[[WMG:[[center:[-'''RECAP:'''\\
[[Recap/TheXFiles Index]] | [[Recap/TheXFilesS05E01Redux 1]] | [[Recap/TheXFilesS05E02ReduxII 2]] | [[Recap/TheXFilesS05E03UnusualSuspects 3]] | [[Recap/TheXFilesS05E04Detour 4]] | [[Recap/TheXFilesS05E05ThePostModernPrometheus 5]] | [[Recap/TheXFilesS05E06ChristmasCarol 6]] | '''7''' | [[Recap/TheXFilesS05E08Kitsunegari 8]] | [[Recap/TheXFilesS05E09Schizogeny 9]] | [[Recap/TheXFilesS05E10Chinga 10]] | [[Recap/TheXFilesS05E11KillSwitch 11]] | [[Recap/TheXFilesS05E12BadBlood 12]] | [[Recap/TheXFilesS05E13PatientX 13]] | [[Recap/TheXFilesS05E14TheRedAndTheBlack 14]] | [[Recap/TheXFilesS05E15Travelers 15]] | [[Recap/TheXFilesS05E16MindsEye 16]] | [[Recap/TheXFilesS05E17AllSouls 17]] | [[Recap/TheXFilesS05E18ThePineBluffVariant 18]] | [[Recap/TheXFilesS05E19FolieADeux 19]] | [[Recap/TheXFilesS05E20TheEnd 20]]]]-]]]
'''Season 5, Episode 07:'''
!Emily
[[quoteright:350:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/thexfilesemily.png]]
[[caption-width-right:350:''"No matter how much you love this little girl, she's a miracle that was never meant to be, Scully."'']]
->Written by Creator/VinceGilligan, John Shiban & Frank Spotnitz\\
Directed by Kim Manners

->'''Scully:''' I don't understand. Why create a false record?\\
'''Mulder:''' Because there are no true records. [[TitleDrop Emily]] didn't come into this world through any system that keeps them.\\
'''Scully:''' How did she come into this world?\\
'''Mulder:''' Have you asked yourself that?

Mulder investigates the past of Emily, the girl Scully found in the previous episode who is Scully's biological daughter.
----
!!Tropes:
* CallBack:
** Scully's infertility is brought up again.
** The [[AlienBlood alien retrovirus]] from season 2 returns, infecting Detective Kresge and a doctor treating Emily. Because of Mulder's [[Recap/TheXFilesS02E17EndGame previous exposure to it]], he is able to save them.
** One of the Bounty Hunter's disguises is an elderly man with a grey moustache. He had previously assumed this disguise in "[[Recap/TheXFilesS03E24TalithaCumi Talitha Cumi]]".
* CallForward:
** This is one of the first times that Mulder's [[Recap/TheXFilesS05E01Redux newfound beliefs]] about the truth behind alien abductions make him look like a FlatEarthAtheist. He will [[Recap/TheXFilesS05E13PatientX get worse]] before he [[Recap/TheXFilesS05E14TheRedAndTheBlack gets better]].
** This is one of the earliest indications of [[spoiler:The Colonists deploying their own operatives instead of using the Syndicate as middlemen]]. Season 9 would later imply that [[spoiler:[[Recap/TheXFilesS09E10Providence as early as 1991]], the Colonists were starting to get fed up with the Syndicate and were exploring options that would lessen their need for human collaborators]].
* CastAsAMask: The Alien Bounty Hunter does not appear in his ShapeshifterDefaultForm, as Creator/BrianThompson was either not available or simply not cast to keep the character's involvement a surprise. After he kills Dr. Calderon, he seems content to wear his face for the rest of the episode.
* CharacterTitle
* DreamingOfThingsToCome: The opening sequence which shows Scully picking up her cross necklace in sand rather than Emily's cremated remains, foreshadowing the end where Emily's coffin contains only sand.
* DreamSequence: The opening, with Scully in a sandstorm, finding her cross necklace in the sand, and turning into sand herself and blowing away.
-->'''Scully:''' It begins where it ends: In nothingness. A nightmare born from deepest fears, coming to me unguarded. Whispering images unlocked from time and distance. A soul unbound - touched by others but never held. On a course charted by some unseen hand. The journey ahead promising no more than my past reflecting back upon me. Until at last, I reach the end - facing a truth I can no longer deny. Alone, as ever.
* EruditeStoner: Frohike is implied to be one.
-->'''Mulder:''' Do you know anything about pharmaceuticals?\\
'''Frohike:''' Medicinal or... recreational?
* FriendToAllChildren: Mulder to Emily, with his impression of Mr. Potato Head.
* HeroInsurance: Mulder gets some pretty generous coverage in this one. Normally the NoHoldsBarredBeatdown he gave to Dr. Calderon would have resulted in [[WhatTheHellHero Skinner reading him the riot act]]. But since Calderon can't afford any unwanted attention from the authorities, he doesn't report it, so Mulder faces no repercussions.
* HijackedByGanon: The two silent, mysterious figures who killed Emily's adoptive parents in the previous episode are revealed to be Alien Bounty Hunters. One of them injects a serum into Emily then quietly slips back into the shadows. The other one becomes the FinalBoss.
* KillAndReplace: The Bounty Hunter does this to Dr. Calderon.
* LeeroyJenkins: Kresge is a bit too triggerhappy when confronting the Bounty Hunter, which ends about as well as you'd expect.
* MeaningfulName: Emily '''Sim''', as in ''simulation'', something artificially created.
-->'''Mulder:''' No matter how much you love this little girl, she's a miracle that was never meant to be.
* MercyKill: Scully tells Mulder that Emily doesn't deserve to live as a test subject or tool for the villains. As a result, Mulder doesn't tell Scully about the medicine he stole.
* MissionControl: The Lone Gunmen briefly serve as this while Mulder is infiltrating the convalescent home that the Colonists are using as a front for their experiments. While Frohike is the only one seen on screen, [[FreezeFrameBonus some subtle arm movement behind him]] suggests that Byers and Langly are working alongside him off camera.
* MythArc: More fallout from Scully's abduction, Bounty Hunters and Clones return, and another failed attempt to create an alien/human hybrid.
* OhCrap: [[DownplayedTrope Downplayed.]] Scully and Mulder talk about how, even though she's dead, Emily is still evidence that the villains' scheme exists. Scully then goes to Emily's coffin and opens it, to find nothing but sand.
* PapaWolf: Mulder delivers the scumbag Dr. Calderon a much-deserved beat down over what he is doing to Emily.
-->'''Mulder:''' Medical rapists! That's all you are! You don't care if that little girl dies! She's just a lab rat to you!
* ShaggyDogStory: Mulder threatens Dr. Calderon and tails him to a secret laboratory so he can steal medicine for Emily. He makes it out with the medicine, but ultimately decides to [[MercyKill let Emily die]].
* TeethClenchedTeamwork: Mulder and Kresge.
* WouldntHurtAChild: PlayedWith. Mulder deduces that the bad guys who killed Emily's adoptive parents [[IWantThemAlive need Emily alive for their experiments.]]
* YouHaveOutlivedYourUsefulness: Dr. Calderon finds himself on the receiving end of this after he inadvertently leads Mulder to the Colonists' secret lab.
-->'''Calderon:''' He came to see me. He knows I'm involved.\\
'''Bounty Hunter:''' [[YouHaveFailedMe And now you've brought him to see us]].\\
'''Calderon:''' What do you want me to tell him?\\
'''Bounty Hunter:''' [[PreMortemOneLiner Nothing]].
----
->''"Who are the men who would create a life whose only hope was to die?"''