NEW YORK (Reuters) -- FX is preparing to unload reruns of "The X-Files," the sci-fi drama that put the cable channel on the map four years ago, to a competing cable network, Variety reports.

The deal could reap a cash bonanza of more than $200 million for the show's syndicator, Twentieth TV. Both FX and Twentieth are owned by News Corp., whose Fox broadcast network bowed "The X-Files" in 1993.

Sources said Twentieth TV is fielding offers from at least two networks, TNT and the Sci Fi Channel, to take over the remaining four years of FX's license term to "X-Files."

In one scenario, AOL Time Warner's TNT and Vivendi/USA's Sci Fi would share in the purchase of the series, which would set an industry precedent: Two networks owned by competing media conglomerates have never engineered a joint purchase of a series as high-profile as "X-Files." The various parties to these talks either declined to comment or couldn't be reached.

It's no coincidence that these negotiations are taking place less than a year after News Corp. settled a lawsuit brought by "NYPD Blue" producer Steven Bochco, who had charged that Twentieth sold the reruns to his show to FX for a bargain, thus affecting his cut of the proceeds.

The outcome of that suit was that FX, after screening reruns of "NYPD Blue" for four years, handed the show back to Twentieth, which then sold the show's repeats to TNT and Court TV for a shared $850,000 an episode -- more than double what FX had originally paid for "NYPD Blue" back in 1997. TNT and Court TV are part of the AOL Time Warner empire.

Following the "NYPD Blue" deal, representatives for "X-Files" creator-producer Chris Carter, a profit participant, made it known to Twentieth that they thought it would be worthwhile to test the marketplace, in the event that another network might be eager to pony up a bigger license fee than the $600,000 an episode being shelled out by FX for "X-Files."

Carter had reason to think "X-Files" was worth more. TNN, after all, agreed to pay $1 million an episode to its sister company Paramount TV for reruns of "Star Trek: The Next Generation" two years ago, despite the fact that TV stations had squeezed just about every drop of Nielsen decimals out of the series for more than a dozen years.

That deal came together when the economy was booming. But TNN is getting its money's worth by running "Next Generation" at 8 and 11 p.m. Monday through Thursday, and from 8 to midnight on Friday.

If TNT and Sci Fi decided to pool their resources and share "X-Files," Twentieth could collect $1 million or so per episode, reaping about $300,000 an episode more in license fees than it gets under its existing FX deal. FX pays $600,000 per episode now, and likely would ask for some sort of low-six-figure per-episode compensation for letting the series go. That's because FX could lose viewers to the competing network that gets "X-Files."

Multiplied by the show's 200 episodes, the potential $300,000 windfall would yield some $60 million in found money to News Corp. and the other profit participants.

On TV stations in weekend broadcast syndication, "X-Files" repeats have consistently ranked among the two or three highest-rated weekly series since they started in the fall of 1997.