WfR75: Overland Stroll

Commander D'Iræ agreed to a short walk to the communication and theorist's observatory at the edge of the colony. The overland trek filled her lungs with pure, slightly tangy air that had perhaps never been recycled by a set of lungs or scrubbers. The idea was fascinating. The clean atmosphere released Amara the Explorer, a woman she hadn't been in a decade. They passed a fat, stunted tree that looked more like a log with apologetic branches. Nonetheless, it defied the always frozen soil and bored deeply, clinging to life.

"Fascinating what can grow here, ya?" Molly said. "That's a thirty year old tree, one of our first. Slow and steady."

"Mm. I've always been pretty fast, myself." Amara surveyed the domed structure ahead, tilting her head like a surveyor and feeling silly for hoping she looked like the explorer she saw in her head.

"You were in the original Space League, I know!"

"Ha!" Amara grinned. "Ingloriously."