A/N: I really don't know how to explain how this came to me, but I have a strange fondness for it.

Rest assured, this is (at least somewhat) pertinent to Wicked. It might take a bit of deep thought to connect the two, but there's no way I would publish original fiction in this section. I don't have a death wish ;).

I'd love to get some reviews to see if the message came across, but I completely understand if it was lost in translation XD.

Sunshine

"No!"

A scream broke the still, stale air in the building, the noise shrill with terror and sorrow.

"Stop!"

The woman at the table in the back sighed as one of her colleagues popped his head in the doorway. "She's screaming again," he said, wringing his hands anxiously.

"I can hear that," she said dryly. "Will you give her something?"

He sighed, entering the room fully, leaning against the frame of the door. "We've been giving her sedatives daily- sometimes more than one per day," he said. "Surely she ought to be showing some improvement?"

The woman grimaced sympathetically. "I know it's hard, Ryan, but what else are we supposed to do?"

The man known as Ryan rubbed his hand against the back of his neck, looking altogether put out. "We haven't found any family?"

"No," the woman said, shaking her head. "You know we've been looking." The scream from the other room finally died down to be replaced by heaving sobs, each puncturing the air, draining all confidence from the occupants of the room. "Now go on," she said with a frown. Interns.

Ryan nodded and re-entered the room with the sobbing woman. "Hey, Kate," he said, clucking his tongue sympathetically. "Is everything okay?"

The sobbing woman shook her head violently. "My name isn't Kate," she said simply, refusing to expand.

"You've said that almost every day, but that was the name you were admitted with," Ryan said, losing what little patience he had. "I have medicine if that'll help." He gestured to the needle in his hand.

The woman took several steps back, her blonde curls bobbing violently as she adamantly shook her head. "No medicine, please," she begged.

Ryan gave her a half-smile. "I'm sorry, Kate, but you're disturbing the other patients. Besides, we don't want you to be upset and screaming. This will help."

"It doesn't!" the woman called Kate wailed. "Please, no medicine!"

"All right!" Ryan conceded, holding his hands up in the universal sign for surrender. He put the needle down, instead pulling up two chairs. He sat in one and gestured for her to sit in the other one. "Can we talk instead?"

"I don't want to talk to you," she said haughtily.

Ryan sighed. He knew she would say that, but it was frustrating all the same. "Is there anyone you want to talk to?" he asked, hoping beyond hope that she might reveal the name of a family member. "Someone I can call, perhaps?"

"I want to talk to Elphie," she said, sniffling, all pretence of anger gone.

"I'll do my best," he said with a frown, standing up and walking over to the room he had come from. "Lisa, she wants to talk to 'Elphaba'," he said, sighing, as he plopped down into the chair across from his superior.

Lisa shook her head. "Faye's getting some tests run today. She's still really sick."

Ryan sighed yet again, rubbing his forehead in exasperation. "What do I tell her?"

As if on cue, the sobbing from the other room resumed. Lisa stretched, looking distraught. "I suppose we could let her see Faye after the testing's done for the day."

Ryan nodded gratefully. "Any idea when that'll be?"

"It should be in an hour or two. Only let them talk for a little bit, though; the doctors said she needs to sleep."

Ryan relayed the message to the distressed Kate, who calmed down long enough to thank him, hugging him around his middle, before she, with the grace of a princess, sat down in one of the chairs, staring out of the window at the cold Michigan snow despondently.

She was still sitting like that an hour later when he came to fetch her. She was shivering, he noticed, and he grabbed a blanket, embroidered with St. Mary's Mental Institution, from the cupboard and wrapped it about her shoulders like a shawl. "Are you all right, Kate?" he asked, noticing her lack of enthusiasm.

"My name isn't Kate," was her only response as she stood up, ready to see her friend.

They walked down the hallway in relative silence, the only noise a faint whispering from Kate as she mumbled under her breath. As soon as they reached the door marked 52A, her face lit up and she ran inside, the blanket dropping off of her shoulders.

Ryan watched as she slowed a few feet in front of the bed, timidity replacing excitement as she sat down in one of the chairs next to the bed. "Hi, Elphie," she whispered, absent-mindedly stroking the ties that restrained the occupant of the bed.

The woman in bed, Faye, smiled, still not opening her eyes. "Glin, is that you?"

Kate nodded excitedly, tears beginning to form in her blue eyes. "Oh, Elphaba, I missed you."

Ryan watched the scene unfold awkwardly, feeling as though he was intruding on a private moment. It was odd how attached these two women were to one another.

Kate had been a patient at the mental institution for nearly three years, now. An elderly woman dropped her off one night, telling them she couldn't take care of her any more. Apparently Kate had wandered into the woman's house, asking her for help. The woman, feeling sorry for the confused girl, had taken care of her for as long as she could. "Now it's up to you," she said before disappearing into the night. "I called her Kate."

Faye had been an even stranger case. She had simply stumbled into the institution one night, her hands covered in blood and not appearing to remember anything. She had been nearly comatose for three weeks after her admittance. The only name she would respond to was 'Faye', so the attendings adopted that as her name. She had been ill ever since she awoke, but the first time Kate had strolled by, the two of them had created a fast friendship, for some reason calling each other 'Glinda' and 'Elphaba'. It continued to this day, despite Faye's frequent memory lapses and attempts at running away.

It was ironic: they neither recognised nor knew anything that surrounded them, yet from the beginning they acted as though they were sisters.

"I'm sorry," Kate said, sobbing, drawing Ryan from his thoughts. "I should have stopped her. I didn't know she would hurt Nessa."

Faye smiled weakly. "Don't cry, my pretty."

Kate kept blubbering apologies, attempting to preen Faye's dark hair. Amidst all the tears and confusion, Lisa popped her head and the door and quietly motioned to her watch. Ryan got the message: time was up for today.

"Come on, Kate, we have to go," he mumbled, gently clutching her arm.

Kate sobbed, burying her head into the sheets on Faye's bed. "Don't leave me," she moaned; through the thick tension that had fallen in the room, Ryan wasn't sure whom she was addressing.

"It's time to go," he repeated, feeling sympathy clench at his heart.

"Who's crying?" Faye said suddenly, sitting up as best she could with the restraints around her hands and feet. "Who's there?"

"It's Glinda," Kate said suddenly, the urgent fervour clutching her voice and making it sound even more strained than usual. "It's me."

"Who?"

Oh, no. Ryan grabbed Kate's arm again, more forcefully this time. "It's time to go."