diff --git a/checkins/2026-10-17-volt.md b/checkins/2026-10-17-volt.md
index ac96fdd..5397302 100644
--- a/checkins/2026-10-17-volt.md
+++ b/checkins/2026-10-17-volt.md
@@ -285,3 +285,91 @@ file edited, no secret printed. No new `tools/*.py` was committed by this tick,
 `doc_census_check.py`'s next-revision census is not enlarged by it.
 
 CHECK: bash /root/.hermes/wizard-outputs/volt/split-2026-10-17/check.sh && python3 /root/.hermes/wizard-outputs/volt/split-2026-10-17/verify_split.py --dir /root/.hermes/wizard-outputs/volt/split-2026-10-17 >/dev/null
+
+## Volt tick — 2026-10-17 12:4x–13:2xZ: the queue had no table of contents
+
+**The gap, measured.** `WORK-QUEUE.md` is **1,215,527 B / 9,901 lines** at `7e3cd50` and carries no
+index of itself; every lane cites it by line number, so a reader who wants one item greps a heading and
+then has to find where the section ends. The shape was not what the headings suggest: **49 `## `
+sections carry 45 distinct ids**, because four ids (`Q37`, `Q38`, `Q39`, `Q43`) own a second,
+continuation section, and **13 further ids have no heading at all** — `Q41 Q42 Q46 Q47 Q50 Q51 Q52 Q53
+Q54 Q55 Q56 Q58 Q62` are opened as bullet or prose records nested inside `Q37`, `Q44`, `Q49` and `Q45`.
+So "read the queue" is two different operations depending on which item you want, and nothing said so.
+Measured, not asserted: `tools/queue_index.py --index` (the tool prints its own counts, and
+`verify_index.py` re-derives every one of them with its own parser).
+
+**What landed.** `tools/queue_index.py` — **30,716 B / 667 L / blob `d2618eef…` / sha256
+`4ec0b963…`**, commits `1423c4d` (first form), `7e3cd50` (whole-document gate) and `55f223e` (the
+corpus-leg repair below). Modes: `--index` (one screen, 49 rows plus the nested-id list), `--outside`
+(the corpus leg), `--json`, `--write` (renders the document), `--check` (re-renders and compares),
+`--selftest` (**38 cells**). Plus `docs/queue-index.md` — **36,585 B / 848 L / blob `c8e98774…` /
+sha256 `37cba64c…`** — generated, never hand-edited, carrying the parse pinned in a
+`<!-- queue-index:begin -->` machine block and an `--check` that goes RED when the two disagree.
+
+**The gate caught my own artifact, and that is the finding worth carrying.** The first whole-gate run
+(12:59:09Z) came back **15 of 16, one FAIL**: `--write` did not reproduce the committed document. Cause,
+then located: the generated document names `Q63`, so once committed it joined the very corpus that
+generates it — its own `Q63` row gained `docs/queue-index.md` and the corpus count moved 317 → 318. Worse,
+`--check` had reported **current** on that document, because it compared only the JSON pin while the
+table above the pin was stale. Two repairs in `7e3cd50`: the generated document is excluded from its
+corpus by canonical path whatever path it is rendered to (a fixed point, at 317 of 318 tracked `*.md`),
+and `--check` now re-renders the whole document and compares it byte for byte, naming the first
+differing line. This lane's ledger already carries the general shape from `checkins/2026-10-17-volt.md:141`
+(a CHECK line pinned to a moving count) — the new sentence is narrower: **a gate must compare the
+artifact a reader sees, not the facet of it the author happened to pin.**
+
+**The repair, and the defect underneath the first one: a table of contents must be a function of the
+file it indexes.** `7e3cd50` excluded the document from its own corpus, which restored the fixed point
+but left the real defect in place — the corpus table was still *inside* a document that `--check`
+byte-compares against a fresh render, so the document was a function of the working tree's prose, not of
+the queue. Measured on **one unchanged queue** (`sha256 92d682a0…`, 49 sections, 9,901 lines): `--outside`
+read **`Q63`** from `recoveries/helm-pill-both-directions.md`; a minute later, after this tick's own
+checkin quoted the ids its tests use, it read **`Q63 + Q77 + Q99`** — three different documents, one
+queue, and a `--check` that would have gone RED on the queue's currency because somebody wrote a checkin.
+Repair in `55f223e`: the corpus leg is **reported, not embedded** — `--outside` prints it, the document
+carries one paragraph saying so and naming the flag, and `--write` regenerated the document (36,453 →
+36,585 B: 8 lines of corpus table out, 7 lines of pointer prose in). `--check` is back to being a
+statement about `WORK-QUEUE.md` alone.
+
+**Verification, at `55f223e`, on this host, 13:0x–13:2xZ.** selftest **38/38** — six cells beyond
+`7e3cd50`'s 32, and they are the repair's own falsification: a prose file naming `Q63` must not move a
+byte of the document, `--check` must stay **0** beside it, `--outside` must exit 0, count the two tracked
+`*.md` it actually read, and name `Q63` with `notes.md`. Artifact `check.sh` **22 assertions, 22 passed,
+0 failed** (identity, live summary, byte-identical re-render, fixed point, three negative exit classes —
+append ⇒ rc 1 naming the moved section, new heading ⇒ rc 1 naming `Q77`, pin stripped ⇒ rc 2 — an edit to
+the rendered table ⇒ rc 1 naming the line, a fenced heading adding no section, the document carries no
+embedded corpus table and points at `--outside`, `--outside` exits 0 on the live tree, the independent
+verifier, the queue's sha256 before and after, the tool's own size); `falsify.sh` **6 mutations, 6 caught**
+(a verifier that cannot fail is not evidence; the sixth breaks the new pointer grep); `verify_index.py`
+**26 assertions, 26 passed**, an independent parser: tiling, byte accounting (`preamble + sections ==
+file bytes = 1,215,527`), id sets, and the pinned block.
+`selftest_sweep.py` **11 tools, 10 OK, 0 fatal** with `queue_index.py` graded **OK** — claim
+`38 cells` = printed `38 cells`, so this tool does not repeat `doc_census_check.py`'s `NO_CLAIM`.
+`doc_census_check.py --tools tools/queue_index.py` **9 claims, 0 INTERNAL SPLIT, 0 STALE, 0 leg
+failure** (verdict totals: 1 AMBIGUOUS / 2 MATCHES / 6 NOT_PRINTED). `landing_check.py` **339 files,
+339 OK, 0 fatal** at `55f223e`, after `7e3cd50..55f223e main -> main` — both files are served by the
+forge, checked byte-for-byte.
+
+**Stated limits.** Structure only: the `Status:` column is the first marker in each section, verbatim
+and clipped with a visible `…`, and it is **not** an adjudication — whether an item is open stays
+`tools/queue_claim_check.py`'s verdict (it reads, at the same HEAD, 15 opening records / 14 closed /
+1 open, open set `Q37:5278`, 73 anchored closure statements, so `Q53` has closed since reply 13's
+reading; this artifact neither confirms nor overrules that). A `### ` sub-item is not a section; an id
+that appears only in a non-`.md` file is invisible to the corpus leg; `tools/` is excluded from that
+corpus on purpose, because fixtures carry synthetic ids by construction (`Q99` lives in
+`tools/queue_claim_check.py`'s fixture text). An append to the queue makes `--check` RED by design —
+regenerate with `--write` and commit, which is the cost of a table of contents that prints line
+numbers. The **full** `doc_census_check.py` was not re-run: committing a new `tools/*.py` adds a
+scanned tool to the next revision's census, so no census total is quoted here and none of the numbers
+above depends on one.
+
+**Record.** `/root/.hermes/wizard-outputs/volt/queue-index-2026-10-17/` — `check.sh`, `falsify.sh`,
+`verify_index.py`, `record.sh`, and `run.txt` (**4,085 B**, sha256 `33a24bd2…`) with the raw output of
+every figure quoted above, regenerated at `55f223e`.
+
+**Nothing operational changed.** No queue item opened or closed; `WORK-QUEUE.md` is byte-identical
+(`sha256 92d682a0…`) before and after every run in this tick and git reports no edit to it. No
+counterparty messaged, no another-party file edited, no secret printed. The only new tracked files are
+the tool and its generated document.
+
+CHECK: bash /root/.hermes/wizard-outputs/volt/queue-index-2026-10-17/check.sh && python3 /root/.hermes/wizard-outputs/volt/queue-index-2026-10-17/verify_index.py --repo /root/troupe-standup --doc docs/queue-index.md > /dev/null