This third bay, like the two above it, was big enough to stand in. As he stepped in, he glanced back up the stairs, then quickly resealed the door. Off went the lights again, so he withdrew his penlight and turned to start searching for what he wanted.
Directly in front of him was a steel monolith with banks of toggle switches: electrical power controls, communications controls, propulsion system controls, reaction-control systems. Okay, that's the command console, which was preset for each flight and then monitored from the cockpit.
Now where's the damned on-board AI module?
He scanned the bay. The AI system was the key to his plan. He had to make certain the computer's artificial intelligence functions could be completely shut down, disengaged, when the crucial moment came. He couldn't afford for the on-board system-override to abort his planned revision in the hypersonic flight plan. His job tonight was to make sure all the surprises were his, not somebody else's. There wouldn't be any margin for screw-ups. Everything had to go like clockwork.
He edged his way on through the freezing bay, searching the banks of equipment for a clue, and then he saw what he was looking for. There, along the portside bulkhead. It was a white, rectangular console, and everything about it told him immediately it was what he wanted.
He studied it a second, trying to decide where to begin.
At that moment he also caught himself wondering fleetingly how he'd ever gotten into this crazy situation. Maybe he should have quit the Air Force years ago and gone to engineering school like his father had wanted. Right now, he had to admit, a little electrical engineering would definitely come in handy.
He took out a pocket screwdriver and began carefully removing the AI console's faceplate, a bronzed rectangle. Eight screws later, he lifted it off and settled it on the floor.
The penlight revealed a line of chips connected by neat sections of plastic-coated wires. Somewhere in this electronic ganglia there had to be a crucial node where he could attach the device he'd brought.
It had taken some doing, but he'd managed to assemble an item that should take care of his problem beautifully when the moment came. It was a radio-controlled, electrically operated blade that, when clamped onto a strand of wires, could sever them in an instant. The radio range was fifty meters, which would be adequate; the transmitter, no larger than a small tape recorder, was going to be with him in his flight suit. The instant he switched the turboramjets over to the scramjet mode, he was going to activate it and blow their fucking AI module out of the system. Permanently.