It's disconcerting, the sudden, spiralling growth, and her weight shifts, already-wary stance now primed for movement. But there are no grasping vines, despite the phantom throbbing in her shoulder, and the end result is...uncanny. Alien. And yet--

"It's beautiful," she says. It is, and they are, and she's far too familiar with beautiful, dangerous things to let that put her off her guard.

"You must be a very long way from home."