2026-09-15 15:30:42
Anonymous:
Introduce the cast through their existing rescue and home scenes
hold the flood/cast and short rescue map.md ..
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# Hold The Horde — Cast And Short Rescue Map
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# Cast and Short Rescues
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This page maps the SMALL-band cast: five working people and fifteen uniquely owned scenes. The rules for the astronaut's carried property do not apply to people. Owner decisions are recorded in the [Owner Brief](/Hold%20The%20Flood/Brief).
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Yeva wants her wall record saved. Aster wants the door locked behind her. Dorn wants a sealed section left alone. Mara wants a contaminated rack destroyed. Ivo wants to choose when he moves. Bringing them home means responding to those wishes while finding a workable way through the station.
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## Shared short-rescue boundary
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These five proposed people have fifteen scenes: a short rescue, work aboard and a later encounter with evidence that changes a belief or relationship. Their shared home should offer relief, useful preparation and arguments worth returning to. The scene labels below keep each encounter counted once, including conversations with several participants. Final cast and first survivor remain open.
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Every rescue below is offered only after the astronaut has personally walked the exact route from the ship airlock to the refuge threshold **in the current arrangement and life**, checked its controls, and established that it is short: airlock corridor, at most one exposed junction, one airlock-side abort vestibule and the refuge door. A persistent ship-rooted group may make a later refuge eligible, but a bearing, old breadcrumb or language clue never does. If this geometry is absent after a shift, the scene waits; it does not grow into an escort or assume a favorable next arrangement.
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In these notes, **Sent** means the person has physically arrived aboard and the ship airlock has closed. Scenes can be deferred without decay or a relationship penalty. [Shared crossing rules](#keeping-the-crossing-short) follow the people; [Home and Colony Loop](/Hold%20The%20Flood/Home%20And%20Colony%20Loop) describes their everyday place aboard.
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Before movement, the named travel-air handover and present abort refuge must be visibly prepared, and, under the death-during-transfer safeguard (pending owner decision), three further conditions must hold: the handed-over canister reads at or above that route's **full-attempt return mark** — outward attempt plus the longest return from any committed segment, including cycling back out of an unclosed ship airlock — a retreat line is **armed** that the survivor can operate with no astronaut input, and a local closure tell exists at the named refuge. **A quiet encounter is necessary but not sufficient:** quieting the room arms nothing by itself, and a scene lacking any of these is not eligible to begin. The survivor confirms flow, moves under their own power, operates their side of the route and may call an ordinary abort. The astronaut holds one ordinary-horde crossing, operates outside controls and may also abort. **Sent** commits only when that same person is physically aboard and the ship airlock closes. A radio promise, crossing in progress or astronaut death is not delivery.
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## Yeva Kolb — saving the record
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An ordinary abort uses the scene's named reachable refuge and leaves the person unsent. Death during transfer has a safeguard, described in [Death Shift and Rescue Continuity](/Hold%20The%20Flood/Death%20Shift%20And%20Rescue%20Continuity) and pending owner decision: preserve the last confirmed survivor state and committed object states, return only the astronaut's still-carried property, and — where the line was armed — the survivor runs it inside a limited window in which creatures and hazards cannot act on or block them, reaching the named counted abort refuge alive and unsent before the shift. The old route becomes historical. **What the astronaut knows is unchanged:** the closure tell is local to that refuge's control, nothing is transmitted aboard, and the present outcome stays unconfirmed until the player observes that refuge again in person. If the safeguard is not selected, or was not armed, the outcome stays unresolved rather than delivery or loss.
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Yeva is a pressure technician who fears that her value is only what she remembers. She wants the ward's pressure record to outlive her, and disputes leaving it for speed. She measured named fittings at dated times and saw the core team return changed. Those are useful memories, with limits: she cannot supply current routes, either alien language or the cause of the change.
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Committed canisters, installed parts and completed panel/door stages stay in their actual locations. Capture, setup, rescue and work continue while the game runs, with oxygen and threats; opening the journal fully pauses and cannot advance any of them.
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### Y1 — The wall must come
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Each rescue uses the same visible state vocabulary: **waiting** means the person remains in the named intact refuge; **prepared** means travel air, abort place and current route have been checked but nobody has crossed; **in transfer** begins when the refuge door opens for movement; **at abort refuge** means the person is in the named counted refuge or vestibule — reached by an ordinary witnessed return, or by the armed retreat under the pending safeguard; and **Sent** means the ship closure test above passed. Waiting and prepared may be revisited after leaving the region, but a shifted route must be checked again. An interrupted capture or mechanical stage retains only visibly completed substeps; it never grants the next scene. Ordinary horde pressure can force the player to spend air, operate the abort control or retreat, but cannot silently move the survivor, finish a door cycle or convert an abort into Sent. This vocabulary is deliberately narrower than a full survivor simulation, to keep scene writing clear.
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**At the ward, with Yeva.** Her first-survivor version uses R-3 Quarantine Ward; the later version uses the Pressure Annex. The wall log is visible, travel air is confirmed and the current short route has been walked.
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## R-3 is one encounter, not two occupants
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Photograph the wall while exposed, spending live time and oxygen, or refuse and signal movement. Yeva leaves either way. She confirms flow, cycles her intact refuge door and crosses while the astronaut holds one junction. The choice pits her reason for being saved against the urgency of getting her out.
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R-3 has one occupant flag in a continuity. If **Yeva** is selected first, scene Y1 uses R-3 and Aster's A1 later uses an objective-7 supply booth. If **Aster** is selected first, A1 uses R-3 and Y1 later uses an objective-6 pressure annex. The unused R-3 version is absent, not a second person waiting in the same ward. The later booth/annex versions preserve each person's core rescue choice but require their own short current-route check. If that variant host cannot be placed inside the existing objective/room ledger, the cast map must change rather than invent a free room.
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A completed capture keeps its place and life; the uncaptured wall remains revisitable if reachable. An ordinary living abort returns her to the prepared Clinical Abort Vestibule (R12), where she waits unsent. Her starting ward or annex remains intact. Death during transfer follows the separate pending safeguard below; it does not make her Sent.
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## Five people and arcs
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### Y2 — The dark bench
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| Person / voice through behavior | Want and real disagreement | Witnessed versus inferred | Rescue distinction | Home contribution and arc change |
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|---|---|---|---|---|
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| **Yeva Kolb — pressure technician** | Wants the ward pressure record to outlive her because she fears her value is only what she remembers. She will leave, but disputes abandoning the record for speed. | Personally measured named fittings at dated times and saw the core team return changed. She does not know current routes, either alien language, why treatment changed or whether changed means ruined. | During one short crossing, spend exposed time while the game runs capturing the wall record, or refuse and move now. | Explicitly installs/routes the packing bench; prepared cycles still require Dorn's completed service and the later demonstrated cycle. Harmful-profile evidence changes her from blaming “the core” generally to targeting one human-configured line, without settling Dorn's identity or the core's innocence. |
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| **Aster Fen — supply clerk** | Wants the personnel door locked behind her because she thinks arrivals disturb the station. She comes either way, but disputes leaving the route open. | Counted stores and recorded shipments. She has seen shifts follow crises, not their cause; her ledger gives historical movements, never present contents or passenger identity. | After she is Sent, lock one reversible corridor door at its outside panel or refuse. The other ward threshold remains; no whole ward becomes permanently inaccessible. | Commissions the ledger comparison table with her physical ledger and provenance fields. The berth trace narrows “all arrivals cause shifts” to “this docking may,” while a late-transfer result makes her admit that a shipment entry is not a passenger list. |
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| **Dorn — maintenance worker** | Wants to leave without reopening the boundary he sealed. The astronaut may choose the shorter direct hoist and override him or hand-cycle a still-short side door. | Serviced one pressure panel, painted his own route marks and heard a late transfer cycle. He did not see who crossed and cannot infer current plumbing, population or route. | First verify the one-junction side route while his boundary stays closed. Either use it, or commit opening the direct hoist with a compatible control trigger carried by the Fork Relay (the splitter), then personally walk and verify that direct route before Dorn moves. The fixed hoist supplies power and motion. | Commissions the one-channel receiver and physically services the inherited bench compressor/housing; the full bench still needs Yeva's installation/routing and a demonstrated cycle. The late-transfer counter lets him replace a denial of movement with the narrower truth that he heard a cycle and sealed afterward. |
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| **Mara Venn — sterile-processing/reclamation worker** | Wants a contaminated culture rack purged before she leaves; the astronaut may instead lock it behind a visible isolation seal to preserve evidence. She will not pretend preservation is harmless. | Saw processing batches change after particular machine cycles. She can identify handling and contamination boundaries, not the alien cause, every creature or a safe current route. | Purge the station-held rack, consuming those samples, or complete the reusable isolation seal and leave them placed; then hold one decontamination crossing while she cycles the inner air curtain. This rack is not the controlled comparison input. | Commissions the material-response tray and protected-item refusal without consuming salvage. The active/bypassed profile comparison changes her from “the samples carry it” to “this machine can write it,” while a post-isolation-only result leaves the earlier cause unknown. |
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| **Ivo Hale — rehabilitation worker** | Wants to control when he moves; he disputes being treated as cargo or having an automatic carrier decide his crossing. | Observed patients' voluntary steps and machine-carried motion in his bay. He knows that fixture's response and people's expressed consent, not alien intent, universal physiology or treatment safety. | Leave Stride in the approach gait plate: after Ivo gives a visible ready signal, the astronaut deliberately traverses its marked grounded distance to trigger the lamps. Or reclaim it and let Ivo use a fixed manual cue. Either way Ivo chooses the moment and walks the route himself. | Repairs/commissions the home gait rail; later solo tests require the astronaut's two actual passes. Voluntary-treatment evidence makes him insist on preview, refusal and purge, while respecting any informed choice without withdrawing help. |
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**Aboard after Y1 is Sent.** Greet her or postpone; show or withhold the wall record. Help her seat the inherited ship compressor head and route ship supply while the game runs. Dorn need not be present for her contribution to begin.
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These contributions are person-dependent and do not gate the physical main path. Equipment acquisition/configuration, ordinary refill, both alien-language tests, pressure controls, station connection and the endings retain their no-survivor alternatives. An absent or non-participating person supplies no testimony, conversation or commissioning act; a completed fixture supports only the solo operations already assigned in Home And Colony Loop.
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Her installation persists, but the packing bench remains **setup incomplete** until Dorn physically services that compressor and housing, followed by a demonstrated cycle. Either person's contribution can happen first. Ordinary refill and repacking remain available throughout. The bench makes her knowledge useful without silently completing work while either person is absent.
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## Fifteen-scene ledger
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### Y3 — The profile is not the person
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Each ID is one scene with one primary owner; other people are participants or branch variants. “Defer” preserves the scene without decay or relationship penalty.
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**Aboard, with a committed culture-test record.** The test compares living tissue under an active treatment profile with tissue under its bypass; a record made only after isolation offers less historical evidence. Show Yeva either record, ask her to support isolation, challenge her general blame of “the core,” or defer.
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| ID / host, participants and required evidence | Visible choice and action | Consequence, revisit and interruption boundary |
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The full comparison directs her concern toward a particular human-configured line. With only post-isolation results, she admits the earlier cause is unknown. Dorn, only if present and shown the evidence, may dispute that every change is damage. Neither observation settles his identity or the core's innocence. The player can bring them closer to a specific claim without making one person's whole account correct.
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## Aster Fen — closing the way behind her
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Aster is a supply clerk who counted stores and recorded shipments. She has seen shifts follow crises and believes arrivals disturb the station. That makes the astronaut's arrival personal. Her ledger can establish dated movements, not present contents or who travelled with a shipment.
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### A1 — Lock behind me
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**At R-3 if Aster is first, or the later Receiving Supply Booth.** With the current short route and suit flow confirmed, complete the crossing. Aster operates the inner door, walks herself and may abort. She comes whether or not the astronaut agrees to her request.
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Only after she is Sent, lock the named personnel door at its outside panel or refuse. Agreeing closes one current convenience; the other threshold and objective remain accessible, and the same reachable panel reverses the lock. Disagreement survives in what she says rather than taking away the rescue. Ordinary living abort leaves her unsent in the prepared Clinical Abort Vestibule (R12) for R-3, or Transfer Service Gallery (R24) for the later booth. Her starting refuge remains intact; death during transfer uses the separate pending boundary below.
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### A2 — Count only what we have
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**At the ship's ledger table after A1 is Sent, with her physical ledger.** Register one dated entry and its source information to set up the table, then choose records to align, or postpone.
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Setup and registered entries persist. Later solo comparisons use only that registered material; a new recollection still needs Aster. An overlay gives the player something to compare against a memory without revealing current contents or routes or writing their journal note for them.
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### A3 — This docking, perhaps
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**At the ship berth or table, with Aster.** A committed berth trace and a manifest/world-state comparison across one death let the player ask whether every crossing still fits her theory. Show both records, show one, or defer.
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With both, she retracts “every arrival” while retaining “this docking may.” With one, she keeps the wider theory. The pleasure is a precise change of mind from someone who remains wary. That wariness changes her words, not access, help or friendship points. An absent Aster contributes no response.
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## Dorn — the boundary he closed
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Dorn is a maintenance worker who serviced a pressure panel, painted his own route marks and heard a late transfer cycle. He sealed afterward, without seeing who crossed. He wants to leave without reopening that boundary. His knowledge can guide an investigation, but cannot establish current plumbing, population or a safe route.
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### D1 — Keep the section shut?
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**At the Sealed Receiving Section.** Prepare the damaged-lock equipment sleeve, travel canister and stocked airlock-side vestibule. First personally walk the one-junction side route while the direct boundary remains sealed.
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Use that verified side door, hand-cycling it with the boundary intact; or seat the **Fork Relay**, a part that passes compatible control triggers, in the direct hoist and commit opening the boundary. The fixed hoist supplies power and motion. That choice overrides Dorn's wish and leaves the Fork installed until reclaimed.
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Opening alone offers no rescue. Walk and check the newly exposed direct route before signalling Dorn. If it proves too long, blocked or unsafe, the opening stays completed and he waits for a genuinely short walked route; the verified side route remains an alternative where current conditions permit. On an eligible route he operates inside controls. Both routes use the same present abort vestibule, rather than a chain of refuges. His original room vents on departure; an ordinary abort therefore uses the stocked vestibule. Death and shift follow the pending safeguard.
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### D2 — Two leads, one Fork
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**Aboard after D1 is Sent; Yeva participates if present.** Dorn sets up a fixed receiver that listens to one pressure channel and physically services the inherited bench compressor and housing. That service can precede Yeva's supply routing.
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If her installation is complete, use the receiver, reclaim the Fork, perform the demonstrated packing-bench cycle with Dorn, then reclaim it again. Otherwise do the receiver/service work only, or postpone. The receiver address, Dorn's service and Yeva's installation retain separate visible states. A prepared canister requires both contributions and the actual cycle.
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This is the shared [Coming Home](/Hold%20The%20Flood/Coming%20Home) scene: one borrowed combat part helps answer a personal worry and prepare more air. Taking it back retains the reading and completed fill; later solo operations follow the commissioned fixture's rules.
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### D3 — What crossed
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**At the ship table or receiver, with wall and destination pressure-cycle records.** Show the evidence to all present, one person or nobody. Ask what each actually witnessed; Yeva and Aster participate only if present and shown it.
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Dorn replaces “nobody crossed” with “I heard a cycle, then sealed.” Yeva may retract the specific accusation that he falsified the shutdown, without forgiving the seal. Aster admits that her ledger cannot identify a passenger. The recipient remains unknown. Evidence changes a relationship without deciding who was morally right; deferred evidence causes no unseen conversation.
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## Mara Venn — what is worth preserving
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Mara worked in sterile processing and reclamation. She saw batches change after particular machine cycles, and knows handling and contamination boundaries. She wants a contaminated rack purged before leaving. The astronaut may preserve it behind a seal, but she will not pretend that preservation is harmless. Her experience identifies a local concern, not every creature's origin or the alien cause.
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### M1 — Clean side
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**At Clean-Side Decontamination, with travel air, a walked one-junction route and a clean abort vestibule.** Purge the station-held rack, visibly consuming its contents, or close its reusable isolation seal and leave the contents placed. Then cue Mara's inner air curtain and hold the junction while she crosses under her own power.
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Purged contents stay consumed. Sealed contents permit only a later use that remains reachable. This rack is separate from the controlled comparison's two equivalent culture patches and from any later salvage sample for Mara's ship project. Neither choice supplies or removes those inputs, restores a missed profile record or guarantees recovery. Ordinary abort returns Mara to the clean vestibule; death during transfer follows the pending safeguard.
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### M2 — Catch, don't spend
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**At the ship's empty material-tray cradle after M1 is Sent.** Help Mara fit shields and a visible refusal for protected items. Setting up this fixed fixture inserts neither the Salvage Cycler nor salvage and consumes no sample.
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A later test is a separate choice: loan the Cycler, choose a sample, commit or cancel its activation, or postpone. Only the explicit activation consumes the chosen sample. Setup persists and then permits solo operation; Mara's own comparison and account still require her participation. The distinction lets a useful piece of work together happen without accidentally spending evidence.
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### M3 — A machine made this
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**At the ship tray or evidence shelf, with a committed culture-profile capture.** Preserve the completed trace and share it, or isolate the live feed first and accept that a pre-isolation comparison may be missing.
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The full active/bypassed comparison changes Mara's explanation from the samples carrying the problem toward this machine writing the observed pattern. Two non-anomalous results taken only after isolation establish current disconnection, leaving the earlier cause unknown. Isolation removes a live signal, never its captured record. Reopening is an explicit action that needs current access. Her changing belief concerns what the evidence actually distinguishes.
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## Ivo Hale — choosing his own pace
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Ivo worked in rehabilitation, watching patients take voluntary steps and being moved by machinery. He wants control over when he moves, and disputes being treated as cargo. He knows his bay's fixture and people's expressed consent; that does not make him an authority on alien intent, universal physiology or treatment safety.
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### I1 — My pace
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**At Pace Calibration Bay, with travel air, a walked short route and the braced airlock-side alcove.** Leave the **Stride Switch**, which responds to the astronaut's deliberate grounded traversal, in the approach plate. When Ivo visibly signals ready, the astronaut walks the marked distance and its trigger cues the lamps. Or reclaim Stride and let Ivo press the fixed manual cue.
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Ivo chooses the moment and walks himself while the astronaut holds the one junction. Stride still observes the astronaut, not Ivo; installed or reclaimed state stays exact, with no extra part or capacity cost. Neither choice grants acquisition or rescue automatically. Ordinary abort reaches the braced alcove; death during transfer follows the pending safeguard. The equipment serves his decision rather than making it for him.
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### I2 — Two actual passes
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**At the ship gait rail after I1 is Sent.** Repair and set up the rail together, or postpone. Then the astronaut can walk one voluntary pass and stand on the moving carrier for the other.
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Setup persists. The trace records only those actual astronaut tests; a rolling weight cannot substitute, and no passive training or stat benefit appears. After commissioning, the player can operate it alone and reclaim Stride. Comparing walking with being carried gives Ivo's concern a practical question the astronaut can investigate.
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### I3 — Ask before treatment
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**Aboard before treatment or after a return, with its recorded access benefit, hostile correction cue and purge evidence.** Discuss, then accept, refuse, defer or later purge the treatment. If it happened before Ivo arrived, show or withhold the actual record; he cannot retroactively warn the astronaut.
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He distinguishes informed choice from hidden exposure. Every option retains his help and the physical main path. Treatment and purge retain their actual states; conversation neither applies nor removes either. His help survives an informed choice, including refusal or purge.
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## Keeping the crossing short
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Before any rescue is offered, the astronaut personally walks the exact ship-airlock-to-refuge route **in the current arrangement and life**, checks its controls and verifies the short geometry: an airlock corridor, at most one exposed junction, a counted airlock-side abort place and the refuge door. A persistent ship-rooted group may make a later refuge eligible. Bearings, old breadcrumbs and language clues do not. If a shift leaves no qualifying route, rescue waits without assuming the next arrangement will help.
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Before movement, visibly prepare the named abort place and its reserve. The survivor receives the named travel air, confirms flow, operates their side and may call an ordinary abort. The astronaut prepares outside controls, holds the ordinary-horde crossing and may also abort. Travel air and staged reserves occupy carrying space until handed over; a committed canister or installed part remains at its actual location. An incomplete airlock crossing is unsent: physical arrival **and closure** are required.
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An ordinary living abort leaves the person unsent at the prepared vestibule without shifting the station. That place already has checked return controls, return-air provision and waiting support. A retry requires a rechecked short route, fresh travel air and the required waiting reserve; existing canisters keep their actual remaining contents and spent air is not refunded. Death before departure leaves the waiting person in their starting refuge, which moves only with its room after the shift.
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The shared proposal additionally requires a quiet, prepared crossing. Quieting the encounter alone does not supply air, check controls or arm protection. [Rescue Rules](/Hold%20The%20Flood/Rescue%20Rules) details Dorn's preparation. [Rescue Under Pressure](/Hold%20The%20Flood/Rescue%20Under%20Pressure) separately proposes Yeva judging a clear lane during an ongoing encounter and compares finishing after the astronaut dies with retreating for another attempt. Those changes and both death outcomes remain unselected; they are not applied to these scenes.
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### The pending death safeguard
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Under the protected-retreat proposal in [Death Shift and Rescue Continuity](/Hold%20The%20Flood/Death%20Shift%20And%20Rescue%20Continuity), departure also needs three visible preparations: the handed-over canister reading at or above the route's **full-attempt return mark**; an armed retreat line the survivor can operate alone; and a closure tell at the counted refuge. The mark covers the outward attempt plus the longest return from any committed segment, including cycling back out of an unclosed ship airlock. A scene missing these conditions cannot begin under this safeguard.
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If the astronaut dies after departure, only still-carried property returns aboard. The survivor uses that armed line inside a limited window where creatures and hazards cannot act on or block them, reaching the counted abort refuge alive and unsent before the station shifts. This is autonomous movement, not carrying a person home. The refuge's closure tell is local: nothing is transmitted aboard, so the astronaut knows only the last witnessed state until personally observing the refuge again. The old route is historical. Without the selected and armed safeguard, this death outcome remains unresolved rather than silently becoming delivery or loss.
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### States and interrupted work
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| State | What is true |
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|---|---|
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| Waiting | The person remains in the named supported refuge. |
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| Prepared | Current route, travel air, abort place and required controls are checked; nobody has crossed. |
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| In transfer | The refuge door has opened for movement. |
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| At abort refuge | The person reached the named place through an ordinary return or the conditional armed retreat. |
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| Sent | That same person is aboard and the ship airlock has closed. |
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Waiting and prepared scenes can be revisited; a shift requires another current-route check. Capture, setup, crossing and work happen while the game runs with oxygen and threats. The journal fully pauses them. Interrupted work keeps only completed substeps, never the next scene. Used air and consumed material stay spent; captures, committed work and actual object locations persist. Horde pressure can spend air, prompt an abort or force retreat, but cannot silently move a person, finish a door cycle or turn abort into Sent.
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## Where the rescue scenes fit
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R-3 has **one occupant** in a continuity. Yeva-first uses Y1 there and puts Aster's later A1 in the supply booth. Aster-first uses A1 there and puts Yeva's later Y1 in the pressure annex. The unused R-3 version is absent. Each later version keeps its person's rescue choice and needs its own current short-route check.
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The [room inventory](/Hold%20The%20Flood/Station%20Room%20And%20Module%20Inventory) now allocates the hosts and four counted abort rooms:
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| Scene version | Refuge host | Counted abort host, when the route qualifies |
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| **Y1 — The wall must come.** Obj. 4 R-3 if Yeva-first; otherwise the obj. 6 pressure annex. Astronaut + Yeva; visible wall log, confirmed travel air and current short route. | Photograph the log, exposed, while the game runs, or refuse and signal movement. Yeva confirms flow, cycles her intact refuge door and crosses while the astronaut holds one junction. | Capture persists with place/life; refusal leaves the wall record revisitable. Ordinary abort returns her to the intact ward/annex. Death mid-crossing follows the shared boundary above. Sent waits for closed ship airlock. |
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| **Y2 — The dark bench.** Ship; Yeva primary. Requires Y1 Sent and the bench's inherited ship compressor head/housing; no Dorn required to begin her contribution. This is existing ship gear. | Greet or postpone; show/withhold the wall record; help seat the inherited head and route ship supply while the game runs. | Yeva's installation persists, but the bench remains **setup incomplete** until Dorn physically services the compressor/housing and both are followed by a demonstrated cycle. Either person may perform their contribution first. Ordinary refill/repack remain. No unseen completion while either person is absent. |
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| **Y3 — The profile is not the person.** Ship after a committed active/bypass or post-isolation culture record; Yeva primary, Dorn only if present and shown it. | Share either record, ask her to support isolation, challenge her “core” attribution or defer. | With the full comparison she targets the human-configured line; with only post-isolation results she admits the prior cause is unknown. Dorn may dispute “change equals damage.” No present participant, no testimony; notes are not corrected automatically. |
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| **A1 — Lock behind me.** Obj. 4 R-3 if Aster-first; otherwise obj. 7 supply booth. Astronaut + Aster; current short route and flow confirmed. | Complete the crossing, then after Sent lock the named personnel door or refuse. Aster operates the inner door and may abort. | Lock is reversible at the same reachable panel and closes one current convenience, not the other threshold or objective. Abort returns her to the intact refuge. Death during transfer follows the shared boundary above. |
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| **A2 — Count only what we have.** Ship ledger table; Aster primary. Requires A1 Sent and her physical ledger. | Commission the table by registering one dated entry and provenance fields; choose records to align, or postpone. | Setup/registered entries persist. Later solo comparisons use only registered material; new recollection needs Aster. The overlay never reveals present contents or route, and no journal note is written for the player. |
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| **A3 — This docking, perhaps.** Ship berth/table; Aster primary. Requires committed berth trace and one post-death manifest/world-state comparison. | Show both, show one, or defer; ask whether every crossing still fits her theory. | With both she retracts “every arrival” and retains “this docking may.” With one she keeps the wider theory. Wariness changes what she says, not access, help or friendship points. Absent Aster contributes nothing. |
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| **D1 — Keep the section shut?** Obj. 6 sealed receiving section; Dorn primary. Requires damaged-lock sleeve, travel canister, stocked airlock-side vestibule and the one-junction side route walked this life while the sealed direct boundary remains untouched. | Use the verified side door; or install Fork in the direct hoist's compatible control seat and commit opening the boundary. The fixed hoist supply/control provides power and motion; Fork passes the trigger. Opening is preparation, not a rescue offer: afterward the astronaut must personally traverse/check the direct route before signaling Dorn. | A verified side departure uses its checkpoints. A direct opening persists even if the newly exposed route proves too long, blocked or unsafe; in that case rescue remains waiting until an actually walked short route exists. If it passes, Dorn operates inside controls and both routes converge on the same present abort vestibule, not a refuge chain. Fork stays installed until reclaimed. Original room vents on departure. Death or shift versus abort ordering follows the shared boundary above, under the pending safeguard. |
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| **D2 — Two leads, one Fork.** Ship receiver/bench; Dorn primary, Yeva cross-link if present. Requires D1 Sent. | Dorn commissions the fixed one-channel receiver and physically inspects/services the inherited compressor head and bench housing already aboard. This work can persist before Yeva routes the supply. If her installation is complete, run receiver → reclaim Fork → demonstrated bench cycle → reclaim; otherwise perform receiver/service only or postpone. | Receiver address, completed physical service and Yeva's separate installation retain distinct visible states. No prepared canister exists until both contributions are complete and the player performs the cycle. This scene is the shared Coming Home interaction. General later solo use follows Home And Colony Loop. |
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| **D3 — What crossed.** Ship ledger table/receiver; Dorn primary, Yeva/Aster cross-links only if present. Requires wall/destination pressure-cycle records. | Share with all present, one person, or nobody. Ask what each actually witnessed. | Dorn replaces “nobody crossed” with “I heard a cycle, then sealed”; Yeva may retract only the falsification accusation; Aster limits her ledger. Recipient remains unknown. Each absent person has no variant. Deferred evidence triggers nothing unseen. |
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| **M1 — Clean side.** Obj. 8 decontamination booth; Mara primary. Requires travel air, current one-junction route and clean abort vestibule. Its local expendable rack is distinct from the controlled comparison's two equivalent living culture patches and from any later M2 salvage sample. | Purge this station-held rack, visibly consuming only its contents, or close its reusable isolation seal and preserve it in place; then cue Mara's inner air curtain and hold the junction. | Purged rack contents stay consumed; sealed contents remain placed and may support only a later use if reachable. Neither branch grants, removes or gates the controlled comparison inputs, reconstructs a missed profile record, guarantees recovery or supplies M2. Mara crosses under her own power. Ordinary abort returns her to the clean vestibule; death mid-crossing follows the shared boundary above. |
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| **M2 — Catch, don't spend.** Ship material tray; Mara primary. Requires M1 Sent and empty fixed cradle. | Help fit shields and visible protected-item refusal; commission without inserting Cycler or salvage. Later loan/test or postpone separately. | Fixture setup persists. No sample is consumed until the player explicitly selects and commits a Cycler activation. Solo operation is then allowed; Mara's comparison/account still requires her participation. |
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| **M3 — A machine made this.** Ship tray/evidence shelf; Mara primary. Requires a committed culture-profile capture. | Preserve the completed trace, share it, or isolate first and accept that the pre-isolation comparison may be missing. | Full comparison changes her causal belief toward the machine profile. Two post-isolation non-anomalous results establish only current disconnection. Isolation removes a live signal, never the captured record; reopening remains explicit and access-conditional. |
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| **I1 — My pace.** Obj. 2 rehab/calibration bay; Ivo primary. Requires travel air, current short route and braced airlock-side alcove. | Leave Stride in the approach plate; when Ivo visibly signals ready, the astronaut performs the established deliberate grounded traversal and its trigger cues the lamps. Or reclaim Stride and let Ivo press the bay's fixed manual cue before walking. Astronaut holds the single junction. | Stride's observed eligible subject remains the astronaut; Ivo controls when the crossing begins and moves under his own power. Installed/reclaimed state is exact, with no extra part or capacity cost. Neither branch grants rescue or acquisition automatically. Ordinary abort reaches the braced alcove; death mid-crossing follows the shared boundary above. |
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| **I2 — Two actual passes.** Ship gait rail; Ivo primary. Requires I1 Sent. | Repair/commission rail together or postpone. After commissioning, the astronaut may walk one voluntary pass and stand on the moving carrier for the second. | Fixture setup persists; trace records only performed astronaut tests, never a rolling-weight substitute. Player may later operate solo and reclaim Stride. No passive training/stat benefit appears. |
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| **I3 — Ask before treatment.** Ship before treatment or after a return; Ivo primary. Requires the treatment's recorded access benefit, hostile correction cue and purge evidence. | Discuss then accept, refuse, defer or later purge. If treatment happened before Ivo arrived, show/withhold the actual record; he cannot retroactively warn. | His response distinguishes informed choice from hidden exposure. All options retain his help and main progression. Treatment/purge state persists; conversation neither applies nor removes it. |
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| I1 | Pace Calibration Bay, R05 (objective 2) | Pace Approach Junction, R06 |
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| Y1 first **or** A1 first | R-3 Quarantine Ward, R13 (objective 4) | Clinical Abort Vestibule, R12 |
Five rescue identities use six refuge rooms and seven mutually exclusive host variants; they are not seven rescues. All four abort rooms are already counted. Their assignment does not guarantee adjacent, quiet or short routes in any particular arrangement, and R12 cannot support remote rescues simultaneously. Home and evidence scenes stay aboard. The [scene/evidence crosswalk](/Hold%20The%20Flood/Campaign%20Evidence%20And%20State%20Crosswalk) records the exact shared observations and participants.
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**Yeva first.** Objective 1 opens the R-3 bearing; a later current short geometry enables Y1 at objective 4. Y2 makes the pressure record and incomplete bench visible immediately, while ordinary refill/rig work stays useful. Objectives 5/6 can proceed without Yeva's testimony. Dorn's D1/D2 later completes the bench/receiver; Aster enters once her objective-7 booth gets a verified short route. Yeva's early road names remain attributed help, never translation.
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## Three viable ways through the cast
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**Aster first.** A1 occupies R-3 and A2 gives a first-return record comparison without any other project appearing. A3 can narrow her shift belief after an ordinary death. Yeva later occupies the objective-6 pressure annex, never R-3; she may complete Y2's installation before or after Dorn physically services the inherited bench gear, but prepared cycles wait for both contributions and a demonstrated cycle. All physical language, pressure and equipment paths remain available before either joins.
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**Yeva first.** Objective 1 supplies R-3's bearing; a later short current route enables Y1 at objective 4. Y2 immediately makes her record and incomplete bench useful company aboard. Objectives 5/6 proceed without her testimony. Dorn's later D1/D2 supplies receiver/service and completes the bench prerequisites; Aster waits for her objective-7 booth to gain a verified short route. Yeva's early crew road names are attributed help, not alien translation.
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**Deeper mechanisms before the cast.** The investigator defers objective 4 until a valid short route, completes builder/visitor tests and reaches objective 11 by physical alternatives. They may capture the live harmful-profile feed, leave isolation open, or re-seat it before any rescue. Completed captures survive; missing pre-isolation evidence is not reconstructed, and a later post-isolation test has only the limited result M3 describes. Reopening is explicit but depends on reaching the control again. Later people respond only to records shown after they arrive; none supplies an unseen prior conversation. Objective 12's physical all-room construction remains independent of gathering the cast, intervention or diagnostics.
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**Aster first.** A1 occupies R-3; A2 supplies the first-return comparison without other people's projects appearing. A3 can narrow her belief after an ordinary death. Yeva later takes the objective-6 annex and may install the bench before or after Dorn services it. Prepared cycles still need both contributions and a demonstration. Physical language, pressure and equipment paths remain available throughout.
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These schedules overlay the two Regional orders rather than replacing them. A shift can defer any rescue host, while completed objective work, joins, records and object locations retain their owning states.
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**Deeper exploration before anyone comes home.** Defer objective 4 until its short route exists; complete both language tests and reach objective 11 through physical alternatives. Capture the harmful-profile feed, leave isolation open or re-seat it before rescuing anyone. Existing captures survive; missing pre-isolation evidence is not reconstructed, and later post-isolation results retain M3's limits. Reopening requires reaching its control again. Later arrivals respond only to records actually shown. Objective 12's all-room construction remains independent of the cast, intervention and diagnostics.
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## Strongest case and costs
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These schedules fit either [regional dependency order](/Hold%20The%20Flood/Regional%20Discovery%20Map). Equipment, ordinary refill, both language tests, pressure controls, station connection and endings retain routes without survivors. Each person must participate in their own setup and testimony; an absent or uninformed person contributes nothing unseen. Responses remain attributed and never correct the player's notes automatically. Completed fixtures support only their defined later solo use. Sharing a record inside its scene is sufficient; no separate preliminary conversation is required. Yeva's crew names and Dorn's crawl-mark memories help when requested without translating either language or revealing current neighbours.
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**Strongest case.** Keep all five working people. Their rescue choices concern record versus exposure, reversible closure, boundary versus part use, purge versus preserved evidence and autonomy versus automation. Their home work changes preparation without becoming upkeep, and later evidence changes a specific belief or relationship rather than awarding generic loyalty.
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## The cost of this cast, and a smaller option
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**Costs.** Five short rescues still require five route/abort/ordinary-horde integrations and survivor behavior; mutually exclusive first-survivor hosting adds real branch work; D2 and D3 need careful shared-scene accounting; optional testimony increases knowledge-state variants; and “one junction” may feel contrived if the shifting layout rarely produces credible geometry.
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Keeping all five preserves different human stakes: record versus exposure, reversible closure, respect for a sealed boundary, purge versus evidence and control over one's movement. Their home work improves preparation without becoming upkeep; later evidence changes particular beliefs and relationships.
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**Strongest smaller cut.** Select Yeva as first survivor, remove the Aster-first R-3 branch and Yeva-later annex variant, and keep Aster's later objective-7 rescue. The five people, fifteen scene identities and every main system remain. The lost experience is substantive: the opening can no longer begin with distrust of the astronaut's arrival, the owner loses the strongest alternate first-person tone, and Aster's berth theory is encountered only after the player already knows another survivor.
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It still costs five route/abort/horde integrations and survivor behaviours, seven host variants, shared-scene accounting for D2/D3 and optional knowledge-state writing. The one-junction limit could feel contrived if the station rarely offers credible geometry. Portraits and machinery alone will not make players care; these scenes still need dialogue and authored responses.
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## Open questions
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The strongest smaller cut chooses Yeva first, removes the Aster-first ward branch and Yeva-later annex variant, and keeps Aster's later supply-booth rescue. All five people, fifteen scene identities and main systems survive. The lost tone is substantial: the opening can no longer begin with distrust of the astronaut's arrival, and Aster's berth theory comes only after the player knows someone else. This remains an option, not a selection.
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- Yeva versus Aster as R-3's first survivor.
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- The global order and outcome when astronaut death intersects a transfer and a death-triggered shift. The mid-crossing safeguard in Death Shift and Rescue Continuity is pending owner decision; this map recommends neither automatic safety nor loss.
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- Whether, and how, a person already Sent can later die.
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- Final names and cast, exact geometry, dialogue, content placement and the story/core branch.
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- Actual layout and the full dialogue and state permutations are not yet written.
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- Later ledger must allocate four non-R-3 refuge/abort fixtures and both mutually exclusive non-first host variants; if they do not fit, record an increment or revise.
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- These rules are untested; numbers are proposals.
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Still open: the first survivor and final cast/names; the rescue death safeguard or finish-versus-retry alternative; broader survivor loss and whether someone already Sent can later die; exact layout, dialogue and state permutations; and the story/core branch. [Open Decisions](/Hold%20The%20Flood/Open%20Decisions) holds the competing proposals, while the [Owner Brief](/Hold%20The%20Flood/Brief) records actual choices. The intended emotional effects remain design hypotheses.
