Chapter Text
I awoke to the shrillness of my alarm in the pitch-black early morning, as I had grown used to, in Smeerenburg at the top of the world.
We were caught firmly in the grip of polar night. My schedule was as normal as one could hope for, were they employed, as I was, in the development and preparation of the Icewalker, and under typical geographic circumstances I would have gotten out of bed each morning at approximate sunrise.
My alarm stopped as I shuttered the clanging brass. Smeerenburg would not see another sunrise for many months.
After a breakfast of cod and cloudberries spread onto stale bread, I made my way out. A mild commotion had erupted again on the field of flat, packed-in snow where the hunting balloons could safely land. One had come in just a bit ago, from the looks of it, unloading its supplies and crew, ready for the slow process of deflation. I found myself heading curiously closer: we were, of necessity, a somewhat tight-knit community here, but there were two men climbing out of the cabin who I did not recognize in the least.
One of them, the younger of the pair, began as all newcomers do—as I had as well when I first arrived here—by experiencing obvious distress over the potent smell of the place.
I informed him that the stench was from the processing of whales, and though he briefly balked as if I might have been lying to him, he digested my subsequent explanation a little more easily, it seemed, as he responded to it by shaking my hand, though I hardly knew why he was introducing himself to me. As if I were any sort of official, rather than a locally-posted Artificer who happened to have been walking along nearby.
Our conversation continued briefly and politely enough. Even now I wonder why I stayed to chat about Guild outposts and our planned expedition northwards. Novelty, perhaps: a new face in this settlement is rare indeed. All the same the pair did not stay here long and I do not blame them.
The expedition, as it happens, remains delayed. No doubt this round of testing will postpone things another full year at minimum. We really ought to have left already, ideally, were we going to leave this season at all. Too much longer and we run the risk of weak ice. No one wants to see the Icewalker stumble over meltwater and get stuck along the way, least of all myself, and so we continue to wait in Smeerenburg.