so this is a story i thought of while sitting in my APES class. I thought it was different from my usual tales. Anyway, i wrote it out and i like it, so please, tell me what you think! :D i'm dying for 11/4! but still GO GIANTS!

Summary: ten-year-old Olive and Nick enjoy the sun for the first time in a long time

Warnings: K+. pretty dark stuff.

Disclaimers: no inFRINGEment intended :)

April 2, 1990

The sun came out today. Since there is rarely any sun left anymore, they were all let out to play in the large recess yard. The yard of the testing facility looks just like a schoolyard; tire swings and tall artificial trees, a play structure with a hovering elevation disk, and turf field for games like capture the flag and football. And finally a large fake sand box, configured and programmed to look like an ancient Mexican beach complete with pearly white grains of sand and soft realistic waves. To any small child, the place looked perfect. And to them, it did.

Ten-year-old Olive ran from the doors of her testing wing and straight for the monkey bars on the play structure. Her long blonde locks were twisted into a braid that ran down the back of her black smock dress that she wore. She was the fastest of all the testing subjects let out at that time, and it had been noted well before. She smiled as she touched the monkey bars first, swinging up onto the top of them with almost cat like movements. She had already forgotten the side effects the drugs left in her ten-year-old body as she smiles down at her other ten-year-old companion, Nick.

Nick was a scraggly boy, thin and lean for his age of ten, with small bony bird-like wrists and arms. He reached the monkey bars second, but nowhere near the pace that Olivia had set. She was smiling down at Nick from her perch when he reached her. He swung up and grasped the bars, feet dangling over the open pit and swinging back and forth from the bars.

"Olive look," Nick said, swinging up so his knees rested in the crook of the bars and he hung upside down. His hair hung down toward the ground and he smiled, a toothy grin. He had lost his front tooth last night.

Olivia giggled, her little girl giggle and swung down to match his hanging style. Her braid whipped out behind her and nearly touched the ground. By now the other children in their test wing had caught up with them and where playing around. The rarity of the sun and natural supply of Vitamin D felt appealing to their skin and moods and the sharp eyed scientists watched from the stoop of the wing, flat writers on and fingers pressing away at the electronic keys. They observe the children from a distance as if they want to capture what they would be like having been raised as children and not as the test subjects they were.

Olivia swung from the bars with Nick and, after having done so for a while, they began a rousing game of tag with many other children joining in. Olivia seemed to be the leader of the game and she flitted away like a butterfly each time a child neared her to tag her. One scientist noted this and put it in her folder in the system, under aspiring qualities. It was proof that even while the subjects played, they were observed.

Twelve-year-old Peter Bishop watched from the window of his testing room as the children outside played. He had been at work for hours in the physical therapy room, conditioning his body with the large trainer that worked there. Behind the mirrored wall there was another scientist taking the measurements from the wires on his head and from the nano-chips that littered his bloodstream. He wagered that his father was back there too, but Peter would never acknowledge the man as his father. Peter looked back out the window at the children playing and longed to play as well.

"I want to go out," Peter declared, his voice demanding and loud. The trainer looked over to the window.

"No," the PA system said, "Not today."

Peter turned back to the room. He was not about to go through another round of physical therapy.

"I'm done in here then," he said simply, heading for the door. It was no surprise to find it locked. He walked over to the window and stared into the mirror intently, looking through his reflection to find a scientist on the other side.

"Son," the PA announced, the voice of his father. Peter tried not to shudder. He looked into the glass harder.

"I am going to go outside. The sun hasn't been here for a long time."

"Let him out," came his father's voice. Peter immediately was relieved at the thought he was heading outside for some interaction but then felt suspicious about it. What game was his father playing now? He saw the door open and a red haired woman was waiting to take him down the stairs and out into the sunshine.

For the first time that Peter can remember he rode in the elevator of the center. It was an unusual elevator, one that both went down and went to the side. He didn't question the ways it could, only stared at the powder white walls before it abruptly came to a halt on the ground floor. Te doors swung open and Peter could smell the fresh air wafting in from outside. The woman stepped off and he followed, walking at a pace behind her. She pushed open the doors and stepped aside to let him into the warm, natural light.

Olivia ran freely in the sun, twisting away from a girl with blonde hair's grasp. She wound between two trees and turned around, out running the girl by a length. The girl, frustrated that she could not catch Olive, ran back and tagged a boy that Olivia had never seen before.

"You're IT!" the girl screeched happily and scampered off. She hadn't noticed the game stopped. All the children stared at the boy in wonder. They had never seen him before. Who was he?

"Can I play?" he asked gently, "I'm already it."

Nick looked at Olive and shrugged. "Okay," he said, before darting off at full speed. The boy started after a girl with curly brown hair and she ran up the stairs of the play structure.

"This is base," the girl said with a smile. Peter stopped and frowned.

"I didn't know there was a base," he answered. "I'm Peter."

"I'm angelica," she answered with a blush. The scientists noted this. Peter smiled ear-to-ear and nodded before running off after another boy with thick black hair. Once he had danced away and onto base, Peter set his eyes on a blonde girl with a long braid, snickering with the boy that told him he could play. The girl giggled and nudged the boy, but Peter set off after the blonde, who was much faster than the other children he chased.

Olive ran around the trees and ducked behind the sandbox with Peter hot on her tail. He would reach out to tag her but she skirted away faster than he could catch her. Suddenly he devised a plan. He chased her at top speed, following her around as she fled even faster. He knew, somewhere in his mind, that she would slow after getting winded. And pretty soon, after their third lap between the trees, she began to slow and was almost in reach. In one more stride he caught up to her and tagged her back before slamming on the breaks to begin going the other way. But she was much faster and she had tagged him back on the arm, and he caught her wrist in his hand.

"Hey," she said with a grin, "That's holding!"

"Tag backs aren't fair!" Peter protested with mirth in his glance.

"Why?" she said with wide innocent eyes, "Can't catch me?"

"I'm Peter," he answered instead, holding out his hand once he'd dropped hers. Olivia giggled.

"Olive," she answered, shaking his hand in a grin. She tagged him roughly and ran off, already two steps ahead of the twelve-year-old Peter. He smiled and ran off after her.

The scientists noted this.

reviews, anyone? They're like comfort food for a writer :D