Invocation (The X-Files): Difference between revisions

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[[Dana Scully]] ([[Gillian Anderson]]) and [[John Doggett]] ([[Robert Patrick]]) arrive at the police station to see Billy. Doggett interviews the boy, who seems to be [[Muteness|mute]]. In attempt to get Billy to speak, Doggett keeps his backpack from him. This infuriates Lisa and leads Scully to question Doggett’s expertise in [[child abduction]] cases. Scully suggests that Billy is an [[alien abduction|alien abductee]], but Doggett believes Ronald Purnell, a local [[:wikt:delinquent|delinquent]], may have been involved in the boy's disappearance. Doggett questions Purnell, who expresses confusion when the agent suggests that he should meet Billy. As Doggett sits in his car, he pulls out a photo of his deceased son, Luke.

When Billy is returned home, his brother and father are uneasy about his presence; Lisa is blind to these problems. While Lisa and her husband Doug argue about Billy, he wanders into his brother’s room holding a knife. Lisa finds a bloody knife in his brotherJosh's bed the next morning, although the boy is unscathed. Billy stands in the room staring at Josh. [[Forensic]] analysis shows the blood to be Billy's, although there are no injuries on him. The knife bears a symbol that Billy drew while being interrogated by Doggett, which was also drawn by a psychic investigator ten years earlier. The Underwoods reluctantly agree to let Bill speak with the psychic, but when theyDoug attempt to drive him to the meeting, Billy appears toseemingly disappeardisappears from inside the family minivan, only to reappear in Josh's room, frightening Josh with his silent staring. Meanwhile, at Purnell's trailer, his mother's boyfriend, Cal Jeppy, shows up and hassles him. Purnell goes into the woods and digs up a skull. Later, Jeppy [[blackmail]]s Purnell into silence over something related to Billy.

Scully and Doggett bring the psychic, Sharon Pearl, to meet Billy. After touching Billy, Pearl says that she feels powerful forces acting through him, and that she senses emanations from Doggett as well. She then goes into a [[seizure]], the mysterious symbol forming on her forehead. Scully and Doggett later notice Purnell drive up to the Underwood home. Purnell panics when he sees Billy ininside his car, but after a short pursuit, Purnell is arrested. The agents fail to find Billy in the vehicle. Elsewhere, Josh Underwood is abducted at a gas station while looking at a [[horse trailer]]. The symbol appears on the trailer.

After interrogation by Doggett, Purnell confesses to snatching Billy in 1990 on behalf of someone else. Doggett recognizes Purnell was also a victim, and with enough prodding, gets a name: Cal Jeppy. The police and the two FBI agents go to Jeppy’s home and find Josh in a compartment under the floor of his horse trailer. Doggett chases Jeppy into the woods, catches him, and discovers the skull of Billy that Purnell dug up earlier. As the Underwoods stand over the shallow grave of their long dead son, Doggett express incredulity that the case's conclusion was an instance of justice from beyond the grave and laments an inability to explain it; Scully reasons that the body is explanation enough and that the important thing is that Josh Underwood was saved from the same fate.<ref>{{cite web|title=Invocation|url=https://www.bbc.co.uk/cult/xfiles/episodeguide/eight/page05.shtml|work=BBC Cult|publisher=BBC|access-date=11 May 2012}}</ref>