“What are you doing?” Elara asked, her voice tighter than intended.

“Shh,” Mira said. “You can’t measure this part.”

Elara stood.

She traced the logic. The model had derived Φ from the residuals of her equations—the tiny, discarded errors that every scientist agrees to ignore. The model, in its relentless pursuit of completely science , had refused to ignore them.

Two palms. One seed.