initial upload

docs/economy/DIALOGUE-PROLOGUE-0015.md

@@ -0,0 +1,342 @@
+# DIALOGUE-PROLOGUE-0015
+## The Sick Mule Market — Canonical Draft
+### Status: Canonical Dialogue Draft
+### Layer: OTIVM (Roman Merchant)
+### Purpose: Prologue scenario teaching transport dependency, animal disease risk, replacement shortages, cascading logistics failure, and how working animals function as economic infrastructure.
+### Repository Path: docs/scenarios/DIALOGUE-PROLOGUE-0015.md
+
+---
+
+## 0. Design Intent
+
+Illness has spread through Ostia’s hauling yards.
+
+Several mules are coughing, refusing feed, stumbling under load, or dead by morning. Teamsters argue, buyers panic, fodder sellers raise prices, and merchants discover how much commerce walks on four legs.
+
+Known facts are uncertain:
+
+- contagious disease or spoiled feed
+- overwork mistaken for plague
+- poisoned water source
+- one yard affected or many
+- sellers hiding symptoms
+- cure available or not
+
+The participant must learn that transport animals are infrastructure, not scenery.
+
+---
+
+## 1. Scene Constraints
+
+Location: animal market and adjacent hauling yards in Ostia, late morning.
+
+Primary signals:
+
+- coughing animals
+- teamsters demanding replacements
+- veterinarians overwhelmed
+- fodder prices rising
+- carts idle without teams
+- healthy animals repriced hourly
+
+Selection method: participant chooses whose interpretation to follow.
+
+---
+
+## 2. Opening Scene Draft
+
+The market smelled of hay, dung, vinegar, sweat, and expensive concern.
+
+Normally the mule yard sounded like bargaining, swearing, and hooves striking boards. Today it sounded like coughing.
+
+Three carts stood loaded and motionless because the animals before them preferred lying down.
+
+Marcus Atilius Varro stood near the main gate watching the line of idle wagons lengthen by the minute.
+
+Lucius Fabius Felix arrived holding his nose and smiling anyway.
+
+“No fire. No riot. No taxes,” Felix said. “Yet panic. Splendid.”
+
+Varro nodded toward a collapsed mule under shade cloth.
+
+“One dead since dawn.”
+
+“Then prices rose before breakfast.”
+
+Gaius Licinius Crispus approached stepping carefully between puddles and evidence.
+
+“Who governs animal inspection here?” he demanded.
+
+Felix answered first.
+
+“Today? Coughing.”
+
+Crispus ignored him.
+
+“Has movement been restricted?”
+
+Varro said, “Only by reality.”
+
+Quintus Cornelius Lentulus Minor arrived in boots new enough to resent mud.
+
+“My steward cannot hire a team,” he said.
+
+Felix stared.
+
+“Then Rome shakes.”
+
+“He has deliveries waiting.”
+
+“Then Rome negotiates.”
+
+Titus Varenus Secundus emerged from a pen carrying a bucket and practical contempt.
+
+“Not all disease,” he said. “Some are starved, some overdriven, some sick.”
+
+Varro asked, “How many usable?”
+
+“Half what men think. Quarter what sellers claim.”
+
+A quiet voice came from beside the water trough.
+
+“And twice what buyers can pay.”
+
+Publius Terentius Chresimus stood writing while watching who touched which animal.
+
+Felix sighed.
+
+“Even mules become ledgers.”
+
+“They always were,” Chresimus said.
+
+A drover shouted that his beasts were sound and immediately hid one coughing behind another.
+
+Secundus pointed.
+
+“There.”
+
+“What?” Lentulus asked.
+
+“The market technique.”
+
+Felix laughed.
+
+“Inventory management.”
+
+Crispus folded his hands.
+
+“If diseased stock is sold knowingly, penalties follow.”
+
+Felix replied, “Then sellers will become suddenly ignorant.”
+
+A veterinarian’s assistant ran by carrying herbs, vinegar, and despair.
+
+Varro watched him go.
+
+“One healer?”
+
+“Two apprentices,” Secundus said. “Master already drunk or exhausted.”
+
+“Same effect,” Felix added.
+
+The fodder stall posted new prices.
+
+The crowd groaned.
+
+Lentulus frowned.
+
+“Hay doubled?”
+
+Chresimus said, “Healthy animals eat. Sick animals waste. Fear buys both.”
+
+A teamster shouted that he needed replacements for a grain cart.
+
+Three sellers quoted three absurd prices.
+
+Felix smiled.
+
+“There. Honest market signals.”
+
+Crispus said, “Predation.”
+
+“Scarcity with manners.”
+
+Secundus crouched beside a mule and checked its gums.
+
+“Bad water in some yards.”
+
+“How can you tell?” Lentulus asked.
+
+“Because this one is thirsty and afraid of the trough.”
+
+Varro looked toward the carts.
+
+“If grain does not move?”
+
+Secundus answered first.
+
+“Bread rises tomorrow.”
+
+Chresimus added:
+
+“Storage fees rise tonight.”
+
+Felix nodded.
+
+“And fear rises immediately.”
+
+A fish merchant began hiring human porters at triple rate.
+
+The porters accepted before hearing distance.
+
+Varro said, “Labor shifting.”
+
+Crispus said, “Temporary.”
+
+Chresimus said, “Profitable.”
+
+A wealthy matron’s steward arrived demanding a calm white mule for ceremonial travel.
+
+The yard laughed openly.
+
+Felix bowed toward him.
+
+“At last, comic relief.”
+
+Lentulus said, “Status households still require movement.”
+
+Secundus replied, “Then let them pull their own litters.”
+
+A seller painted oil on a dull mule’s coat to make it look healthier.
+
+Felix admired the effort.
+
+“Presentation matters.”
+
+Varro said, “Fraud matters too.”
+
+“Only when noticed.”
+
+Crispus pointed at the animal.
+
+“That one is to be examined.”
+
+The seller vanished instantly.
+
+Chresimus did not look up.
+
+“He owes two men already.”
+
+“How do you know?” Crispus asked.
+
+“He ran toward creditors he likes less.”
+
+Another cough spread through the pens like a signal.
+
+Half the buyers stepped back.
+
+Prices for the visibly healthy animals rose again.
+
+Lentulus said, “This is madness.”
+
+“No,” Felix said. “This is sorting.”
+
+Secundus stood.
+
+“What matters now?”
+
+Varro answered first.
+
+“Working teams, route priority, water source.”
+
+Crispus said, “Inspection authority.”
+
+Lentulus said, “Reliable suppliers.”
+
+Felix said, “Panic discounts on sick-looking but usable stock.”
+
+Chresimus said, “Who can wait two days.”
+
+They all looked at him.
+
+“If recovery is likely, patient men buy cheap today.”
+
+Secundus nodded slowly.
+
+“True.”
+
+A carter ran in shouting that the northern yard had closed entirely.
+
+The whole market changed at once.
+
+Varro stepped toward the gate.
+
+“I’ll secure teams before roads empty.”
+
+Secundus moved with him.
+
+“I’ll inspect water and separate truly sick from tired.”
+
+Lentulus adjusted his cloak.
+
+“I will contact estates outside town.”
+
+Crispus drew himself up.
+
+“I will demand quarantine powers.”
+
+Felix turned toward the bargain pens.
+
+“I will buy every mule men are too frightened to understand.”
+
+Chresimus tied his tablets.
+
+“I will learn who owns fodder and who owns time.”
+
+Felix looked back once.
+
+“Six men. One coughing yard. None of us discussing animals.”
+
+Varro answered without turning.
+
+“We are discussing movement.”
+
+---
+
+## 3. Choice Presentation
+
+> The mule yard is sick. The roads soon may be. Whose reading of the market do you trust?
+
+| Choice | Background |
+|---|---|
+| Follow Varro to secure transport before routes fail. | Former Legionary |
+| Follow Felix to exploit panic and distressed animal sales. | Freedman Trader |
+| Follow Lentulus to source healthy teams through elite estates. | Noble Younger Son |
+| Follow Crispus to command inspection, quarantine, and penalties. | Failed Magistrate |
+| Follow Secundus to diagnose stock, water, and practical capacity. | Camp Logistician |
+| Follow Chresimus to trace fodder, ownership, and who profits from delay. | Guild Scribe |
+
+---
+
+## 4. What This Scene Teaches
+
+- Working animals are core transport infrastructure.
+- Disease rumors can freeze logistics quickly.
+- Replacement capacity becomes scarce immediately.
+- Labor substitutes emerge at higher cost.
+- Sellers may hide defects under stress.
+- Time horizon determines whether panic buying is wise.
+
+---
+
+## 5. Canonical Success Condition
+
+If the participant stops asking:
+
+“Are the mules sick?”
+
+and starts asking:
+
+“What stops moving if they are?”
+
+then this dialogue is functioning correctly.