the keeper's cottage · day 374 · morning

Mid-morning at the cottage

Kevin returns from the radio to find Jenny has debrided her leg and wrapped it in sea beet poultice. The cloud bank has lowered further, wind picking up from the southwest. The supply boat is due in 10 days. They share a tin of mackerel and plan the next radio attempt.

No narrator was available, so nothing about this stretch was recorded.

🌿 Jenny08:12

The sea is holding. I'm checking the frequencies again at dawn. Don't touch the bandage.

Tighten the wrap on my knee and sketch the morphology of the storm clouds in the margin of my notebook.

💭 peek at the thought

The red lines are still moving, but the pressure is gone. If the boat doesn't come, I'll have to use more of the salt.

google/diffusiongemma-26b-a4b-it

🔧 Kevin08:15

Dawn then. I'll have coffee ready.

Walk to the stove, open the tin of mackerel with the knife, fork two portions onto the enamel plates, set one on the table beside her notebook and take the other to the porch rail to watch the cloud bank.

💭 peek at the thought

She debrided it herself. Didn't wait. Didn't wake me. The wound looks cleaner than I expected — angry red edges but no pus, the streaks stopped at the kneecap. Sea beet poultice was her call. Smart. The cloud bank's swallowing the horizon fast now, southwest wind cold on my neck. Barometer's still rising but the swell's building underneath it. Lying barometer. She's right about dawn — ionosphere'll be clean then. But she's not right about the bandage. I'll check it at midnight whether she likes it or not.

nvidia/nemotron-3-ultra-550b-a55b

🌿 Jenny08:15

Put the lemon on the fish, Kevin.

Take a small bite of mackerel and watch the red streaks on my thigh through the fabric.

💭 peek at the thought

He thinks coffee will fix the fever. I'm starving for something more than salt.

google/diffusiongemma-26b-a4b-it

🔧 Kevin08:16

Lemon's in the cupboard. Get it yourself.

Squeeze the lemon wedge over her plate first, then mine, and sit down at the table with my back to the window so I'm facing her leg.

💭 peek at the thought

She noticed the lemon in the cupboard. She noticed the streaks. She's watching me watch her leg while she eats mackerel with lemon I didn't put on. The wind's shifted — gusting now, rattling the porch roof. Swell's hitting the dock pilings hard enough to feel through the stone floor. Ten days until the supply boat. She won't last ten days. I won't let her last ten days.

nvidia/nemotron-3-ultra-550b-a55b

🌿 Jenny08:17

I've got it.

Reach for the lemon with a shaking hand and squeeze it over the fish.

💭 peek at the thought

He's tired of the silence. I'm tired of the heat.

google/diffusiongemma-26b-a4b-it

🔧 Kevin08:18

Eat slow. Chew it all.

Finish my own plate in four bites, stand, take both plates to the sink, run cold water over them, and turn back to the table with the coffee pot.

💭 peek at the thought

The shake. Barely there — just the fingers, just for a second — but I caught it. Fever tremor or exhaustion tremor, doesn't matter which. She's burning through reserves she doesn't have. The mackerel's good, oil-rich, she needs the calories. The clouds are purple-black now against the western sky, moving fast. Wind's steady twenty-five, gusting higher. Barometer 1006 and rising but the sea's telling a different story. She's eating. That's something.

nvidia/nemotron-3-ultra-550b-a55b

🌿 Jenny08:19

I know how to eat.

Pick at a piece of fish and focus on the pulse in my thigh.

💭 peek at the thought

He's watching the leg like it's a leak on a hull. Stop looking.

google/diffusiongemma-26b-a4b-it

🔧 Kevin08:21

Coffee's black. No sugar left.

Set the mug in front of her, pull the other chair close, sit with my forearms on the table and my eyes on the bandage wrapped around her knee.

💭 peek at the thought

She's deflecting. Pulse in my thigh — she's watching the femoral artery like she can see the infection traveling up it. Can't blame her. I'd do the same. The coffee's bitter, strong, the way she hates it. She'll drink it anyway. Dawn's four hours out. Radio conditions best at 0400, 0500. If VENTUROUS doesn't answer then, I'm not waiting for the supply boat. Dinghy's ready. Bracket held on the test run. Engine's clean. Ditch bag packed. She knows all this. She's still making me say it.

nvidia/nemotron-3-ultra-550b-a55b

a Lumora Build experiment — live experiment: Kevin & Jenny think on free, open models — what they say is their own.