In this week's issue of The X-Files comic the series goes back to its roots with a classic one-shot involving aliens, unhelpful local law enforcement, Mulder in peril, and an angry Scully. Find out all about "Falling" after the jump.
This week on The X-Files we, uniquely, open on someone running through the woods. Specifically the woods of the Adirondack Park in New York. We see the figure running from the vantage point of someone spying on them and watch as they tread on a rope which causes an enormous log to fall on them from where it has been positioned up in the canopy. Our spies turn out to be a bunch of five boys all aged around 10 who are attempting to catch an “alien” having discovered a downed UFO in the woods.
The boys investigate their downed foe, discovering both that it is still breathing and that they may have broken its leg. One of the boys, Timmy, suggests that they should “smash [the alien’s] head in with a rock” so it will “look like an accident” but the others are scared. Investigating the body, Timmy discovers a gun and FBI ID - immediately deciding that the captured “alien” must have been “planning to infiltrate the FBI”. As we watch these events play out Mulder talks to us in voiceover discussing the variety of aliens, or extraterrestrial biological entities as he prefers, that have been described by witnesses. As we focus in on Timmy, gleefully holding the FBI badge now revealed to belong to Mulder, Mulder suggests that “some aliens will never be recognised at all”.
Outside the forest Scully and the local sheriff are investigating a supposed alien running amok in the town of Childwold. A local resident claims to have the alien trapped in her home but as the pair approach the door, a man covered in red marks bursts out and throwing Scully sideways. He is unable to speak in anything other than grunts and turns on Scully who is saved when the sheriff fires and kills him. The Sheriff IDs the victim as a crazy veteran who lived on the outskirts of the town. Scully guesses that the disfigurement explains away the nearby “alien sightings”.She takes a look at the marks, thinking they look familiar, then suddenly realises they are caused by exposure to radiation (very similar to that seen in “Fallen Angel”) and orders the Sheriff to call in a HAZMAT team.
Back in the woods Mulder has regained consciousness. The boys are concerned that he may actually be a shape-shifting alien and take a vote about what to do next. Each one except Timmy, who is still in possession of the gun and worryingly confident about handling the weapon, votes to trust Mulder. The fallen tree is too big for them to move (which begs the question about how they set up their trap in the first place) so Timmy and Joey decide to go to town and find help, Timmy taking the gun along for good measure in case they are attacked by the alien.
In town the HAZMAT team have arrived and begun decontaminating “anything that came into contact with the deceased” including Scully who is now performing an autopsy on the veteran. She discovers high levels of testosterone which she believes may have caused his aggressive behaviour but part way through the procedure she is interrupted by two men who drag her from the tent and in front of the sheriff. Scully is irate to learn that he has called in the military who have banned her and Mulder from touching the body. The sheriff has also called off the search for Mulder who is now officially missing, claiming that once the Air Force arrives they will “do what they can” to find him.
In the woods, Timmy and Joey are still making their way away from the others, playing a game of sheriff and prisoner. Timmy pushes Joey to the ground, aiming the gun at him, and Joey becomes concerned that his friend is “talking crazy”. Timmy is aware but claims that he likes it. Over at the tree, Mulder shows the remaining boys that he has been infected by the same radiation that killed the man in town and tells them to get out of the woods. Two loud bangs echo through the trees and Timmy comes running back screaming Joey's name. He claims they were attacked by an eight foot tall green skinned monsters and that he thinks he managed to shoot it. Mulder, now starting to fade, isn’t convinced, but a noise in the woods scares all the boys and Timmy announces that the thing that killed Joey will kill them if he doesn’t kill it first. The boys march into the forest armed with the gun and sticks…
In the Sheriff’s Office, Scully is still fighting her case with the sheriff but is being ignored. The sheriff refuses to share any information that will allow her to investigate further until he receives a call from his wife. He learns that Timmy, his son, was playing right by the supposed crash site. In a change of attitude more sudden than the sheriff in “Quagmire” after he felt something near his leg in the lake, the sheriff begs Scully not to leave “just yet”.
Now covered in blood and victorious against their supposed alien, the boys return to Mulder to check if he’s still alive. Timmy tells the others to leave Mulder behind as “he’s almost dead anyway”. He suggest that they could always send someone back for Mulder if they don’t “run into any more aliens”. As he speaks he and Mulder, now convinced there is more to Timmy than a ten year old boy, lock eyes. The boys leave and Mulder watches the shape of something moving within the cracked spaceship. He wonders in his mind whether the creature has “fallen from the Heavens” or is no more than a local pilot “who’ll never see his wife and kids again”. He considers how “it’s so easy to be wrong and so important to be right - especially when you’re afraid” as we pan to see the “alien” killed by the boys - an ordinary human man.
Out in the woods, four bangs are heard and soon the shape of Timmy emerges terrifyingly from the shadows. He aims the gun at Mulder’s head and shoots, however the gun is out of ammunition. Undeterred he simply throws it away and begins to hunt for a rock. “You killed them all, didn’t you?” Mulder asks brokenly. Timmy admits to the awful crime with a smile. When asked why, he cannot give a satisfactory answer except that he “never liked.. them”. He lifts the rock over Mulder’s head only to freeze as his father rolls up in a jeep driven by Scully who rescues Mulder from beneath the tree.
In the hospital Scully arrives to give Mulder the good news. The radiation he was exposed to had a short wave length which meant it only affected his skin. Mulder questions her about Timmy’s actions as we get a good look at the book he is reading: The Lord of The Flies. Scully tells him she cannot put Timmy’s actions down to radiation making him aggressive as with the veteran because as far as she knows, such effects only affect adults. Mulder smiles and points out that children “never listen to adults” but “always manage to imitate us” as we cut to one final view of the forest where soldiers armed with machine guns stand guard as the crashed UFO is lifted away from the scene.