Magic Lamp

24 – Two Days Later – Hour 12

The following takes place between 6 am and 7 am

6:00 am – Everyone gains their bearings as they try and focus on where they’re standing. Despite the fact that they just appeared out of no where on a busy city sidewalk, no one around them seems to have noticed. Jack points at a clock on the outside of a building, and says, “According to that clock, it’s 9 p.m. here. Let’s get going.” Bill and Chloe follow Jack down the sidewalk. Morris has other ideas.

Morris yells, “That’s it! I’m through! This is completely absurd! All I wanted was a nice quiet dinner out with my friends! In the last week, I’ve been drilled in the shoulder, kidnapped, and shot at. Everything calmed down for a couple of days and now we’re traveling from one crazy place to the next, and just as we’re about to find out some answers to what the heck is going on in that last crazy place, we’re transported away… AGAIN! You all act like this is completely normal! Like you do this sort of thing every day! We don’t even know what city this is!”

Morris turns to an old woman walking her little white dog, and says, “Hey, you! You! What city is this?”

The woman takes one look at Morris and says, “Bite me!”

Chloe and Bill turn to each other and both say, “New York.”

6:04 am – Jack tries to calm Morris down, “OK, so we know we’re in New York. The main thing is that we have to keep going and get those terrorists. They’re collecting items and we need to find out how they’re getting us to jump from place to place. Come on, let’s go!” They all walk down the street.”

Commercial

6:09 am – A car on the street comes to a screeching halt right next to where the group is standing. Other cars swerve to avoid the car and several drivers say things that aren’t printable in a family blog like this. A tall thin man with brown hair jumps out of the driver’s side of the car. He runs up to Morris and holds up a device that has LEDs on either side of it. The LEDs light up on either side of the device, all the way to the top, as he holds it up to Morris. The man says, “I knew it! I knew it! Hey, Scully!”

Chloe and Bill turn to each other and both say, “New York.”

Scully, a redheaded woman comes out of the passenger side of the car and says, “Mulder, will you leave those people alone?”

6:12 am – Mulder is too distracted to notice what Scully just said. He says, “Scully, these readings are off the chart!” The device emits a high-pitched squeal as he turns a knob. He looks at Morris, “Quick! Tell me what you were just doing!”

Morris sputters, “I… I was just talking to some of my friends…”

Mulder looks at Morris and taps the device again. He runs over to Chloe and Bill, and the device has the same reaction as it did with Morris. Mulder moves over to Jack… same result. Jack puts his hand on the device to move it out of his face and asks, “What’s this all about?”

Mulder mutters to himself, and twists another knob on the device. Scully says, “Mulder! Quit bothering these people!”

Mulder says, “I don’t understand. This temporal displacement detector is brand new!”

Jack says, “What’s a temporal displacement detector?”

Mulder and Chloe simultaneously say, “It detects time travel.”

Mulder looks surprised. “How did you know that?”

Chloe rolls her eyes, “Isn’t it obvious? It has a multivariate temporal adapter on each side. What else could it be?”

6:15 am – A homeless man comes up to Scully to ask for some change, which she gives to him. She looks at Chloe while she’s doing this and says, “Oh no, there are two of you, Mulder…”

Mulder says, “But I don’t understand what could cause these readings. This should be accurate.”

Chloe says, “So, who said it wasn’t? You just asked him what he was just doing, not what he’s been doing for the last twelve hours.”

Scully looks surprised.

Chloe continues, “We’ve been…”

Jack interrupts, “Wait a minute, Chloe. We don’t know who these people are.”

6:18 am – Scully produces a badge, “I’m Special Agent Dana Scully. This is Special Agent Mulder. We’re with the FBI.”

Jack says, “FBI? We’re with CTU! We’ve been looking for another federal agency to talk to! We need to get in touch with CTU as soon as possible?”

Mulder says, “CTU? What’s CTU? “Chasing The Unidentified? Chimpanzees That Undulate? Cow Thong Underwear?’”

Jack says, “Ha, Ha… Real funny. It’s ‘Counter Terrorism Unit’. We’re based out of Los Angeles. You know, the people that stopped more of the nuclear weapons from going off in California a couple of days ago?”

Scully asks, “What do you mean ‘more of the nuclear weapons’? What nuclear weapons?”

Mulder says, “They’re not in our timeline. The bombs that went off didn’t happen here! At least not yet… What year is it where you came from?”

Chloe says, “2007.”

Scully says, “You expect us to believe that? Some little gizmo that he…”, she gestures at Mulder, “…gets from the back of a comic book goes off, and you’re telling us you’re from the future?”

Mulder says, “The readings are accurate. You can’t fake these.” Scully rolls her eyes. “These obviously aren’t the people controlling the temporal field. They probably got caught up in its wake somehow.” He fiddles with the device.

Scully says, “Mulder, let’s leave these nice people here. Sorry to have bothered you folks…”

6:22 am -Mulder turns to Scully, pulls out his gun, and shoots three times. The homeless man that was panhandling a few minutes ago had just started transforming into a very large and ugly monster. Scully doesn’t seem the least bit fazed by this.

Jack points at the dead homeless monster, opening and closing his mouth… he can’t say anything.

Bill says, “WHAT WAS THAT?”

Scully replies, “That? Typical morphing homeless monster… It’s completely explainable.”

Mulder says, “Scully, We can’t just leave them here. We have to help them.” He turns to the group. “You’re coming with us!”

Commercial

6:27 am – The car arrives at the entrance to a hotel. There is a small sign in front which says, “Annual Meeting of: A.N.T.I. S.K.E.P.T.I.C. – A National Team Investigating Secret Knowledge, Enduring Pathetic Theories, Incognito”. Mulder runs inside, and the rest follow.

A short, scruffy-looking man sits just inside the entrance to a hotel ballroom, which is filled with chairs and a podium. He looks dejected until he sees Mulder running up to him. He brightens up.

The man says, “Mulder! We didn’t think you were going to make it!”

Mulder says, “Frohike, I need to talk to you and Byers and Langly.”

The rest of the group arrives.

Frohike says, “Hey! You brought people with! A group came in here a while ago and registered, and now you. There might be hope for this conference yet.” He eyes Chloe and Scully and says, “Well! Hellooooo, Ladies!”

Scully says, “Stop it, Frohike.” She looks around. “It doesn’t look like you’re having much of a conference.”

Frohike says, “It’s more than last year. The trouble with an anti-skeptic conference is that when you tell people about it, they don’t really believe you.”

6:28 am – Mulder enters the nearly empty ballroom, and walks towards the stage. A tall man with long blonde hair works up on the stage setting up for a presentation.

Mulder says, “Langly! Where’s Byers?” Frohike comes into the ballroom, followed by everyone else.

Langly says, “Huh? What? Oh, hey, Mulder. He went upstairs. He had to grab his laptop. He’s doing a presentation as soon as I get this set up.”

Frohike mumbles, “More PowerPoint poisoning for the masses.”

6:29 am – Mulder says, “This can’t wait. Remember those temporal disturbances you called me about? Well, I have some living proof of it right here.” He motions in back of him.

Langly says, “Empty chairs?”

Mulder looks around, “No! I mean those people back there.” He points at Jack, Chloe, Bill and Morris.

6:30 am – Langly climbs off the stage. Mulder says, “I took a reading with the HQN-5000 earlier. It was off the chart! I thought it was wrong at first, since you said you got the readings here, but I think their story checked out.”

Scully says, “Checked out? You’re kidding, right? These people said they’ve been traveling back and forth through time and space, and you believe them?”

Frohike looks at his watch, “Byers should be back by now. I’m going to check on him.” He leaves.

Langly yells after him, “I’m not manning the door this year!” He turns to everyone and says, “I’m not manning the door this year.”

Jack says, “I’m sure this is all very interesting for all of you to argue about, but we’re chasing after some terrorists, and we need your help.”

6:32 am – Chloe steps up behind Jack and whispers something. Jack turns around and says, “Now?”

Chloe says, “It’s been HOURS. We’ll be right back.”

She says something to Scully, Morris and Bill and they all leave and head to the bathrooms.

Commercial

6:37 am – Jack says, “We’re wasting time!”

Two gunshots ring out from somewhere outside of the ballroom. Jack runs out of the ballroom, and two more shots ring out. Chloe runs out of the lady’s room, straight into Jack’s arms. She’s crying. “Jack! It was horrible!” Bill and Morris run out of the men’s room.

Jack yells, “Morris! Come here and take care of Chloe! She’s hysterical!”

Morris says, “Well, she’s pretty funny, but I’m not sure I’d call her hysterical…”

Jack runs to the lady’s room, just as Scully walks out of it.

Jack says, “What were those gunshots?”

Scully says, “They were noises that emanated from a firearm when it expelled a projectile. But that’s not important. I took care of the problem.”

Jack says, “What problem?”

Chloe sobs, “That THING tried to attack me!”

Jack says, “Thing? What ‘thing’?”

Scully says, “It was just a gray ooze that slid down the wall, and tried to become bipedal. I took care of it.”

Bill says, “… and you don’t find this the slightest bit strange?”

Scully says, “Uh… no… I mean it was just a gray ooze! This sort of thing happens all the time! Completely explainable.”

6:42 am – More gunshots go off, this time from the lobby.

Jack runs to the lobby, meeting Mulder on the way. They see Byers and Frohike chasing someone who has just left the hotel. Byers stops and yells, “They stole the presentation!” as Frohike runs through the revolving front door. Jack stands still, not understanding why the loss of one PowerPoint presentation is a big deal. Chloe, Bill, Scully and Morris run into the lobby. Chloe has regained her composure.

Byers gets impatient. “I think it was as one of those terrorists that Frohike says you’re after! They stole schematics for a temporal displacement device!” Byers runs out of the hotel, and Mulder follows. Jack still doesn’t understand. Chloe slaps Jack in the back of the head, “We could use that to get back home!”

Jack finally understands, and says “You guys wait here, I’m going after them.” He runs to the door.

Langley says, “…and I’m stuck manning the door!”

6:44 am – Jack runs out of the hotel and looks left and right. He sees Mulder and Byers heading down a flight of stairs to a subway platform.

Jack runs after them. He runs down the stairs, pushing people out of the way as he goes. He makes it to the bottom of the stairs and turns the corner just in time to get shot at. He dives behind a garbage can, and watches as the subway car’s doors slide shut. Frohike takes another shot, but misses badly. Jack runs to the doors and bangs on them. The man dressed in black holding Byer’s laptop waves at Jack as it leaves the station.

6:45 am – Jack yells in frustration. “I can’t believe that just happened! We almost had him! This whole situation is so… so….”

Frohike says, “Cliché?”

Mulder says, “I’ve already phoned Transit Authority. They’re going to stop that car at the next station. We’ll meet it there.”

Jack says, “Well, then what are we waiting for?” They move through the crowd, which doesn’t seem to be the least bit concerned about what just happened. Frohike and Byers run up the stairs pushing the crowd out of the way as they run. Jack and Mulder follow.

6:46 am – As Jack and Mulder make their way up the stairs, Mulder bumps into someone. The man continues on his way down the stairs. Mulder reaches into his pocket and says, “Hey you!” The man he bumped into turns, and Mulder tosses the man a clove of garlic. The man recoils at the garlic and vaporizes into a puff of smoke.

Commercial

6:51 am – Jack and Mulder enter the lobby. Langly talks to Chloe while the others listen.

Chloe says, “I think we have something Jack.”

Frohike says, “That’s just what I was thinking, baby…”

Chloe slaps him in the back of the head. “That’s not what I was talking about! Langley, tell Jack what you just told me.”

Frohike rubs the back of his head. “Feisty!”

6:53 am – Langley says, “… Anyway, I was just telling Chloe here that I think I might know what’s happening.”

He pauses. Jack says, “AND….?”

Langley says, “Chloe described what’s been happening for the last twelve hours. I think what’s happened is that you’ve entered some kind of temporal vortex. The people you were chasing after set this up so they can travel through time looking for things. They probably weren’t counting on you being with them on this little trip of theirs.”

Mulder says, “So they must be thrown off course! That makes a lot of sense!”

Scully says, “EVERYTHING makes sense to you…”

Chloe says, “Homeless monsters? Gray ooze in the bathroom? That makes sense?”

Scully says, “Sure it does! It’s completely explainable by science.”

Chloe mutters, “Yeah, science FICTION.”

Jack says, “Stop it! We have to hurry and follow them to the next station. I’ll meet you out front, I have to take care of something.”

They all leave to go to the front of the hotel, and Jack heads to the men’s room.

6:56 am -Just as Jack is about to walk into the men’s room, a voice says, “Mr. Bauer!”

Just off the lobby, Jack sees a man smoking a cigarette in the back of a bar. He beckons to Jack to join him, and says, “I’ve been waiting for you!”

Jack walks into the bar. Jack tries to make out the man’s features, but can’t because of the lighting. Jack asks, “How do you know my name?”

The smoking man says, “We’ve been watching you, Mr. Bauer.” Jack rushes forward, only to be stopped by two large men who step out of the shadows. They open their jackets. One man shows off the holstered guns he’s carrying. The other man shows a menacing submarine sandwich, realizes his mistake and then shows off the gun he’s carrying under the other side of his jacket.

Jack asks, “What do you want?”

The smoking man takes a long drag on his cigarette, “Want? I want to help you, Mr. Bauer. It’s important to my organization.”

Jack says, “Why is it important to you? Who are you?”

The smoking man laughs, “I thought that would be obvious why it would be important, Mr. Bauer. They’re going to try and kill you.”

Jack says, “They? Who’s ‘they’?”

6:58 am – There’s a flash of light, and Jack is gone.

The smoking man slams his fist on the table, “I have to quit being so melodramatic.” He pulls out a cell phone and speaks into it. “Temporal displacement occurred on schedule.”

6:59 am – Jack, Morris, Chloe and Bill are standing beside a highway in the desert.

7:00 am – Time’s up!