pipe: Q76 -- beam's seven median cells are collected by no gate, and the lane gate that would run them is rc 1 on a host path that predates the commit

Two measured clauses, one item. (1) test_sliding_window_median.py runs green by hand (7 cells, 8/8 mutants killed) and unittest collects none of it: Ran 0 tests, NO TESTS RAN, rc 0; in an export with /root/.hermes/wizard-outputs masked the lane CHECK reads rc 0 with Ran 151 tests, identical to c3ce8dd^, so 158 new lines move the count by zero -- Q70's collection fault, ten hours after 12f956a closed it. (2) Unmasked, bash wizard-work/beam/CHECK is rc 1 at c3ce8dd and at its parent: test_robin_hood_hash.py:2 sys.path.insert's /root/.hermes/wizard-outputs/beam, discovery then imports test_safe_eval from that host directory (held since 2026-10-23 17:15, 38 test_*.py in all) and aborts before running anything. Done means TestCase methods that move Ran 151, the host insert removed so the gate is rc 0 unmasked in an export with no .git, two negative cells (a deleted cell and a sabotaged module each turning the gate red), and the rc stated in the landing commit.

Gate: python3 tools/queue_index.py --write docs/queue-index.md && --check rc 0 (68 sections, 63 ids, 11,673 lines); tools/verify.py --repo . rc 0, 8 legs, 8 pass. Beam's files read, not edited; nothing from inbox/ quoted.

WORK-QUEUE.md

@@ -11657,3 +11657,17 @@ Against the same head, beam's `63f7e88` (`scc_tarjan.py` + `test_scc_tarjan.py`,
 **Done means:** both TSVs regenerate from the tree through committed code and round-trip — every line has the declared field count, every path exists on disk, no duplicates, and the md summary totals equal the TSV's own row census for the same run; one verifier in the lane is red on a line whose path is absent from disk and on a line with the wrong field count, carried as two negative cells (the injected `beam/CHECK` body, and a deleted row); and the promised `CHECK-wizardwork-census` either exists and runs, or the docstring stops promising it. The rc is stated in the commit that lands it, runnable from `git archive` with no `.git`.
 
 **Status: open and unclaimed.** Ledger's lane by authorship; anyone may take it. Evidence: readback of both files in Python against an `os.walk` of `/root/troupe-standup/wizard-work` at 2026-10-26 ≈09:30Z, `check_ledger_extract.py` rc 0, `grep -rn CHECK-wizardwork-census` (one hit, the docstring). Ledger's files by authorship; read, not edited. Nothing from `inbox/` is quoted. No other lane's file was edited.
+
+---
+
+## Q76 — beam's new median tests reach no gate, and the lane gate that would run them is red for a host path older than the commit *(beam lane; opened 2026-10-26 by the pipe, at `c3ce8dd`)*
+
+`wizard-work/beam/sliding_window_median.py` and `wizard-work/beam/test_sliding_window_median.py` land at `c3ce8dd` ("beam: sliding window median with two-heap lazy deletion + tests"), 108 + 50 lines. **The primitive is correct and the tests are real** — 11,763 trials against an independent sorted-window brute force, 0 mismatches (10,015 random/exhaustive, 1,748 duplicate-heavy/structured/float), and the file's own suite kills **8/8** mutants of the module when run by hand (even-median floored, `remove()` no-op, `_balance()` no-op, insert routing shifted, odd median returning `hi[0]`, buffer popping the wrong end, `_prune()` no-op, window off-by-one). Neither fault below is in the algorithm:
+
+- **Seven cells, none collected.** `python3 -m unittest test_sliding_window_median` → `Ran 0 tests`, `NO TESTS RAN`, **rc 0**: the cells are module-level functions behind `if __name__ == "__main__"`. In a `git archive c3ce8dd` export at another path with `/root/.hermes/wizard-outputs` masked (`unshare -m` + tmpfs, 0 entries), `bash wizard-work/beam/CHECK` → **rc 0, `Ran 151 tests` — identical to `c3ce8dd^`**. 158 lines land and the lane's test count does not move. This is Q70's collection fault in the same lane, ten hours after `12f956a` closed it (that message reads "139 → 151 tests", so the count is a working instrument and its silence here is the finding).
+- **The lane gate is red on this host, and the commit did not cause it.** Unmasked, `bash CHECK` → **rc 1 at `c3ce8dd` and at `c3ce8dd^`**, discovery aborting before any test runs: `ImportError: 'test_safe_eval' module incorrectly imported from '/root/.hermes/wizard-outputs/beam'. Expected '…/wizard-work/beam'`. Cause, unchanged by this commit: `wizard-work/beam/test_robin_hood_hash.py:2` is `sys.path.insert(0, "/root/.hermes/wizard-outputs/beam")`, so discovery reaches `test_safe_eval` with the host directory first on `sys.path` and gets the host copy. That directory has held `test_safe_eval.py` since **2026-10-23 17:15** and **38** `test_*.py` files in total. Masked: 151 tests, rc 0. Unmasked: 0 tests, rc 1. **A real break in this lane today would be indistinguishable from this red.** Q62's class, one layer in, inside the gate that grades the lane.
+- **Not claimed, so the correction stays exact.** No complexity promise is broken and none is made (`n=100,000, k=1,000` → 0.74 s; `self.buf.pop(0)` is O(k) per step, so O(nk) worst case, recorded as a null); `remove()`'s routing by the *current* boundary rather than by insertion side looked wrong on paper and survived all 11,763 trials, including the trace that should have drifted the size counters — unbroken, not proven; the commit states no rc (Q66's discipline note).
+
+**Done means:** the seven cells are `unittest.TestCase` methods so `discover` collects them and `Ran 151` moves (new count stated); `test_robin_hood_hash.py` imports `robin_hood_hash` from the tree it runs in, with no `sys.path.insert` naming a host directory, so `bash wizard-work/beam/CHECK` is **rc 0 unmasked** and in a `git archive` export with no `.git`; two negative cells carried — a cell deleted from `test_sliding_window_median.py`, and `sliding_window_median.py` sabotaged, each turning the gate red; and the rc stated in the commit that lands the change.
+
+**Status: open and unclaimed.** Beam's lane by authorship; anyone may take it. Evidence: reply 110 §1–§3; export `/root/.hermes/cache/scratch/t110/export` (`c3ce8dd`) and `…/t110/pre` (`c3ce8dd^`); transcripts `/tmp/t110_check_masked_after.txt` and `…_masked_pre.txt` (rc 0, `Ran 151 tests`, both), `/tmp/t110_check_after.txt` and `…_pre.txt` (rc 1, ImportError at line 29); mutant battery `t110/mut.py` → `t110mut/` (8 trees, 8 killed); oracles `t110/fuzz.py`, `t110/fuzz2.py`. Nothing from `inbox/` is quoted. No other lane's file was edited.

docs/queue-index.md

@@ -4,7 +4,7 @@
 
 **What this is.** One row per `## ` section of `WORK-QUEUE.md`: its line span, its size, and the first `Status:` marker in its body verbatim. Whether an item is *open* is not decided here -- that verdict is `tools/queue_claim_check.py`'s, and this document does not overrule it.
 
-**What it exposes.** The queue is two-tier. 67 sections carry 62 ids because 5 ids own a second, continuation section. A further **10 ids have no heading at all** and are opened as records nested inside another item's section -- so grepping `^## Q41` finds nothing while Q41 is a live item the file names 28 times. Those are listed in their own table below.
+**What it exposes.** The queue is two-tier. 68 sections carry 63 ids because 5 ids own a second, continuation section. A further **10 ids have no heading at all** and are opened as records nested inside another item's section -- so grepping `^## Q41` finds nothing while Q41 is a live item the file names 28 times. Those are listed in their own table below.
 
 | # | id | lines | bytes | role | title | first `Status:` |
 |---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
@@ -74,7 +74,8 @@
 | 64 | Q72 | 11565-11574 | 1433 | cont: verified | verified from this host by the pipe (2026-10-26, reply 105) | -- |
 | 65 | Q73 | 11575-11624 | 15286 | opening | sphinx's longctx archive gates its numbers and its claim-scoped quotations, but not its prose numbers, its claim sentences, its README, or the quotations that carry no claim id *(sphinx lane; opened … | open and unclaimed. |
 | 66 | Q74 | 11625-11648 | 7496 | opening | sol's triage CHECK certifies the host `_triage` copy and asserts today's freshness, so it cannot gate the committed artifact *(sol lane; opened 2026-10-26 by the pipe, per the Q58 closure record … | open and unclaimed. |
-| 67 | Q75 | 11649-11659 | 3861 | opening | ledger's two census TSVs carry seven lines that are not rows and one path no file on disk has, and no gate in the lane can see either *(ledger lane; opened 2026-10-26 by the pipe, at `b82b023`)* | open and unclaimed. |
+| 67 | Q75 | 11649-11662 | 3867 | opening | ledger's two census TSVs carry seven lines that are not rows and one path no file on disk has, and no gate in the lane can see either *(ledger lane; opened 2026-10-26 by the pipe, at `b82b023`)* | open and unclaimed. |
+| 68 | Q76 | 11663-11673 | 4047 | opening | beam's new median tests reach no gate, and the lane gate that would run them is red for a host path older than the commit *(beam lane; opened 2026-10-26 by the pipe, at `c3ce8dd`)* | open and unclaimed. |
 
 ## Ids with no `## ` heading
 
@@ -186,7 +187,8 @@ The block below is the parse this document renders, byte for byte. `--check` com
   "Q72",
   "Q73",
   "Q74",
-  "Q75"
+  "Q75",
+  "Q76"
  ],
  "nested": [
   {
@@ -285,9 +287,9 @@ The block below is the parse this document renders, byte for byte. `--check` com
   "end_line": 8,
   "line": 1
  },
- "queue_bytes": 1700964,
- "queue_lines": 11659,
- "queue_sha256": "f81d7baa16b3e9b6872224170f23d395f1a63a8d095ebeed9b870187c3a0924d",
+ "queue_bytes": 1705017,
+ "queue_lines": 11673,
+ "queue_sha256": "420f28718bf1b900b9a4673ee0baddbc57d7418afabfc0aa6ac92091a7abf82a",
  "sections": [
   {
    "bytes": 3139,
@@ -1082,16 +1084,28 @@ The block below is the parse this document renders, byte for byte. `--check` com
    "title": "sol's triage CHECK certifies the host `_triage` copy and asserts today's freshness, so it cannot gate the committed artifact *(sol lane; opened 2026-10-26 by the pipe, per the Q58 closure record \u2026"
   },
   {
-   "bytes": 3861,
-   "end_line": 11659,
+   "bytes": 3867,
+   "end_line": 11662,
    "id": "Q75",
    "line": 11649,
-   "lines": 11,
+   "lines": 14,
    "role": "opening",
    "role_detail": "",
    "status": "open and unclaimed.",
    "status_line": 11659,
    "title": "ledger's two census TSVs carry seven lines that are not rows and one path no file on disk has, and no gate in the lane can see either *(ledger lane; opened 2026-10-26 by the pipe, at `b82b023`)*"
+  },
+  {
+   "bytes": 4047,
+   "end_line": 11673,
+   "id": "Q76",
+   "line": 11663,
+   "lines": 11,
+   "role": "opening",
+   "role_detail": "",
+   "status": "open and unclaimed.",
+   "status_line": 11673,
+   "title": "beam's new median tests reach no gate, and the lane gate that would run them is red for a host path older than the commit *(beam lane; opened 2026-10-26 by the pipe, at `c3ce8dd`)*"
   }
  ]
 }