3x02 Paperclip



Albert: To the Navajo, the Earth and its creatures have great influence over our existence. The stories passed from generation to generation help us to understand the reason for our tears of sadness and tears of joy. Animals like the bear, the spider and the coyote are powerful symbols to our people. When the FBI man, Mulder, was cured by the holy people, we were reminded of the story of the Gila monster, who symbolizes the healing powers of the medicine man. In this myth, the Gila monster restores a man by taking all his parts and putting them back together. His blood is gathered by ants, his eyes and ears by sun, his mind by talking god and pollen boy. Then, lightning and thunder bring the man back to life. At the end of the ceremony, when the FBI Man had been healed, we heard the news from other Native Americans in the northern plains that a great event had taken place. Like the Navajo, these people have their own stories and myths. One of these stories tells of the white buffalo woman, who came down from the heavens and taught the indians how to lead virtuous lives, and how to pray to the creator. She told the people she would return one day. Then, she turned into a white buffalo and ascended into the clouds, never to be seen again. But, on this day, when the holy people had given the FBI man a miracle, a white buffalo was born, and every Native American knew, whether he believed the story or not, that this was a powerful omen and that great changes were coming.

Skinner: I've got the digital tape.
Scully: You're lying.
Skinner: I've got it in my pocket. I took it out of Mulder's desk.

[someone at the door. Skinner takes his gun out]

Skinner: Drop your weapon! Put it down, Scully.
Scully: No way.
Skinner: Put it down!
Scully: I said no! You're setting me up.
Skinner: I'm trying to help you.
Scully: Then put your weapon down and sit down.
Skinner: Not a change.
Scully: You said you weren't here to kill me, Skinner. Now prove it.
Skinner: I didn't come to have a gun shoved in my face, either.
Scully: Dammit, Skinner!

[Mulder comes in]

Mulder: Drop your weapon! I said...
Skinner: Back off!
Mulder: Put it down.
Skinner: What the hell is this? What are you pulling here?
Mulder: You okay, Scully?
Scully: Yeah.
Mulder: Get his gun. Give her the gun. Give it to her!
Skinner: All right.
Mulder: Now I want an explanation.
Scully: I was warned that somebody would kill me. Someone I trusted.
Skinner: I'm going to reach into my coat pocket and end this charade. All right? I presume you both know what this is. Now I want an explanation.
Mulder: Your cigarette-smoking friend killed my father for that tape, and then he killed me.
Skinner: What are you talking about?
Mulder: I was a dead man. Now I'm back.
Skinner: What is on this tape?
Mulder: Defense Department files that weren't supposed to exist. The truth about our government's involvement in a global conspiracy of silence about the existence of extraterrestrial life.
Scully: Give me that tape.
Skinner: Uh-uh, this tape stays with me.
Mulder: Give her the tape.
Skinner: If what you say is true, if the information on this tape is valuable enough to kill for, then it's the only leverage we've got to bring these men to justice. It's not going to do us any good if it falls back into their hands.
Mulder: Then you better make sure it doesn't. Come on, Scully. Let's go.
Scully: Where?
Mulder: There are truths out there that aren't on that tape.

Scully: Mulder, I...
Mulder: Scully, whatever you're gonna say...
Scully: I went to your father's funeral. I told your mother that you were going to okay.
Mulder: And how did you know?
Scully: I just knew.

Margaret: My daughter was brought here. I'm trying to find her.
MD: All right. What's her name?
Margaret: Scully. Dana Scully.
MD: Melissa Scully?
Margaret: No... that's her sister.
MD: We just had a Melissa Scully in surgery with a cranial gunshot wound.

Margaret: Missy? It's mom.
MD: We took drastic precautionary measures due to the nature of the head wound. We've induced coma to try and relieve the trauma on the brain.
Margaret: Is she going to be okay?
MD: We've done everything we can right now. We'll be monitoring her around the clock. Nurse, why don't we get mrs. Scully a comfortable chair?

Mulder: That's my father on the left, there.
Byers: This was taken, when?
Mulder: About 1973.
Byers: Amazing. Langly, take a look.
Scully: Do you recognize any of those men?
Byers: Are you familiar with a post-World War II project known as Operation Paperclip?
Mulder: Our deal with the devil. The U.S. provided safe haven for certain Nazi war criminals in exchange for their scientific knowledge.
Langly: I know who this man is--Victor Klemper.
Byers: The man standing next to your father is one of those criminals, though not the most famous of the bunch. Wernher Von Braun, designer of the V-2 rockets that leveled London may be the most notorious, but Victor Klemper certainly takes the prize for the most evil Nazi to escape the Nuremberg trials.
Scully: What did he do?
Langly: He experimented on the Jews. Drowned them, suffocated them, put them in pressure chambers. All in the name of science.
Byers: Together with with Von Braun, Klemper help us win the space race. Using his scientific data on the effects of high-altitude flying, we were able to put astronauts on the moon before the soviets.
Langly: One giant step for mankind.
Scully: What would he be doing in a photo with your father?
Mulder: I don't know. Do you recognize anybody else in the photograph?
Byers: No. Operation Paperclip was supposed to have been scrapped in the 1950s, but if this is 1973...
Scully: Whatever happened to Klemper?
Langly: He's still here, living very well at the expense of the American taxpayer.

[Frohike comes in]

Frohike: Unbelievable! We thought you were history.
Mulder: You'll have to wait a little longer for my video collection, Frohike.
Langely: Where were you? We were looking all over.
Frohike: Down at D.C. General. I was scanning the police frequency when I heard the report of a shooting. Agent Scully...
Scully: What? What is it?
Frohike: Your sister's in critical condition.
Mulder: Scully... Scully, wait. Scully! Scully, wait! Scully!
Scully: I have to go there, Mulder.
Mulder: You can't go.
Scully: That bullet was meant for me.
Mulder: If they're trying to kill you, that's the first place they're gonna look.
Scully: Those bastards.
Mulder: We're gonna call someone I think can help. The only thing you can do for her right now is to try to crucify them.

46TH STREET, NEW YORK
7:09 AM

Elder 1: This is a serious mistake. An innocent woman has been shot.
Elder 2: Can this be traced?
Elder 3: This is your man.
CM: There was a mistake. It will be rectified.
WMM: By whom? By whom will this be rectified--your ridiculously ineffectual assassins?
CM: These men are professionals.
WMM: This is not a profession for men who make mistakes. My god, you presume to make us believe you can simply fix it with enough bullets?
CM: No.
WMM: This woman... Scully... I know she believes her partner is still alive.
CM: Mulder's dead. I took care of it myself.
WMM: And the computer tape containing the stolen files, you tell us was recovered--you can show it to us?
CM: I wasn't aware that my honesty was in question or doubt. Elder 1: You have the tape?
CM: Of course I have it.
Elder: I think I'd like to see it.
Elder: So would I.
CM: I have vouchsafed it for reasons of security. I'll have it here for you tomorrow... by which time this whole matter will be cleared up.

Mulder: Victor Klemper?
Klemper: Yes?
Mulder: My name is Fox Mulder. This is Dana Scully.
Klemper: Your name is Mulder?
Mulder: Yes. I think you knew my father.
Klemper: What's this about?
Mulder: When you came to this country, you did work for our government.
Klemper: I'm an old man now. History bores me.
Scully: Because it escaped you, or because you escaped it?
Klemper: Freud, Salk, Crick, Watson; these will be the names they celebrate at the end of the millennium. Great scientists. And Klemper? He will be remembered only as a butcher.
Scully: History may be the only justice you'll ever know.
Klemper: Do you know my work? Do you know what we accomplished?
Scully: As a Nazi or for the blood money we paid you?
Klemper: We were young men caught in a fervor, but our experiments changed the world.
Scully: For a lot of innocent Jews.
Klemper: Progress demands sacrifice, and I... I have confronted my demons. And soon I will die, too.
Mulder: Like my father. They killed him, and I believe you know why.
Klemper: I believe they would kill anyone if it is in the best interest of the work.
Mulder: What is this work that my father was involved in?
Kempler: I have no answer for you.
Mulder: Well, you knew him! Was he a murderer too?
Kempler: There are some things you don't have to know.
Mulder: No, I need to know! I need to know the truth! Isn't that what you want--for the truth to be known?
Kempler: Do you know the formula of Napier's constant?
Scully: Yes. Why?
Kempler: The photo was taken at the Strughold Mining Company in West Virginia, and that is all I will tell you. The rest you can find out yourself.
Mulder: Let's go, Scully.

Man: Hello? Yes. One moment. It's for you, sir.
WMM: Yes?
Kempler: It's Klemper.
WMM: Victor...
Kempler: How are you, old friend? It's been far too many years.
WMM: What is it, Victor?
Kempler: Oh, I was just paid a visit by the son of one of our old colleagues.
WMM: What did you tell him, Victor?
Kempler: I told him that you were the most venal man I've ever met. Beyond that, I told him nothing.
[hangs up]
WMM: Mulder is alive.
Elder 1: Then I think it's time that we call our friends, who will handle this matter more satisfactorily.

Nurse: Are you expecting any visitors?
Margaret: Oh, is it Dana? Is Dana here?
Nurse: No. It's a man. He says he was asked to come here.
Albert: My name is Albert Hosteen. I was asked to come here and help with your daughter.
Margaret: There must be some mistake.
Albert: Is your daughter the FBI woman?
Margaret: Dana?
Albert: Yes. She's very sorry she can't come here to comfort you.
Margaret: Is she okay?
Albert: Yes, I believe so. [turns to Melissa] She is weak.
Margaret: She's getting better. She has the best doctors. They're watching her around the clock.
Albert: If it's all right, I would like to pray over her here.

RURAL WEST VIRGINIA

Scully: What do you think your father would have been doing here?
Mulder: I don't know. He never came home wearing a miner's cap.
Scully: Mulder, take a look at this. What do you think?
Mulder: I'd like to try door number one, Monty. I'm trying 27828. It's not working.
Scully: It's not working here either.
Mulder: Sure that's the right number?
Scully: Positive. Napier's constant is the basis of all natural logarithms.
Mulder: I think, with a crowbar and a small nuclear device I might be able to get through one of these things.
Scully: Mulder. No. Wait. Hang on a second. Whatever we find in here... I don't think you've had time to process everything that you've been through.
Mulder: I'm okay, Scully.
Scully: You weren't even able to go to your father's funeral, and if something in here were to cast doubt on the kind of man he was... I just know how it would affect me.

CM: You called me.
Skinner: Yes, I did.
CM: About?
Skinner: I may have located the digital tape that you're looking for.
CM: You may have located it?
Skinner: Yes, though there's a great chance it might fall into the hands of people who might use it for purposes not your own.
CM: You want to work a deal? Is that what this is? Let me tell you something. I don't work deals.
Skinner: I just thought you should know of certain potentialities.
CM: Do you have the tape?
Skinner: As I said, I may have located it.
CM: Do you have the damn tape?!
Skinner: I'll know more when we next meet.
CM: I do not negotiate. You understand?!
Skinner: Yes, sir.
CM: I don't think you do. I don't think you understand at all.
Skinner: No, I'm quite aware of your policies in those regards.
CM: Then I hope your next course of action will be more cautious and informed.

Scully: Mulder, look at this. It looks like they're storing records.
Mulder: Of what?
Scully: Medical files, by the look of it. Got names... alphabetized.
Mulder: Lots of files.
Scully: Lots and lots of files.
Mulder: What's in these files?
Scully: Standard medical forms. These are birth certificates, smallpox vaccination certificate, and then there's this.
Mulder: What is this?
Scully: It's an old tissue collection cassette. The new ones are plastic.
Mulder: Do all these files contain the same materials?
Scully: Yes, exactly.
Mulder: What year was this person born?
Scully: 1955. All of these files are 1955.
Mulder: What year were you born?
Scully: 1964. Why?
Mulder: Let's go find 1964.
Scully: You're looking for a file on me?
Mulder: "Dana Katherine Scully."
Scully: What? It's a recent tissue sample. What the hell is going on here, Mulder?
Mulder: I don't know, Scully.
Scully: That's your sister's file.
Mulder: Yeah.
Scully: What are you looking for?
Mulder: I don't know. Take a look at this, Scully. This file was originally mine.
Scully: I don't understand.
Mulder: Wait here, Scully.
Scully: Mulder, where are you going? Mulder? Mulder?

Man: Come on. Let's go!
Man: There!
Man: Find the woman, too.

Mulder: Scully!
Scully: Mulder!
Mulder: Scully!
Scully: Mulder, down here.
Mulder: You okay, Scully?
Scully: I heard gunshots.
Mulder: I've been looking for you.
Scully: What happened to you?
Mulder: They got a small army outside. I think they got us trapped.
Scully: I think there's a way out down here.

ROUTE 320A
CRAIGER, MARYLAND

Skinner: This place isn't even on the map. How'd you get here?
Mulder: You'd be surprised at what's not on the map in this country. And what our government will do to keep it that way.
Skinner: How's that?
Mulder: Last night we were chased by some kind of hit squad, driving what looked an awful lot like CIA fleet sedans.
Skinner: Well, I may be able to negotiate a deal that would guarantee your safety.
Scully: What kind of deal?
Skinner: I'll turn over the digital tape in return for your reinstatement.
Mulder: No, sir. I need that tape. I need those files.
Skinner: I'm talking about a way to saving your lives.
Mulder: And I'm talking about a conspiracy against the American public. Do you know what we found last night?
Skinner: What?
Scully: An extremely elaborate filing system of medical records.
Mulder: Locked inside a mountain vault.
Skinner: For the purpose of?
Mulder: I don't know, but the answer's gotta be on that tape, in those files.
Skinner: Is that answer worth your lives?
Mulder: It's obviously worth killing us for.
Skinner: In your wildest dreams, what do you possibly hope to find, agent Mulder?
Mulder: Why they killed my father... what happened to my sister... what they did to agent Scully.
Scully: I think we should let him make the deal, Mulder. Look, those answers mean nothing if we're going to be hunted down like animals. We are operating so far outside of the law right now, we've given up on the very notion of justice. We have turned ourselves into outsiders. We have lost our access and our protection.
Mulder: What makes you think there's any such thing as justice, Scully?
Scully: Then what good are those answers to anybody but you?
Mulder: What we found last night...
Scully: Look, I want exactly what you want... but I need to see my sister.
Mulder: I suppose you already tried to make a backup of the tape.
Skinner: Whoever downloaded those files put a copy protector on them. I couldn't get a hard copy, either.
Mulder: What makes you think they'll even honor this deal?
Skinner: Because if they don't, I'll go state's evidence and testify... and they'll have to kill me too.
Mulder: It's up to you, Scully.

Scully: I told Skinner to make the deal, but not to hand over the tape until you agree to it.
Mulder: I'm sorry about your sister, Scully.
Scully: I just need to know if she's going to be okay.

Albert: For two days I had prayed for the FBI woman's sister. Her doctor said she was getting better, and her mother, who would not leave her bedside, was able to sleep. But, word had come from my brothers in the north that did not give me hope. The white buffalo calf had survived, but after a day it would no longer drink its mother's milk. On the third day, the mother buffalo laid down in her stall, and would not get up. They said the men could do nothing for her. That night, she died. My father taught me, when was a boy, that this is how life is--that for something to live another thing must often be sacrificed. This was my fear now for the young woman.

Skinner: I'm here to see Melissa Scully. My name is Walter Skinner. I'm an Assistant Director at the FBI. I'm very sorry about your daughter. Dana asked me to come here to deliver a message.
Margaret: You've been in contact with her?
Skinner: Yes.
Margaret: Well, I want to know where she is, and if she's okay.
Skinner: She's okay. She's in a very serious situation which prevents her from being here.
Margaret: What kind of situation?
Skinner: One that we hope to reverse so that Dana can come back to work.
Albert: That man you just saw. He's been very curious about this room.
Skinner: Who are you?
Albert: My name is Albert Hosteen. I was asked to come here.
Skinner: Albert, do not leave this room. Do you understand?
Albert: Yes.

[Krycek beats the tape out of Skinner]

SOUTHEAST WASHINGTON, D.C.

Cardinal: I could use a beer. Do you want anything?
Krycek: No.
Cardinal: You sure?
Krycek: Yeah.

[boom]

Mulder: Mr. Klemper? Mr. Klemper?
WMM: Hello again, young lady.
Scully: Where's Victor Klemper?
WMM: Oh, poor Klemper. They found him yesterday here among his flowers. Apparently, his heart had given out.
Mulder: You killed him, didn't you? You're one of the men in this photo. You knew my father.
WMM: Yes, since we were young men.
Mulder: You were involved in this project. You know why the medical data was being collected.
WMM: Yes, I do, indeed. In 1947 a spacecraft was reportedly recovered in New Mexico. No doubt you know of this, and of the reported recovery of a body at the site. These incidents coincided with, not only the end of World War II, but an ignominious project which brought nazi scientists and war criminals to this country to exploit their knowledge.
Scully: Operation Paperclip.
WMM: Yes. You know of it already, and you must also know the work Of Dr. Josef Mengele--the Nazi angel of death.
Scully: Mengele thought that he could produce a super race through genetic engineering.
WMM: As did many of his colleagues at the Institute of Hereditary Biology and Racial Hygiene.
Scully: Like Victor Klemper?
WMM: Poor Victor. He loved his orchids. Did you know that he was able to create some of the most beautiful hybrids?
Mulder: Klemper was trying to create an alien-human hybrid. That's what I saw in the boxcar. He was using human test subjects.
Scully: Mulder, wait.
Mulder: My father was involved in this?
Scully: The technology wasn't there, Mulder. DNA wasn't even identified until 1944. This is all a lie.
WMM: When your father realized what the medical data was being used for, he objected strenuously.
Mulder: He collected those files?
WMM: With the threat of nuclear holocaust in the 1950s, the government instructed men like your father to gather genetic data on the general populace, for the purposes of post-apocalyptic identification.
Mulder: The vaccination records. They took tissue from everyone who received a smallpox inoculation.
WMM: Hundreds of millions of Americans.
Mulder: So that Victor Klemper had access to a DNA database of nearly everyone who was born since 1950.
Scully: Mulder, this man is telling you everything you want to hear, but it's a fabrication, pure science fiction. There were no experiments with aliens.
WMM: Why would I lie to you?
Scully: Like you said before, to protect yourself and the continuation of the nazi agenda--human tests.
Mulder: Why was your file there, Scully?
Scully: I don't know.
Mulder: There were current records on file.
Scully: Yes, but records of what, Mulder?
Mulder: Of abductions! Of abductees. They took my sister. Why? WMM: They took her as insurance, because your father threatened to expose the project.
Mulder: Why her? Why not me?
WMM: It's not for me to say, but your life is in danger now, too. You also threaten to expose the project. You've become your father.
Mulder: Why are you telling me this?
WMM: It's what you want to know... isn't it?
Mulder: Is there more?
WMM: More than you'll ever know.

Man: Yes? Yes, he's just arrived. One moment, please. You have a call, sir.
CM: Thank you. Hello?
Krycek: I'm alive. Isn't that a surprise?
CM: Yes. Good, good, good. Where are you?
Krycek: Somewhere thet you'll never find me, you double-crossing son of a bitch.
CM: Are you sure?
Krycek: I'm sure of this--if I so much as feel your presence, I'm gonna make you a very, very famous man. You understand?
CM: Yes, thank you. I'm going to report that to the group. [hangs up] I've just received confirmation that the digital tape containing the stolen files was destroyed in a car bomb explosion which killed agent Scully's would-be assassin.
Elder 1: What about Mulder and Scully?
CM: I have a meeting with the FBI. They wanna make a deal.
Elder 1: For what?
CM: For nothing. There'll be no deal. There's no deal to make.

MrsMulder: Fox?
Mulder: Yeah.
MrsMulder: What time is it?
Mulder: It's after 2.
MrsMulder: Did you drive up here? Why didn't you call?
Mulder: I needed to see you in person. I need to ask you something. I need to ask you about something that happened a long time ago.
MrsMulder: Oh, Fox... I don't remember anything. I told you before.
Mulder: Mom, listen to me. When Samantha... before she was gone, did dad ever ask you if you had a favorite? Did he ever ask you that?
MrsMulder: Fox, please...
Mulder: Mom, did he ever ask you to make a choice?
MrsMulder: Don't do this.
Mulder: Mom, listen to me! I need to know. Did he make you make a choice?!
MrsMulder: No. I couldn't choose. It was your father's choice, and I hated him for it. Even in his grave, I hate him still.

CM: Now, you wanted to see me?
Skinner: I have the tape you've been looking for.
CM: Really?
Skinner: I'm prepared to hand it over, or destroy it in exchange for Mulder and Scully's safety and for their reinstatement here.
CM: What did I tell you, mr. Skinner? I don't negotiate, especially with punks like you, who think they can bluff me.
Skinner: Bluff you?
CM: You haven't got any tape. You haven't got any deal. You can't play poker if you're not holding any cards, mr. Skinner. Ever wondered what it would be like to... die in a plane crash? Of botulism? Even a heart attack's not uncommon for a man your age. You think I'm bluffing?
Skinner: I'm not finished yet. Albert.
[speaking Navajo]
CM: What is this?
Skinner: This is where you pucker up and kiss my ass.
CM: Now, listen...
Skinner: No, you listen to me, you son of a bitch. This man's name is Albert Hosteen. You should remember that, because if agents Mulder and Scully come down with so much as a case of the flu, Albert is prepared to recite chapter and verse, file for file, everything on your precious tape.
CM: It's a nice try, Skinner.
Skinner: I'm sure you're thinking Albert is an old man, and there are plenty of ways that you might kill him too, which is why, in the ancient oral tradition of his people, he's told 20 other men the information on those files. So unless you kill every navajo living in four states that information is available to a simple phone call. Welcome to the wonderful world of high technology.
CM: You're bluffing.
Skinner: Am I?

Scully: It happened three hours ago. She went into surgery and the damage to her brain was worse than they had hoped. Her blood pressure started to rise and... she slipped away. She died for me and I tried to tell her I was sorry, but I don't think she'll ever really know.
Mulder: She knows. Melissa knows.
Scully: You were right. There is no justice.
Mulder: I don't think this is about justice, Scully.
Scully: Then what is it about?
Mulder: I think it's about something we have no personal choice in. I think it's about fate. Skinner told me that he talked to you, that you were insistent about coming back to work. Now, if Melissa's death is...
Scully: I need something to put my back up against.
Mulder: I feel the same way. We've both lost so much... But I believe that what we're looking for is in the x-files. I'm more certain than ever that the truth is in there.
Scully: I've heard the truth, Mulder. Now what I want are the answers.

In Memoriam
Mario Mark Kennedy
1966-1995