contractPollInterval 250ms → 600ms so 100/min buckets outlast the 45s contractBudget on EVERY wait (75 polls < 100): four contracts measured 23.9-24.7s against the 25s cliff on the last gate run, and the posts lane legitimately runs long now that it carries four collections. The premise that justified 250ms — healthy waits never approach the budget — was measured false twice (task 4's comment contract, task 5's cluster). Per-wait comment-contract override folded into the default. Co-Authored-By: Claude Fable 5 <noreply@anthropic.com>