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FIGHT THE FUTURE

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Mulder picks up the phone as Scully leans in close (hee) to listen in. Pusher's on the line, asking them if they're just going to stay in the car necking all night. They're like, "What? That – that's just crazy! We w-weren't –" but he's all, "Cut the crap, Mulder. I totally saw you! But don't bother hunting around for me. I'm far away." Scully calls someone, I'm guessing the elusive Danny, to run a trace on the call while Mulder keeps him talking. Pusher is questioning Mulder's relationship with Scully, but asking questions that no one would ask, like "do you work well together?" Any real person, bad guy or good, would be all, "so, do you sleep together?" Or, at the very least, use air quotes when saying "work." Except he's on the phone. Shut up. Mulder asks for his name, but Pusher calls him a G-man and tells him he needs to follow his bread-crumb trail to prove his worth. I love the whole G-man thing, because later, when Mulder calls Scully a G-woman, it's totally just like in Redux when he's watching her undress in her bedroom. For those who know what I'm talking about, it's a fairly smile-inducing memory. For those who don't, Ha! He watched her strip and you've never seen it! Nya, nya! Anyway, no names for Mulder. Mulder's not having fun playing Pusher's game, but does so anyway. Pusher tells him to "let [his] fingers do the walking," then hangs up. Scully can't get a complete trace because of some "digital scrambler" type thing, which leaves me impressed that they even know what "digital" is back in 1995. So, what does "let your fingers do the walking" mean, you ask? Scully suggests the phone book, but because she's always wrong and he's always right, Mulder is all, "No, silly. It's the phone." I'm not sure how he made that leap, but that's why he's got a photographic memory and an IQ of 180, while I can't even get my thesis started six months after I finished school. Scully calls Danny back to get the last number dialed from that phone, and it turns out to be some random driving range. "So, he's a killer and a golfer," she snarks as Mulder hangs up. He asks if that rings a bell, and I'm left wondering if this some vague reference to OJ Simpson. Have many other golfers committed homicide? OJ is a golfer, right? Wouldn't it make more sense to be calling some kind of football playing place, since OJ played football? I don't know. But Mulder clearly knows exactly what's going on, and is about to sprint back to the car when he practically purrs, "Let's go, G-woman." She looks at him suggestively, and Mulder makes a mental note to call her that again later when they get into bed.

Apparently that driving range was far away, because here we are the following morning and our intrepid duo still hasn't caught up with him. In fact, Pusher is just casually hitting some golf balls with Asian tourists and pronouncing "good shot" as though he were, I dunno, Canadian, or something. Weird. He tells them that the ball he's using has a core of uranium. Yeah, right. Oh, I get it. Joke. Heh. Also, it "gets up there like Sputnik", which I find hilarious because the first time I saw this, when I was 15, I had absolutely NO idea what Sputnik was. Ah, the gullibility of youth. Anyway, he hits the ball, then pumps his fist, then notices several heavily armed SWAT members in camouflage 300 yards away hiding behind trees. Wow, he's got good vision. He konichiwas the tourists and takes off running as other SWAT members surround the building. One of them finds Pusher and points his gigantic gun with the little tiny red laser light at him. Pusher's half in shadow, his hands raised in surrender, as he tells the cop to relax. Over and over. SWAT Man obliges, lowering the gun, taking off his helmet and mask as Pusher calls him Colin (so, 1. Pusher knows his name? and 2. What a cute name. Wonder if he's British and prone to playing droll aristocratic hotties?) and soothes him into a hypnotic state. Pusher steps into the light and my goodness, he's sweating like crazy. He picks up a tin can full of gasoline (How do I know this? Because the can reads "Gasoline" in big yellow letters, that's why!) and asks Colin if he'll do something for him. Colin looks confused, but obliges.

Outside, Mulder and Scully finally arrive at the scene, with Scully in her massive brown overcoat and both of them wielding their firearms. Scully notices Colin, whose name is actually Collins, walking out of the building, soaking wet, holding the can of gas, and trying to light a match while crying. Eeshk. This will not end well. Mulder, Scully, and Burst approach the officer slowly, kind of in disbelief over what he seems to be about to do. Collins screams, "Stop me!" as Mulder tries to convince him to put the lighter down. Scully runs off somewhere, presumably to find some water or a blanket or a fire extinguisher, or something, as Collins finally gets the lighter to flame up. He shakes his head, struggling against himself, as Mulder prepares for the inevitable by taking off his coat. It's about to get hot out here. Collins goes up like a Christmas tree for a second before Mulder rushes at him with his now ruined Brooks Brothers coat, and Scully douses them both with the retrieved extinguisher. Burst just stands there in horror. Way to be proactive, there, Burst. Mulder and Scully pat Collins down and man, he's burned up bad. Still alive, though, although I'm not sure that's a good thing, and muttering, "light it up" over and over. Burst finally springs into action, calling in a burn unit, as Mulder hears a car horn honking insistently nearby.

He leaves the scene and heads over to a white Cadillac parked alone in the adjacent lot, and yanks open the door, gun drawn. Pusher's in there, looking wiped out and leaning on the horn. He's muttering, "light it up" over and over, just like Collins. When he notices Mulder, he smiles at him tiredly and snarks, "Betcha five bucks I get off." Is that Canadian or American bucks, there, Pusher? Because $5 Canadian won't get you nearly as far, especially in 1995. Ironically, if this happened today, Modell would be specifying Canadian money to get more bang for his buck.

Later, presumably days later, we're in the Loudon County Courthouse and Pusher is at a hearing for all of these supposed murders. As he rattles off his full name and address (Robert Patrick Modell, for those not in the know), I notice that his lawyer looks like a poorly dressed version of Janet Reno. How unfortunate for her. The judge is sitting at this rinky-dink little table instead of on one of those big bench things, which makes me wonder if all the money budgeted for set design went into the hospital scene that's at the end of the episode. This crew couldn't just use the ER set like every other show on television, since they're in Canada. They probably had to use the Dia gnosis Murder set. Yuck. Anyway, back to the scene. Mulder's on the stand, trying in vain to explain how Pusher, née Modell, pushes people into doing stuff like killing themselves, while Scully just watches on, her head in her hands. 'When will he learn not to share his harebrained theories in public?' she muses. When the judge asks Modell why he confessed to all these murders, he just kinda shrugs, "I was drugged." Just kidding. He tells them, through his lawyer, that the confession phone call was made as a drunken prank and that he knew crime scene details because he just happened to be in the area. Then Mark Snow's Violin s of People Being Pushed fades in as we can see the judge begin to waver. Mulder can see this too, and watches helplessly as Modell pushes the judge into letting him go. Mulder's all, "Holy fuck! He's doing it right now!"