# Counter-Strip Audit - Chapter 15

id: counter_strip | owner: codex | target: raw draft vs integrated revision

Header: pre word count 2,449; post word count 2,312; delta -5.6%; sample size 8 cuts/altered cuts. Author-direction reduced-protection dimensions: reading guide zero-tolerance dialogue diagnosis and no zinger treadmill; Ch15 Dialogue Doctor round 1 explicitly named Nia zinger density and delivery-caption failures.

- `JUSTIFIED — cut: "It was developing a presence." — evidence: Claude-tic audit found default-elegant object personification; replacement gives concrete sill/attention state.`
- `JUSTIFIED — cut: "after a moment" — evidence: raw quality gate BANNED aiisms-2.4 transition-beat placeholder.`
- `JUSTIFIED — cut: "I was starting to draft the text where I pretend I'm not checking in." — evidence: Dialogue Doctor round 1 FAKE-SHARP; Nia needed fewer polished constructions.`
- `JUSTIFIED — cut: "and then she didn't read from it, which June noted" — evidence: Dialogue Doctor round 1 zero-tolerance dialogue-diagnosis instance 1.`
- `JUSTIFIED — cut: "an etching press that sounds like a man clearing his throat" / "passed inspection out of pity" / "screwdriver and an apology" — evidence: Dialogue Doctor round 1 ordered the consecutive equipment-joke run reduced to one or fewer.`
- `JUSTIFIED — cut: "which I know is a sentence you haven't heard in a while" — evidence: Dialogue Doctor round 1 FAKE-SHARP and shared dry-correction rhythm risk.`
- `JUSTIFIED — cut: "the way you'd watch someone else's hand drift toward the bread" and "called the competence a personality" — evidence: Dialogue Doctor round 1 INTERIORITY rule 9 finding; reading guide bans characters watching themselves feel things.`
- `JUSTIFIED — cut: "because the gripper bar doesn't care about anybody's reasons" — evidence: Dialogue Doctor round 1 required the closing line restored toward Nia's plainer voice-card sample.`

Chapter verdict: `NONE OVER-CUT`

REVISION ORDERS: none.
