By joan the english chick
Part 1: Misanthropist's Heaven

Disclaimer: Mulder, Scully, and any other characters you recognize are property of 10-13 Productions and 20th Century Fox, and are used without permission. No copyright infringement is intended. This story is property of the author, namely me, and may not be reproduced, retransmitted, or posted anywhere without my expressed permission.
Additionally, Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte is not mine and is used without permission.

For once, Scully was awake when Mulder called.

It was late, but not too late, at night, and Scully was sitting in bed with a box of tissues rereading Wuthering Heights. She had just gotten to the part where a love- and grief-crazed Heathcliff forces the second Cathy to marry his son, when the phone rang. Sighing, Scully closed the book around her finger as she reached for the phone with her other hand.

"At least you didn't wait till I was asleep," she said.

"Scully, I've been thinking," Mulder said, as if they were in the middle of a conversation rather than just beginning one. "I'm not so sure there was really anything in those briefcases."

"But Mulder, if that's true, why was the murderer so anxious to get hold of them?"

"Probably to throw us off track."

"You think he killed four people and cut out their tongues, and then took their briefcases just to throw us off track?"

"I wouldn't put it past him. The stupid briefcases were probably full of rice or something."

"Imported Japanese rice that gives you superpowers if you eat it?"

"No, Scully," he said patiently, "just plain rice. Or paperwork, peanut butter sandwiches, I don't know. The point is, we still haven't found any answers."

"Let me get this clear, Mulder. You called me up at ten-thirty at night to tell me we still don't know anything."

"Okay, you don't have to get all annoyed," he said petulantly. Scully could just picture the mock-hurt expression on his face. "I just think we should start looking in another direction."

"Great idea Mulder. We'll discuss it at the office in the morning, once I get the autopsy reports."

"I can take a hint, Scully."

"Really?" she yawned. "Prove it."

The phone clicked in her ear. Dial tone.

Scully stared at the dead receiver for a moment, first incredulous, then slightly pissed off, then resigned. She laughed sardonically, shoved aside her book, flicked off the lamp and laid her head on the pillow.

...An eerie tapping at the window woke her, and she rolled over, thinking it was branches blown by the storm, but it was a hand tapping tapping tapping - a small white child's hand, wet with rain, grimy, scratched by branches.

Suddenly the window broke and the hand was reaching for her hair. A plaintive voice sobbed, "Let me in - let me in!" Scully seized the small wrist and cried, "Who are you? What do you want? Who are you?"

"Samantha," a small voice whispered. "Samantha Mulder. Samantha Scully. Ssssssamantha......" It was dark, too dark. Scully peered desperately at the face, which was abruptly illuminated by a flash of lightning. But the features were those of an Eve-child. Scully cried out and released the hand.

"No! I'll never let you in, not if you beg for twenty years!"

"It's twenty years," mourned the voice, "twenty years, I've been an alien for twenty years!" Slowly the child-image began to fade away.....

...with no perceptible movement Scully found herself suddenly in a church, in the aisle, staring at rows of expectant faces. Looking down in horror, she found that she was wearing a long white gown and clutching a bunch of flowers. Her feet moved of their own accord, carrying her toward the altar where she could see a priest waiting - and Walter Skinner, looking nervous and anxious and excited in his tuxedo.

"No!" Scully tried to exclaim, but nothing came from her lips....

...and she was in a bedroom, clutching at one of the carven posts of a four-poster bed, gasping with emotion as Mulder clutched her, showering kisses across her face. He fell to his knees and she rebuked him.

"You and Skinner have broken my heart, Mulder! And you both come to bewail the deed to me, as if you were the people to be pitied!" Her hand flew instinctively to the spot at the back of her neck....

"Don't torture me till I'm as mad as yourself," Mulder begged, drawing a long evil cackle from the corner of the room.

"Mad, you're all mad," hissed Cancerman, laughing at them as they clutched each other. He strode to the door and flung it open, letting in Skinner. Scully swooned in Mulder's arms. He scooped her up and thrust her into Skinner's grasp.

"Unless you be a fiend, help her first!" Mulder growled, and flung himself out the door. Distantly, Scully could see him stumbling across moors and marshes, battered by wind and rain, faintly calling her name.

"The child is doomed as well," Cancerman said cryptically, coming forward to lay a hand on Scully's stomach. She shoved his hand aside violently, and the motion woke her up.....

Scully broke out of the dream, gasping and sweaty. She sat up, clutching the comforter around her body, breathing deeply until her pulse slowed. She pawed around in the covers until she found the book, age-battered and somewhat the worse for having been slept on. In the dark she ruffled through its pages for a moment, still gripped in the icy desperate clutch of the dream. Then she gave a snort of disgust, hurled the book across the room and went back to sleep.