 In the 1990s , spec scripts were widely used in television , wherein unexperienced writers could write a teleplay for their favorite shows . The X @-@ Files had a large staff of writers , however occasionally to fill the large amount of ordered episodes per season , the staff would have to take a risk on a teleplay written by a freelance writer . " Sanguinarium " was such a case , being written by sisters Vivian Mayhew and Valerie Mayhew , their first experience with writing a one @-@ hour network program . They would later be responsible for several episodes in the television series Charmed . The sisters asked staff writers Glen Morgan and James Wong for suggestions . Morgan and Wong stated that " the scariest things are those which repeat every day " . After Vivian was paged by a number she did not know , she concluded that a pager qualified as a scary thing because an unknown person could connect with its owner . Then the Mayhews went from the pagers to a class that normally uses them , doctors , and concluded that doctors losing control and being bewitched could be a good plot . After writing the spec script , they presented them to Morgan and Wong , who suggested they change the villain from a woman to a man as " plastic surgery is related to vanity , and everyone expects that from a woman , but not a man . " The spec script written by the Mayhew sisters was chosen to become a full episode . " Sanguinarium " stands as the siblings ' only work in The X @-@ Files . 
