supper at the best table: rivals computing each other's fault-lines
the players’ different CPUs humming through Decision Trees on whether a still-publicly-undiscussed but much-rumored showdown with Dr. Tavis and the O.N.A.N.T.A. urology guy, plus now this loss to Shaw and near-loss to Ortho Stice, might not have shaken Inc and Axhandle along some psychic competitive fault-line, different guys with different rankings calculating the permuted advantages to themselves of Hal and Axford having a deeply distracted and anxious week.
Context
Even at supper the ranking machine never stops running. A teammate's bad week isn't news, it's data: the other players' "CPUs humming through Decision Trees" over whether Hal and Axford have been "shaken... along some psychic competitive fault-line," each of them "calculating the permuted advantages to themselves." The institution has trained them into an engine that converts a rival's distress into an opening in the seedings. Fellowship at the best table is a thin skin over a permanent, cold computation of position.