Scully clutched her gun. She watched the black car pull up to where she, Motsouka and Mulder stood. It stopped twenty feet in front of them. Suddenly, the back door open and a skinny man stumbled from the backseat. His hands were tied with crude rope.

Scully raised her gun. "Stay still!"

The man coughed and fell onto his knees. "Don't hurt me! I just. James says you need to listen to him. They've…they've got a gun with them."

"Wang, come out with your hands up. Your accomplice, as well." Mulder shouted. His gun was pointed at the car along with Scully's.

"Please don't shoot." The man began to cry. "He's aiming at me."

"Tell them to exit the car now, and we'll talk." Scully said.

The man turned back and said something to Wang and the other person in the front seat. "He says to put the gun down first. Both of you."

"Tell him to toss his weapon or weapons outside the car. Then we'll put the gun down."

Scully caught her breath. Then, she saw a hand toss the gun out the open back door with a loud clunk.

"What if they have more?" Motsouka whispered.

Scully shook her head. She was afraid of the same thing. FBI protocol stated that neither she nor Mulder were to drop their weapons unless in an extreme circumstance. She damn well hoped this standoff made the cut. She wanted to run to the skinny man, who was pale and bruised, looking on the verge of collapse. "Mulder," she whispered.

Mulder was still clutching his gun and aiming it at the car. He grimaced and then, very slowly, lowered himself and placed his gun on the ground in front of him, never taking his eyes off the car. "Come out of the car, Wang," he called.

The car's motor stopped running. Scully watched the car's driver side door creep open. Wang stood leaning on the door.

"Your accomplice, too," Scully said.

"άκόύειν," Wang said. His voice was loud, but he sounded serene as he began to chant. "άκόύειν. άκόύειν."

"No!" Scully called. She glanced at her gun. Mulder put his hand on her arm.

"Motsouka was right. The accomplice has a weapon, too." he said, squinting.

Scully began to feel light-headed and she wanted to close her eyes. She forced herself to keep them open and covered her ears with her hands. "Mulder, it's working."

"Hey!" Mulder shouted, looking around him. He raised his hands to his ears and then swooped his arms around, doing it again. A smattering of townspeople copied him.

Suddenly, Wang's chanting stopped. Scully turned and saw Tom tackle Wang. A bang went off. Someone screamed. Scully raced toward the car, fixated on the blossom of blood growing on the man's arm.

"Stop moving!" A voice shouted. The woman had her gun pointed at the bound man's head. Scully felt Mulder catch up to her. He had his gun extended.

He raised his gun. "Drop your weapon now."

"I'll shoot again. I'm warning you."

"Is he worth this to both of you?"

The woman was crying now.

"C'mon," Mulder said. "Put the gun down, and I'll put mine down. We don't want anyone to die today. This isn't how to get what you want. This isn't how to get revenge."

"Don't listen to him, Eleanor!" Wang shouted from the ground, where Tom held him.

Shouts ricocheted through the crowd. Scully glanced up. Ruth, Terbell and a smattering of other bodies trundled from the edge of the parking lot toward them. "Shit," she muttered. She wanted to get to the injured man, but the townspeople looked like deer in the wide headlight of a heavy locomotive rolling toward them. She had less than a minute to calm them down – to beat their panic. Still, she couldn't scare the woman with the gun.

She began to walk backwards slowly toward the crowd with her hands raised. "I'm just going to help them," she said. "I'm just going to make sure there isn't panic."

The woman didn't hear her. She was still crying – still staring at Mulder as if asking for permission to explode.

Scully began to walk more quickly.

"Did you hear her?" Mulder asked with his eerie-calm voice: the voice he used to talk to all crazy gunmen in this past. Jesus, there had been so many crazy gunmen.

"Yes," the woman said.

Wang began his chant again from the ground. Scully jogged to the group and flung open the motel office door. "Inside!" She shouted and pointed.

The townspeople reacted immediately, running in, pressing themselves through the door. Scully forced them to enter one by one. The slow, hypnotized zombies moved closer. She looked inside the office. People were pressed into all available space, bodies spilling into area behind the front desk. The space was full, but there were more townspeople waiting outside.

Scully found Motsouka in the crowd, trying to line people up so they didn't stampede the office entrance. "Maria!" She shouted. Motsouka looked up. She threw Motsouka her room key. "Take the rest of them to my room and your room. Just get them inside and safe!"

Motsouka waved her arms and began to jog down the outdoor corridor to Scully's room. Scully looked back at Mulder. He was still at a standstill with the woman and the gun. Scully looked inside the crowded office and made eye contact with an old man standing by the door. She pointed back to the car and then shut the door soundly, praying everyone inside had enough sense to stay there. Ruth, Terbell and the hypnotics were close now. She jogged toward Mulder, keeping her hands raised high in the air.

"You can help us fix things. No one has to get hurt," Mulder was saying. Wang was still chanting, but his words had a different rhythm.

The woman shook her head. "It's too late, now. There's no way back."

"There's always a way back."

Wang's voice grew louder. He began to thrash at Tom. Tom struggled to keep him on the ground. He looked up with a red face and wide eyes.

"Ellie. Please. I'm so sorry. Just…"

Scully glanced over her shoulder and saw Ruth grinning at her, not ten feet away.