(That's a figure of speech referring to cowardice.)

It gets brighter. The chairs and tables in the dining hall are rearranged. The wargaming group cancels a session for 'mighty mouse' despite there being no signs of any mice. Someone wearing a fairly unimpressive vine garland says that Blai can also have one if he wants, since they're cleaning out the greenhouse.

Blai would like to know what a mighty mouse is (does "mighty" mean "dire", for example). He does not need a garland.

"'Mighty mouse' is our spring cleaning – we call the usual shared cleaning tasks 'house mouse' and then this is, I guess, more metaphorical mouse. The summer crew is larger and busier so it's good to have things in good order before they arrive."

"Oh, I see. I still don't have Prestidigitation working in that application, is there something I should do anyway?"

"If you're up for hanging around while I clean that helps some. If you'd like to join in we can have you, uh, move furniture and mop floors, that's probably straightforward and not too hard to learn. We'll manage without you if you'd rather not, though. Soon we'll be re-smoothing the skiway and that's going to involve volunteers placing a bunch of flags along over 2 miles of ice, if you'd like to join in on that or give people Endure Elements for it that would be much appreciated."

"I can place flags and do Endures. I don't see how it would be helpful to loiter while you clean, so much as - merely not diverting you entirely from it."

"The default plan is, I think, to divert me entirely."

"Well, I can improve on that, then, and move furniture too."

"Sounds like a plan."

Plenty of furniture involves metal even when one could imagine perfectly good furniture of the type being made out of wood except for a few screws. A lot of it folds.

Kevin's cleaning tasks seem to also involve organizing collections of miscellaneous items and using a loud device that removes dust from the floor by unclear means.

Folding furniture is interesting! The loud device is abstractly interesting but mostly loud.

It's good that furniture is interesting because there's a lot of it.

Also, placing flags is cold (less so with Endures) and there are specific placement rules.

He is competent to go out in the cold and follow rules there. It is among the things he is most competent to do.

Nobody else here has quite as much experience with it as he does, but there are no significant incentives to place flags incorrectly, so the parts of the task not done by Blai still go smoothly.

Great. Anything else need doing outside while they've got Endures?

Yes, but not by Blai.

Fair enough. He will go back in then.

The sun continues to rise, but the overcast weather makes it less dramatic than it could be.

The first flight that briefly stops at the base is going to be any week now, depending on weather conditions.

Maybe tomorrow! …or not.

Does Blai have any way of forecasting or controlling the weather? Does he want to see the plane? The first flight isn't going to take passengers out but it might be nice to see an airplane before flying in one.

That's very considerate, he would like to see the plane. He does not have a way to get useful amounts of information on the weather affecting the plane.

After multiple cancellations there is: A plane!

It's red with black accents and a white underside, and has skis instead of feet. It's plausibly around the size of an old or ancient dragon. If Blai stood on top of it in the center a channel could reach from the nose to the tail and only barely miss the wingtips.

It comes in fast and needs nearly the entire length of ice road that Blai helped with flags for to come to a stop.

An impressive beast. ...machine.

People do come out of it from a door that would be kind of weird for a beast to have.

"We can stick around for refueling and takeoff if you like or just head in now, your call."

"I would like to watch it take off."

"Got it."