Season 9: Nothing Important Happened Today (2) (9X02)

Written by: Chris Carter & Frank Spotnitz
Directed by: Tony Wharmby

A ship captain delivers a message to Dr. Nordlinger, who upon reading the contents instructs the captain to return the vintage World War ll merchant marine craft to its base. Follmer leaves the reclamation plant when he sees no sign of Doggett. Shannon McMahon has held him underwater but passes air into his lungs to help him breathe.

Doggett regains consciousness at his house to find McMahon there. She tells him she is a bioengineered soldier and that Knowle Rohrer was part of the same programme. Doggett thinks Rohrer is dead but she tells him that his kind cannot be killed. Meanwhile Rohrer approaches the captain aboard the ship and informs him that he is the new second in command. He quizzes the captain about the vessel's mission. Later, the body of the original younger officer is found in the water.

Reyes, Doggett and McMahon meet with Scully. McMahon tells her that the US government has changed the molecular structure of chloramine to breed a generation of super soldiers. She is a Stage One prototype.

The Lone Gunmen break into the X-Files office after Reyes requests their help. As they access a phone system, they happen upon someone dialing Carl Wormus' phone number. The caller turns out to be the captain, warning that the FBI must be contacted so the lab aboard his ship can be exposed. Rohrer is nearby, eavesdropping. The call is traced to a phone booth.

The Captain gets the jump on a Navy SEAL guarding the lab aboard the ship. He orders Nordlinger to hand over every scrap of data on the project. He doesn't see Rohrer creeping up behind him. Doggett, Scully and Reyes arrive at the phone booth to find Rohrer. Doggett tries to shoot him but bullets don't work. As Rohrer is about to kill him, McMahon appears and decapitates him. Rohrer's headless body rises and stabs McMahon with its arm. They both fall into the water.

Scully discovers an electronic filing system on board the boat. She realises the scientists were manipulating human ova in the lab for transplantation. Doggett finds a bomb and urges them to leave. They take cover as the ship explodes.

Deep beneath the water, Shannon McMahon's eyes suddenly pop open. And later, after Scully tucks William in for the night, the child's mobile begins to turn, seemingly by itself.

Notes:
The first tag line change for season nine is the title, 'Nothing Important Happened Today'.

This episode is dedicated to the memory of Chad Keller, who was killed in the terrorist attacks of 11 September 2001. Chad Keller, a rocket scientist, was a family friend of Chris Carter and his wife, Dori.

Quotes:
Skinner: Agent Reyes. You probably want to zip it and try to co-operate.
Assistant Director Follmer: Like it or not, I'm charged with the task of reining you in.
Reyes: Reining us in? For what?
Assistant Director Follmer: Unauthorised autopsies. Breaking and entering into a state water facility. Wilful misuse of your positions.
Reyes: I really don't want to go into any of this without my partner here.
Assistant Director Follmer: Your partner. Your so called partner, who's running this circus, is right now nowhere to be found.
Reyes: What are you doing, Brad?
Assistant Director Follmer: Giving you and Mr Skinner the opportunity to put a nice spin on this mess that Doggett's making.
Skinner: Agent Reyes. If you're not going to zip it, at least recognise that he's trying to help you.
Reyes: We were given a tip we believe lead us to a larger conspiracy.
Assistant Director Follmer: A conspiracy? Involving the FBI?
Reyes: John Doggett and I are running a legitimate investigation into the FBI. Neither one of us feels...
Assistant Director Follmer: Agent Reyes, I'm trying to help you keep your job. But that's not going to happen, if you insist on chasing shadows, chasing conspiracies.
Reyes: How do you know there isn't one?
Assistant Director Follmer: You're taking on the entire FBI here, Monica. This witch hunt... isn't going to expose... anything... but you. That is, unless you distance yourself from John Doggett. What are you doing?
Reyes: I'm distancing myself, Brad. From you, from your political games. You just want to get John Doggett.
Assistant Director Follmer: You're making a big mistake here.
Reyes: Yeah, I seem to make one every time I walk in your door.

Reyes: Dana, this is Shannon McMahon.

Shannon McMahon: Hi.
Scully: Let's start with the water.
Shannon McMahon: Well, you're a scientist, you'll appreciate the science involved. A new additive is being put in the water supply. It's called chloramine, it's not news, well let me say it's been reported but no one's asking questions yet.
Scully: And what should they be asking?
Shannon McMahon: If you want to deliver something to everyone's home in America, what better way than through what's what's most taken for granted, water.
Scully: Look, I've had my fair share of outrageous conspiracy theories, okay, so cut the mystery crap and get to the science. Chloramine is just a substitute for chlorine, you can drink it and it's harmless.
Shannon McMahon: Unless someone were to quietly go and change its molecular make-up.
Scully: Who? And how?
Shannon McMahon: I think you'd be more interested in why.
Scully: All right then, why?
Shannon McMahon: To prime a population to breed a generation of Super Soldiers.
Scully: By adding something to our water?
Shannon McMahon: Something which promotes the mutation of offspring. And fertilisation. And pregnancy.
Scully: What you're saying is absurd.
Shannon McMahon: Is it? No more absurd than I am. I am a first generation prototype. Now they're seven stages advanced on the science that created me, to the point where now they have successfully given birth to a Super Soldier from a mutated egg.
Scully: Huh. How can we trust any of this? Or you? What you say you are?
Shannon McMahon: We all have a standard mutation...
(She pulls her hair aside to reveal a lump on the back of her neck)

Doggett: You want to turf me now? You going to take my badge and gun?

Deputy Director Kersh: Agent Doggett, you can't just burst in here.
Doggett: How's it going to look, Deputy Director, you suspending me right before I nail you up against a wall as a co-conspirator.
Assistant Director Follmer: Glad you dropped in, Mr Doggett. Assistant Director Follmer.
Doggett: You're Brad Follmer.
Assistant Director Follmer: I was just explaining to the Deputy Director the reasons why you were being suspended, but I think your actions here speak for themselves.
Doggett: I see what this is, this is just a little bureaucratic pimp job.
Deputy Director Kersh: I'd watch your mouth, John.
Assistant Director Follmer: What this is, is a testament to your gross subordination and reckless disregard for the FBI.
Doggett: The orders start here and then they come out your wishy-washy mouth.
Assistant Director Follmer: Paranoia must go with the job. You're starting to sound just like Fox Mulder, Mr Doggett.
Doggett: Don't you Mr Doggett me. I don't answer to you, I answer to AD Skinner.
Assistant Director Follmer: The job suspension stands, Mr Doggett.
Doggett: Try and stop me.

Deputy Director Kersh: My sources tell me you've wrapped up your investigation, John.

Doggett: I have my report ready, Sir, yes.
Deputy Director Kersh: How do I come out? Super Soldiers, a Navy ship, a woman at the Department of Justice who drowned two men, all disappeared now, but which constitute a conspiracy like a cancer in the US Government. Not a mention of my name, John?
Doggett: No, Sir. I found nothing on you, nothing damning I can honestly include in my report, let me say. And 'cause I got nothing to lose, let me say that I know that your hands are dirty on this thing, Sir, filthy.
Deputy Director Kersh: That's why you're here? Take a last wild push before the bell.
Doggett: There's one thing I can't figure, and then I'll be on my way. Is why you slipped that obituary under my door?
Deputy Director Kersh: You think I did that?
Doggett: Over and over in my mind, it had to be you. You're the only one that had a reason.
Deputy Director Kersh: What's my reason?
Doggett: You tell me. Are you looking just to get me fired or to get me killed?
Deputy Director Kersh: You ever hear of King George III?
Doggett: You answer my question!
Deputy Director Kersh: He was King of England when America declared Independence in 1776. King George III kept a diary. On July 4th 1776, he made an entry in it: 'Nothing important happened today'.
Doggett: What the hell has that got to do with me?
Deputy Director Kersh: Revolutions start, things that change the world forever, and even kings can miss them if they're not paying attention.
Doggett: Are you saying that you left that obituary to help me? To help me find the things that I found? Nah, why would I believe that you'd help me?
Deputy Director Kersh: Agent Mulder believed me.
Doggett: Mulder? What the hell are you talking about? Mulder's long gone.
Deputy Director Kersh: Say I told Mulder that he would be killed if he stayed. The same people who threatened to kill me if I didn't go along. Would you believe that, John?
Doggett: No. Mulder wouldn't hear it, not from you, not from anybody.
Deputy Director Kersh: I said I told him to go. I didn't say I persuaded him.
Doggett: Holy god. It was Scully. Scully made him go. That's it isn't it?

Episode Number: 184
Season Number: 9
First Aired: Sunday, November 18, 2001
Production Code: 9X02

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Season 9: Nothing Important Happened Today (1) (9X01)

Written by: Chris Carter & Frank Spotnitz
Directed by: Kim Manners

A man, Carl Wormus, intrigues a woman in a bar by mentioning that the government is adding chloramine to the water supply. They go for a drive together but as they near a drawbridge the woman grabs the steering wheel sending them plunging into the water. She grabs his ankle to stop him escaping.

Monica Reyes meets up with Assistant Director Follmer in his office. Follmer hands Reyes two videos which contain footage of the underground garage where Doggett and Skinner fought off "super soldier" FBI agents. But the video shows nothing out of the ordinary. Meanwhile, at a water reclamation facility, a worker is pulled underwater by the woman from the bar.

Doggett shows up at Scully's apartment to tell her that Mulder isn't living in his apartment anymore. Scully already knows but refuses to elaborate further. Skinner urges Doggett to drop his investigations. Scully agrees but Doggett tells her his supposed friend, Knowle Rohrer, had tried to kill him and Skinner in the garage.

Doggett gets home and finds a photograph of him and Rohrer in the marines so decides to find out about Rohrer. Coincidentally, the woman from the bar, Shannon McMahon, is also in the photo. McMahon sneaks into the FBI and leaves an envelope containing Wormus' obituary. Doggett pursues the lead by calling Scully into the morgue where she determines that Wormus drowned but notes the bruising on his ankle.

The Lone Gunmen tell Reyes that Doggett and Skinner left to investigate emails sent to Carl Wormus from a worker at the water plant named Roland McFarland - the man Shannon McMahon drowned. Doggett and Skinner sneak into the main control room where Doggett finds files relating to chloramine. Follmer tracks the men but Doggett slips into a filtration tank to get away. Suddenly Shannon McMahon surfaces and grabs hold of Doggett and pulls him under the water......

Notes:
The opening titles get a major revamp for this last season. The basic concept is still there, but some images are added. One shot shows a list of "FBI Contacts, Witnesses, and Contributors." The names on this list are actually the screen names of posters on the official "X-Files" message board and changed with each new episode that season. Other names on the list were anagrams of characters on the show.

The character of Brad Follmer is named after creator Chris Carter's writing assistant.

When Doggett meets with the Lone Gunmen, their faces are blue. This is a reference to an incident in the series finale of "The Lone Gunmen", "All About Yves".

"Nothing important happened today" (or words to that effect) was the entry King George III of England made in his personal diary on 4 July 1776. (Since he could not have known about the events occurring in the colonies for several weeks, his comment is often cited as a bit of historical irony.)

Quotes:
Assistant Director Follmer: Monica?
Reyes: Hi.
Assistant Director Follmer: What are you doing?
Reyes: I was leaving you a note. Your assistant was out and I didn't want to knock. I was going to call you... Hi, Brad.
Assistant Director Follmer: Come on in. (As Reyes enters the office, Assistant Director Follmer kisses her) What?
Reyes: We're at work.
Assistant Director Follmer: You used to ask me to close the door at work back in New York.
Reyes: Is that all you called me here for, Assistant Director?
Assistant Director Follmer: I probably shouldn't tell you how hot you look either, because you do. How long's it been? Two years?
Reyes: Yeah. We should catch up, Brad. Really. I've got to get downstairs.
Assistant Director Follmer: I've got something for you. (He takes a pair of video tapes out of his desk drawer) Forgive me, but... it didn't take a whole lot of digging to figure out why you're here in DC, Monica.
Reyes: What are those?
Assistant Director Follmer: Something you're going to see, but... I wanted to show you first. They were taken from the security cameras in the FBI parking garage. One of them... shows you arriving in a cab meeting John Doggett.
Reyes: Yeah, I'm working with him. He called me up here on a case.
Assistant Director Follmer: I heard. Believe me, this whole thing about a... chase and a crash and a fire. And now Doggett's internal investigation of Deputy Director Kersh, it's... big news"
Reyes: What's so important to show me? What's on the other tape?

Skinner: I don't know where Mulder is. I don't know that I'd tell you if I did.

Reyes: (to Doggett) I checked with movers, airlines, car rental agencies... No Mulder.
Doggett: Somebody get to him, that it? Doesn't seem possible, does it? (to Skinner) Okay, so where's that leave us? It's just me and you, our word against Kersh and the FBI.
Reyes: You'd better sit down, John. It's more complicated than that.
Doggett: What's more complicated?
Reyes: This investigation.
Doggett: What about it?
Skinner: I want to ask you to drop it.
Doggett: No, not from you. Not from you. Not after what we've been through. I mean, we barely escaped with our lives.
Skinner: That's something worth thinking about.
Doggett: I'm sorry, you're not that reasonable. What, did they get to you, too?
Skinner: No one got to me, John, they didn't have to. That's the point.
Doggett: You're afraid of them.
Skinner: I'm not afraid of them.
Doggett: Well, you're afraid of something. What? The real tape showing up? Them calling you a killer for you having to shoot Alex Krycek?
Skinner: No, I'll stand by my actions, Agent Doggett, but I won't stand by yours if you're going to continue to push and push until you get somebody killed. You want to know what I fear? I fear for Mulder and Scully. I fear for the life of that child if you don't stop pushing, John.
Doggett: You don't think I fear for those things, same as you?
Skinner: If you did, you'd let it go.
Doggett: So what I'm hearing is... if I don't drop it, I'm alone on this.
Reyes: John. You're not.

Doggett: I'm really sorry. I... Dana, I need your help.

Scully: I don't know how to find him.
Doggett: It just doesn't make any sense. Mulder leaving you here all alone. Just walking out on you, not telling you where and why.
Scully: It makes sense in its own way. That's all I can tell you.
Doggett: Then tell me why you can't trust me. Everything I did to try to protect you when you thought your baby was in danger. What changed? Why is it suddenly I'm now the enemy?
Scully: Let it go, John. Drop it. Please.
Doggett: These people tried to kill me. They tried to kill AD Skinner. They would have killed Mulder, too. They're still out there, Dana.
Scully: Exactly right, and they are unstoppable, and they are inside the FBI.
Doggett: You know something you're not telling me. Mulder knows something. How long can you hide from it? Knowle Rohrer, this old military buddy of mine, he told me your pregnancy was a result of a Government cloning experiment to try to create what he called a Super Soldier.
Scully: I don't want to hear this. Look, there is nothing to any of this.
Doggett: Knowle Rohrer, my buddy, was one of the men that tried to kill us in the FBI garage.
Scully: My baby... my son... is fine.
Doggett: I hope to god that's true. I just don't want to pretend.
Scully: I'm going to ask you to leave. I'm going to ask you to leave and not come back here.

Scully: Water. Asphyxiation induced by the inhalation of water. There's contusions on the forehead and on the chest but the impact isn't what killed him. This man drowned. You're looking at me like you hope that there's something more, but there isn't.

Reyes: I'm sorry, that's not it. I'm just impressed that you can do this.
Scully: This is what I do, Agent Reyes.
Reyes: But you're here doing it now. Something did happen, didn't it. I know what you're afraid of. That there's something wrong with your baby.
Scully: We can let our fears get the better of us. We can... imagine things, make connections with things that aren't there. Like with this man.
Reyes: If you ever feel the need to talk to someone, Dana, I'm here. I'd never betray a confidence.
Scully: There is something.
Reyes: What?
Scully: Right here on the ankle.
Reyes: Are those... fingerprints?
Scully: Yeah, that's what they look like.
Reyes: From someone holding him down?
Scully: I don't know how, or who.

Episode Number: 183
Season Number: 9
First Aired: Sunday, November 11, 2001
Production Code: 9A01

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