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They cross the rise and the valley is sprawled out before them, light breaking through the cloudy day in streaks across the leaves of the...Kaidan feels comfortable calling them trees; pale, thick trunks slender and stabbing into the air. The leaves are golden, here, so maybe it's not chlorophyll. He's going to call this as the source of the pollen that's so thick they've been advised to keep their armor sealed, even thought the atmosphere would be breathable otherwise.
It looks...familiar. Maybe he's thinking of aspen groves but it's not quite...
Williams has popped her head out of the roof of the MAKO. "Looks like an elfwood, like Lorien." There's a laugh in her voice, delighted by the pretty view.
"Yeah, that's it-couldn't place it."
His commander isn't quite so poetic as she climbs out. "Be a bitch to drive through, though. Better go on foot from here."
They're only a couple of clicks from the pyramid they located in the flyby, and while the MAKO would be destructive, there's enough space between the trunks that they've got an easy hike, footprints muffled by a thick layer of moss. No leaves, though.
He gives into his curiosity, and scrapes back a layer of the silver blue fuzz of growth to find a layer of decayed leaves. Ash nudges him with a smirk - "Like an elfwood, not *actually,* LT."
"Wishful thinking," he chuckles.
Some local fauna chitters at them like squirrels from the branches as they pass, not pyjaks but maybe the big insectoid things that he'd seen in the briefing that looked like a crayfish had had illicit relations with a hedgehog. And just ahead of them, Shepard has paused to check her omni and as they step up behind her, she lays her hand, fingertips really, against one pale trunk. Up close, he can see the bark is in nearly translucent layers of silver grey and white. There's something weirdly delicate about her touch. And she's been quiet, like she gets sometimes when he and Ashley are talking.
"Commander?"
"Hmm?" She turns to look at him, he can just see the way her eyebrows are lifted behind her clear visor. "Oh, just reminded me a little of something I'd forgotten about."
"Storybooks for you, too, Skipper?" Ash's question is light but he knows she's just as curious as he is about the things Shepard seems to avoid.
Shepard's snort breaks the moment. "No." And then she pauses, shrugs. "Just we had some trees back where I was little. Sycamores, says the 'net, with the white trunks. Big ol' leaves, though."
And her voice, just for a few words, shifts from the low, crisp tone to something slower, softer. Like warm syrup from a ladle.
"Alright, let's go. Got to get that reading and get back." And it's over.
Ash jostles his elbow as she hustles to keep up with Shepard's efficient stride and breaks him out of the spell.