transcribe and speak share an httpx client per speech server with a 300 s keep-alive, and run on the engine's loop. stt warms it with GET /v1/models when an utterance opens, so a reply's first sentence finds the connection open: a new one over a lossy link cost up to a second (openpanel V4). Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 5.5 <noreply@anthropic.com> Claude-Session: https://claude.ai/code/session_01Ljdk7nDaguh9Uhi3zhcSjn