The sprawl of greenery is jarring and unfamiliar, so incredibly isolated from the industrial grays and browns and oxidized coppers of the Shatterdome. The branches remind Mako fleetingly of the snaking pipes that chased the corridors with their flecked, alloyed steel, but the careful brush of a fingertip rewards her with something inherently, gratifyingly organic.

She smiles, ensnared in silent rapture.

Free of the toxic, vibrant Kaiju blues and the dour gray-black cast that always hung perpetually over the city, Mako climbs. She shoots up one of the great trunks with whip-like precision, hand over hand, darting nimbly from bough to limb as she tests each sturdy, supple handhold, and it takes no time at all to reach the top of one mammoth of a tree where she crouches, triumphant, to stare at the wind-rustled treetops with a hungry curiosity. She sears the memory of the colors and textures into her mind, so different and disparate they are from what she's come to expect of her life; the brilliant spectrum of greens and browns, the clear air, and the thick, roughened bark beneath her fingers are all surveyed with melancholy-tinged reverence.

A breeze hisses through the upper leaves, tossing up her hair. She drinks it in with a deep, slow breath - and laughs.