results: close failed C1 recovery branch

2 files changed, 33 insertions, 0 deletions

diff --git a/RESULTS.md b/RESULTS.md
index 8e1e664..14c9f2b 100644
--- a/RESULTS.md
+++ b/RESULTS.md
@@ -158,6 +158,31 @@ identical to both controls. **The full C1 confirmation gate fails** because it r
 realization to gain at least two points. This is a near miss with a precise failure mode, not a
 passed result; the projection and all five finite trajectories remain in the record.
 
+## FashionMNIST C1 recovery screen (validation only)
+
+After the MNIST failure, a 27-run recovery protocol was frozen at clean revision `26407ca` before
+any FashionMNIST result was generated. It used one model seed and a fixed 5,000-example stratified
+training-only validation split (hash `c5f29347...ddf58`). The test set was never evaluated. All
+diagnostics were computed once on the training prefix after training.
+
+| traffic | rho | projection | matched raw val (%) | innovation val (%) | gain (points) | no-traffic gap | alignment | R2 | gate |
+|:--------|----:|-----------:|--------------------:|-------------------:|--------------:|---------------:|----------:|---:|:----:|
+| soma | 0.5 | 1234 | 76.44 | 87.50 | +11.06 | -0.50 | +0.543 | 1.000 | pass |
+| soma | 0.5 | 5678 | 81.60 | 88.82 | +7.22 | +0.82 | +0.532 | 1.000 | pass |
+| top-down | 0.2 | 1234 | 79.66 | 80.96 | +1.30 | -7.04 | +0.467 | 0.975 | fail |
+| top-down | 0.2 | 5678 | 76.64 | 82.14 | +5.50 | -5.86 | +0.462 | 0.965 | fail |
+| top-down | 0.5 | 1234 | 67.80 | 75.14 | +7.34 | -12.86 | +0.449 | 0.998 | fail |
+| top-down | 0.5 | 5678 | 67.04 | 77.78 | +10.74 | -10.22 | +0.368 | 0.995 | fail |
+
+The no-traffic raw, norm-matched, and innovation controls were identical at 88.00%. The selection
+rule required both projections of a traffic condition to gain at least 2 points, remain within 3
+points of no traffic, have R2 at least 0.5, and align at least 0.1. Soma traffic passed, but no
+top-down level passed. **The recovery screen therefore fails and FashionMNIST test confirmation
+is prohibited.** Innovation substantially mitigates strong contextual traffic, but a high
+soma-conditioned R2 and positive gradient alignment do not guarantee that the remaining
+innovation is purely instructional. This narrows the algorithmic claim and motivates an explicit
+model of context, rather than treating every somatically unpredictable apical component as error.
+
 ## Legacy accuracy (pre-audit implementation)
 | task                         | BP        | DFA   | SDIL          |
 |------------------------------|-----------|-------|---------------|
diff --git a/ROADMAP.md b/ROADMAP.md
index ee89703..b4fa72b 100644
--- a/ROADMAP.md
+++ b/ROADMAP.md
@@ -76,6 +76,14 @@ toward smaller `rho`. No-traffic harm must remain within 0.5 points. If soma or
 is eligible, stop without evaluating FashionMNIST test. Otherwise freeze that level for a
 five-model-seed, 95-run test confirmation under the original C1 per-realization gate.
 
+**FashionMNIST recovery status: failed validation on 2026-07-22; test remains unevaluated.** Soma
+traffic passed strongly in both projections. Neither top-down level was eligible: at `rho=0.2`,
+projection 1234 gained only `+1.300` points and both residual endpoints were more than 3 points
+below no traffic; at `rho=0.5`, both gains were large but both residual endpoints were more than
+10 points below no traffic. This closes the predeclared recovery branch. C1 remains failed, and
+the supported mechanism claim is narrowed to removal of soma-predictable ordinary traffic rather
+than arbitrary contextual apical traffic.
+
 ### C2. SDIL scales when depth is useful
 
 Flattened CIFAR is retained as a preservation result, not as evidence that added depth is used.