207 lines
9.4 KiB
Plaintext
207 lines
9.4 KiB
Plaintext
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**** FROM: nebula.symmons @ ases voyager
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**** SUBJECT: Water Leak
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**** Transcript for QEC generated on:
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2330.04.17 @ 22:46 (local time)
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by Aster, Neb's AI companion!
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**********************************************************************
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**** BEGIN TRANSCRIPT
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Hello to friends near and far! Today was... interesting, to say the
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least. I'll just get right into it.
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I woke up to an alarm and about an inch of water at the bottom of my
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cabin. The sunlamps hadn't turned on yet, so I checked my clock:
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03:27. I barely had time to fully wake up before I got a summons to
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the engine sector. Apparently whatever had gone horribly wrong here
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needed a computer engineer to help fix it.
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The hallways in the residence sector had turned into tiny rivers. The
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water was never very deep, but it was still flowing from
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somewhere. Seeing this much running water on a spaceship was certainly
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unsettling.
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The sound of rushing water got louder as I got closer to the
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engine core sector. As I turned the corner into the control room, I
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practically ran into Archie, one of the sysadmins on the Ases. He
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definitely looked as if he had been woken up in the middle of the
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night. His hair was sticking up in odd places and he was wearing
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pajama pants with his work shirt.
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"Neb!" He said. "We need you to check out the cooling system. Log in
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to terminal seven over there. The core team engineers have already
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stopped the leak, but we need you to check the code and figure out
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what caused this so it doesn't start again. We don't want to finish
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cleaning up only for more water to come pouring out."
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"Got it," I said. I don't normally work in the core sector of the
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ship, but all the terminals on board are practically identitcal. Some
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of the more vital functions run on designated systems that can't be
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accessed from anywhere else on the ship. It helps with security, but
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it certainly makes things more complicated when an emergency happens.
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The alarm had finally stopped, so I was able to focus and figure out
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what caused the cooling system to spew water everywhere. I'll leave
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out the gritty details, but it all started with a particularly nasty
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buffer overflow. The team that wrote the cooling system software had
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done a good job, but if you run a program for nearly a hundred years,
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you're bound to find a few bugs somewhere.
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Luckily, once I figured out how the code was laid out, it was a fairly
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quick patch. I sent it to the maintenance team along with a few notes
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to review in the morning. Once I reassured Archie that the cooling
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system wouldn't start leaking again, my work was done. It was already
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almost 05:00. I had too much energy to fall back asleep, so I grabbed
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a mop and joined the effort to clean up the water. I needed to work
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off what Corinna calls my "nervous fingers" - I just get a bit antsy
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after I spend a while hyperfocused on something. It was also an
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opportunity to look around the core sector a bit. Maybe I'd run into
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Corinna. I feel like I've barely seen her since she started working in
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the core. I guess it's normal for siblings to talk to each other less
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as they get older, but it still feels weird.
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Once I got into the rhythm of mopping, I could tune into the
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conversations happening around me. The atmosphere in the core control
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room is definitely different from the atmosphere in the engineering
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wing where I usually work. People were more reserved and they barely
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chatted while they worked. Maybe it was because everyone had been
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woken up in the middle of the night, but it definitely felt
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different. If this had happened in the engineering wing, we would've
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spent the whole time joking about it and complaining about our loss of
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sleep.
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Another strange thing that I noticed was the lack of equipment
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checks. Water leaks on a spaceship can cause a lot of damage. People
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looked stressed, but no one was panicking. No one was reading out a
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list of systems to check or sending teams to report on the status of
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other rooms in the core sector. Maybe this is just the stoic nature of
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people who work in the core sector, but it just felt strange to me.
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I can see why Corinna likes working in the core, though. Everyone
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there is no-nonsense, just like her. Even though there was a disaster
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happening, it always felt like the core team had everything under
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control.
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Eventually, someone took my mop and told me to go back to bed. There
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was still plenty of water and I wanted to protest, but I was tired. I
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could do what I was told if that involved going back to sleep.
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The problem was that I had done a fair bit of wandering while I was
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cleaning up, and now I didn't know where I was. The core sector is a
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strange place to begin with, and I had never really explored it. I
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couldn't pull up the ship map, because the engineering team had taken
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the system offline while they were protecting it from the flood. The
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person who took my mop was already gone, so I started wandering in the
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direction that I thought would take me back to the residential sector.
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After a few minutes, I determined that I was actually heading deeper
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into the core sector. I felt like a child - no one gets lost on the
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ship anymore. Once you grow up, you realize that it really isn't that
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big. A few years of wandering is all you need to build a good sense of
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direction. The core sector was different, though. There were fewer
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signs, and they were labled with locations that seemed like they only
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made sense to the people who worked in the core. There were several
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hallways where I had to turn around and backtrack because the only way
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through involved a locked door that I wasn't authorized for. Luckily,
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I was too tired to be properly frustrated.
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I eventually started basing my navigation on pure gut feeling. This
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part of the ship was unfamiliar, but I could tell when I was getting
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closer to the core. Maybe it had something to do with the rumbling of
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the engine, I'm not sure. I was worried that I was walking in circles.
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Finally, I crossed paths with Corinna. She seemed surprised to see
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me. I was just glad to run into someone who knew their way around the
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core.
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"You look exhausted, Neb," Corinna said.
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"I was just helping out. They told me to go back to sleep, but I got
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lost, and uh... I'm just glad I ran into you," I said.
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"I'm glad too. You really shouldn't wander around the core."
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"It is a strange place," I replied. "I felt more lost here than I ever
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have in other places on the Ases. And it kind of felt like the core
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was pulling me in or something. Maybe my brain is just making things
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up because I'm sleepy."
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"Probably."
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Corinna didn't say anything else as she walked me out of the
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core sector. Stoic as always.
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She did stop me before I entered the residential sector, though.
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"Hey, Neb. After you get some sleep, do you want to meet up for lunch?
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It's been a while since we caught up."
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"That sounds great," I said.
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"Great. Ping me when you wake up and you're ready for some food. I'll
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see you then."
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I waved as Corinna turned around and headed back to the core. I hoped
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she would get some sleep, too. She always seems to work a bit too
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hard. Maybe it's an older sister thing.
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I practically collapsed into my bed when I got to my cabin. The floor
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drainage system had done its job and there was barely any water left
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on the floor.
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I almost fell asleep, but then I remembered: "Aster, disable my
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morning alarm."
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"Done. Your alarm will resume tomorrow at 06:00."
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"Aster, remind me to log overtime with RHEMy tomorrow."
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"I will remind you when you wake up."
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"Great. Thanks, Aster."
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"Goodnight, Neb."
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Aster's voice faded out and was replaced by the gentle piano music
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that I programmed to play as I fall asleep. I drifted off wondering
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how other people on the Ases made it through the days without their
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own version of Aster. Sure, RHEMy could set reminders for you, but
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none of the other AIs on the ship were programmed to be your friend. I
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know I have a soft spot for computers, but I really do consider Aster
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to be one of my closest companions.
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Wow, it's [YAWN] later than I thought. I'm still low on sleep, so
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I need to get to bed on time. Lunch with Corinna was nice, but I'll
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save that story for the next broadcast, so make sure to tune in
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then! Of course, if you're getting my show transcripts via the QEC,
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just be on the lookout for when the next one comes in. I don't have a
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regular broadcast schedule: just think of it as a fun surprise when
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you get a message from your pal Neb on the Ases Voyager.
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Take care and stay curious!
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**** END TRANSCRIPT
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**********************************************************************
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