June enters production with Eden Press and works closely with editor Daniella Woodhouse, who responds quickly and proposes clear, commercial-minded edits. Following Daniella’s guidance, June clarifies language, renames confusing characters, softens slurs and caricatured racism, trims digressive backstory, and cuts a graphic suicide scene. The largest change removes the didactic Treaty of Versailles section; the story now ends with a homeward-bound image and a brief epilogue line from a 1918 letter. Daniella’s praise reassures June, who feels her voice and Athena’s have fused.

June internalizes the validation, claiming real authorship of the polished book. She was initially wary of Eden, but at Brett’s urging embraces being a priority author and aims to be “commercial and compulsively readable.”

To preempt suspicion, June amplifies her connection to Athena in interviews and on social media, posting old selfies and a tribute poem, and asserting that Athena aided her research. She establishes a scholarship in Athena’s name with the Asian American Writers’ Collective, which Peggy Chan publicly promotes. Meanwhile, June studies sources, briefly attempts Mandarin, and sets Google Alerts for both their names.

A Yale Daily News article announces that Athena’s drafting notebooks will enter the Marlin Archive, alarming June. She visits Patricia Liu, sees the notebooks boxed at home, and frames public access as a violation of Athena’s private, painful process—likening it to displaying a body. Patricia, moved and unsettled, considers giving the notebooks to June, but June demurs to avoid a traceable link while steering her away from donation.

Patricia resolves to keep the notebooks from public view. Soon after, the archive announcement disappears and the planned public access date passes without updates. June has neutralized a key threat to her secret.