episode by Sarah Charno
summary by Pellinor
Internal dating: No dates given. By air-date, ought to be November or December 1994, but the month-long quarantine at the end of "Firewalker" messes this up. "Irresistible" suggests that the dating in this section of the second season should be taken with a pinch of salt.
Aubrey Missouri Police Station. A team discuss a brutal murder, resolving not to tell the media about "this sister thing." A female detective, BJ Morrow, tells Lieutenant Tillman she's pregnant, writing the message on a memo pad while he's on the phone. He arranges to meet her that night at a motel.
That night, as she's unlocking her motel door, she gets a sudden vision of a 1940s car driving into a field, where a man then buries a body. As if in a nightmare, she digs there now, unearthing bones and an old FBI badge.
Mulder is studying two sets of X-rays of teeth, in the little-seen part of his office beyond the glass partition. By comparing the two sets, they've found out the bones found in the teaser belonged to Special Agent Sam Chaney. Mulder tells Scully how Chaney and his partner used to work in their own time applying rudimentary techniques of psychological profiling to find serial killers. They both went missing in 1942 in Missouri, until Chaney's bones were found two days ago by BJ Morrow. He says his interest is based on the fact that, in those days, using psychology to hunt killers was frowned upon, like believing in the paranormal is now. He's also interested in how BJ found the bones, and, "besides, I've always been intrigued by women called BJ."
Mulder and Scully visit the crime scene. BJ says she found the bones by seeing a dog dig in the field, after her car had broken down. Mulder questions her, picking holes in her explanation, but Tillman tries to defend her. Mulder then asks her if she's ever experiences any visions or precognitary dreams. "What the hell kind of question is that?" demands Tillman but BJ looks distracted.
In the Coroner's Office, Scully examines the bones, while Mulder reads aloud from Chaney's journal, about whether killers were monsters from birth or moulded by their upbringing. He tells her about the 1942 killings, when three young women were disabled by a blow to the head, then bled to death after the word "sister" was carved in their chest. Scully, who's found some cuts on the ribs of the bone, thinks they could be spell a word.
Scully has got hold of a digital scanner and is trying to find out what the slashes could read, while Mulder still discusses the how BJ found the bones. Scully says it's obvious BJ and Tillman are having an affair, and that she was in the area en route for a rendezvous. "A woman senses these things," she says, when Mulder asks her how she knows this. The computer then delivers the results, and they find out the scratches can't read "sister."
BJ comes in, and has another vision when she sees the skull. Upset, she runs from the room. Scully follows her, and offers support. "I've had feelings for people I've worked with," she says. "Inter-office relationships can be complicated, especially when he's married. You're pregnant, aren't you?" BJ says she's suffering from morning sickness, but also from nightmares. She dreams she's in a house. A woman's been hurt, and she can see a man's face in the mirror, and there is blood everywhere.
Back in the office, Mulder and Scully work on trying to find out what the cuts spell, but as they talk BJ touches the bones, and says they cuts spell "brother". The computer confirms this is probable. Tillman comes in, and is angry when he sees the photographs of the bodies with "sister" carved on them, saying no-one was to interfere with this evidence. Mulder and Scully explain that the photographs date from 1942, and he reveals that a murder happened three days ago which was exactly the same. Only he, one of his men, and the coroner knew about the word carved on the chest.
Another identical murder takes place, the body lying in an empty swimming pool. BJ recognises the body as the woman she saw in her dream.
In the park, BJ, Mulder and Scully discuss her dream. BJ is sceptical, saying her father would never believe you could solve a case by a dream. "I've often felt that dreams are answers to questions we haven't yet figured out how to ask," Mulder says. She describes her dream again. The man she sees in the mirror has a rash on his face, and there is a picture on the wall showing a strange monument. From her description, Mulder identifies it as the symbols of the 1939 World Fair in New York City, but she can't explain why this would be in her dream.
BJ looks through criminals' photographs from 1942, ignoring Tillman's objections. She's intent, not looking at him when he tries to arrange an abortion. "I've changed my mind," she says, before returning to the pictures and finding the face from her dream.
Mulder and Scully drive out to see the man BJ identified - a man called Harry Cokely, newly released from prison. In 1945 he raped and tried to kill a Linda Thibodeaux, carving "sister" into his chest. "I don't want to jump to any rash conclusions," says Mulder, ironically, "but I'd say he's definitely our prime suspect." Scully objects that he's 75, but Mulder says some people are late bloomers.
They the discuss BJ's involvement again. Scully thinks it's cryptamnesia. BJ's father was a police officer, so maybe when she was young she saw Cokely's face in a file and has remembered it subconsciously. The recent murders triggered some memory of a connection no-one else had made, which helped her find the bones. "You mean a hunch?" Mulder asks. "That's a pretty extreme hunch." "I seem to recall you having some pretty extreme hunches," Scully says. "I never have!" Mulder says, and they both laugh.
They arrive at Cokely's house. He's old and infirm, breathing through a tube in his nose. They confront him with the 1942 murders, but he says he was sick then, and has served his time now. He calls Scully "little sister." Mulder asks where he was two nights ago, and he grows angry, saying he can't even leave the house.
BJ dreams of the 1942 murders again, waking up in terror to find she has "sister" carved into her own chest. As she cleans up the blood, she sees young Cokely's face in the mirror, then sees a vision of a body being buried under the floorboards.
BJ is found later, incoherent, digging with her bare hands on the floorboards of a woman's house, who'd opened the door to her then called the police when she burst in, Mulder reaches into the hole in the floorboards and brings out some bones.
Mulder and Scully visit BJ in the hospital and ask her what happened. She insists it was Cokely who attacked her, looking just like his 1942 mug shot. "I swear it was him," she says. There is a rash on her hands.
Cokely is arrested, but denies everything. The rash on his hands is similar to the one seen on BJ's.
Mulder and Scully discuss the case in Mulder's motel room. Scully has found the second victim had blood under her fingernails, and the blood matches Cokely's. "Imagine the strength of this man's psychosis, still driving him to murder after 50 years." They decide to visit Mrs Thibodeaux, who was attacked by Cokely in 1945.
Mrs Thibodeaux, a widow, says how the attack has ruined her life. She's never had a photograph taken since, she says, as he points at a picture of herself and her husband. Another photo shows them at the World Fair - the picture seen by BJ in her dream. As Cokely attacked her, he said "Someone's got to take the blame, little sister, and it's not going to be me." At the trial they tried to say how his father beat him, and he was the only son in a family of five sisters, and everyone punished him for everything that went wrong. "But if you ask me," she says, "That man was born evil." Mulder asks her if she had children. She says no, but he points out that she checked back into hospital 9 months later. "What happened to the child?" he asks. She says her husband told her not to blame the child, but "it was the spawn of evil. I couldn't keep it." She gives them the address of the adoption agency she used.
Scully finds out that the bones that BJ found belonged to Chaney's partner. They had been buried under a house Cokely rented at the time. Cokely's been released now, she says, but she thinks they have enough to nail him. Mulder's chewing sunflower seeds, lying back on the couch looking thoughtful. He wonders if the killer could actually be Cokely's grandson, which would explain why she saw a younger man in the mirror.
"When I was kid," he tells her, "I had nightmares. I'd wake up in the middle of the night, thinking I was the only person left in the world. And then I would hear this...." he crunches a seed, saying how he would hear his father in his study eating seeds. "What if I like sunflower seeds because I'm genetically predisposed to like them?" he asks, suggesting that more than basic biological information can be passed down genetically. Scully says people are shaped more by upbringing, but Mulder cites cases of twins separated at birth who end up having very similar lives. "It's genetic memory, Scully," he says, but his argument is cut short when Scully gets through the Danny Validello, their ever-useful source at the FBI, who tells them that Cokely's son was BJ Morrow's father. "She's responsible for the murders," he says, grabbing his coat. Scully says BJ's not capable of murder, but Mulder says she's become Cokely. His memories and compulsions have been passed on genetically to her, and her nightmares re in fact true memories of going out and killing.
BJ tries to attack Mrs Thibodeaux, who throws over cleaner into her face and grabs a gun. BJ speaks the same words Cokely used when he attacked her in 1945, and corners her on the stairs. "You're my grandchild," Mrs Thibodeaux says, letting her gun fall. "He's done this to both of us."
Mulder and Scully, who assumed BJ would go after Mrs Thibodeaux, arrive and find her collapsed on the stairs but alive. "Something stopped her," she says. Scully says everything started when BJ found she was pregnant, and now she's looking for someone to blame. She thinks she'll go after Tillman, but Mulder thinks it will be Cokely.
Scully takes Mrs Thibodeaux to the police station. Tillman is furious at the accusations made against BJ, but Mrs Thibodeaux assures him it happened as she said it did.
Cokely is attacked by BJ in his own house, just as Mulder drives up outside. "How does it feel to be on the other side of the razor, brother?" BJ says, slashing at Cokely. "You know the rules. This doesn't stop until you're dead."
Mulder enters the house, and sees Cokely collapsed on the floor. BJ then attacks him, knocking him to the floor with a fire extinguisher and holding a razor at his throat. As the camera sees through her eyes, Mulder turns into the 1942 agent, begging for his life. "This time you'll stay dead," she says, slashing at his throat. Tillman and Scully burst in, guns drawn. "Let him go, BJ," Scully says, but she says she's not BJ. "Yes you are," Mulder says. BJ holds the razor at Mulder's throat, but then Cokely dies and she falls back, looking confused. Tillman helps her up, telling her if will be okay, and Scully gently supports Mulder's head.
Scully writes her concluding report, saying that result are inconclusive, though BJ's blood tests have found a rare mutator gene, activating previously dormant genes. The foetus, which is male, appears normal, but BJ attempted to abort it and is now on suicide watch. Tillman wants to adopt the boy.