A Primordial-Tensor Null from Boundary Printing: Pre-registering r_linear=0 and a Scalar-Induced Floor

A Primordial-Tensor Null from Boundary Printing: Pre-registering r_linear=0 and a Scalar-Induced Floor. A dated pre-registration note recording the finite-QEC boundary-printing branch's primordial-tensor prediction, in the same style as the dark-energy w0,wa and sterile-neutrino X-ray notes. In this branch inflation is not de Sitter stretching of an existing metric but the printing of new boundary cells by a scalar service process; a scalar source has no transverse-traceless component, so at linear order the TT projector annihilates it and the primordial tensor-to-scalar ratio is a null, r_linear = 0. The only residual is a second-order scalar-induced gravitational-wave floor r_induced = C_SIGW * A_s, where the framework fixes the scalar amplitude A_s = (3/4) alpha0^4 ~ 2.13e-9 (an input that reproduces the observed value, hence a postdiction) but does not tune the external transfer coefficient C_SIGW; even a broad bracket C_SIGW in [0.1,10] keeps the floor at ~2e-10 to 2e-8, far below any near-term threshold. The near-term prediction is therefore a null: no primordial B-mode detection at r >= 1e-3 after dust, lensing, and systematics. A robust primordial signal at that level (within LiteBIRD/CMB-S4 reach) would falsify the scalar boundary-printer / no-squeezing branch; the note records explicit post-hoc rules forbidding adjustment of the branch or A_s after the data. Companion to the dark-energy and sterile-neutrino prediction notes and the finite-QEC cosmology work. This record is part of the finite-QEC substrate / It-from-Bit publication refresh.