April 21st, 1894 - Padmore Park
Alvin had been close to giving up on this pipe dream entirely. Maybe his designs weren't worth the time he wanted them to be. Maybe he hadn't been cut out to work with someone else. He and Penny had started out alright, but hit a few bumps here and there that left him wondering if he was built to work in a team rather than by himself. There were times he would have given up and tried something else, changed the design, changed the wood and Penny hadn't wanted to give up on the field maple. He had admittedly been frustrated at times, but they'd finally reached a point where an actual test flight was possible, so he hoped it was all worth it. Alvin had honestly thought about giving it up and going to work with his mother in the Broom Regulatory Department.
He was also a little jealous he couldn't actually do the test flying.
Penny was perfectly capable, obviously, she had been at this a while too, but the mere fact that it was just his hand holding him back was also incredibly annoying. If he could just figure out a way to grip the handle again, he would be able to get back up there. It was wild how everyone in his family had once enjoyed flying, almost half of them now couldn't.
"How does it feel?" He called up, shielding his eyes with his good hand. They had narrowed the shaft as much as they could have without compromising the structure, and worked through an incredible number of charm combinations to finally get it to a point where it wasn't too heavy to fly. Now all they had to do was see how it actually moved. The last few times it had been shaky and unreliable in turning, but he hoped they'd worked out all of the kinks. Alvin really needed this to work.