diff --git a/frontend/packages/dashboard/src/app.js b/frontend/packages/dashboard/src/app.js
index d2d8d93..88f056e 100644
--- a/frontend/packages/dashboard/src/app.js
+++ b/frontend/packages/dashboard/src/app.js
@@ -535,6 +535,34 @@ window.marked = marked;
   function applyRebuildQueueChanged(ev) {
     rebuildQueueState = (ev.queue || []).slice();
     renderRebuildQueueFromState();
+    // Container cards surface in-flight rebuild / meta-update ops as
+    // a "building..." badge (#398) — re-render the SW4RM tab so
+    // newly-queued / newly-running ops light up the right card,
+    // and finished ops fall back to the regular state badges.
+    renderContainersFromState();
+  }
+  // Map from agent name → highest-priority in-flight queue entry
+  // (`running` beats `queued`). Used by the container row renderer
+  // to surface "building..." / "meta-updating..." badges on the
+  // SW4RM tab when an op is still in the rebuild queue but no
+  // operator-initiated transient is set (#398).
+  function inFlightOpsByAgent() {
+    const out = new Map();
+    for (const e of rebuildQueueState) {
+      if (e.state !== 'queued' && e.state !== 'running') continue;
+      // spawn ops target an agent that doesn't exist yet as a
+      // container — the transient store already drives the
+      // pending row for that case. Skip here to avoid double-
+      // surfacing if the spawn op happens to land in the queue
+      // while the row exists transiently.
+      if (e.kind === 'spawn') continue;
+      const cur = out.get(e.agent);
+      // Prefer running over queued; otherwise keep the first match.
+      if (!cur || (cur.state === 'queued' && e.state === 'running')) {
+        out.set(e.agent, e);
+      }
+    }
+    return out;
   }
   function renderRebuildQueueFromState() {
     renderRebuildQueue({ rebuild_queue: rebuildQueueState });
@@ -729,13 +757,32 @@ window.marked = marked;
     const hostname = (s && s.hostname) || window.location.hostname;
     const ul = el('ul', { class: 'containers' });
     const tree = buildAgentTree(containers);
+    // In-flight rebuild / meta-update / destroy ops per agent name.
+    // Surface them as "building..." style badges on the container
+    // card when no operator-initiated transient already covers the
+    // row (#398). Mara: the SW4RM tab showed an agent as stopped
+    // while SYST3M showed an active rebuild; cross-reference fixes
+    // that.
+    const inFlight = inFlightOpsByAgent();
     for (const node of tree) {
       const c = node.container;
       const url = `http://${hostname}:${c.port}/`;
-      // Pending state is overlaid from the transient store, not from
-      // the container row — `ContainerStateChanged` doesn't carry it,
-      // `TransientSet` / `TransientCleared` do.
-      const pending = transientsState.get(c.name)?.kind || null;
+      // Pending state is overlaid from the transient store first
+      // (operator-initiated spawn/destroy/rebuild — covers the
+      // create+start window where the container literally isn't up
+      // yet), then from the rebuild_queue (#398 — covers in-flight
+      // ops the worker is running even if no transient was set).
+      // `ContainerStateChanged` doesn't carry either signal.
+      const transientKind = transientsState.get(c.name)?.kind || null;
+      const op = !transientKind ? inFlight.get(c.name) : null;
+      const pending = transientKind
+        || (op && (op.state === 'running'
+              ? (op.kind === 'meta_update' ? 'meta-updating'
+                  : op.kind === 'destroy'  ? 'destroying'
+                  : 'rebuilding')
+              : (op.kind === 'meta_update' ? 'meta-update queued'
+                  : op.kind === 'destroy'  ? 'destroy queued'
+                  : 'rebuild queued')));
       const li = el('li', { class: 'container-row' + (pending ? ' pending' : '') });
       // Topology: depth contributes left-padding; the glyph string in
       // the .tree-prefix span draws the ├─ / └─ joint + continuation