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**** FROM: neb.symmons @ ases voyager
**** SUBJECT: Lunch
**** Transcript for QEC generated on:
     2330.04.18 @ 21:13 (local time)
     by Aster, Neb's AI companion!
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**** BEGIN TRANSCRIPT

Good evening, folks. Well, it's evening for me, at least. Who knows
what time looks like in your part of the universe.

Everyone on board has been talking about the leak in the core sector
for the past two days. Some people are worried that it signals the
start of the end, and that different parts of the ship are going to
break one after another until something important stops working and we
all die. That's a bit too morbid for me. The Ases Voyager certainly
isn't a new ship, but it was designed to last for centuries. We have
minor disasters every once in a while, but that's just a normal part
of living in space.

Most people are carrying around a healthy amount of worry about the
whole situation. After all, we don't have big exciting events that
often. Some equipment was damaged, but nothing too important
was lost. The engine itself was apparently unscathed, but I couldn't
really get much information about that.

That reminds me - I had lunch with Corinna yesterday. It was nice to
catch up with her. She doesn't talk to Mom or Dad as often as I do, so
I filled her in on the interesting things our parents have been up
to. Dad has gotten really into hydroponics lately, and he's helping
out in the gardens when he can. Mom is leading another big software
project, naturally. She works in a different part of the engineering
sector than I do, but I still drop by and say hello every once in a
while. The Ases is large enough for people to grow up and become
independent, but it's small enough that you'll run into your family
more often than you expect.

Corinna is the exception, I suppose. She's been more withdrawn
lately. I tried asking her how things were going at work and how her
friends were doing, but she just kept giving me the same old terse
answers. "Everything's great." "My friends are doing well." "No, I
haven't been out much lately, what are people into these days?" The
last one isn't really something Corinna said, but it was certainly
similar. I should convince Mara to drag her to a movie or something. I
know it's a little awkward because they're ex-girlfriends and all, but
I'm pretty sure they're still friends?

The strangest part of it all was how cagey Corinna got when I started
asking her questions about the core. I know she was exhausted from the
night before, but I don't think that's why. She loves working in the
core sector. She told me once that it combined all of her favorite
parts of engineering. And Corinna isn't talkative, but she used to
talk about her work more often. I'm kind of worried about her.

I'll let her rest, though. She definitely needs it. Hopefully she'll
feel better next week and I can ask her more questions about the core
during lunch. For some reason, I just can't get it out of my head. I
realized that I really don't know that much about the Ases Voyager's
engine. It seems like an interesting branch of engineering to get
involved in.

For now, I need to go to sleep. Maybe tomorrow I'll see what
information the library has about the core.

Stay curious, friends. Goodnight.

**** END TRANSCRIPT

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