episode by Scott Kaufer and Chris Carter
summary by Pellinor
Internal dating: Not given. "Miracle Man", two episodes further on, is set around March 7 1994, so this is presumably sometime in February 1994, if episodes are in right order.
Tashmoo Federal Correctional Facility, Pennsylvania, 1989. A wheel-chair bound prisoner, Crandall, follows the sound of screaming and sees a doctor working alone on his friend, John Barnett. One of Barnett's hands is missing. The doctor says Bartett is dead, and threatens Crandall with a scalpel.Barnett's eyes blink
Mulder and Scully arrive at the scene of a jewellery store armed robbery where Mulder's been called by his old colleague, Reggie Purdue. "This is going to blow your mind," says Purdue, showing Mulder a note left by the criminal at the scene. "That's Barnett," Mudler says, puzzled.
Mulder tells Scully how Purdue was his first ASAC on his first case, that of armed robber John Barnett, when he was 28 and right out of the Academy. "I had this theory on the case. Reggie thought I was full of it," he says. "I was full of it," he adds, with a smile. When they tried to lay a trap, Barnett started leaving notes, Mulder tells her, showing her the new note which reads "Fox can't guard the chicken coop." They did catch him eventually, he says, but "not clean. An agent died because I screwed up." Barnett died in prison 4 years ago. "I was paying attention," Mulder says when Scully asks him if he's sure.
Mulder takes the note to an Agent Henderson to get the handwriting analysed. She flirts with him, but he doesn't respond. She's 95 precent sure the note is by Barnett, and is recent.
Purdue shows Scully the video of Barnett's arrest. Barnett had a hostage so Mulder, who had a clear shot, didn't fire as this is not by the book. Barnett killed the hostage and another Agent, Steve Wallenberg. "Mulder never forgave himself for that," Purdue says, and also tells her how Barnett swore he'd get Mulder.
Mulder gets a copy of Barnett's death certificate, showing he died of cardiac arrest on September 16th 1989. Scully thinks it's a clever copycat or one of Barnett's fellow prisoners carrying out a plan hatched with Barnett before his death. She tells him that she's seen the vidoe and talked to Purdue. "You did the right thing, Mulder," she tells him. "Did I?" he says, telling how Steve Wallenberg's children are fatherless because of him. He walks away and shuts the door.
Still clutching the note, Mulder goes to watch Wallenberg's son playing football. When he returns to his car he finds another note inside. "A hunted fox eventually dies," it reads. There are also photographs of him and Scully arriving at the jewellery store. "I'll get you, you son of a bitch!" Mulder shouts. Barnett watches him from a distance.
Purdue thinks someone is messing with Mulder's head. Lots of people know about the threat Barnett made and he thinks one of them is using the knowledge to get at Mulder. He says he's never heeded all the Spooky Mulder talk about how paranoid he is, but he can still remember when he first met him. "You pissed me off just lookijg at you, but then I saw the way your mind worked - how you were always three jumps ahead. It was scary, Mulder. Everybody said so." Mulder pulls away but Purdue continues, saying how everyone had really big plans for him, but now they think he's an embarrassment. "Are you saying someone from the Bureau's behind this?" Mulder asks, surprised. Purdue says he's not sure, but it's as well to be careful.
Scully comes in, interrupting the conversation. She's found that Barnett left everything to a fellow prisoner, Joe Crandall, and he was cremated. Purdue repeats that he thinks someone's messing with Mulder's head but Mulder thinks that killing a sales clerk just to leave him a note is going too far unless it really is Barnett.
Mulder gets a photograph of Barnett aged on the computer to work out what he'd look like now. As the computer person works, he flashes back to Barnett's trial. On the witness stand he described how they caught Barnett. Visibly moved, he described why he hadn't shot Barnett when he had a chance, and how Barnett started firing. After being told to stand down he refused, and angrily shouted at Barnett, saying he deserved to die like an animal for what he did. As he returned to his seat, Barnett turned round and whispered "I'll get you."
Scully finds out Barnett's previous medical records showed no sign on heart problems, and when they go to visit Joe Crandall in prison he says there's no way he died of cardiac arrest. "He's not dead, is he?" asks Crandall, describing what he saw (in the teaser).
Mulder refuses to sit and wait for another note, though he's not sure what to do. Just then Barnett calls him. "I'm everywhere you are - everywhere," he says. "Man, I own you." Mulder says Barnett's dead. "You're the dead man, Mulder," Barnett says, but hangs up before Scully can trace the call. Mulder thinks the voice was really Barnett, due to the New Hampshire accent.
Reggie Purdue is woken up at night by Mulder calling him. Mulder tells him Barnett's not dead. Purdue tells him to go home and get some rest, but Mulder crries on, telling him how Henderson said the note was written by a right-hander, but Crandall says Barnett's right hand was amputated. As he's talking, a strange reptile-like hand reaches out and strangles Purdue as Mulder calls to him from the other end of the phone.
At Purdue's home the nest day, Mulder tells Scully how Purdue's wife died of Cancer 6 years ago and he'd been working on a mystery novel he'd wanted Mulder to read. "I8m probably the only guy in the Burean he trusted enough to even ask," he says. "I'm just thinking how different things woul have been if I'd taken that shot at Barnett when I had it," he says, interrupting Scully's attempts to offer sympathy, and he shows her the note which reads "Funeral for Fox's friends, then for Fox."
Agent Henderson again says the note was by a right-handed person, and not by a prosthetic hand. There are no prints on the note, but it also doesn't look as if the man wore a glove.
Scully finds that Dr Ridley, who signed Barnett's death certificate and was the one seen by Crandall, lost his medical licence in 1979 for research malpractice.
At the National Institute of Health, Bethesda, they watch a video of a child with progeria, a disease that causes people to die of old age, usually before the age of 10. Dr Ridley was working with these patients, using than as objects, trying to reverse the ageing process. People called him "Dr Mengele." It was rumoured he went later to South America.
Mulder thinks Ridley was using prisoners as test subjects in his project to reverse the ageing process. "Maybe Barnett's found the perfect disguise - youth," he says. He then gets Barnett's photgraph artificially made younger rather than older.
At night, Scully works on her report in her apartment. She feels there is no evdidence that Ridley was successful. As she writes, the strange hand that attacked Purdue is seen opening a door in her apartment. She hears a noise and gets her gun, only to find Dr Ridley at her door. The man hidden in her apartment withdraws.
In Scully's apartment, Mulder and Scully talk to Dr Ridley. He says Barnett was his only success, and that he himself is dying. Barnett, however, is thriving, except for his eyes. He was able to grow for him a new hand, using the hand of a salamander. "Unbelievable," says Scully. He says that the US Government financed him after he lost his licence, for the man who controls the fountain of youth controls the world.
Mulder meets with Deep Throat who says that Barnett stole Ridley's research, and the government is bargaining with him to get it back.
Next morning, Scully finds someone's accessed her messages on her answering machine. Barnett's prints are on the machine. Just as she's telling Mulder, Barnett calls him, saying how he's going to kill all his friends. From Scully's messages they realise Barnett knows she's meeting a friend, Cathy, for a cello recital so assume he'll attack then.
At the concert, lots of plainclothes agents are mingling with the crowd, with orders to take Barnett alive. Scully, with a bullet-proof vest, is playing the target. Despite all the precautions, Barnett, who's passed himself off as the paino tuner, manages to shoot Scully. Mulder chases him into the hall, but Barnett takes the cellist hostage. "Shoot, Mulder," Barbett tauts him. "What are you afraid of, huh? Against regulations, huh?.... I can shoot her, and you just have to live with it" Mulder shoots him.
Scully opens her eyes, dazed but alive, the bullet having hit her bullet-proof vest.
In the hospital, doctors work to save Barnett's life. A man in a suit, assumed by Mulder to be a CIA Agent but actually Cancer Man, urges him to talk. "I know what you did wasn't by the book," says Scully. "Says a lot about the book," he replies. Barnett dies, taking the secret of the whereabouts of the research to the grave. As the camera closes in on a left-luggage locker at the railway station, Mulder says "I feel like we haven't heard the last from John Barnett.".