Broken A833OD

In many years of building manual transmissions, I have never seen a broken one!
What are the chances it's just laying in there?
With the cover off; you can shift each slider to the left and then to the right, and by doing so, verify that all the struts are in there......................................or not........................
Just look beside the brass, on the side away from the gear, and rotate the mainshaft until you find one. Then rotate 120* and find the next, and so on.
If you overshift the slider and the struts pop up, don't panic; they are easily returned. But try to avoid it.