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The Hour of Battle, by Robert Sheckley
The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Hour of Battle, by Robert Sheckley This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.net
Title: The Hour of Battle
Author: Robert Sheckley
Illustrator: Roy Gerald Krenkel
Release Date: July 18, 2009 [EBook #29445]
Language: English
Character set encoding: ASCII
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THE HOUR OF BATTLE
BY ROBERT SHECKLEY
ILLUSTRATED BY KRENKEL
As one of the Guardian ships protecting Earth, the crew had a problem to solve. Just how do you protect a race from an enemy who can take over a man's mind without seeming effort or warning?
"That hand didn't move, did it?" Edwardson asked, standing at the port, looking at the stars.
"No," Morse said. He had been staring fixedly at the Attison Detector for over an hour. Now he blinked three times rapidly, and looked again. "Not a millimeter."
"I don't think it moved either," Cassel added, from behind the gunfire panel. And that was that. The slender black hand of the indicator rested unwaveringly on zero. The ship's guns were ready, their black mouths open to the stars. A steady hum filled the room. It came from the Attison Detector, and the sound was reassuring. It reinforced the fact that the Detector was attached to all the other Detector