. He'll be in in just a few minutes, and you can tell him then." She stands up. "Otherwise, Oops! there go your legs."
She pulls back the blanket, and now Mulder is missing both his arms. He screams in horror. Across the room, Scully bursts in the door, crying that the women are spies. With graceful agility, she single-handedly knocks out the three nurses, then gathers Mulder's face between her hands. He tries pathetically to call her attention to his stumps, but she only asks where the kill switch is. Realizing this is not Scully, Mulder kicks her, and she flies back. Her image flickers, then dies, as does the entire hospital setting.
In the trailer, Mulder regains consciousness and begins calling for Scully.
Scully and Esther arrive at the chicken farm and find the trailer. A robot arm reaches out and injects Mulder with something. Instantly he slumps to the side, falling quiet, but Scully has heard one of his cries.
After entering the trailer through the bottom, Esther sees David Markham's body, and then Scully sees Mulder. She goes to him, and tries to get him to talk to her, but Mulder is incapable of speech.
Behind Scully a CD-ROM drive is ejected. "It wants the kill switch," Esther says.
"And we don't have it," Scully replies dejectedly. "You threw it in the water with the computer."
Esther shakes her head and takes the disc out of her pocket. When she hesitates, the AI begins shocking Mulder. As she stands there, Scully grabs the disc and inserts it.
The computer begins reading the disc, and the manacles holding Mulder snap open. Scully goes to him, murmuring encouragement, and helps him out of the trailer. She returns, looking for Esther, who says, "You don't listen, do you? Get out of here."
Scully leaves. Esther puts on the virtual reality helmet and commands, "Upload."
Mulder and Scully stagger through the woods, and the trailer explodes.
The next morning, the two agents walk through the debris. Mulder theorizes that Esther succeeded in linking with the AI.
In North Platte, Nebraska, two children are playing football when their ball lands in a fenced yard around a trailer. Skittishly, one of the kids climbs the fence and retrieves the ball. From inside the trailer, a computer monitors him.
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