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FIGHT THE FUTURE

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Scully asks Fred's pardon but is he sure that these are the right two bodies, and not the bodies of some couple who were missing for six months? Fred doesn't look too offended, and tells the two that after triple-checking the dental records, it's definitely Angela and Wallace Schiff lying on the tables there. Mulder looks at the photos and takes the file from Scully, asking Fred for the exact location where the bodies were found. Fred confirms that it was near Brown Mountain and offers to write Mulder some directions. Meanwhile, Scully is examining one of the skeletons (I don't know whether it's Angela or Wallace, since I'm not a forensic pathologist like Scully), and she notices some yellow goo. Dun dun DUN! She smears some onto the fingers of her glove and asks Fred if he knows what it is. Both he and Mulder come over to look at it. Fred dismisses it by saying the remains were found in a swampy area, so it's just organic "bog sludge."

Scully looks dissatisfied, perhaps thinking back to the last time she and Mulder dealt with yellow goo in a way that made Mulder betray his cool exterior, and Mulder says he wants to go check out where the bodies were found. He sets down the dental records file and asks Scully if she's coming. She tells him to go ahead, at which he looks slightly disappointed but leaves nonetheless. I really, REALLY like how he looks in that blue pullover.

Mulder drives up to the scene where the bodies were found, the tire of his car crushing some mushrooms which release a puff of spores into the air. When I first watched this, I was like, "Hmm, I wonder if that could be significant, since the camera made sure to focus on the mushrooms right there." But then later on I almost convinced myself that I had guessed wrong. I hate it when I do that to myself. Mulder gets out of the car into the cloud of spores and looks around. The field is in a very pleasant, sparsely-forested area, with rocks and boulders and stuff around. Mulder walks over to the exact spot where the bodies were (you can tell because there's no grass there, just dirt), and bends down to touch some more of the yellow goo that's on the ground. Eeww! You don't have gloves! What is it with you and touching nasty goo without gloves, Mulder?? He smells it and grimaces, then stands up again, just in time to see Wallace Schiff walking around near some boulders!

Wallace looks over and sees Mulder, who calls out his name questioningly. At this, Wallace starts running, and Mulder quickly gives chase, as the music builds. Mulder runs after Wallace into a more rocky part of the terrain, and sees him crawl into a small hole under a rock. At this point, I am forcibly reminded of that scene in The Silver Chair where the giants are chasing Jill, Eustace, and Puddleglum to try to catch them and make pies out of them, but the three adventurers escape in a very similar manner to Wallace just now. Mulder runs up to the tiny cave entrance and turns on his flashlight, calling out Wallace's name again. He's so pretty (Mulder, that is, though Wallace is not bad-looking, either).

Back at the morgue, Scully is looking at a drop of the yellow stuff under a microscope. Fred comes in with the results of Scully's gas spectrometer, and shock of shocks, the bog sludge isn't bog sludge at all! Scully reads off the list of components and recognizes that they are all digestive secretions. Fred agrees that it amounts pretty much to "stomach juices." Ah, Fred, you and your quaint, folksy ways of saying things. "Bog sludge" and "stomach juices," indeed. Then he ruins his folksy image by pointing out the one disparity in the results: chitinase. Scully doesn't seem to know what that is, so Fred exposits that it's also a digestives secretion, but one found only in plants.