Andrew hurriedly made her way out of town, continually glancing back over her shoulder to make sure this Fritz guy wasn't following her. She realized she was probably over-reacting, but the last thing she needed right now was some guy mooning after her. She made her way out onto the plains, where she intended to figure out how to fly.
She took a few minutes to re-examine her wings and make some attempts at stretching; she'd had never been the athletic type, but she remembered that much from P.E., and getting cramps several hundred feet off the ground was definitely something she wanted to avoid. After getting limbered up, Andrew shifted her satchel to hang straight down in front of her, leaped off the ground, and beat her wings downward.
This wasn't a complete failure; she did rise a couple feet further, but she didn't have nearly enough lift for a vertical takeoff, and she dropped back to the ground, just managing to keep her balance. All right, then, if she couldn't take off like a Harrier, she'd have to do it like a Cessna. Andrew angled herself almost parallel to the ground, tilted her wings slightly upwards, and took off running.
This worked much better, and it wasn't long at all before she took one short leap off the ground and was airborne. Flight was both exhilarating and liberating; not that walking was difficult or anything, but compared to flying it was like slogging through knee-deep water. She soared over the grassy meadows, taking in the whole scenery around her. Off in the distance she could see the first of the increasingly larger towns, but between her and it lay a fairly sizeable forest, and she was getting a bit winded; she'd have to practice to build up her stamina for flight.
As she approached the edge of the woods, Andrew swooped down almost to ground level. Her feet hit the ground and she almost tripped, but she managed to break into a run and gradually slowed to a stop, aided by tilting her wings backwards to serve as air brakes. She walked a little further, almost to the treeline, and sat down to rest a bit.
It was now about three o'clock, to judge by the sun, and Andrew was feeling pretty tired. Flying had been much more enjoyable than she'd expected, but her flight, plus the long hike that morning, had left her almost completely exhausted, to the point where she wondered if she would be able to make it over the forest that day. She was so tired, in fact, that she didn't notice a lone figure lurking just behind the treeline...