Aaaah, thank you so much! I'd forgotten about Normal Lost Phone, but it was such an interesting concept. And thank you-- honestly I've been bedbound for a few days now, it's kinda knocked me out of the jam-- but I'm doin' what I can, hehe.
also thank you sooooo much for telling me about nulls! I was honestly puzzling over how to how to wrangle the grid, not half because it's tough to visualise in Ren'py-- this helps heaps! <3