"I figured it out. But did you hear the other news? Mino-san just advised he's going to override Petra. We're about to find out who's really flying this baby."
"No." Androv was raising his flight helmet and gesturing, his wounded arm urging at something in his right pocket. "Please take. Do it quickly. And then . . ."
Vance unstrapped his G-seat harness, rose, and moved over to the central console. Androv had raised his hydraulic helmet all the way up now and was trying to unzip the right side of his flight suit. Vance reached down and helped him, not sure exactly what he needed.
"There." Yuri was trying to point. "The radio. Please, you must . . ." The English began to fail him again.
"What's this?" Vance took out the transmitter, the size and shape of a small calculator.
The answer was in Russian, complex and garbled. Something about computer.
"He's wired something into the on-board computer, Michael," Eva began translating. "The radio will perform brain surgery on Petra, disabling her AI functions. It's supposed to prevent Flight Control from overriding . . . I didn't quite get it. But he wants you to help."
Vance glanced up at the line of video screens. Daedalus was now skimming rapidly over the straits, banking in the direction of the archipelago known as the Kurile Islands, and the image of Tanzan Mino was breaking up, almost gone. Had he heard? Maybe it didn't matter. The allotted sixty seconds was ticking away and he could just make out the image of Tanzan Mino, holding a microphone, preparing to give orders.
By the clock on the screens he saw that forty-one seconds had already passed.
"Dr. Vance, we are preparing to initiate total systems override." The CEO's voice sounded through his headphones. "You have fifteen seconds remaining to acknowledge."