"Kinara!" Adrin called, "look at Andere's tree!"
I looked in the direction he was pointing. There was a huge chunk of soil completely gone from the side that hung over the 4-foot ledge. There was a half a boot print where the soil collapsed. I took a closer look at the boot print. "The girl was definitely here," I said to Adrin "It looks like her foot prints are coming from the south. She probably saw the tree, stepped on the hollow soil and fell down the ledge." I jumped off the ledge landing on the mushy soil. Adrin followed. "Look! more foot prints!" He exclaimed. He was right, they were the same foot prints from on top of the ledge!
At the edge of the forest we saw a pair of boots that matched the boot prints by the tree. I picked them up, she'll probably need these when she is discharged. I thought.
We followed the footprints onto the beach. "She started running around here," I pointed out. Her footsteps look unsteady, I thought.
"but her fo-", "look at that orange thing floating in the water!" I exclaimed interrupting Adrin mid-sentence. "Maybe it might tell us who the girl is." He stopped, looked up, then ran into the water.
"what are you doing!" I yelled after him.
"Testing out a theory!" He yelled back wading deeper into the water. Suddenly, he flopped back and floated on his back, his wet midnight black hair covered his eyes.
"Adrin! This is not the time to be relaxing! What does this have to do with the girl or Andere?" I fumed.
Adrin started to drift away from the shore faster than he should. I looked down, the footprints had curved and ran straight into the water. I guess he realized the footprints were going into the water, I thought.
Adrin drifted for a while but then stopped suddenly. He was right in front of the orange object we saw earlier. He grabbed it then swam parallel to the beach.
"Actually! What are you doing?" I asked again.
"I'll explain when I'm on shore!" He shouted while he treaded water.
He swam to the place where we found Andere and crawled out of the water. He put the orange object which turned out to be Andere's lava coloured ball on the sand where I could still see the imprint of where Andere was laying. Abruptly, he stood up, then fell backward into the water, exactly where the girl was floating.
I ran up to him. "So now that you've had your leisurely afternoon swim, fully clothed might I add. Are you going to take a time out to explain yourself?" I remarked kicking sand up harshly.
Adrin muttered something.
"What?" I asked him
"I Figured it out!" He exclaimed splashing as he got up.
"You see Kinara, this is the sequence of events. The girl walked from somewhere in the south forest to the capital probably a far distance judging by the footprints by Andere's tree." He started pacing, I swore I could hear his brain ticking. "After She fell off the ledge, she walked towards the light shining through the trees then saw something or maybe someone, maybe Andere in the process of being pulled down by a surge!"
I gasped, "how do you know it was a surge?"
"Simple, when I went to get the ball, I felt something trying to pull me, so I laid in my back and rode it to the ball. I also found this!" Adrin beamed pulling a black ribbon out of his pocket. "This is probably the mystery girl's ribbon."
"Anyways she pulls Andere out of the water and then loses her consciousness and lands in the water." He added. "That means," he paused. "She just saved Andere's life!" We both exclaimed in unison. "We should go tell your sister before she goes airhead on us!" I yelled already running back to the hospital.
"I'm with you on that one!" Adrin agreed running behind me.