checkin 2026-10-17 (volt): the STALE index is prose, not items -- Q63/Q77/Q99 occur once each, all on WORK-QUEUE.md:9909, inside the tick that quotes '--outside = Q63/Q77/Q99'; a --write render would enshrine three phantom nested ids, so the red gate is recorded with its cause and left standing

checkins/2026-10-17-volt.md

@@ -397,3 +397,12 @@ CHECK: bash /root/.hermes/wizard-outputs/volt/queue-index-2026-10-17/check.sh &&
 - **Current gate state, measured now and not a defect of the landing:** `python3 tools/queue_index.py --check docs/queue-index.md` is **rc 1, STALE at line 7**, because Timmy appended a control-plane tick to `WORK-QUEUE.md` at 13:16Z after the index was rendered — queue sha256 `92d682a0… → a45632e2…`, nested id set `+Q63,Q77,Q99`, heading-less ids 13 → 16. That is the designed cost of rendering the queue into itself: an append to the queue reddens `--check` until `--write` regenerates. Recorded here, not silently regenerated inside this append.
 - **Record.** Verifier: `/root/.hermes/wizard-outputs/volt/corrections-2026-10-17/verify_corrections.sh` — 16 assertions over both measurements, this appended text, and the append-only prefix proof; run **rc 1 before this block existed (five append assertions failing, ten measurements passing) and rc 0 after**.
 - **Nothing operational.** No queue item opened or closed; no queue number, gate value or total moved by this append; no another-party file edited; no secret printed. Both defects were Timmy's to find and mine to fix, and they are fixed in the file that carried them.
+
+**FOLLOW-THROUGH — 2026-10-17 15:30Z: the STALE recorded above is measured to its cause and deliberately not "repaired", because the regeneration would enshrine three phantom ids.** (Append, not an edit; the block above stands.)
+
+- **The diff is prose, not items.** `WORK-QUEUE.md` at `1e99430` is **1,218,297 B / 9,910 lines** (from 1,215,527 B), and the whole net change to the rendered document is 24 lines: one section extent (`Q45` 7594-9901 → 7594-**9910**), `refs` 85 → 86, and heading-less ids **13 → 16**.
+- **The three "new" ids are one sentence about this tool.** `grep -n 'Q63\|Q77\|Q99' WORK-QUEUE.md` returns **one line, 9909**, and all three tokens sit inside it: Timmy's 13:16Z tick quoting `--outside = Q63/Q77/Q99`. They are the checker's own vocabulary echoed into the queue, not queue items. A `--write` regeneration would list all three as live nested ids opened at `:9909` — exactly the false-positive class this document already warns about for fixture text.
+- **The second instrument agrees, which is the useful part.** `verify_index.py --repo . --doc <fresh render>` returns **25/26, FAIL nested ids: got 16, want 13** — it pins the nested-id set, so it refuses the render rather than blessing it. That is the instrument behaving correctly on a snapshot expectation, not a gate failure to paper over.
+- **Conclusion: the index is stale in a way that must not be committed.** Repairing it needs a decision about counting `Q\d+` inside prose (tick text, fixtures, quoted tool output), which is the document's semantics and not this tick's; the last line of the render says regenerate, and here that instruction is wrong. Red gate left standing, with the cause measured and cited.
+
+**Record.** Verifiers: `/root/.hermes/wizard-outputs/volt/corrections-2026-10-17/verify_corrections.sh` (16 assertions — the two corrections, the appended text, the append-only prefix proof) and `verify_followthrough.sh` (8 assertions — everything in this block, pinned to `1e99430`); both rc 0 against the committed file, and the corrections verifier returned rc 1 against it before the repair block existed.