SEASON 1

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SEASON 5

FIGHT THE FUTURE

SEASON 6

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Outside the cabin, Mulder and Hot Larry are checking the tires on the truck. Mulder thinks they can patch the tire and then "limp down the mountain." He says they at least should try and radio out to people what the situation is. The gang hikes down the mountain. They find the truck and hey! Look who it is. Jackhole Steve, semi-cocooned inside, with his face staring out the window, frozen in horror. The gang then sees DDD's jeep heading for them. DDD stops and the three of them jump in. He tells them that his friends didn't make it and they need to "haul ass" if they're going to. They speed along until they hit some of the caltrops laid by those ecoterrorists. DDD goes outside to check it out and is clearly frustrated. A familiar humming gets louder as Mark Snow takes it home with "Green Static Army (Rolling Along And Sucking Your Fluids)". DDD freaks out and he's swarmed. Adios, Porn-Stache. But what about our heroes?! The mites swarm the jeep and flood the inside. There's screaming and flailing and really gross crunching ang juicing sounds. Ewwwwwwwww. OMG. EW!!! Exposition, hold me! That was nasty. Oh, no! I can't remember if Hot Larry dies or not! I hope he's ok.

Sidebar: It is a really good thing that I didn't watch The X-Files Season 1 when it first aired. Because my family were campers. And every summer we'd drive up to the Adirondack Mountains and camp for a week. And I don't mean stay in a cabin. We slept outside, in tents. And if I had seen this episode back then, I don't think I would've made it through those vacations. Insects gave me nightmares enough, without adding this episode to the mix. I'm going to take this opportunity to share with you my personal story of watching The X-Files for the first time. It was 1995, I was 12 yrs old and the episode was Irresistible. No lie. ["Relax. My first episode was Lord of the Flies. At least you didn't have to put up with bugs and bad jokes. And before someone points out how noobish that is to admit, I was three years old when the show started." - Raceguy] My parents watched the show sometimes, but I had been more of a TGIF kinda girl. But one night it was reruns or something so I decided to watch The X-Files. And Donnie Pfaster came into my life. Since then, through the years, I would have this recurring nightmare where a man comes into my house in the middle of the night, kills my family and then chases me around the neighborhood. That man? Donnie Pfaster. I haven't had the dream in a couple years, but it's always the same. I'm always in my childhood home, even though I haven't lived there in 9 years, and being chased by Donnie Pfaster. It's absolutely terrifying every time. So, that episode kept me away from The X-Files for a long while. Wanna know the second episode I saw? Home. ["Improbable. I win again." - Raceguy] Yeah. But I loved it. I was a bit older and the inbred stuff, while gross, didn't really bother me. But the scene where the Sheriff and his wife are killed disturbed me at such a level, that to this day I can't watch that scene. I skip it every time. Ok, where were we?

Morning. Helicopters and quarantine people arrive. They find the jeep where our heroes are cocooned. OH NO! They're dead! How can this be? I thought Mulder was supposed to die from autoerotic asphyxiation? Wait, we don't find that out until later. So, they'll be fine. Oh, look! Scully's moving.

High Containment Facility, Winthrop, Washington. We see containment vents, with white and clear plastic everywhere. People walking around in quarantine gear, all dressed in white and it all basically looks like that scene from ET where Elliot and ET are kept in those plastic playpens and I can't really watch that movie because of it. That scene scared the crap out of me as a kid. It just bothered me and so now I can't really watch ET. Wow. I'm recapping all my childhood traumas tonight, aren't I? Hey, it's Hot Larry! I'm glad he made it. He's lying in a bed, being cared for. Same with Scully. Mulder approaches Scully's bedside, looking like he's had some serious chemical burns. He's all in white, including a white doo rag, and he's got oxygen hooked up to his nose. The doctor, I'm guessing, asks Mulder how he's doing. Mulder says that he's better and asks about the test results. "Your respiratory charts were good. We're more concerned with the extent of damage due to inhalation. There were large concentrations of the chemical determined as Luciferene... The same enzymes we find in fireflies and other bioluminescent insects. Our entomologists are still trying to determine the specific epithet of the insects you encountered." Mulder asks about Scully and the doctor tells him that she's lost a lot of fluids and that two or three more hours of exposure, she wouldn't have made it. "I told her it was going to be a nice trip to the forest," Mulder says sadly. You owe her big time, Mulder. Like, a feet-rubbing-dinner-cooking-hot-night-of-loving kind of debt. And one lonely night six years from now, she will call you over to collect said debt. And you better deliver! Anyways, Mulder asks how the situation will be contained and "what if the swarm migrates?" The doctor tells him that the government is using controlled burns and pesticides, and they're certain of success. "And if they're not?" Mulder asks. The doctor tells him "that is not an option." In a rare moment, Mulder looks skeptical and then we fade out.