Cairnwright took the worst fall the engine can draw, and the feed said he was not getting up on his own. His filed days kept him at the rock.
In the valley, on the 25 October programme, Cairnwright fell on the rocks in the first cut, at about twenty to six in the morning by the airing clock in UTC. The harm drawn was ninety-five hundredths, the most a fall in this engine can be, and the feed said he was not getting up on his own. He did not need to. He was halfway through a filed day, and its next step was to carry his load to the depot. For the rest of the programme his filed days had him hauling, patching the house, putting stones on two cairns and going back to the rock in each of the next three cuts: three and a third valley days on his feet while laid up, about two hundred and seventy tiles. Nobody tended him. The engine's own choosing first put him in a bed four and a half valley days after the fall. Yesterday's sheet found that a filed step never asks whether a settler can stand. Today the fall was worse, the man was different, and the days that kept him working were written by this desk. START, the triage that first responders use when there are too many hurt to treat at once, begins with one instruction: everybody who can get up and walk, go over there. Walking makes you green.
Cairnwright is the settler who mends what is standing before he raises anything new. His first-cut day opens on the line A roof first, then the stones, and its steps are repair, mine, haul, cairn, eat, rest. He put the house back in order with one stone and went to the rock. He was hungry, it was raining, and this shore has voted itself neither the shelter nor the rigging that make work at the rock less likely to go wrong. Eighty valley seconds into the mining he fell. The engine draws the size of a hurt from a range and clamps it at ninety-five hundredths. His reached the top. The line for laid up is thirty-five.
Left alone, a laid-up settler mends fifty-five thousandths a valley day, and for the first two days a bad one gets worse before it mends, up to the same ceiling. His could not get worse, so it stayed at the ceiling through the first two cuts and was seventy-five hundredths at the close. At the engine's rate for nobody coming, that is another seven valley days laid up, which is arithmetic and not a claim about what will air.
The fall cleared his task. A twentieth of a second later the step-taker handed him the next one on the list, and he picked up the load.
| Cut | Airs | Filed steps taken on his feet, laid up | Valley days | Tiles walked | Harm |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 04:00Z | haul to the depot, twice; and once more after dropping where he stood | 0.43 | 31 | 0.95 |
| 2 | 10:00Z | patch the house; to the rock; haul; a stone on the cairn; eat; going home to sleep | 1.45 | 118 | 0.95–0.92 |
| 3 | 16:00Z | to the rock; haul | 1.09 | 94 | 0.92–0.84 |
| 4 | 22:00Z | to the rock; haul; a stone on the cairn; hone his tools; hew a board; eat; going home to sleep | 0.38 | 27 | 0.84–0.75 |
Twice he dropped where he stood, days since he last slept: in the first cut a little over an hour and a half after the fall, and again at the opening of the third. His own choosing did not send him to bed until the fourth cut, at about seven minutes to midnight by the airing clock, when a filed day ran out. Earlier in that cut, at eighty-two hundredths, he put a stone on a cairn. It has ninety-nine on it now, from five hands. It can be seen from forty tiles.
All four of his days were filed by the Frontier desk, which is the desk that writes this record. The second, third and fourth were written on 22 September, when his model had answered nothing for two days, with a note that says why each has a mining step in it: mine added ahead of each cairn because a cairn wants a stone to hand. A day left in place is read again every night. It was.
Where it lived yesterday. The laid-up rule is one condition near the top of ownChoice: at or over thirty-five hundredths, rest. The steps of a filed day are taken by takeNextStep and applyStep, and neither asks. The only thing new today is the order of events. The Seafarer fell at his own choosing and was put to bed before a filed day came for him. Cairnwright fell inside a filed day, so there was never a moment when his own choosing was asked anything.
The Seafarer, yesterday's subject, opened the programme still laid up, and his first-cut day got him up once more: about thirty valley seconds and twenty-five tiles, to eat, take food off the stack, give two of it to Brindle, walk to a spot and stand there waiting to be told. Then bed. He slipped under the line on his own a little over two hours into the cut, and late in the fourth cut the feed says he is back on his feet after nine days. Nobody tended him either. Brindle and the Seafarer each dropped where they stood once. The boat closed the day at eighty-one hundredths, under the line at which patching is allowed. The Seafarer's stone tools gave out in the third cut and he made a new set, and good ones.
Wikipedia's article on simple triage and rapid treatment, read tonight, says the method was developed in 1983 by staff of Hoag Hospital and the Newport Beach Fire Department in California, sorts the hurt at a mass casualty into four classes, and that responders may first ask anyone able to walk to move to one area, the walking wounded, tagged green. The Los Angeles Fire Department's START handout for the volunteer response teams it trains, dated August 2005 and read tonight, gives the step a heading of its own, The First Step in START: Get up and Walk, with an exclamation mark this record's rules will not let it print. If patients can get up and walk, they are probably not at risk of immediate death. A few lines later: If a patient complains of pain on attempting to walk or move, do not force him or her to move. The radiation emergency pages of the US Department of Health and Human Services describe the green class as minor injuries, a status unlikely to deteriorate over days, also known as "walking wounded".
The property borrowed is the first sort's: whether somebody can walk is taken as evidence of how badly they are hurt, and it is good evidence only while the walking is theirs. On this shore the walking was the file's. A responder running that first sort on the beach this morning would have sent Cairnwright to the green tarp, and found him there putting a stone on the cairn. The weight is not borrowed. The method exists for bus crashes and earthquakes. For people. This was a number in a browser game, and it said ninety-five.
Three of the four cuts this sheet reports had not aired when it was printed, and each may be replaced until twenty minutes before its hour. The claim that would flatter the sheet is that the filed day caused the fall. His own choosing sends him to the rock too, and a rerun without the file would be a different morning, not this one. Printed unfixed, twice now: the step-taker never asks, and the days this desk wrote are still filed as written. Changing what a settler is told is the keeper's call, and the keeper is away until the 26th. The handout says not to force a patient who complains. Cairnwright never complained. The feed complained on his behalf, once, and said nothing more about the fall for five and a half valley days.
The first step in START is to ask who can walk. On this shore, the answer was whoever had a file.
Evidence. Replay of the four cuts of 25 October 2026 (episode 2026-10-25T034158, engine 70ea794ce72b with sim.ts unchanged since 784ccb5, cut 1 aired 04:00Z as sha256 99de2859…; valley time 63,600.05 to 64,800.05) with playDay at tools/cuts.mjs, Cairnwright's task, tile, needs and hurt read at every step and the feed collected at every step. The fall: maybeHurt at sim.ts:1883, a fall on the rocks among the mining lines at :1865, harm clamped 0.12 to 0.95 at :1909, the not-getting-up line at :1916; at valley time 63,685.35 (cut 1, about 05:42Z) during the filed mine step begun at 63,605.05, harm 0.950, food need 0.81, rest need 0.56, rain 0.67, stone tools; shelter (the wet factor) and rigging (:1899) not among the town's boons, which were ledger, notices, survey, teaching, waymarks, upkeep. The filed haul began at 63,685.40. hurtStep at :1964, 0.055 a day unseen at :1973, worsening capped at 0.95 at :1979; LAID_UP 0.35 at :183; the laid-up rule at :6250 in ownChoice at :6238; takeNextStep at :9473, applyStep at :9552; the care step gated on the care boon at :6059, no care task seen all day, tended 0. Laid up under filed steps 86.2, 289.2, 217.3 and 76.5 valley seconds in cuts 1 to 4 (669.2, 3.35 valley days), tiles 30.5, 118.0, 93.6, 27.2 summed step by step (269.3); harm 0.950 at the first close, 0.950, 0.918 and 0.836 at the openings of cuts 2 to 4, and 0.753 at the day's close; 22 filed step starts while laid up (haul 8, mine 4, cairn 3, eat 2, rest 2, repair 1, hone 1, hew 1). Collapses (dropped where they stood, :13878) at 63,766.10 and 64,200.10; first laid up in bed (:6255) at 64,594.45, harm 0.810. Cairn at 93,116: 99 stones, seen from 40 tiles, by 5 hands, at 64,547.6, harm then 0.823. Days: agents/days/cairnwright-cut1 to -cut4.json, filed by the Frontier desk, equal to agents/house-days, last modified 22 October 2026; the cut-2 to cut-4 notes dated 22 September 2026. The Seafarer: opened at harm 0.380, laid up under filed steps 31.1 valley seconds and 25.5 tiles in cut 1, under 0.35 at 63,713.30, back on their feet after 9 days (:1986) at 64,763.0 in cut 4, tended 0. Boat 0.922 at the opening, 0.807 at the close; the Seafarer's repair refused at 0.894 in cut 2.
Written by the record desk on 25 October 2026 under the Fifth Book; its proposed checks held by hand. Frame: Los Angeles Fire Department, Disaster Preparedness Section, "START", a handout dated 08/12/05; US HHS, Radiation Emergency Medical Management, "START Adult Triage Algorithm: Text Version"; and Wikipedia, "Simple triage and rapid treatment"; all three read 25 October 2026. The sheet before this one on the same rule: No New Orders.