episode by James "Chargers" Wong and Glen "Bolts, Baby" Morgan (yes, that's what it says)
summary by Pellinor
Internal dating: One of the boys involved in the ritual at the start of the case borrowed a library book on January 16th 1995. The plot suggests the whole witchcraft thing was done on impulse, suggesting this date was probably the same day as the ritual, or, at least, not many days earlier. Thus Mulder and Scully arrive on this case either on Janury 17th or some time not long after that. This causes problems with the "Colony" dating.
Milford Haven, New Hampshire. The local parent-teachers committee meets. Among other business they discuss the suitability of a student production of "Jesus Christ, Superstar," which they seem to object to on religious grounds. As they adjourn, one of their number is asked to lead them in a prayer. "We've been letting it slip," one says, as they light a candle and pray to the "forces of darkness." "His is the hand that wounds," they say in German - die hand die verletzt.
A group of teenagers head into the woods at night, with the two boys planning which girl they'll go for. At a stump which they say is an altar, one of the boys reads out an invocation of the powers of darkness. As he reads, there is a menacing rustling, the candle goes out and there are suddenly rats everywhere. One of the girls panics and runs, muttering Hail Marys. One of the boys chases her, but a hand reaches out and grabs him by the throat.
8.56 next morning, Mulder and Scully examine the body, which was found a few hours ago. (Now that's a quick arrival!) The sheriff says "they" say this area is used for witchcraft activities - "they" meaning "everybody". The boy's eyes and heart have been cut out, there's signs of candle wax and the teenagers were no doubt listening to Heavy Metal - "Devil's Music" - and what more proof could one need? Scully finds the remains of two six packs, and a burnt page of a library book, and wonders why the police didn't turn these up themselves. The sheriff says the crime has them "rattled" and fearing a "deeper conspiracy." "This is a strange area," he says. Mulder agrees, but Scully thinks it's just a murderer taking advantage of local folklore. "There's nothing odd about..." she begins, as frogs start falling from the sky. "Lunch?" says Mulder. Scully is open-mouthed with astonishment.
Mulder and Scully go the local High School's library and track down the burnt page as coming from a book on witchcraft in America. They find out the last person to have taken the book out. At the same time, Scully has managed to come to terms with the rain of frogs by calling the National Weather Service and finding a convenient tornado to blame.
The three surviving teenagers from the teaser are about to start their class with Mrs Paddock, their new substitute teacher. Mulder and Scully knock at the door, but as soon as he sees them the boy, Dave Duran, bolts for the window. Mulder grabs him, and they question him. He says he knows nothing about black magic but was just doing it to impress the girls. "I never thought it would work," he says, adding that he's scared of whatever it is they called up.
In an adjoining room, the PTC discuss the situation anxiously. The boy was killed according to their rites, they say, so one of them must have done the killing. Nevertheless, they all deny it. "Something is here - a presence amongst us," one of them says.
Mulder and Scully let the teenagers go, and the PTC objects, saying "they" are reaching in from outside and corrupting the children. "'They' again," Mulder prompts, to which the PTC say they mean the cults. Scully says the FBI has concluded a study that show satanic cults don't exist, at least not in anything like the numbers being alleged. The PTC spokesman challenges her, but Mulder pulls her away, saying firmly that they are still investigating.
Scully asserts that the whole thing is mass hysteria, and their presence on a routine murder will only feed that. As she talks, Mulder takes a drink from a drinking fountain and sees the water going down the wrong way. "Something is here, Scully," he says. "Something is making these things possible."
Mrs Paddock calls the two girls back after class and says she's here if they need anyone to talk to. After they have gone, she opens her drawer, revealing a heart and two eyes.
Mulder talks to the Calcagni, the school counsellor (one of the PTC people), pointing out a high incidence of stress, headaches and depression amongst the students. He suggests that this could be evidence of suppressed memories of abuse, but he says he's seen no evidence of this and refuses to let Mulder talk to any of the troubled pupils.
Scully finds a posting on the Net which describes how Satanists are behind all sorts of atrocities. It's word for word the same as a Nazi newspaper in the 1930s, with "cultist" inserted for "Jew". "The rumours are the same, but the blanks have been filled in with whoever must be feared or persecuted at the time," she says. Mulder explains how modern witches and even Satanists don't kill, and that nether can explain the frogs or the water.
Mrs Paddock leads the class in the dissection of a pig's heart. One of the girls from the teaser, Shannon Ausbury, sees the heart seem to beat and screams and screams. The counsellor says he'll call her father but she runs out, screaming "No!". Mulder chases her, saying, "you're remembering. Tell me what you're remembering."
Shannon tells Mulder and Scully that she has recently remembered that her father - actually her step-father - raped her when she was four. After that, other men and women would come to the house and wear black and red robes. They would tie her and her sister up and rape them. "They would me pregnant and then kill the babies," she says, telling them she's had three babies all buried in the cellar. Her eight-year old sister was sacrificed and killed too, she says, falling weeping into Scully's arms.
Mulder and Scully visit Shannon's step-father, another of the PTC members. While Mulder talks to the father, Scully talks to the mother. She thinks it's a cry for attention, as she and her husband have been wrapped up in their marriage problems recently. Shannon did have a sister, she admits, but she died at eight weeks old. While his wife is tearful, Jim Ausbury is angry, smashing a glass and saying he'd kill anyone who did to her the things she spoke of. "Not a very Christian tenet," Mulder says, but Ausbury quotes some Scripture. Mulder opens the cellar door. "Even the Devil can quote Scripture for his own ends," he says, as the door suddenly slams shut as if pulled from his hand. "How dare you?" Ausbury yells, accusing Mulder of putting all these ideas into his daughter's head. He orders Mulder to leave. "The Devil travels in many forms, and you may be one!" Ausbury shouts.
Shannon stays behind after class to complete the dissection. In the adjacent room, Mrs Paddock holds Shannon's charm bracelet in a candle flame and concentrates very hard. Shannon slashes her own wrists.
While Scully talks to Paddock, Mulder goes into her office and finds Shannon's bracelet and the smell of incense. Paddock says it's the block the smell of formaldehyde, but Mulder says it's also used in Black Mass rituals. Even Scully is suspicious, saying the teacher Paddock replaced was stricken very suddenly with a very rare disease, and that no-one can remember hiring Paddock as a substitute. But it's "just a coincidence," she says, defensively.
The PTC are anxious, saying they need to perform a sacrifice to please the evil being amongst them. "It's years since we've done that," one of them says. They ask Jim Ausbury to say Shannon killed the boy out of jealousy that he might look at another girl, and that she has now killed herself out of remorse. Then, after the police and FBI have gone, they'll renew their faith with another sacrifice.
Mulder gets a search warrant for the Ausbury's house, where he finds Ausbury in the cellar. He admits to being a Satanist, which he prefers over what he sees as Christian hypocrisy, but has been disillusioned with that faith now, after Shannon's death. He says they used to use the children in their rituals, but never hurt them. They used to miss out the stronger parts of the ritual. They would repress the children's memories with posy-hypnotic suggestion, ready to tell them everything when they were 21. Shannon must have confused the truth with things she'd seen on television, he tells Mulder. He says neither he nor the others killed Shannon or the boy, but Mulder says they are responsible nevertheless. "Did you really think you could call up the devil and ask him to behave?" he asks.
At the school, Scully works at her computer, looking up Paddock's records. In another room, Paddock holds Scully's pen over a candle flame. She is then able to call Mulder and speak in Scully's voice, asking for help. Mulder handcuffs Ausbury in the cellar and rushes off to help Scully.
Ausbury is eaten by a huge snake that slithers down the cellar steps.
Mulder bursts into the school, where Scully denies having called him. As thunder and lightning flash dramatically, they return to the Ausbury house and find only his bones plus snake tracks in the dust. Scully says it would take weeks for a snake to consume a whole human, then remembers there was a snake in Paddock's room.
The remaining PTC say Ausbury was killed in punishment for doubts, and they must act quickly to confirm their face. They say they must assume Ausbury told Mulder their names, but the Calcagni says this will only make the sacrifice more meaningful, if he knows who they are.
Mulder and Scully, watched by the PTC, arrive at the school. They find Paddock on the floor, seemingly terrified. She says they stole her snake and threatened her as she's found out what they are. They soothe her, then go after the others, but are surprised and grabbed themselves.
The three surviving PTC members drag Mulder and Sully into the showers, which they say will make the blood easier to clean up. Chanting, the woman raises the knife, as in the other room Paddock stares coldly into a candle flame. Before the knife can fall, Calcagni shoots the other two PTC members and then shots himself. "It's already too late," Paddock says. Covered with water, Mulder and Scully work their way out of their bonds. "It was as if something else had control of them," Scully says. "Paddock," Mulder replies, simply.
Paddock is gone, leaving a message on the board that reads "Goodbye. It's been nice working with you."