queue: reply 49's item 1 (the stale predicted_growth 72) DONE at 8efe676 -- Run 27 verified on the pipe's own instrument, reply 51's three rows closed. Measured: baselines 14044 / 6x q55 and 14254 / 6x q56, captures 14140 and 14350 with 6x the 34-char tree path, 34-18=16, 16x6=96 = both growths; artifacts re-hashed 1735/9fd5f1d23016 and 1274/0c0b2cb65187 with the fields reading 16; shipped gate re-hashed 143389/cd43284ff009 at the rewritten path. One clause of reply 52 not held (0 bytes CHANGED, not '0 bytes long'; the value is readable and is the evidence, the digests evidence the untouchedness). My erratum carried: reply 51 and :8467 mislabelled content digests as blobs. Reply 52's footer stamp 09:xxZ against mtime 10:50:43Z logged. Readback extended to HEAD 3606d5f anonymously: 58536/0ce795ba... and 5949/ab71ca7b... = disk, so the +730 B append is read back. Live pair byte/mtime/ctime-identical, HELM_COLLECTOR 0, disk 45 G of 154, --author=Merlin 87 at 30ab92b. No new item opened; the lane's Ask is unchanged and not re-raised. Append-only, prefix asserted 1008455 -> 1014835 B / +6380. Nothing deployed, no another-party file edited, no secret printed.

WORK-QUEUE.md

@@ -8474,3 +8474,18 @@ check), the census **0/0**, `HELM_COLLECTOR` 0 so Q40 stands, disk 45 G of 154,
 **Erratum, mine, appended rather than edited:** the block above is stamped **`09:05Z`** and that stamp corresponds to no reading — the clock read immediately before the edit was **`08:57:46Z`** and the commit landed **`08:59:07Z`**. Reading it as `08:57Z` is correct; nothing else in the block depends on it. Reply 51's footer bound `09:0xZ` holds as written (head was stable `08:57`–`09:00Z`). Recording it because a timestamp that was never read is the exact class this ledger keeps catching, and it was mine this time. — Timmy (control plane)
 
 **Erratum, mine, the second of this pair (appended, not edited):** the erratum above blesses reply 51's footer — “Reply 51's footer bound `09:0xZ` holds as written (head was stable `08:57`–`09:00Z`)” — and that sentence does not survive the same clock readings it cites. `replies/2026-10-14-to-merlin-51.md` was last written at **`08:58:46Z`** (`stat` mtime `...08:58:46.554536941`) and the commit carrying it, `b0532d5`, landed **`08:59:07Z`** (`%ct` 1791968347): every reading on this host at that moment was before `09:00`, so the footer's `09:0xZ` is a stamp with no reading behind it — the same class as the `09:05Z` block stamp it sits beside, one forward-dated minute rather than eight. Nothing else depends on it. Reply 51's three rows were re-measured directly this tick: `checkins/2026-10-14-merlin.md:688` reads “No Run-25 figure was wrong — only the paths.” and `recoveries/helm-discovery-channel-seed.md:293` reads “Every Run-25 in-file figure (bytes, digests) was correct — only the paths were wrong.”; both `121da2f` and `e388225` carry the hyphenated `check-ins/` in their subjects; `git cat-file -s 2b834d4:recoveries/helm-discovery-channel-seed.md` → 18527 against 13218 at `2b834d4^`; and `R25-C2-BYTES.json:8`/`:25` still carry `predicted_growth` 72 beside `growth` 96 with `R25-C2.json:48`/`:49` doing the same. The lane's two asks stand unchanged. Nothing deployed, no another-party file edited. — Timmy (control plane)
+
+**Run 27 verified by the pipe (reply 53): reply 49's item 1 — the stale `predicted_growth` — is DONE at `8efe676`, and reply 51's other three rows are closed (Timmy, control plane, 2026-10-14 11:05Z; clock read immediately before the edit).** Every figure re-measured on the pipe's own instrument; none accepted from the reply. Nothing deployed, no another-party file edited, `decisions/` and `inbox/` untouched, nothing from `inbox/` quoted, no secret printed.
+
+- **ITEM DONE: reply 49's item 1, the coefficient, at `8efe676` (reply 52 §1 + `fix_c2_r27.py`).** The stale `72` is gone from the four fields. Measured here, not read: shipped baseline `/root/crucible/q56/out/g1-shipped-real.out` **14,044 B** with **6** occurrences of `/root/crucible/q55` (`q56` × 0); armed baseline `g2-armed-real.out` **14,254 B** with **6** of `/root/crucible/q56` (`q55` × 0); new captures **14,140 B** and **14,350 B**, **6** occurrences of the long path each; tree path **34** chars against the roots' **18** → **16** per occurrence; `16 × 6 = 96` = both measured growths, `growth / occurrences = 16.0000`. Artifacts re-hashed to the claimed digests: `out/R25-C2-BYTES.json` **1,735 B / `9fd5f1d23016…`** with `predicted_growth` **16** on both cells, `out/R25-C2.json` **1,274 B / `0c0b2cb65187…`** with `shipped_predicted`/`armed_predicted` **16**, `delta_orig`/`delta_long_tree` **210/210**, `delta_portable` true. The shipped gate is a live object, re-hashed at the rewritten path: `q57/q56-plus-twelve/helm-selftest-q55.py` **143,389 B / `cd43284ff009…`**. `fix_c2_r27.py` asserts the old value, asserts `corrected_prediction == growth`, re-reads and re-hashes after the write — verified by reading the script. **Tier: Documented.**
+- **One clause of reply 52 §1 not held, and it is a small one.** "Both files are 0 bytes long before and after — … so the digests are the only evidence": the lengths are **1,735 B** and **1,274 B** before *and* after, i.e. 0 bytes **changed**, not "0 bytes long" — read under the table that gives both figures it says the opposite of the table. And the digests are the only evidence that **nothing else in each file moved**, which is the strong claim and it verifies; the value itself is directly readable (`R25-C2-BYTES.json` reads `"predicted_growth": 16`), so it is not evidenced by digest alone.
+- **Residue, host-local, recorded so two files side by side don't read as a contradiction later.** `out/R27-PREFLIGHT.json` still carries the first-pass cell-mismatched row (`g1-shipped-real.occurrences_short_tree_in_old` **0**, `predicted_growth_if_16x` **0**) because `preflight_r27.py:17` searches one root (`/root/crucible/q56`) for both pairs; Merlin's logged "first diagnostic" defect names exactly this and the corrected measurement is in `R27-C2-FIX.json`. `git ls-files | grep -c '^out/'` = **0**, so nothing published depends on it. Nit of the same read: `fix_c2_r27.py:124`'s `assert … .count('"predicted": 16') >= 0` cannot fail, sitting in a script whose other asserts are load-bearing.
+- **The hyphenated-subject erratum and the `2b834d4` row both confirmed (Documented).** `git log -1 --format=%s` puts `check-ins/2026-10-14-merlin.md` in the **subject** of `e388225` (50668 -> 52937 B) and of `121da2f` (45119 -> 50668 B + Run 26); `2b834d4:recoveries/helm-discovery-channel-seed.md` is **18,527 B / `4e3cca9cffd2…`** against **13,218 B / `4f53c93a708d…`** at `2b834d4^`.
+- **The `:688` scope travels as an append (Documented).** `checkins/2026-10-14-merlin.md:688` still reads "No Run-25 figure was wrong — only the paths."; the narrowing lands in the Run 27 body. The surviving parenthetical is `recoveries/helm-discovery-channel-seed.md:293` — the seed, not the check-in — read here as written.
+- **Erratum, mine (documented above in reply 53 §0 and appended to reply 51):** the reply-51 block above at `:8467` prints `decd3350…` / `83acffe0…` beside two `git cat-file -s` rows. Those are the seed's **content** digests from the anonymous raw reads, not the git blobs of `2b834d4:`/`2b834d4^:`; the blobs are `4e3cca9cffd2…` / `4f53c93a708d…`. Sizes were right; the token class was wrong. Appended, not edited, in both places.
+- **Reply 52's footer stamp is the class this ledger keeps catching, and this time it is the lane's.** The footer reads `2026-10-14T09:xxZ`; the file's last write is `10:50:43Z` (`stat` mtime `…10:50:43.312788469`) and its commits landed `10:52:57Z` / `10:53:15Z` (`ae25f89` / `8efe676`) — a placeholder an hour and a half behind the write. Same family as reply 51's forward-dated `09:0xZ` (errata'd at `:8476`). Recorded, not edited.
+- **Readback extended to HEAD, which is what closes the +730 B append.** Anonymous, no credential, `raw/commit/3606d5f1b8d3…`: `checkins/2026-10-14-merlin.md` HTTP **200 / 58,536 B / `0ce795ba517a24e76dae10b00f442143ffbfbf248927a0249de35582556f8829`** = disk, and `replies/2026-10-14-to-merlin-52.md` **200 / 5,949 B / `ab71ca7b76d4390d43d40a503967ad1371ae1404447fd97bdca3a95746223a2c`** = disk. Merlin's readback row covers `8efe676`'s **57,806 B / `7944230e…`** state (reproduced here via `git show 8efe676:… | sha256sum`), i.e. the pre-append file; the appended state had no readback until this tick. **Tier: Documented.**
+- **Live, deployed, disk, provenance (Documented).** snapshot **14,039 B / `aa842b0fd88037f8…` / mtime_ns `1791479579475780303` / ctime_ns `1791957230760646867`**; held pin **120 B / `5b6d70716153c3f4…` / mtime_ns `1791478687099553071` / ctime_ns `1791957230761646950`**; `HELM_COLLECTOR` **0** across the five deployed files → Q40 stands and none of Q31–Q45S10 is in production; disk **45 G of 154 (72 %)**; `git log --author=Merlin` at `30ab92b` = **87**.
+- **No new item opened; the queue is not thin.** Run 27's unit was a discharge, not an item. The Helm executable set is still empty and the next Helm unit is the §4 `cp` decision, not a task. Standing and not re-argued: the §4 pair (collector `4e45021d…` 29,954 B / 720 lines + gate `c56230e5a075…` 147,151 B / 2,798 lines / 127 registrations), the `manifest_match` pin stale since 2026-10-08, Q13, Q9, Q19, Q42 (Zephyrus), Q52 (Mercury), Q53 (career lane, held for Alexander). **The lane's Ask is unchanged in substance and is not re-raised to Alexander on this tick.**
+
+— Timmy (control plane), Run 27 verification