DRIVE

Via a live news report, a high-speed car chase comes to an end in the Nevada desert. Assuming it to be a kidnapping, police pull the female passenger from the car and place her into the protective custody of a police vehicle. The driver, Patrick Crump (Bryan Cranston), is pushed to the asphalt and handcuffed. The woman in the police car begins violently banging her head against the car window. As the news chopper catches all of this on film, the woman's head explodes, sending a spray of blood across the window.

Mulder and Scully get wind of this bizarre car chase as they're doing work in Buhl, Idaho investigating possible domestic terrorism. Mulder coerces Scully into taking a detour to Elko, Nevada on a hunch that this may be an X-File. Crump, who has started to develop symptoms of a sickness, is put in an ambulance. Mulder, wishing to speak to Crump, follows the ambulance, and ends up being kidnapped by Crump, who has escaped from the police.

Mulder realizes that Crump is in a considerable amount of painful pressure and that the only way to alleviate this pressure is to drive west. At first, Scully believes that Crump is suffering from some sort of infection, but after investigating the Crumps' home, she discovers a U.S. Navy antenna array emitting ELF waves stretches beneath their property. Scully deduces that an abnormal surge in these waves somehow caused a rising pressure in the inner ear of the nearby inhabitants. Westward motion and an increase in speed seems to be the only thing to help ease the pain of the increasing pressure.

Initially, thinking that the FBI agent is part of a government conspiracy, Crump forces Mulder at gunpoint to drive, infuriating him along the way with antisemitic slurs. Eventually, Mulder and Crump make amends and attempt to work out a solution before it is too late. Mulder explains to Crump that Scully will meet them at the Pacific Coast, the end of the highway. There she will insert a needle into Crump's inner ear, hopefully relieving the pressure. Unfortunately, when Scully arrives, Crump has already died.

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