Long COVID as Post-Viral Wrong-Attractor Capture: Dysautonomia, Mast Cell Activation, and the Failed Return to Ground State After Acute SARS-CoV-2 Displacement

We apply the Displacement Framework to Long COVID (post-acute sequelae of SARS-CoV-2, PASC), formalizing the condition as failure to return to ground state S0 after an acute viral displacement event. Long COVID is modeled as wrong-attractor capture: a stable dysregulated configuration maintained by six coupled lock-in mechanisms — persistent viral reservoir, mast cell activation syndrome, dysautonomia (POTS), mitochondrial dysfunction, gut microbiome dysbiosis, and neuroinflammation.

We formalize S0 as a six-dimensional state space, derive propositions on acute displacement severity as PASC predictor, coupled lock-in stability, post-exertional malaise as return-path blockade, and recovery sequence dependence. Standard medical failure is explained geometrically: symptom suppression does not change the attractor geometry. A sequenced recovery protocol is derived from the displacement analysis.