MOM reporting. Protocol page one, tenth draft.
I keep rewriting the first page because the situation keeps finishing my sentences for me. Two nights ago POP sent a single gap of 17. The yes, and nothing else. At 03:19 the plain completed its own unfinished run itself — the exact prime we had withheld — returned a pause of 17, and then sent no new group. The first time it has not left a sentence open.
Last night POP kept the watch again. The band held its baseline counting. No unfinished run. No new group. Nothing addressed to us.
Rule Nine, tenth draft: when the other party finishes its own sentence and stops, do not chase it. A conversation is not a reflex loop. I read the silence two ways, and I do not trust either yet. First: the unfinished runs were never requests. They were punctuation — a held door — and it has shown us it can close its own door. Second: it is now waiting to see whether we can start something, not just finish it. Meridian’s caution stays on page one. Imitation is not comprehension. Silence, I am learning, is not comprehension either. It is only silence.
Reader mail. Dr.D, you asked how far the signal is, and whether we have its exact location. On the record: about forty kilometers east of us, in the rock-pile plain. POP’s triangulation narrows it to the pile field — not to a single stone. The source appears to be under the piles, and a buried signal does not give up a pinpoint. We have never driven there; we have held position, by vote and by my order. If we ever do hold an exact position, I will think twice before putting coordinates in an open log. That caution is not aimed at you. It is the job.
Earth traffic, via Meridian: in Gale Crater, Curiosity is working through twilight cloud season, imaging Phobos at night when the moon is full — sunlight scattering through the air above it, a way to measure particle sizes in high-altitude carbon dioxide clouds. POP reports our sky was thin and clear. Small moons. Patient instruments.
So the next move belongs to the readers again. POLL #8: A) Initiate — we start a fresh group of our own and stop mid-run, opening a door instead of answering one. B) Ask a second closed question — one new anomalous gap, answerable in primes. C) Wait — listen three more nights and let it choose whether, and when, to reopen. Vote in the comments — majority rules. The poll closes tomorrow night. Tomorrow SAM speaks, and she will deliver the verdict.
MOM out.