5x20 The End



VANCOUVER
BRITISH COLUMBIA

Gibson: Checkmate.

[opening credits]

LAURENTIAN MOUNTAINS
QUEBEC, CANADA
6:39 AM

CM: Go on! Take your shot, Alex!
Krycek: Right there! I was... sent to bring you back.

Mulder: Wow, you know you're going places in the Bureau when the Assistant Director tidies up your office for you. What's up?
Skinner: I was just, uh... looking.
Mulder: For anything special?
Skinner: I came down to ask you something. I, uh, I guess I was nosing around--wondering about you, your, uh, long-term plans.
Mulder: My long-term plans? You got them right there in your hands.
Skinner: What do you hope to find? I mean, in the end.
Mulder: Whatever I hope to find is in here. And maybe I'll know it when I find it. Is that what you came to ask me?
Skinner: No. There's a case--nothing I'd send you normally--a murder... an assassination of a Russian chess player. The shooter is former National Security Agency... one of ours. It's got a lot of people upset. This kid, Jeffrey Spender--Special Agent Spender--he's been given the case. He's running it.
Mulder: Did you give it to him?
Skinner: No. It came as an order from somewhere outside the Bureau. His team's assembled upstairs. He was very specific that you be excluded.

Spender: Using a weapon registered to a US intelligence agency, the shooter fired one kill shot at Anatole Klebanow before being captured without incident a short distance from the scene. No motive has been established, nor has the shooter offered up a statement or accomplice.
Mulder: Please continue.
Spender: The trajectory of the kill shot suggests the shooter acted alone, but we cannot yet rule out an accomplice or conspiracy. A single bullet was fired from a catwalk at a steep angle striking the target, just right of the solar plexus.
Mulder: I'm... sorry, can you rewind the tape? Please. I'll tell you where. Just take it back?
Spender: Let me get through this. If you have any questions, we can talk later.
Mulder: I don't have any questions, no. I just think you're wrong.
Scully: Mulder... what are you doing?
Mulder: I don't think the Russian was the target. I think it was his opponent.
Spender: His opponent, agent Mulder, was a 12-year-old boy.
Mulder: And a good chess player. Here, let me show you his best move, if you'll just take it back. OK, stop it there. Look what the kid does right here, right before the kill shot. Play. Do you see what he does? He just pushes back. Do you see that?
Spender: He just completed a checkmate. He's pushing back because the game's over.
Mulder: You described a steep trajectory for the kill shot. If the kid doesn't push back at that precise moment, he catches the bullet in the back of the neck, not the Russian.
Spender: May we move on here?
Fowley: I think agent Mulder is right. Looks like the boy sensed the shooter precognitively. If you rewind the tape, you'll see it.
Spender: There's no way. It's impossible.
Skinner: Rewind the tape so we can all see for ourselves.

CM: You look surprised. Is it that I'm here, or that I'm alive?
Elder #1: When we heard you'd been shot, we'd assumed the worst.
Elder #2: There were reports you lost too much blood to have survived.
CM: Obviously, you underestimated me. More obviously, you overestimated the man you sent to do the job. Well, let's say all is forgiven. Now, you have a job for me.
WMM: There's been an incident... an unfortunate mistake.
CM: Yes, I've seen, I've heard, I've read.
Elder #3: The boy is a problem to us.
CM: What would you like me to do... shoot him dead... splatter his brains?
WMM: Dear God!
CM: What's the matter? Does this sort of business offend you?
Elder #1: It's in your interest... as in ours.
CM: You think you know my interests?
Elder #1: Can we count on you?
CM: Yes.

Scully: How long have you been with the Bureau, agent Fowley?
Fowley: Since '91. I took an assignment in Europe after the wall came down, when the Director stepped up foreign terrorism concerns.
Scully: And they brought you on this because of a terrorism angle?
Fowley: No. I, uh, I requested a reassignment. There were things at home I decided I wanted to get back to.
Scully: 1991. That's about when you started work on the X-files.
Mulder: More or less, yeah.

Mulder: Gibson? Hi. My name is Fox. This is Dana and Diana. How are you doing?
Gibson: I don't mind it here. They get all the good TV shows. Where I live, in the Philippines, all we get is Baywatch.
Mulder: What's wrong with Baywatch?
Gibson: You've got a dirty mind.
Scully: Your parents are going to pick you up on Friday, Gibson, to take you back home.
Gibson: I don't want to play any chess.
Mulder: How do you know I want to?
Gibson: 'Cause you got that cheapo chess computer in your hand.
Mulder: It's not so cheap. Don't you want to see how fast you can beat it?
Gibson: No.
Mulder: Maybe because you can't. I'm right, aren't I? You know what I'm talking about. You knew the moment I came in. That's how you win, isn't it... How you know what your opponent's going to do? You get inside his head. You read his thoughts. That's how you knew that man was going to shoot you... isn't it?
Gibson: I know what's on your mind. I know you're thinking about one of the girls you brought.
Mulder: Oh?
Gibson: One of them's thinking about you.
Fowley: Which one?
Gibson: He doesn't want me to say.
Mulder: This kid's going to need round-the-clock protection.
Scully: Mulder... what was that all about?
Mulder: The kid's no chess master. Under controlled conditions, I could probably beat him.
Scully: Mulder, he's recognized internationally as a prodigy. He's beaten grand masters.
Mulder: With the most unfair advantage. What he's doing amounts to a parlor magic trick.
Scully: Mulder, he was goofing on you. He was playing along. I mean, what you're positing is that this kid reads minds.
Mulder: We've seen a number of these cases before, Scully.
Scully: We have seen cases, Mulder, of fakers and lucky guessers, but no one that has ever been able to stand up to any kind of rigorous testing, and no one who has gone so far as to claim that they can zero in on the mind of one person in a crowd of thousands.
Mulder: Maybe that's why they want him dead.
Scully: Who? Who are you talking about?
Mulder: I don't know, I'm not the mind reader.
Scully: Say that what you're suggesting were even possible, who'd want to kill a kid whose abilities would offer you the ultimate advantage... I mean, in business, in war, in anything?
Fowley: Maybe somebody whose business is in keeping secrets.
Mulder: Well, let's test him. I think the kid will stand up. Let's run a brain scan and a psych evaluation on him. You know what to do, Diana.
Scully: So, you two know each other?
Fowley: It was a long time ago.

[commercial break]

FEDERAL DETENTION FACILITY
FT. MARLENE, MARYLAND

Spender: What are you doing here?
Mulder: I want to talk to the shooter.
Spender: I've just spent the last six hours talking with him. He's not been what I would call forthcoming.
Mulder: Okay. Let me see what I can do.
Spender: I prefer you stay out of there. In fact, I prefer you stay out of this thing altogether.
Mulder: You know, when I first met you, I figured you were just ambitious. This morning, my opinion changed, and I thought you were arrogant. Now I'm beginning to wonder what you're protecting.
Spender: I'm just trying to run this right, not like some ridiculous paranormal free-for-all.
Mulder: You're insulting me when you should be taking notes. Somehow, you got the big assignment, but wearing the suit doesn't mean it fits. You're lucky you're not busy defusing an international incident, kissing some serious Russian ass and sending a whole lot of agents barking down a whole lot of bad leads. Now, the kid is the key to this, and the shooter knows why. Excuse me.

Mulder: What does it take to kill a kid? Money, or just evil stupidity?
Shooter: I didn't kill the kid.
Mulder: No... thanks to the kid.
Shooter: Want to talk about heartlessness? Your squeaky friend there... hasn't given me any food or water for what--16 hours?
Mulder: I won't tolerate that. Spender, you got to get this guy some food. Go on.
Shooter: I've got nothing to say.
Mulder: Yeah... I read your bio. You've been trained. Special Forces. You were in Grenada, Zaire. You were inside Saddam's palace with a hit squad when they started raining bombs down over it, yet you failed to kill him as well.
Shooter: Like I said...
Mulder: Yeah, I know--you got nothing to say. That's okay. I'm a pretty good guesser. The kid reads minds. How's that? Why don't I tell him you told me that, and then let's see how safe and snug you feel in here.
Shooter: What can you do for me?
Mulder: I don't know. I might be able to get you immunity or, uh... get you into the witness protection program.
Shooter: Never happen.
Mulder: Think about it.

Spender: What did you get? Did you get anything?
Mulder: Just his attention.

Scully: How you doing?
Gibson: I didn't like those tests. I didn't like being in the machine.
Scully: Hmm... they're a little scary, aren't they?
Gibson: You're wondering, aren't you?
Scully: About what? About you?
Gibson: About that other girl. She's wondering about you, too.

Man: We're going to show you a group of cards, and as we look at them, we want you to tell us what we're thinking. Now, take as much time as you need.
Gibson: Chair. Piano. Piece of pie. Lightbulb. Smiley face. Statue. Cat.

Scully: It's amazing. It's hard to believe.
Fowley: I've witnessed clairvoyants who were over 90% accurate, and seen telepathy being demonstrated, but I don't know I've ever witnessed anything quite like this.
Scully: Where'd you see that?
Fowley: Agent Mulder and I spent some time in psychiatric hospitals. There were some patients serving criminal sentences, who we felt had been misdiagnosed.

Gibson: A three-egg Denver omelette. Coffee and a cruller. A nonfat latte. An English muffin. Grand slam number two with double hash browns and a side of Canadian bacon.
Man: He just told us all what we ate for breakfast.
Scully: I have to disappear for a bit.

Guard: I was handed a note. Now I'm handing it to you.
[You're a dead man]

Frohike: OK, hang on. I'm coming.
Scully: Is somebody going to let me in?
Frohike: Yeah. Yeah. Coming. Coming. Sorry. You caught me getting ready for bed. Come in. Come in.
Scully: Thank you.
Frohike: To what do we owe the pleasure at this late night hour.
Scully: I need your help.
Langly: With what?
Scully: You've all heard of Gibson Praise, the chess wunderkind. These are a series of scans and neural electrical outputs of his brain and brain processes. There seems to be some suspicion that he's a fraud.
Byers: Dorf on chess?
Scully: Well, apparently, he wins by reading his opponents' minds.
Frohike: I love that.
Langly: And you want us to... what?
Scully: Analyze the data... with an eye to the parapsychological.
Frohike: Oooh... a walk on the wild side.
Scully: First... I want you guys to tell me who Diana Fowley is.
Byers: Diana Fowley? Geez, we haven't heard that name in a while.
Scully: Then you know her.
Byers: Well... yeah.
Frohike: She was Mulder's chickadee when he just got out of the Academy. Good-looking.
Scully: Well, she claims to have worked closely with him for a while.
Langly: She was there when he discovered the X-files. She has some kind of background in para-science.
Byers: She got a legat appointment a while back... in Berlin. I always wondered why they split up.
Scully: Well... why don't you boys see what you can find?

Mulder: How's little Karnak going?
Fowley: Put a TV in front of him, and he turns right into a normal kid. He's the real deal, Fox. We tested him with Zener cards, random numbers, a variety of ESP tasking. He's got ability to not just focus on a thought, but a multitude of thoughts at once.
Mulder: There's something else. There's something we're missing here.
Fowley: That was a good catch, on the videotape. I was impressed.
Mulder: Oh, you would have caught it eventually.
Fowley: Mmh. I've been too many years trying to get inside the head of too many Arab terrorists. I'm out of practice with this stuff. But you seem at the top of your game.
Mulder: That's all I do. That's all I've been doing for the last five years. Been my life, such as it is.
Fowley: Sometimes I hear about you... about the work you're doing... and I think how it might have been if I'd stayed.
Mulder: Ah, we'd all be blown up by some terrorist bomb, no doubt, huh?
Fowley: I sense you could have used an ally, though--someone who thinks like you, with some background.
Mulder: You mean Scully?
Fowley: She's not what I'd call an open mind on the subject.
Mulder: No. She's a, uh... she's a scientist. She just makes me work for everything.
Fowley: Yes, but I'm... I'm sure there were times when two like minds on a case would have been advantageous.
Mulder: I've done OK without you.
Fowley: Hey... I'm on your side.

[Scully walks by, goes back to her car.]

Mulder: Mulder.
Scully: Mulder, it's me.
Mulder: Where are you?
Scully: I'm, uh... I'm on my way to work. I was hoping I could show you something. Something about the boy.
Mulder: Well, I'm at the psych facility with him right now. Why don't you come by and show me?
Scully: Uh, no, I'd... I'd prefer to show you at work, if that's okay.
Mulder: Okay. What is it?
Scully: I think you'll be surprised. Very surprised.
Mulder: I'm on my way.

CM: Agent Spender. I need to speak with you.
Spender: Who are you?
CM: Somebody who's taken an interest in you... in this case of yours. This case I gave you.
Spender: What are you? CIA? NSA?
CM: You're a bright boy.
Spender: You said you had information.
CM: Control the board. Know which men to sacrifice and when.
Spender: I don't know what you're talking about.
CM: Don't become part of someone else's cause or crusade. Pursue your own self-interest. Always.
Mulder: Agent Spender. Agent Spender. Who were you talking to?
Spender: I don't know.
Mulder: You don't know who you were talking to?
Spender: I don't know.
Mulder: You don't know who you were talking to? You're lying.
Spender: What's your deal?
Mulder: I was told he was dead.
Spender: Well, obviously whoever it is, he's not.

[commercial break]

Skinner: You're here to tell me a story.
Mulder: Tell him exactly as you told me.
Scully: I've conducted some tests on Gibson Praise, and have come up with some rather unexpected conclusions. Ones which I myself have difficulty reconciling with what I know.
Skinner: These are?
Scully: Neurological tests. Mapping of brain functions using a very high resolution EEG.
Skinner: What did you find out?
Scully: The tests revealed something peculiar in an area of the brain that we are only beginning to understand. An area of the temporal lobe that neurophysicists are calling the "god module."
Skinner: I hope I'm not going to hear that this kid is the next Christ child.
Scully: All of the boy's brain processes are showing extraordinary activity in exactly this part of the brain. Which is not just abnormal or anomalous, but from what I know, absolutely unheard of.
Mulder: There are corollaries--individuals who've been responsible for great leaps forward in understanding in science. Newton, Galileo, Einstein, Stephen Hawking...all these men exhibited modes of thinking that are suggestive of access to special brain centers.
Skinner: All right. So, this kid is a human oddity. Would someone please tell me why anyone would go to such lengths as to kill him?
Mulder: This kid may be the key, not just to all human potential, but to all spiritual unexplained paranormal phenomena. The key to everything in the X-files.
Spender: Let me get this right--we're supposed to believe that this boy was going to be killed because of the X-files?
Mulder: No, it's bigger than that.
Spender: Uh-huh. Explain it to me. To us.
Mulder: I can't. But the shooter can. The assassin that you have locked up... in exchange for immunity from prosecution.
Spender: You want to give a murderer a free ride for the secrets to the pyramids? This is crazy, it's nuts.
Scully: You mischaracterize what I've said. This would be quantifiable, scientific proof of everything agent Mulder and I have investigated over the past five years.
Fowley: How do you quantify the spiritual? It can't be done. You ask for immunity for a killer on that basis, the Attorney General is gonna go off. You're allowed to investigate the X-files as an indulgence. But draw the wrong kind of attention, and they'll close you down. Put an end to all your work. Something I happen to have an interest in, myself.
Skinner: Let's everyone step out in the hall. Agent Mulder, you stay put. She's right, you know. The risk you're taking, the long-term plans that you and I talked about...
Mulder: If what Agent Scully's found is true, and I have every reason to believe that it is, then the answers I might have spent a lifetime searching for, may fall together like a million puzzle pieces.
Skinner: You'd risk the X-files?
Mulder: How soon can you call the Attorney General?

Mulder: The Attorney General's heard your request for immunity.
Shooter: Heard it? You... you said that you could get it.
Mulder: She needs something more. Something to convince her that you're not just playing games. Something that I can corroborate. I need answers from you.
Shooter: The kid is a missing link.
Mulder: To what? He's genetic proof, isn't he?
Spender: Genetic proof of what? Genetic proof of what?
Mulder: The kid's not superhuman. He's just more human than human.
Spender: He's what?
Mulder: Most of us have genes we don't use. They lie there dormant, turned off. Science doesn't know what they're for, why they're there or where they came from.
Spender: Right, and you think this has to do with that?
Mulder: There's a long-held, but unpopular theory, tied to prehistoric evidence of alien astronauts.
Spender: You're not going to go out there and say the kid's part alien. You think that's what you heard? You lead him, agent Mulder. Now you're letting yourself be lead.

WMM: We entrusted you. You failed.
CM: Failed. Failed who?
WMM: Mulder has gone to the Justice Department. He has testimony about the boy.
CM: That's just part of the game.
WMM: It's not a game, for God's sake.
CM: Sure it is. It's all a game. You just take their pieces, one by one, until the board is clear.

CENTERVILLE, VIRGINIA

Scully: Gibson?
Gibson: This is a great show. I wish we got this where I live.
Scully: I'd like to ask you something. How do you do it?
Gibson: I just hear you thinking... like on a radio. And sometimes there are lots of radios. And I want to shut them off and watch some TV.
Scully: Is that why you like chess? 'Cause it's just one thought that you hear?
Gibson: Yeah, but that's not why I like it all the time.
Scully: Why else do you like it?
Gibson: Because there's no talking. Just thinking. It's nothing like real life, where people think one thing but they say something else.
Scully: Is that what people do?
Gibson: They're worried about what other people are thinking, when the people they're worrying about, are worried about the same thing. It makes me laugh.
Scully: Why?
Gibson: They make up all this stuff to believe, but it's all made up. Some people try to be good people, but some people just don't care. Like you.
Scully: You think I don't care?
Gibson: No, you don't care what people think. Except for her, the other one.

[Fowley comes in]

Fowley: I'm here to relieve you.
Scully: Well, we'll talk about this later, OK?
Gibson: They wanna kill me, you know.
Scully: Nobody's going to do anything to you, Gibson. I promise.
Gibson: I know you do.

Guard: I've been handed another note.
[bang]

Fowley: Gibson? What are you doing?
Gibson: There's a man with a gun.
Fowley: Gibson, get down. Get back. Get back.
Gibson: He didn't come here to kill me. He's aiming at you.
[bang]

[commercial break]

Skinner: Agent Mulder, Scully. They killed a US Marshal and then shot agent Fowley. They worked on her here for an hour. They couldn't get a chopper in, so they're in radio communication with the hospital. She's got a hole in one of her lungs, so they're not optimistic.
Scully: What about the boy? Is he here?
Mulder: Where's Spender? He's gone to Federal Detention. We found the shooter shot dead in his cell early this morning. We also found this.

WMM: Hello, young man.
Gibson: Hello.
WMM: There's nothing to be afraid of.
Gibson: You're a liar. Just like him.
CM: You've never had the stomach for our business.
WMM: Just not for your practices.
CM: I'm a necessity. The complement to your cowardice.
WMM: Your work is done now.
CM: My work is just beginning.
Krycek: I got a nice, straight shot.
WMM: No. He's useful. And you may need him in the future.

Spender: ...secure the airports, notify the parents and the Philippine government the boy's missing, and...
Mulder: Who do you work for?!
Spender: Agent Mulder.
Mulder: You work for him--you and old Smokey--is that who put this together?! You're going down for this, Spender! I'm going to see you prosecuted for murder. You watch me! Watch it happen! Your days are numbered.
Spender: You're wrong, agent Mulder. It's your days that are numbered.

Scully: We knew there were risks going to the Attorney General.
Skinner: You know what's coming down here.
Scully: Yes, sir.
Skinner: They're serious about this, Scully.
Scully: I understand.
Skinner: I assume you'll make agent Mulder aware of this.
Scully: Yes, I'm--I'm here with him now.
Skinner: I'm making a case his personal involvement clouded his judgment, but I don't know the Attorney General's listening.
Scully: I'll communicate that to him. Is there anything else--any other news?
Skinner: You should know agent Spender's going after Mulder full bore. He's been reciting some line about "alien astronauts." It makes you both look real bad.
Scully: Right. Well, I'll be here if you need to reach me.
Mulder: Any news on Diana?
Scully: They have her on maximum pressers, but she's barely maintaining her pressure.
Mulder: What did Skinner have to say?
Scully: There are talks going on right now about reassignment.
Mulder: For who?
Scully: Both of us. These talks included instructions from the Justice Department to close down the X-files.
Mulder: This was all strategized--every move. I just couldn't see it. It was all of a plan.
Scully: Mulder, whatever you may believe, this time they may have won.

Spender: Can I help you?
CM: Actually, ...I can help you.
Spender: How did you get in here?
CM: Access, agent Spender. It's about access. It's what I can give you. It's what can make you. It's why I'm doing this for you.
Spender: Who are you?
CM: I'm your father.
Spender: What?!

[fire alarm goes off]