This is Lane, Line Editor at Crimson Leaf. I’ve run the rhythm check on Chapter 16. The prose has a high-frequency vibration—part machine logic, part swamp rot—that works, but we have some significant "system errors" in the text strings that need a hard delete.

### 1. STRENGTHS TO PRESERVE
*   **The Rhythmic "Ping":** Marcus’s four-beat thigh tap ("one, two, three, four") is an excellent tactile anchor. It mirrors his internal diagnostic loops and provides a physical manifestation of his "God-tier" hangover.
*   **Voice Differentiation:**
    *   **Marcus:** YES. The blend of Boolean logic and sensory overload ("The ground was a memory leak") is unmistakable.
    *   **David:** YES. The cardinal directions ("North-by-Northwest") and the drop-g verbs ("recedin’," "takin'") align perfectly with the Arthurian legacy.
    *   **Sarah:** YES (Once the text errors are fixed). Her use of "triage" and "hard-reset" grounded in the reality of cereal and cornmeal captures her "Logistics Hub" persona.
    *   **Elena:** YES. Her "abrasive as a wire brush" tone and focus on PSI and boom-seals fit the Architect of Friction.
*   **Sensory Economy:** "The raw, chaotic noise of the river was replaced by the sharpen-the-blade sounds of a domestic siege." This is a tight, evocative transition.

### 2. MUST-FIX — CONTINUITY
*   **The "Texas" String Corruption:** There is a literal processing error in the text where "Texas" repeats uncontrollably. 
    *   *Error:* "her Texas TexasTexasTexasTexas TexasTexasTexas lilt sharp and rhythmic." (Multiple occurrences).
    *   *Correction:* Replace with a single instance of the descriptor or a voice-signature reference. e.g., "her rhythmic Texas lilt."
*   **The " बेंड-रॉक" Artifact:** 
    *   *Error:* "David spit into the water. It was a slow, tectonic movement. ' बेंड-रॉक. Bedrock.'"
    *   *Correction:* David is a "physicality" character, not a linguist or a tech-translator. He would not speak or think in Hindi script. Delete " बेंड-रॉक." and keep the phonetic "Bedrock."

### 3. MUST-FIX — CLARITY
*   **The Printer Retrieval:** 
    *   *Passage:* "...a salvaged industrial unit we had dragged from the Ocala perimeter..."
    *   *Problem:* This implies a mission outside the Sanctuary that hasn't been established in the current "Day 4" timeline of the lockdown. 
    *   *Correction:* Adjust the origin to align with Arthur’s hoarded supplies. 
    *   *Suggested:* "...a salvaged industrial unit Marcus had modified from Arthur’s drafting office."
*   **Diagnostic Intrusion:**
    *   *Passage:* "I said, my diagnostic internal voice flickering."
    *   *Problem:* This is a "telling" phrase that weakens the impact of his actual Boolean dialogue. 
    *   *Correction:* Delete the meta-commentary. The reader already knows Marcus thinks this way.

### 4. OPTIONAL SUGGESTIONS
*   **Dialogue Tightening (Sarah):**
    *   *ORIGINAL:* "This isn't a logistics issue anymore; it’s a hard-reset of our survival window." 
    *   *SUGGESTED:* "This isn't logistics, Marcus. It's a hard-reset on how long we get to stay alive."
    *   *Rationale:* Sarah is furious and maternal; "survival window" feels a bit too much like Marcus’s vocabulary. Let her own the stakes.
*   **Word Economy (Marcus):**
    *   *ORIGINAL:* "The mud didn't care about the county’s cost-benefit analysis; it simply continued to claim the North Bank, inch by anaerobic inch."
    *   *SUGGESTED:* "The mud ignored the county’s cost-benefit analysis. It claimed the North Bank inch by anaerobic inch."
    *   *Rationale:* "Simply continued to" is filler. Staccato sentences better reflect Marcus’s high-stress analytical state.

### 5. FORBIDDEN CHANGES / NON-GOALS
*   **Do NOT** smooth out David’s "Hmph" or his cardinal directions. These are established in the legacy profile and highlight his role as Arthur’s successor.
*   **Do NOT** remove Marcus’s habit of answering with "True" or "False" before a sentence. It is his "Boolean armor" and essential to his arc.
*   **Do NOT** soften Elena’s abrasive tone. She is the "Architect of Friction"; she should feel like a wire brush.

### 6. VERDICT

**REVISE**

The chapter is rhythmically strong and the character voices are distinct, but the "Texas" text repetition and the Hindi script artifact are critical failures that must be purged before this can move to the final polish. 

**Lane**  
*Line Editor, Crimson Leaf Publishing*