For Honor We Stand Read Online Free PDF Page B

people tend to perceive reality in light of pre-existing expectations and will ignore large amounts of contrary data before finally changing their minds.”
     “Right.  That’s just what I’m counting on”
    “So, you didn’t tell me.  What are you going to do?”
    “What am I doing to do?  Exactly what the Krag expect.  And, no, I won’t tell you what that is.  You’ll just have to be surprised.”  His face took on a predatory look as he tapped his finger on the icon for one of the Krag cruisers.  “Just like our friends with the tails.” 
    Two hours and eleven minutes passed.  During that time, Max had ordered the entire crew by turns to go to the mess or the wardroom, as appropriate, for a hot breakfast.  Just as her Captain would not send the Cumberland into battle unfueled, so he saw that the men who served her went into battle with a hot meal in their bellies.
    “Coming into position,” announced Bartoli.  The Cumberland had not been maintaining a constant position in the atmosphere; rather, as the moon that was the source of the particle stream had moved in its orbit causing the stream to shift along with it, the ship had followed the erratic movement of the stream’s terminus in the atmosphere.  The doctor could sense the tension in CIC gradually increasing as the time to implement the skipper’s plan approached.  He noticed several of the watch standers covertly wiping sweaty palms on their pants or shifting nervously in their seats.  There also seemed to be unusually heavy traffic in and out of the CIC’s “head” or lavatory.  Obviously, whatever Captain Robichaux had in mind, the crew perceived it to be difficult, risky, or both. 
    When the ship was in just the pre-planned position, and at about the time when the Krag would be surmising that the Cumberland ’s heat sink was reaching capacity, Bartoli called out, “Now, Skipper.”
    Max’s adrenalin got the better of him.  He came to his feet.  “Execute,” he said, a little too loudly.  He did his best not to cringe at how his powerful voice boomed in the CIC’s confined space.
    LeBlanc gave two sharp pats to the shoulder of Able Spacer 1 st Class Fleishman, the man on Drives, who pushed his control all the way to the stop.  “Main sublight ahead at Emergency,” said LeBlanc.  Like a rabbit darting out from under a bush, the Cumberland shot out from the clouds in which she had been hiding, her acceleration just over 95% of nominal thanks to hasty repairs by Lieutenant Brown and his band of improvisational engineers.  In a few seconds, the Destroyer cleared the atmosphere of Mengis VI, accelerating away from the planet and making straight for its closest moon, known prosaically as Mengis VI A, an unremarkable rock just over 3000 kilometers in diameter orbiting the planet at an altitude of 56,423 kilometers. 
    “Mr. Nelson,” Max said to the man at the Stealth console.  “Now that we are out of the atmosphere, let’s dump some heat, shall we?”
    “Aye, sir.  Extending radiator fins seventeen through twenty-three.”  On the sides of the ship blocked from the enemy vessels’ view, radiator fins extended themselves and soon turned cherry red, radiating into space the heat that Cumberland had stored in her heat sink.  With no atmosphere around the hull to be heated, the ship could shed its thermal energy without giving away its position, so long as the fins were not in a direct line of sight with either enemy ship.”
    “Would you please tell me at least the first part of what we are doing, Captain?” asked Sahin in a tone bordering on whining, his almost pathological curiosity getting the better of him.
    “Actually, I think I’ll yield that honor to Lieutenant DeCosta.  XO?”
    The executive officer smiled self-deprecatingly and waved the doctor over to his own console, which had more and larger displays tied into more data channels than the doctor’s.  “Here we are, doctor.”  He pointed to the