What it is
Absence made explicit
If the separate reviewer is unavailable, AEGOS does not carry on regardless. It drops into degraded mode: deterministic checks still run, but the outcome is capped at “needs review,” and protected or production work cannot proceed.
Why it matters
A missing check is not a pass
The dangerous failure is a missing review being read as a passing one. Degraded mode makes absence explicit — no review means no green light, by construction.
Never reported as PASS
Honest over convenient
A degraded result is never dressed up as a PASS. The honest answer — “I couldn’t verify this” — always outranks the convenient one.