Page 256 of Commander’s Mate

“No. Work teams. Some have no family left.”

That changed intake again.

Harper wrote it down.

KEEP CHOSEN GROUPS TOGETHER UNTIL ASKED.

The ground captain shifted impatiently.

“We cannot design extraction around every trauma response.”

Harper looked at him.

“No. But we can stop doing obviously stupid things when survivors tell us they are stupid.”

Voro laughed.

The captain did not.

I intervened before pride became operational risk.

“Survivor intelligence is mission intelligence.”

The room settled.

Ralin pointed at a lift junction.

“This door sticks.”

The mining engineer checked the old schematic.

“Not listed.”

“It sticks.”

“How do you know?”

“I repaired it for six years.”

The engineer marked it.

Another survivor corrected an emergency-air route.

Then another corrected the location of a guard station.

The military map changed under civilian hands.

Good.

Warriors knew how to take a facility.

Workers knew how it breathed.

We needed both.

By the time they finished, three assumptions had changed.

That might save lives.