"Can you pinpoint the frequency?"
"Just a notch about one thirty-six point two MCs."
"On the nose, isn't it?" Randall asked.
"Close enough. How _are_ the signals, Carol?"
"They seem shipshape, well modulated, crammed with data. I can even
read some bits having to do with oxygen--plenty of it--in that cave
over there, I believe." She pointed, then glanced at Stewart. "There's
no malfunctioning at all!"
He retrieved his transmitter and switched from MCW to CW. "That
simplifies our task. When we re-establish control, all we'll have to do
is reorient the OC."
Randall walked several feet away, kicked a stone, glanced up at the sky
and returned. "What now?"
Stewart retuned his transmitter. "Penultimate emergency procedure.
I'm going to come down with both heels on the frequency at which it
received code signals from the relay base."
"But can you give it _coded_ commands?"
"I'm just going to lock the sending key on a steady impulse. It's a
'stop-everything' order." He hit the lever.