"Take Heart, Runa"

A paper plane flew up in the sea spray, and almost intercepted the path of a seagull floating on upward, heated winds across a beach, and whirled up some sand and mixed it with salty, vaporizing droplets. Children squealing and running back and forth, throwing their kites and planes in the air, as they were trying to see which could soar higher.

"It still hasn't flown out to sea!", one screamed joyfully, and ran after his paper plane. Two girls ran after him, the one girl holding on to her paper kite, which was making an attempt at tearing away from it's string. It was pinkish, but its colors were made warmer by the strong glow from the afternoon sun. "Grab it if you can!", he yelled.

They traversed a small rocky elevation, and caught up to the paper plane, where it had been caught by a small patch of dry, seaside vegetation. The boy picked it up, and inspected it carefully in the daylight, while shielding his eyes from the sunny glare from shifting, rolling waves. He ripped a small hole in it, and made a bow from the rear of one wing to the other - a spoiler of sorts, maybe to alter the aerodynamics of the plane. He threw it further along the small height they were all standing on, and they kept chasing it. "Wait up", the girl holding the kite sounded out, barely catching up with them before they were off again. She tripped in a root, but remained unharmed, and kept running.

The two who were ahead, soon got to another rocky area where there were mostly boulders. A small crab scattered away from underneath one boulder to conceal itself under another, and the seagulls shrieked out, floating and gliding on those upward gusts of wind. They soon found the paper plane again, when they turned back towards the trailing one. They giggled, and decided to hide behind one boulder. She caught up once again, and started looking for them.

The two were watching her, and shifting their position as she had been getting close to their hiding place, and they were now standing on a rocky surface that was covered with a slippery layer of algae; a fact that went unnoticed, as they were busy hiding. The boy slipped his hand into hers, as they were stepping backwards - slowly. They, suddenly, lost each other's grip.

"Guys, where are you?", the third one asked, annoyed and a bit anxious. She heard movement, followed by a scream and a loud 'thud', as if something had fallen and hit a harder object or surface.

"Emma, no! Runa, come help!", the boy shouted.

She dragged the string attached to the kite downwards to the ground, and put a medium-sized rock on it, to hold it down and keep the kite from flying away. She ran up a small hill, and there the boy was, flat on his stomach, knees and hands, looking down at something, visibly concerned.

"She slipped and fell down here", he moaned, and tried shouting at her, asking her whether she was ok or not. They heard echoes of sobbing, and cries for help, though contested by the strict, coarse summer wind around them. The hole seemed to be quite deep - too deep to climb out of by oneself, at least for Emma, they thought.

"How are you, Emma? Are you hurt?", Runa shouted, her message being carried all the way down to the unfortunate, young girl.

"No, just a couple of bruises. Please go get help!", she yelled back up to them. "It is dark here, and it smells funny", she said, equally anxious and concerned as the other two.

The two looked at each other, and knew the time was to act. "I'll go and find a grown-up - you stay here, and keep her company, ok?", Runa said, the boy surprised at her resourcefulness. "Emma, I'll be back soon! Just stay calm, like dad taught us when we learned how to snorkel", she cried down to her sister. Then she ran off to alarm someone and get help.

Soon she made it to a pale beach house, where she ran up the squeaking stairs, and tore up the thin front door, and found a man sleeping, wearing a sort of bathrobe, while sitting upright in his couch. The TV was going, showing a weather forecast.

"Uncle, wake up!", she cried, grabbing the man's arm, and shaking him violently. "Emma's fallen into a deep pit! You have to come help now!", she cried directly into his ear, as he had not moved a muscle upon her abrupt entry, or reacted at all to normally pitched speech. He kept snoring, and the weather forecast going on in the background. It predicted outside temperatures that would not be fortunate for anyone to be exposed to, and probably another full societal shut-in, which she both dreaded and got excited for at the same time. His snoring throwing odors of strong drink back in her face. She soon gave him up, and ran even faster out of his house, and up the sandy dirt road, leading up from the beach to the town where they lived.

She crossed the main road, and skipped through an opening in the fence that was standing around a small backyard, which she ran right through. She dodged a potted plant, and went through a similar opening in the fence on the other side of this backyard, and ran into a pretty normal-looking suburban house, where she found a young woman frying up some pancakes.

"Tilly, please... Come help! Emma's fallen... Into a deep hole, I think she's hurt!", she panted. The young woman stood there, and was taken aback a bit, frozen - and a voice sounded from the bathroom.

"What? What's happened?", a male voice asked. Ilai, Tilda's boyfriend, emerged.

"Come help, both of you! And bring a long rope!", she pleaded. They all went out into the hallway, and got on their shoes. Tilda opened the shed outside their house, and they grabbed a rope of what had to be a sufficient length. They ran down to the beach fast as they could. They soon got to the rocks, and found the boy, Peik, looking concerned as he could be. He waved eagerly at them, and they approached him.

"She's not responding! Do you think she's alive?", he cried hysterically.

They all shouted down to her, but no response was given. They soon decided to tie the rope around a close-by boulder, and Ilai went down the hole as fast as he could. "She's here! But she's not awake!", he said.

He was a strong, young man, and had done his fair share of climbing before, and, surely, he would have no problem with climbing a rope with extra weight on his shoulders. The sun was dimming down at this point, so they had to get her out - quickly.

"Guys! This is... Amazing! It glows in the dark!", Ilai suddenly exclaimed.

"What...", Tilda said, all three of the ones outside the hole looking at each other in pure confusion. "What glows in the dark, Il?", she asked him, bewildered.

A loud thud sounded from within the hole, similar to the one when Emma fell down.

"Il? Ilai?", Tilda said, semi-loud. "Ilai, are you ok?!", she squealed.

No answer.