The X-files
Synchrony)
Episode: 4X19
First aired:4/13/97
Written by:Howard Gordon and David Greenwaltz
Directed by:Jim Charleston
Jason Nichols and Lucas Menand,
researchers at the
Massachusetts Institute of
Technology, become embroiled in an
argument as they walk down a city street. They
are approached by an
elderly man, who warns Menand that he will be run over by a bus
at exactly eleven forty-six
that evening. Menand tells a
campus security cop that the old
man is harassing him. The
guard places him in the back seat of a
sedan and drives
away. A few moments later, Menand is run down by the bus... at exactly eleven
forty-six.
Mulder and
Scully review the facts of the case. Nichols was taken into
custody after the
bus driver told police that he pushed Menand into the path of his
vehicle. But Nichols
tells
authorities he was attempting to save Menand-as an
unidentified old man had
forewarned of his colleague's impending death.
The
security guard who arrested the old man is found
frozen to death.
Scully concludes
guard was somehow exposed to some sort of
chemical refrigerant, as weather
conditions are too warm to explain the corpse's frigid internal
temperature. Mulder
interviews Nichols at the police station. Nichols explains that he and Menand had been
arguing because Menand
threatened to go public with a claim that he had falsified data
on a
research paper.
A short time later, the elderly man kills Dr. Yonechi, a
Japanese researcher, by pricking
him with a
metallic stylus.
Mulder and Scully examine Yonechi's frozen corpse.
Lab
tests reveal that the doctor was injected with an
unidentifiable chemical compound. The
agents approach Nichol's girlfriend, Lisa Ianelli, who is also a
researcher. She
recognizes the
chemical compound as a
rapid freezing agent that Nichols had been
engineering for years. But she points out that the chemical has not yet been invented.
Lisa tells the agents that if Yonechi was
injected with the chemical, he may not be dead.
With Lisa's help, Scully and a team of
medical personnel successfully resuscitate
Yonechi. But his body
temperature suddenly and rapidly begins to increase, until finally,
he bursts into flames. Lisa realizes she
made an error when she recommended that
doctors remove Yonechi's body from a tub filled with
yellowish fluid.
Lisa
confesses that it was she who falsified the data to get the
research grant (Nichols is
in jail because he is covering for her). Those who would have figured out the
truth-Menand and Yonechi-are
now dead.
Police receive a tip that the elderly man is
living at
a nearby hotel. Inside the elderly man's room, the agents discover a faded
color photograph picturing Nichols, Yonechi and Lisa toasting
champagne glasses inside
the
cryology lab. Mulder realizes the photo was taken five years in the future-on the day
the researchers successfully
synthesized the freezing compound. The elderly man is
attempting to alter that future: when he failed to save Menand from being killed by the
bus, he killed Yonechi. Mulder also realizes the
elderly man is none other than Jason
Nichols.
Lisa locates the elderly man and confronts him. The elderly man gathers the
courage to
inject her with the
chemical. But Scully successfully
resuscitates Lisa, and remembering
the girl's words, immediately returns her body to the tub (to prevent the fire that killed
Yonechi). Nichols confronts his elderly self in the computer
mainframe room at the
cryogenic lab, where the old man has erased all of Nichols' files from the
computer.
Nichols lunges at the old man,
choking him. Mulder, unable to open the lab door, yells
to Nichols. He tells him that Lisa is alive. The old man tells Nichols that "it's better that
we never were."
Wrapping his arms around his younger self, the old man
bursts into
flames. The fire consumes them both. Later, Lisa sets to work at cryonics lab, attempting
to reconstruct the chemical compound.
Important Quotes:
Mulder -- "Gave a rather detailed
description of the old man."
Scully -- "What was he wearing, a
long black robe and carrying a
scythe?"
Scully -- "
Hypothermic? Mulder, this man is an
icicle."
Mulder -- "So what's your . . .
medical opinion, Scully?"
Scully -- "Well, my best guess would be that he's been exposed to some kind of chemical refrigerant like
liquid nitrogen. Possibly even ingested it."
Mulder -- "Well, you see what happens when you
drink and drive?"
Mulder -- "The
security officer who's now in
the morgue has a
body temperature a little
south of
Frosty the Snowman. "
Scully -- "So this
photo that was never taken,
when was it never taken?"
Back to The X-files: Season 4