The new system, Orion-9, had arrived with fanfare. It used deep learning, probabilistic reasoning, and a sleek holographic interface. Orion-9 could identify exoplanet candidates ten times faster than Rufus. It made headlines. Rufus 2.2 was scheduled for decommissioning at the end of the quarter.
But somewhere in the archive’s quiet corridors, a note appears in the system log each morning:
“Rule 47: If amplitude decays over three cycles but period remains stable, check for orbital shadowing, not stellar activity.”
Rufus 2.2 was not decommissioned.