They stay in the bunker “recovering” for 2 weeks, and agree to tell the leaders what they want to hear in order to get outside again. Luckily they are needed for a long distance project, to go fix some broken communication lines. Freak Blizzards are becoming more common and dangerous, and now that the community is more trustworthy of Ilyas, they figure Einar and Ilyas would be the best people to send on the job. Sending out lower runners is becoming more fatal and scout guidelines have become more strict.
Dean is not approved for the "field work", but eventually persuades the leaders as well as her parents to let her go, she has a high body temperature, and is more savvy in tech than Einar or Ilyas, plus, she wants to help the community in place of the scouts that can no longer go outside.
The three of them leave the following day. The trip is expected to take 3 weeks, one week to get there, one to get back, and a third week for repairing the lines as well as extra travel time if they need to hunker down for a freak storm.