Episode by Frank Spotnitz
summary by Pellinor
Internal dating: Probably early April 1995. The previous episode, "Soft Light", started on March 31st, and "Anasazi" starts (for Mulder and Scully) on April 11th.
Dudley, Arkansas. A man, George Kearns, is out at night with a young woman, Paula. He grimaces in pain, but some pills seem to take care of that. She gets out of the car and calls seductively and leads him deep into the woods. Suddenly he is surrounded by lots of people, and a man with an exotic mask attacks him.
Ten weeks later, George Kearns' body still hasn't been recovered and he is listed as a missing person. Scully thinks "they" are sending them on a wild goose chase and there's nothing to it. Mulder, however, thinks it's more of a wild chicken chase, as Kearns was a federal inspector at the local chicken factory. Scully isn't impressed, and still thinks it's an attempt to undermine Mulder's work, but Mulder is still interested in the case. On the night that Kearns disappeared, he says, a woman saw a strange fire in a nearby field, and a large burn mark was found there. He relates it to an Ozark folk tale, by which people are taken away by fire spirits.
He shows her a video which he saw at College about an insane asylum. "It gave me nightmares," he tells her. She says she didn't think anything gave him nightmares. "I was young," he mutters. The video shows a man raving about being taken away by the fire demons, after being missing for three days in the vicinity of Dudley, Arkansas.
Mulder and Scully examine the burn mark in the field. Mulder finds a fork, and there is also a piece of wood that Mulder calls a witching peg, designed to drive out evil. Sheriff Arens comes up and offers to help, but dismisses Mulder's idea that it's something to do with the legend of fox fire. He tells them that George Kearns never tried to fit in, and was a womaniser. He thinks Kearns has probably run off with some woman.
Mulder and Scully visit Kearns's wife. She is also critical of her husband and assumes he's left with a woman. Mulder, however, finds it suspicious that, when he disappeared, Kearns had been on the point of filing a critical report on the chicken factory, recommending that it be closed down.
They go to Chaco Chicken Plant ("Good people, good food.") The woman from the teaser, Paula, works there and is acting oddly and taking pills. Mulder and Scully talk to the floor manager, asking him about the report Kearns was about to file. He says that Kearns had been trying to shut them down all along, but gives the evidence that other inspectors say there's no problem. Kearns was just a trouble maker, he says, picking a fight with everyone. He even tried to pretend that his own job was damaging his health, complaining about headaches and things. He also shows them how the chickens are recycled, with waste bits being ground up and fed to the live chickens.
Just then, Paula seems to see a severed head coming down the conveyor belt with the chickens. She throws it to the floor and runs off, then holds a knife to the manager's throat. Scully is about to talk her out of it when the sheriff shoots and she falls into the vat of ground up chicken.
The doctor says Paula had been complaining of head injuries and irritability, but there was no sign of any illness he could recognise. He'd assumed it was stress. Scully wants to do an autopsy, but is told she must get permission from Mr Chaco himself, as he was Paula's grandfather.
Chaco asks why they want to perform an autopsy, and Mulder says they're wondering if she had the same illness Kearns had. Chaco says he founded the town from scratch, and men like George Kearns are just trouble-makers, challenging such enterprise. However, he gives his permission.
Scully finds out that Paula suffered from Creutzfeld-Jacob diseases, a brain disease. It's very rare, causing progressive dementia. Mulder finds out that Paula was 47, even though she looks little more than 25. "This could turn out to be even more interesting than fox fire," he says.
In the car, Scully tells Mulder how unusual it would be if two people in the same town had such a rare disease. Suddenly a truck swerves in front of them and they narrowly avoid a crash. The truck falls into the river. It is carrying lots of chickens. When the driver is examined it is found that he also has Creutzveld-Jacob disease. Scully tells Mulder she has a "sick theory." "Ooh, I'm listening," Mulder says. She speculates that Kearns' body was ground up into chicken food, so the disease got into the chickens and thus was able to infect anyone who ate them. Mulder points out that Chaco chickens are shipped all over the country yet the illness has only been seen locally.
Noticing that the river is red, due to run-off from the plant, Mulder wants it dragged. The sheriff is reluctant to do it, but Mulder amicably suggests he call an FBI team down. As the river is drained, Mulder explains to Scully that he's just playing a hunch. However, he turns out to be right. There are a lot of human bones in the river.
Scully pieces them together into at least 9 people, one of whom is Kearns. Some of the bones are at least 20 years old, there are no skulls, and all the bones are smooth.
Kearns' wife Doris cries when the sheriff tells her about her husband's death, and runs off. He calls after her, saying "we'll take care of you."
The doctor and the plant manager discuss the bones in the river and the cases of CJD. Mr Chaco knows what's happening, the doctor says, but isn't doing anything about it. The manager says he'll talk to him - "he'll listen to me." "And if he doesn't?" the doctor asks, getting no answer.
Mulder looks at past records and finds out that 87 people have disappeared with a hundred mile radius of Dudley in the last 59 years. He thinks "the good people of Dudley have been eating more than just chicken." The bones are smooth, he says, because they've been boiled in a pot. Some cannibalistic beliefs have it that cannibalism can prolong life, by which he explains Paula's youthful appearance. Scully can't accept this, though she is prepared to accept that the various sufferers from CJD could have all contracted it by eating George Kearns.
The plant manager tells Mr Chaco that people are getting scared about the illness. Doris Kearns turns up in tears and tells Mr Chaco she can't do lie any longer. She helped kill her husband, she says, and feels guilty now. Mr Chaco says George deserved to die for having no values and not fitting in. "You're part of us now and we're going to take good care of you," he says. After she's gone the manager wants to "do something" about her, but Mr Chaco says she's one of "our town" now. "If we start turning on ourselves we're no better than the animals," he says, and the FBI are the real problem.
Mulder and Scully go to the birth registration place to find conclusive proof of Paula's age, as well as the ages of the other people, but they have all been removed. Doris Kearns calls them saying she's afraid, and Mulder asks Scully to go over to look after her. He plans to visit Mr Chaco.
Doris Kearns is attacked by a man in a mask. When Scully gets there the house seems empty.
Mulder arrives at Mr Chaco's house. While he is waiting for the servant to get Mr Chaco, Mulder sees pictures of Mr Chaco with a tribe in New Guinea and finds a display case full of severed heads.
Mulder calls Scully, telling him Mr Chaco is gone. Scully says Doris is gone too, but then she is hit on the head and knocked out by a man lurking in the shadows.
All the town's folk are gathered around a bonfire, presumably eating Doris Kearns. Mr Chaco leads up a bound Scully, shouting at the others for having killed Doris Kearns. He says it's only outsiders they should worry about, not one of them, as Doris was. "Look at what you've become," he shouts. "This isn't faith any more.... You've turned us into an abomination. Once you turn on yourselves it's over." Mr Chaco is dragged off and beheaded by the masked man.
Mulder rushes to find Scully and sees the bonfire in the fields. He arrives just as Scully is about to have her head chopped off and shoots the masked executioner just in the nick of time. He releases Scully and asks her if she's okay. The masked man is revealed to be the sheriff.
The Chaco Processing Plant is shut down just in case. 27 people are now suffering from CJD. They've found out that Chaco was shot down over New Guinea in the 40s, and lived with a tribe there for several months. He was in fact 93 years old, and his remains haven't yet been found. As Scully continues in voice-over, a workman finds a stand of human hair in the chicken feed.