Roland (The X-Files) - Plot

Plot

At the Mahan Washington Institute of Technology, in Colson, Washington, mentally retarded janitor Roland Fuller is scolded by research scientist Dr. Keats for forgetting how to use the facility's keycard locks. Keats then walks in on his colleagues, Frank Nollette and Ronald Surnow, as they argue over a prototype jet engine they are developing. Nollette wants to push testing of the engine to break mach 15, but Surnow is unwilling to risk damaging the prototype. After Keats and Nollette angrily leave, Surnow enters the facility's wind tunnel to make some adjustments. However, Roland activates the tunnel's turbines, sending Surnow flying to his death.

Fox Mulder (David Duchovny) and Dana Scully (Gillian Anderson) are brought in to investigate Surnow's death. Scully notes that another member of the research team, Arthur Grable, had mysteriously died several months earlier, and believes it to be a case of industrial espionage. Mulder examines the handwriting on the team's whiteboard and concludes that it has been written by at least four different people, leading him to suspect that a fourth individual was present. Keats and Nollette both inform the agents that Roland Fuller was the only one left in the facility at the time of Surnow's death, but do not believe him to be capable of murder.

Nevertheless, Mulder and Scully visit the care home where Roland lives. When they gently ask him about the night of the murder, he tells them he had not seen anything out of the ordinary. He also inadvertently reveals his mathematical prowess by rapidly counting the star designs visible on Scully's blouse; however, his handwriting does not match the fourth sample taken from the whiteboard. The discussion ends when Roland experiences a violent vision and has what seems to be a fit; his caregiver asks the agents to leave while she attends to him. Later that night, Roland has another vision, seeing someone killing Keats. He appears at the facility and murders Keats by submerging his head in a tank of liquid nitrogen. Keats' frozen body is left to shatter as Roland begins typing at one of the computers.

The next day, Mulder and Scully notice that the computer had been used for five hours after Keats' death. Attempting to open the file that was being worked on, Mulder realizes that the number Roland had written on an art project the previous day is the computer's password. The file turns out to be the work of Grable, the scientist who had died several months earlier, and it had been worked on constantly since his death.

Looking into Grable's death, the agents find that it was him who had hired Roland. They begin to think that Grable faked his own death and is killing his former colleagues, using Roland as a patsy. Grable's body was never brought to the morgue, nor was a funeral ever held. However, Dr. Nollette brings the agents to a neuropreservation facility where Grable's remains are being stored, proving that he is not the one responsible. A photo of Grable is found, and he appears identical to Roland—leading the agents to discover that the two were actually twins. Speaking to Roland again, Mulder becomes convinced that the janitor is being controlled by the mind of Grable.

Meanwhile, Nollette sneaks into the cryogenic facility and tampers with Grable's storage unit, thawing his remains. He returns to the Mahan Institute, and is in the process of pushing the prototype engine to mach 15 when Roland enters. Nollette admits to stealing Grable's work, and is about to shoot Roland, intending to claim self-defense, when he is struck with a computer keyboard and dragged into the wind tunnel. The agents arrive in time to convince Roland not to kill Nollette. Roland is removed from the care home and taken to a psychiatric institute for testing, apparently now free of Grable's control.