(footsteps creaking)
Land sakes, George, what are you tryin' to do?
- I was trying to be quiet. - Quiet?
smelled you on the stairs.
39 years, I'm still surprised that embalming fluid of yours doesn't wake the dead.
Didn't wake old Zig McPherson tonight, God rest his soul.
Well, you go outside and take those clothes of yours off, so I can rest mine.
George!
I'm going, Tohoma. I'm going.
(creaking)
What the hell?
What the hell is that?
(screeching)
(George screams)
George?
(snarling)
(screams)
(inhuman squealing)
(man) So, this is where the bad kids are banished to.
(man #2) Put me down here, I'd probably cook up a lot of crazy ideas, too!
- Good morning. - Morning.
Um...
' catch you guys later.
Some friends. They're just curious.
I'm not here to be a curiosity, Agent Doggett. I'm here to work.
I am too, Agent Scully.
I've been here all weekend and this morning. I went over every X-File in that cabinet.
just left to get some coffee.
Well...
- D'you have any questions? - Just a few!
Maybe first you could tell me where your area is here and where mine's gonna be.
This is my partner's office, Agent Doggett.
You and I will just be using it for a while.
- So where do we get started? - Homicides. Two in Idaho.
White male, 62, undertaker by profession.
He was killed on his porch, ten feet from his wife.
(slide projector clicks)
Holy God.
Cause of death was blood loss from numerous deep wounds, from bites.
Any thoughts, any questions?
- Bites? - On his head, torso and hands.
Two of his fingers were missing, eaten off.
- By what, an animal? - These were murders.
The bites on his wife appear to be human.
I've seen some violent crimes, some seriously screwed-up stuff,
but this is extreme.
- Is there demonstration of motive? - Not according to local PD.
Is there any pattern or ritual or anything?
l have to admit, Agent Scully, I'm at a loss.
Well, that's a good place to start.
- You the folks from the FBI? - Yeah.
- Yale Abbott, Cassia County Sheriff's. - Hi. Agent Scully. This is Agent Doggett.
We like to handle our own problems,
but some hotshots in the county seat think this is beyond us.
Not that we don't appreciate your coming out to help.
Well, I hope we can.
- I'm a little baffled by what I've seen. - Oh, really?
Detective, we've seen cases like yours regularly on our unit.
Agent Doggett has onlyjust been assigned to the X-Files.
There is nothing baffling about human bite marks.
That's what I was getting around to, ma'am.
We're not so sure now that these bites are human.
The bodies were found by neighbours, so there was contamination of the crime scene.
My boys did a damn good job of separating the various shoe prints and pulling these.
Come on over.
Right there. See that?
- (Doggett) What is it? - It's not human, I know that.
- It's not quite animal, either. - There's only four toes.
That's not an unheard-of birth defect. No more rare than polydactyly.
- What did she just say? - I assume she means it could be human.
Is that a fair assumption?
I'd say that assumption is the problem here.
A strange print is found, and immediately the most important evidence is thrown out
to try and force an explanation.
Maybe this print can help explain those bite marks.
- How? - I'm not quite sure yet.
She's not quite sure yet.
Well, I have to say, I've worked a lot of homicides.
If the victims laid out here for any time at all,
in a setting like this, it'd be pretty remarkable if they didn't attract animals.
I think postmortem predation is definitely a consideration here,
but I only see one print.
And if it were an animal, there would be numerous prints all over here and in the yard.
You agree, Agent Doggett?
I'm gonna go take a look around.
I got two old folks in the morgue, mauled beyond recognition.
I have no motive to go on, no intent.
No evidence cries out for a human explanation,
yet you stand there telling me flat out that what we're looking for is a man.
Thanks for everything, Agent Scully. We'll take it from here.
I'm sure your explanation will mollify those hotshots down at the county seat
and relieve any general anxiety about what this thing might be,
but only until it strikes again.
And one more thing.
I never said that what you're looking for is a man.
(Doggett) Agent Scully?
Is that a second print?
Could be, but I'm not sure if it tells us anything.
Maybe there's no prints in the yard because whatever made these didn't go there.
It came through the house.
If anything, I'd say this print leads up the stairs.
Think I've got another partial here.
- There is a more obvious explanation. - Mm-hm?
The more basic answer is what we're dealing with is simply a man.
A psychotic killer with a deformed foot.
You're familiar with the principle of Ockham's razor?
Yeah. You take every possible explanation and choose the simplest one.
Agent Mulder used to refer to it as Ockham's principle of limited imagination.
Unless you have a simple explanation as to how a killer with a deformed foot
leaves a print only every 25 feet.
Or to what he'd even be doing up here.
I don't know. I'm trying to figure it out just like you are.
Agent Doggett?
It's dark up here.
What do you see? Agent Scully?
Right now, not a heck of a lot.
If there was anything up here, it might have gone out that window.
You ever carry one of these?
Never.
V for "victory".
What?
You said the male victim was missing two fingers?
Well, how'd the fingers get up here?
Well, from their smell, I'd say they were regurgitated...
recently.
By what?
I saw those on the porch, too.
Looks like, to me... I don't know.
Like it was... It was...
Hanging there?
(screeching)
- You still here? - Yeah.
I was waiting for lab results and I wanted to take another look at the body.
Why? What did you find?
Nothing that will allay anyone's fears about what killed this man or his wife.
"What"? You mean who killed them.
To be honest, what I found here leans more towards an animal explanation.
The scratches on the body match the four-toed prints that we found.
And the bites have fang-like tears.
What I thought were marks left by human molars are now inconclusive
because of enzymes that were found in the bites, which are clearly inhuman.
Anticoagulants, which are found solely in the saliva of bats.
- Bats. - Yeah.
I can't exactly explain it, but I realise I owe the detective an apology.
Well, I'm not so sure about that.
Montana. Headline, circa .
The story's the same as what you told me.
The creature was taken to the coroner, who confirmed it was neither man nor animal.
Two days later the coroner was disembowelled by something with four toes.
It ate several body parts and regurgitated them elsewhere.
- Did they ever find it? - Five men died or disappeared.
Then the killing stops. It doesn't say why.
But 44 years later it appears it's back and killing again.
(snarling)
You see those marks, right?
And the ones over here on the rafter?
If you ask me, those look like claw marks.
I don't care what kind of a savage he is, what did this isn't human.
If I may speak for Agent Scully, we're both prepared to concede that point, Detective.
- Then you know what this thing is? - I've got an article I wanna show you.
- (Scully) Agent Doggett? - A rather strange account from .
I found something. A photo album.
- I think it's our first break. - What is it?
The victim's daughter - Ariel - her body was pulled from the river last week.
I got that call. Had to come tell Mrs McKesson the bad news.
You saying there's a connection?
You not only told her mother her daughter was dead,
but that her body had been horribly and inexplicably burned.
A daughter who, by the way, she hadn't seen in over 40 years.
Since , to be exact, which is the date your article says those first killings started.
Do you see the connection?
I'm not sure where you're going with this, Agent Scully.
- The daughter is the connection. - How is that?
I don't know, but these killings only started up since her burned body has been found.
Honest to God! You justjump at whatever explanation is the most far-fetched.
I suggest you jump at it, too, because her body may have been burned for a reason.
You're gonna wanna exhume it to find out why.
You want me to dig up a dead body when I have real people whose lives are in danger?
Hey.
(whispering)
What did you say to him?
I told him to dig up the body. Isn't that what you wanted?
What else did you say to him?
I told him you were a leading authority on paranormal phenomena,
and who are we to argue with an expert.
Look, I am not an expert.
I am a scientist who happens to have seen a lot.
- I am just making a leap here. - Well, I'm sure you have your reasons.
You told him to exhume the body when you don't even necessarily believe me yourself?
(sighs)
I told you I spent the weekend looking through those X-Files,
and I saw how pretty much every X-File broke with a leap.
Maybe I'm just an old-fashioned cop, but I don't take leaps.
In my experience, leaps only get people killed.
Well, I'd say that you're taking a pretty big leap believing in that article
about a human bat.
(screeching)
How do you do it? I called the judge's order in a half-hour ago. You're fast.
Yep. We're really fast when someone's done most of our work.
What are you talking about?
We got out here, somebody had already dug up the box.
All we had to do was haul it out.
I don't know what they were using, but they scratched up the wood on the lid real good.
Let's get this down to the morgue. I think the sooner the better.
(faint screeching)
God!
(screeching)
(Abbott screams)
(screeching)
(screaming and snarling)
I want a word with you.
We listened to you. The detective listened to you.
We could've been hunting this thing down.
- You should be doing that now. - Now?
Now's too late for the detective, isn't it?
Look, we don't need you telling us what to do, or your partner.
She's responsible for this.
Nobody's responsible, except for whatever did it.
I don't care who she is or what she is, she's not touching that body.
We don't need her far-out theories.
She's not welcome here.
What happened to the lynch mob?
- You hear all that? - I heard enough.
- Things have taken a little turn. - I don't think so, Agent Doggett.
You can think what you want, but this looks bad for the FBI.
- It was unavoidable. - How do you figure that?
This is the body pulled from the river.
She died of natural causes - congestive heart failure -
but her body was only burned aftenNards.
- By who, and why burn it? - Obviously to cover something up.
- Yeah, but what? - That's what I still don't know.
We know what we're looking for. We should be out there looking for it.
No use standing here speculating.
It kills like an animal, but with purpose.
It stalked the detective for the same reason it stalked the old woman and the undertaker.
Each victim had had contact with this burned body.
The undertaker prepared it, her mother ID'd it, the detective got the call when she was found.
Who else would have had contact with it?
The man who found her in the river.
A Myron Stefaniuk.
- Stefaniuk? - Yeah.
One of the hunters in the photo in was Ernie Stefaniuk.
There's an address in this file. I hope we're not too late.
(vehicle approaching)
Mr Stefaniuk?
Myron Stefaniuk?
- That's me. - Good. Sorry. You gave us a scare.
We went to your home up the road and we couldn't find you.
Why would that scare you?
Sir, we work with the FBI and have reason to believe your life may be in danger.
- I'm in danger? - We're investigating some murders
that we believe are connected to the body you found.
I fished it out of the river. What have I to do with anything?
- We're not saying for sure that you do. - It may just be your connection to the body.
There is no connection. I just fished it out of the river.
- Sorry, sir, but that may be enough. - That's nonsense. Leave me alone.
Ernie Stefaniuk.
Lived in Montana in .
D'you know him?
Ernie was my brother.
And one of three hunters that killed a man that was half-animal.
- Please! That was a long time ago. - Know where we can find him to talk to him?
My brother's dead. That thing killed him.
I have a newspaper story that says he disappeared.
That was 40 years ago.
Leave it alone! Leave me alone!
(truck engine starts)
We've been out here for nine hours.
The only thing this man seems to be in danger of is terminal loneliness.
Maybe I'm wrong.
Maybe this is all just a grand coincidence and we're wasting our time out here.
You were so sure before.
Yeah, I was sure of the facts as I had deduced them scientifically.
Maybe I'm... I'm trying to force them into shape.
Maybe I'm manufacturing a theory.
What happened to taking a leap?
Maybe I'm just trying too hard.
To do what?
To be Mulder?
You know, I'm not Oxford educated.
About all I know about the paranormal is men are from Mars and women are from Venus.
- But I don't think you're wrong, Agent Scully. - What makes you say that?
Well, I'm no Fox Mulder, but I can tell when a man's hiding something.
Myron Stefaniuk fishes a woman out of the river who's been gone for 40 years.
He has a brother he hasn't seen in over 40 years,
a brother who just happened to hunt down some kind of creature over 40 years ago.
But what does he have to hide?
That's what I'm hoping this good cop work is gonna show us.
(Doggett) You there!
(Scully) Stop right there!
(Scully) I see him.
Stop where you are!
Put your hands up and out!
Now, turn around, slowly.
- Are you Ernie Stefaniuk? - (panicked breathing)
- Are you Ernie Stefaniuk? - Yes.
How's a man supposed to live...
when his fear becomes obsession?
You'd do the same thing.
Who wouldn't who wanted to live?
You never left the island?
44 years. I wouldn't dare, knowing it was out there.
That it could come back for me.
You know something about it. About what this thing is.
I know on the evolutionary ladder bats are real close by the apes.
And just as we came from the apes,
so might a man sprung from a bat.
To live and hunt like a bat, but with the cold-blooded vengeance of a man.
Even if that were true, sir, how could it possibly find you out here on an island?
I needed to cut off all contact.
Communication could be only one way.
My brother helped me.
And then there was my wife.
It was her body your brother pulled in.
She gave up everything to be with me.
I forbid her to tell her mother.
44 years on six acres of island, she made only one demand.
To be buried in consecrated earth.
She was a Catholic her whole life.
Mr Stefaniuk.
It's killed four people.
All of whom would have had traces of your scent
through various degrees of contact with your wife's body.
- My brother? - Your brother's OK, Ernie.
But he had contact with Ariel's body. It'll come after him, too.
He's all right. We spoke with him earlier today.
Today? Today he might have been fine, but this thing hunts like a bat.
It only attacks at night.
Stay here. Stay with him.
(screeching)
(Ernie) I still don't understand.
What's that?
- How did you find me out here? - We followed your brother.
No, I mean who figured it out?
I was sure that what we were looking for was something other than a man.
The detective who was running the case didn't believe that, and he's dead.
But your partner, he believed it?
I think he does now.
So it was you who figured it.
Well, I made the connections, but it was Agent Doggett that got us out here.
You ought to be wishing he hadn't.
Excuse me?
The moment you stepped foot here, you're marked now. You know that?
Sir, I'm here to protect you.
And how are you gonna do that?
You thought of everything, except that.
Well, this thing, Mr Stefaniuk, is still flesh and blood.
It can be killed.
You think it'll just walk through the door?
It's waited 44 years. It'll wait out there as long as it takes, until you can't stand it any more.
How long can you wait, huh? A lifetime to live in fear like this, a young woman?
Are you prepared to sacrifice family, children and spend your life terrorised by a monster?
(alarm beeps)
- What is that? - It's ground radar.
The sensor's set at ten-feet high.
Anything big enough to set it off is coming in through the trees.
(thumping)
(thumping continues)
(creaking)
- You hear it? - No.
Maybe I got it.
Maybe I killed it.
If you've got a gun, get it.
(gunshot/screaming)
(screeching)
Agent Scully.
(screeching)
- You OK? - Yeah. I'm OK.
But you're not, Agent Doggett.
Oh, I got you.
(distant screeching)
Sorry I'm late. I received a fax up in my old office from Ernie's brother, Myron Stefaniuk.
- He's alive? Where is he? - He doesn't say.
He sent this from a small storefront business just across the state line in Wyoming.
He's gone into hiding.
Do you believe it, Agent Doggett?
Believe it?
That this "thing" is still out there and someday it's gonna come after us?
I'm pretty sure I hit it, Agent Scully.
Pretty sure you hit it, too.
The guys upstairs were making some noise about this case and what's in our field report.
Yeah.
You'll get used to it.
I, uh...
I never had a desk in here, Agent Doggett,
but I'll see that you get one.
All right.
And ljust want to say, um...
thank you for watching my back.
Well, I never saw it as an option.
I'm sure you don't either.
Visiontext Subtitles: Natasha Cohn
(child) I made this!