The two routine amendments withdrew the words they replaced.
Juno had Eli read that distinction aloud because he kept looking at the unfamiliar phrase instead of the order in which it arrived. The phrase sounded imperative. So did half the ordinary instructions hunters received when a gate was changing around them. Its force alone could not establish another source.
The sequence was different.
In the routine records, the earlier line was retracted before the replacement took effect. In the copied instruction from the rescue, the later command remained layered over an unretracted rescue instruction. One said to go. The other continued to say hold. The hunters had not imagined the impossibility by remembering the wording badly.
“Could the copy be damaged?” Eli asked.
“It could,” Juno said. “That’s why the independent reader gets the raw version before the conclusion.”
She had placed the three samples under neutral labels. The reader worked through them while Eli helped Sera organize the permitted witness accounts. The rescued leader had asked to be told what the comparison meant for her team’s penalties. She had not asked to become a public witness to every new hypothesis.
Bram’s former colleague supplied a limited account of chamber discussions. Personnel had mentioned an additional command layer. She had heard the term; she had not seen its origin or independently traced who could use it. She separated that from the access changes she had personally observed.
