As the year closes, Pegged enters a decisive transition phase.
The project has moved beyond exploration and structural uncertainty and is now firmly anchored in completion and consolidation. The Pegged novel is no longer a collection of scenes or ideas but a coherent narrative system, supported by a fully articulated conceptual framework.

The initial objective—finishing a first full draft by the end of the year—has largely been met in substance, if not yet in final polish.

• Act 1: Fully complete and stable. No further structural changes anticipated.

• Act 2: Locked. Character arcs and conflicts are now internally consistent and narratively cumulative.

• Act 3: Drafted in full. Remaining work concerns pacing, transitions, and tonal compression rather than content gaps.

• Postscript: Final version established; functions as both narrative closure and philosophical residue.

~64,000 words
Projected final length: 70–75k words after tightening and expansion of select Act 3 passages.

At this stage, writing has shifted from creation to precision: cutting redundancies, sharpening dialogue, and aligning emotional beats with conceptual stakes.

The Pegged White Paper has reached canonical completeness.

Over the past weeks:

• All sections have been finalized and cross-checked for internal coherence.

• The distinction between immutability, irreversibility, and irrevocability is now fully articulated.

• The protocol’s reliance on structural indifference is clearly defended as both a technical and anthropological stance.

• Vulnerabilities and failure modes are explicitly acknowledged, with no narrative hedging.

The White Paper now fulfills its intended role:

• A diegetically real appendix to Pegged

• A standalone intellectual artifact

• A boundary object between fiction, philosophy, and system design

No further conceptual expansion is planned—only layout, formatting, and eventual publication decisions.

Alias’s Notebook Excerpts are now fully integrated as a parallel narrative layer rather than a stopgap publishing solution.

They have proven effective in:

• Clarifying Pegged’s philosophical core without narrative exposition

• Giving Alias a precise, univocal voice

• Allowing Ava’s interpretive distance to surface implicitly

Next steps:

• Organize excerpts into a coherent internal sequence

• Prepare them for later reuse as a standalone volume:
  Alias’s Notebooks: The Ideas Behind Pegged

• Continue selective publication when aligned with narrative or real-world relevance

The Notebooks are no longer ancillary—they are part of the project’s permanent architecture.

The coming weeks will focus on:

1. Final editorial pass on the Pegged novel

2. Internal sequencing and annotation of Alias’s Notebook Excerpts

3. White Paper layout and publication strategy

4. Preparing the transition from drafting to reader-facing refinement in early 2026

This is no longer the phase of invention.
It is the phase of making the work unambiguous.

The feedback from beta readers remains essential. Many thanks to Rand Thomas (he's writing a SF story), Jack Monaghan, Martyn Lesser and Alex Boast for their continued support .

If you wish to beta read Acts 1 and 2, please let me know and I'll send you a copy in .pdf format.

I am also continuing for the hunt for a fitting literary agent. Please let me know if you could give any advice on this topic.

If you’ve been following Pegged throughout this year—reading, thinking, or quietly observing—thank you. The project has reached a point where every remaining decision is deliberate.

“What survives is not what persuades, but what endures without explanation.” — Alias

Merry Christmas,

— Ava