WEST TEXAS, PRESENT DAY

“Scully?”

“Mulder?”

“Where are you, Scully?”

“I’m at the lab finishing tests, Mulder. Where are you?”

“I’m in his room. This is strange, Scully.”

“What’s strange, Mulder?”

“His clothes are all hanging neatly in the closet; stack of books by his bedside. I can’t find anything…”

“Mulder, you better get over here. I found something.”

(Holding a slide panel to the light). “This is strange, Mulder.”

“What is it: Ebola, Zika… Obamacare?”

“Worse. Apparently, it jumped from the auditory cortex to the cerebral cortex in a matter of seconds causing a total distortion in judgment. Look at this, Mulder.”

“What?”

“Most of his frontal lobe has been eaten away.”

“What does that mean, Scully?”

“It’s a virus, Mulder, unlike anything I’ve ever seen before.”

“I knew it! Obama is just one vote away from banning all guns, opening the borders and closing Gitmo. The only way to complete his agenda is through a series of 5-4 liberal rulings. The initial report from the owner of the ranch said that a pillow was found over his face. So, I think we can conclude…”

“It was over his head, Mulder, not his face. There was no petechial hemorrhage in his eyes or under his lips that would have suggested suffocation. And the doctor who first arrived on scene did not detect any unusual odor from his breath that might suggest poisoning.”

“How many times have we been here, Scully? Right here. So close to the truth and now with what we’ve seen and what we know to be right back at the beginning with nothing.”

“It’s not nothing, this time, Mulder. Take a look at this.”

“What?”

(Holds up another slide) “A virus; a rare strain that’s been lying dormant in West Texas since the end of the Nixon administration. That’s what killed him.”

“This is what the government’s been covering up all this time, Scully,  a virus? A disease?

(Holds up a vial) “Look, Mulder.”

“What is that?”

“The truth. I’ve developed a weak vaccine against the virus that’s been infecting people.”

“How did you come up with this so fast?”

“It’s TV, Mulder, just go with it. But… it must be administrated within 96 hours, or everyone will be beyond saving.”

“Ninety-six hours? [thinking] … My God, Scully, that’s Super Tuesday! What if we can’t immunize everyone in time? What if we can’t stop the spread of the virus?

“The impossible scenario we never planned for, Mulder? Well, we better come up with a plan.”