Summary: At 4:05 a.m., Dr. James Langenhahn goes to work at the District Pathology Lab, ready to examine a mostly destroyed body. He’s supposed to “establish and confirm the real fact of death,” but considering his assistant has already described the body as looking like hamburger, he’s…yeah, he’s dead. (It’s a pretty solid guess that this is Billy Miles’ body.) Langenhahn finds something in the pile of meat that looks like a metal vertebra. He tells his assistant to include it in his report, then leaves. Once the room is empty, the metal vertebra starts spinning and growing.
Scully and Reyes are on the road to a safe place, and have made it as far as Georgia. Scully notes Reyes’ tension and realizes it’s because she’s concerned for Scully’s impending delivery. The place they’re headed won’t have much to offer in the way of medical care, and Reyes has no experience delivering a baby. Scully points out that she’s never had one before, so they’re in the same boat.
Back in D.C., Mulder shows Skinner and Doggett a surveillance photo from the morgue – Billy walked out looking completely fine. Krycek reminds the agents that he’s unstoppable, even after being reduced to hamburger by the garbage truck. Skinner wants more of an explanation, but Krycek can’t get more detailed than saying he’s a replicant. Doggett doesn’t think Billy will be able to find Scully or the baby, but Krycek thinks another replicant could.
As Doggett gets a visit from Knowle, Scully and Reyes arrive at their destination, Democrat Hot Springs. It’s Doggett’s birthplace, which Scully somehow finds comforting. Reyes picks out an abandoned building for them to take shelter in, a house with “water from the rock, Exodus 7:16” on its window. Ironically, there’s no running water inside. Reyes lights a cigarette – guess she didn’t quit after all – and sees a bright light in the sky.
Knowle tells Doggett that Billy may have come out of a Cold War program to create super-soldiers. Doggett says that while Billy did seem pretty super, he didn’t seem like a soldier. He was a rumored alien abductee. Knowle says he’s halfway to understanding what the agents are after.
Knowle confirms that Billy’s after Scully, who was also part of the program. Her abduction was part of a military operation. The chip was used to both monitor her and make her pregnant with “the first organic version of that same super-soldier.” Knowle wants Doggett’s help to catch Billy so he can be stopped. Doggett pretends not to know where Scully is, but Knowle is sure that someone involved knows – and that person is in danger.
Mulder leaves, getting impatient with the elevator and deciding to take the stairs. Seconds later, Billy arrives via elevator and ready to do some murdering. Krycek’s Spidey sense tells him something’s wrong, so he leaves Skinner’s office just seconds before Billy arrives. Skinner goes after him, but Krycek deliberately fails to hold the elevator for him. Skinner makes it through the doors just in time…but so does Billy’s hand. It smacks Skinner in the face, then stays put, unaffected, as the elevator starts going down.
Skinner ends up in the hospital with a concussion and Mulder by his side. Doggett comes by and tells Mulder that an old friend gave him some information about Billy and the super-soldier program. Mulder demands to know who Doggett’s source is, since he appears to be making stuff up. Doggett doesn’t think it matters – Knowle says Scully’s in danger, and he has the same goal as the agents, to stop Billy.
Mulder makes sure that Doggett didn’t tell Knowle where Scully is. Doggett’s starting to think that being the only one who knows is going to come back to harm him. Mulder doesn’t want to know, but Doggett’s afraid for Scully’s fate if something happens to him. Mulder decides that they should go on the only lead they have and talk to Knowle about any possible ways to stop Billy.
In Democrat Springs, Reyes has fixed up a little temporary home for her and Scully. She wishes they had whale songs to set the mood. She makes some whale sounds, reminding Scully of her sister. Reyes spots someone outside the house and goes out to investigate. Just as she’s decided there’s nothing there, a truck speeds up. The driver is a game warden who gets her to put her gun down and show some ID.
Once the two women have agreed they’re no harm to each other, Reyes brings the game warden (who never gets a name, but I’ll call her Martha, since that was her portrayer’s role on True Blood) into her and Scully’s house. Martha can’t believe that Scully plans to deliver the baby there. Reyes argues that Scully’s a doctor, but Martha doesn’t think that’s any match for the circumstances. Scully makes it clear that she’s so desperate, she doesn’t have a choice. Martha softens and offers up some supplies to help out.
Mulder and Doggett have no luck trying to get in touch with Knowle back in D.C. Doggett wonders how long Mulder can keep up with trying to fight threats. He’s given up almost a decade of his life to this. Mulder admits that it might never end. They see Krycek arriving in the parking garage of the FBI building, and realize that Knowle is in his car with him.
Reyes tells Scully that she looks beautiful even with everything she’s dealing with. This is not the time to hit on her, Monica! Scully asks if she’s feeling any vibes like she usually does. Reyes says that things feel a little off. She goes out to get more water from a pump and sees the light in the sky again. Her vibes have clearly abandoned her, because she doesn’t notice Billy until he’s right on top of her. She aims her gun at him, but it’s Martha who ends up shooting him.
The women think Billy’s dead and assure Scully that everything’s okay. Scully’s like, “You don’t really get how this all works, do you?” Martha says she’ll have to report the incident, but Scully tells her that’ll have to wait – she just had a contraction. That baby must be Mulder’s, because it already has horrible timing.
Mulder and Doggett split up, Mulder to keep an eye on Krycek and Doggett to follow Knowle as he goes somewhere inside the building. It turns out he’s there to see Crane and discuss how Doggett doesn’t expect anything but needs to be eliminated. Doggett leaves without being noticed and runs to Skinner’s office to make a phone call. Skinner himself is there, not letting a little concussion stop him from…whatever these guys are doing.
Doggett calls Mulder, who’s still in the car, and tells him that Knowle came to talk to Crane. Mulder thinks Krycek, Knowle, and Crane are all working together. They tricked the agents into chasing Billy and thinking they could protect Scully. Since Doggett called Reyes from a phone in the building, the three conspirators probably know where she is.
Mulder tells Doggett to tell him where Scully is. Doggett hesitates, thinking they can take out the conspirators and put an end to the threat. Mulder thinks they might be replicants, which leaves the agents at a big disadvantage. Doggett finally tells Mulder that Scully’s in Democrat Hot Springs. But before Mulder can get on the road, Krycek punches through his car window (always so dramatic) and forces him out of the car.
Krycek holds a gun on his old enemy and says it doesn’t seem fair that it comes down to this. He claims that he’s the one who kept Mulder alive for years. They wanted the same thing. Mulder disagrees – he wanted to stop the conspiracy, while Krycek wanted to save himself. Krycek admits that he tried to kill Scully’s baby to stop the replicants, but it’s too late. Mulder wouldn’t let it go, so Krycek has to finish him off. He can’t know how deep this goes.
Mulder would rather have Krycek kill him than insult him by trying to make him understand the conspiracy. Krycek starts to pull the trigger, but he’s shot first, but Skinner. Looks like Krycek isn’t a replicant or super-soldier, since two bullets pretty much incapacitate him. He warns that it’ll take a lot more than bullets to take down the replicants. But if Skinner fires just one more, Krycek will give him what he needs to save thousands. All Skinner has to do is shoot Mulder. Instead, he shoots Krycek, probably killing him (but on this show, who knows?).
Skinner stays behind while Mulder heads to the airport to fly to Georgia. He’ll have to hurry if he wants to see the birth of the baby, since Scully’s contractions are already two minutes apart. Reyes has a vision, I think (it’s hard to tell), of the baby. Back in D.C., Doggett comes face to face with Knowle and Crane, who ignore him when he threatens to shoot him. They chase him as he finds Skinner and runs off with him.
I guess Reyes’ vision made her think she can’t trust Martha, so she breaks something over her head and holds a gun on her. Martha declares that the baby will be born as a bunch of cars pull up to the house. Billy gathers himself from the dirt outside, back to normal again.
Doggett and Skinner jump in a car and use it to run over Crane. It doesn’t do much good, as he jumps on top of it and swings himself around to punch through the window. As Billy and his replicant friends enter the house in Georgia, Reyes tries to convince Scully that everything’s going to be okay. Scully begs her not to let the replicants take the baby.
We go back and forth between Scully’s delivery and a car chase between Knowle, Skinner, and Doggett. Skinner finally gets rid of Crane by driving his side of the car into a cement column. Knowle ends up crashing, but if he’s a super-soldier, that’s not going to stop him for long. As the replicants stare at the two women, Reyes delivers Scully’s baby.
Mulder also likes to make a memorable entrance, so he gets a helicopter to take him to the house. The replicants are leaving, and he fears that one of them has Scully stashed in a car. Reyes assures him that she’s still safe, though she needs to go to the hospital. I hope Mulder asked the helicopter pilot to wait.
Sometime later, Doggett and Reyes turn in a report about the replicants and Scully’s delivery, but Kersh isn’t happy with it. He doesn’t get why Reyes thinks she was on this case, as if that’s his biggest issue here. But Doggett thinks he had the authority to bring Reyes on board since the office is now under investigation – he knows that Kersh was part of Knowle and Crane’s late-night meeting. Since Knowle and Crane are now missing, Kersh is the only person who can provide answers. Kersh booms that Doggett investigates what Kersh tells him. Doggett says he’s just doing his job, investigating X-Files.
Mulder lets himself into Scully’s apartment (looks like he has his own set of keys) just as the Lone Gunmen are leaving after dropping off some gifts. They’re the Three Wise Men here, you see. They don’t get how Mulder found Scully, since Doggett was never able to give him her exact location. “There was a light. I followed it,” Mulder explains. So the baby is Jesus, I guess.
Mulder happily checks in on Scully and the baby…who looks totally normal and human. Scully has finally picked a name for her son – William, after Mulder’s father (also her father, but she doesn’t mention that). Mulder jokes that the baby looks like Skinner. Scully doesn’t understand why the replicants left the baby alone. Mulder says he must not have been what they were looking for. But he still thinks the baby is a miracle.
Scully says she feared the truth the second she found out she was pregnant. She still doesn’t know how she got pregnant. Mulder says they both feared the possibilities and the truth. But now they know it. Scully asks what the truth is, but instead of answering, Mulder kisses her. And she kisses back! They’re totally making out! They stand there with the baby – their baby – for their last happy moment together until the end of next season.
Thoughts: Martha is played by Dale Dickey, who was in some True Blood episodes with Robert Patrick.
Whose pretty face will I miss more, Mulder’s or Krycek’s? I can’t decide.
I have very little use for Skinner, but he looks really menacing and awesome when he shows up to save Mulder from Krycek. It would have been more satisfying if Mulder had killed Krycek, though, since Krycek killed his father.
Time for season 9! Say goodbye to Duchovny for a few weeks!
'90s Flashback 
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