Forced to take shelter in a nearby apartment building, they find a sheriff’s deputy who has been attacked by what Scully terms a water-borne parasite. Mulder, surmising that whatever attacked the deputy might be in the plumbing, decides to check out the rest of the building for inhabitants. He finds a looter, a couple – Walter and his very pregnant girlfriend, Angela, and a militant neighbor, George Vincent.
Huddled in a darkened apartment together, the motley crew watch as the deputy hovers nears death. They pack him in ice in the tub, hoping to abate his rising temperature. But when the group’s not looking, the looter steals the deputy’s ring and inadvertently knocks a box of Epsom salts into the bath water. Minutes later, pregnant Angela uses the bathroom, only to emerge screaming that she had seen the creature with giant arms like an octopus. When Mulder enters the bathroom, he finds the deputy’s body gone, melted into water in the tub. Mulder theorizes that the monster does not live in water. It actually is water, taking shape only when it attacks.
To avoid any further attacks, Mulder decides it’s time to move everyone to another building. He goes out to the carport only to find the looter has taken the deputy’s prowler and escaped, leaving the group stranded. On his way back into the apartment, he is attacked by a coiled tentacle that extends from the ceiling and wraps its arm around Mulder’s neck.
Managing to free himself from the monster, Mulder tries to get back into the apartment, but Vincent has locked him out. As he struggles for his life in the hallway, Angela goes into labor and Scully must help deliver the baby. As the new bundle arrives, Scully deduces that fresh water kills the organism and has Walter shoot the sprinkler heads. Simultaneously, Mulder has the same realization when he sees a cat sitting out in the rain rather than finding shelter in the apartment building. The storm passes and Mulder and Scully wrap up their visit with Dales, who takes great delight in ribbing Mulder that Scully saved his life.
THE X-FILES “Agua Mala” #6X13
Original Air Date: 02/21/99
CAST:
DAVID DUCHOVNY as Special Agent Fox Mulder
GILLIAN ANDERSON as Special Agent Dana Scully
GUEST CAST:
Darren McGavin as Arthur Dales
Nichole Pelerine as Sara Shipley
Max Kasch as Evan Shipley
Joel McKinnon Miller as Deputy Greer
Valente Rodriguez as Walter Suarez
Diana Maria Riva as Angela Villareal
Jeremy Roberts as George Vincent
Silas Weir Mitchell as Dougie
WRITTEN BY:
David Amann
DIRECTED BY:
Rob Bowman