Paper Hearts

"Thirteen sounds like such a magic number."

- Roche

Mulder dreams of a small red light that lead

s him to

Bosher's Run Park, where the body
of a young girl lies in the fallen leaves.

As he watches, she sinks from sight, and he awakens.

Mulder brings a forensic team to the place he

saw in the dream and the skeleton

of a little girl is found.
But Mulder is able to describe the body even
before it is exhumed: the girl's nightdress will be
missing a heart-shaped piece of fabric.
Mov or Avi (3.1Mb)

This is the mark of serial killer John Roche,

whom Mulder helped find and convict in 1990 for the
murder of thirteen young girls. Mulder has always

been disturbed that the hearts were never found,

making it impossible
to verify the true number of Roche's victims.

The newly discovered victim, Addie Sparks, raises the

tally to fourteen and Mulder fears that there

may still be bodies undiscovered.

Determined to lay this case to rest, Mulder remembers

that the red light in his dream paused briefly on the camper-back of Roche's car.
He and Scully track down the automobile and in the

lining of the camper find a copy of Alice in Wonderland.

Pressed between its pages

are sixteen hearts: two victims are yet unknown.

The agents visit Roche in prison and he refuses to

help them unless
they give him his collection of hearts, noting that Mulder seems to take this case

very personally. Working late, Mulder dreams of the red light, which
this time takes him back to the night of his sister Samantha's disappearance.
The terrible memory replays itself as it has in the past,

except that instead of Samantha disappearing into a bright white light,
it is John Roche who enters the room and

carries off Mulder's screaming sister.

Mulder confronts Roche, demanding to know where he was i

n 1973 when

Samantha disappeared. Roche claims to have sold a

vacuum cleaner, an Electrovac Princess, to Mulder's father.

When he refuses to tell Mulder anything further, Fox hits him.

But later Mulder goes to his mother's home

and finds just that model of vacuum in a storage closet.

The agents show Roche the two hearts from the remaining unknown victims.

Roche describes the scene of Samantha's abduction in minute detail,
claiming that he watched from the window before
taking the girl. He makes Mulder pick one of the hearts
and tells him where the body of

that victim can be found.

A body is

found just where Roche said it would be,

but forensic analysis reveals it is not Samantha Mulder.
Roche refuses to tell them about the remaining victim unless he is allowed

out of prison to show them himself.

Scully refuses, but Mulder secretly obtains a prisoner transfer order and

flies with Roche to Martha's Vineyard.
He takes his prisoner to a house and asks him to tell him about his abduction

of Samantha. Roche complies, but he has walked into a trap:

Mulder has tested him by showing him a house the

Mulder family bought after Samantha's abduction.
Mulder accuses him of using a mental connection to get into his dreams and use

that information to obtain his release.

Mov or Avi (3.1Mb)

hat night, Roche escapes, taking Mulder's badge and gun.

He abducts a young girl he saw on the plane and Mulder tracks

him down to an abandoned school bus.

To rescue the girl, he must shoot Roche and so loses the
chance to learn the truth about the final heart

and the identity of the last victim.