Run each scene–sequel pair against this list before deciding it stays as written. Each item derives from a test in §7 or a pattern in §8. The scene I can state the point-of-view character’s goal in one sentence containing a verb of pursuit and a specific object. That goal descends from the decision that closed the previous sequel, and I can point to the sentence. The resistance changes the shape of the goal rather than merely postponing it. The unit does not end in a clean, costless win. I can name what the character paid, and in what currency. The disaster arises from the pursuit rather than arriving from outside it. The sequel The disaster produces a reaction on the page, not an immediate jump to the next goal. The reaction is carried by the body and by what the attention selects, not by emotional vocabulary — or the naming is being done by a narrator with a stake in it. Both of the dilemma’s options are costly, and I can state each cost in one sentence. A sympathetic reader could reasonably prefer either option. The decision is concrete enough to become the next scene’s goal. The decision forecloses something; it is not a preference the character could quietly abandon. The chain Tracing backwards three links, each is caused by the one before it and not merely followed by it. Reverse-outlined with only and then / but / therefore, there is no run of three “and then”s. Any compressed or skipped sequel is a pacing decision I can defend, not an oversight. Any deferred decision has a page number on which it is paid. The page-space given to each beat tracks its weight in the story rather than my default register. The book There is at least one decision in this manuscript that the protagonist’s earlier self would not have made, and I can say what changed. Where a beat is structurally unavailable to this character, another engine supplies what it would have supplied.