Entangled

It is August of 1991, and the Soviet Union is reeling from the consequences of its ill-advised adventures abroad. It had to walk away from Afghanistan with a bloody nose and Cuba with a wounded pride, which errors of judgment have left it demoralized and broke. Sensing opportunity, the satellite countries in Eastern Europe that make up the Soviet Union are now clamoring for their independence. The new Russia resulting from this bifurcation will be a shadow of the original vast empire that was the Soviet Union, and economically perhaps little better than a third world country. Gorbachev, and the Glasnost he is appeasing the west with, is the last straw for many of the hardliners - the military stages an internal coup to replace Gorbachev.
To keep the Americans from interfering in their internal affairs, the Russians put their armed forces on alert, including their nuclear missiles. In order to safeguard their own interests the Americans are compelled to reciprocate, and suddenly an inadvertent escalation toward nuclear annihilation confronts both superpowers. Fortunately, the Old Guard within the Russian hierarchy that personally witnessed the unconscionable carnage of the Second World War, is determined to avoid any unintended confrontations. Especially a nuclear one, with all its horrific consequences. Consequently, a select group within the Soviet hierarchy has been exploring potential schemes that could work as safeguards to help defuse an inadvertently disastrous escalation.
Sally Nash is the beautiful and sophisticated daughter of a very well to do and politically connected industrialist, Jim Nash, who has extensive business connections with the Russians. At the age of eight Sally suffered a head injury that resulted in significant physiological brain damage, to correct which she was required to undergo a split-brain operation. As a consequence of that surgery all her social and interactive faculties like language and emotion, are now located in her right half-brain. Her left half-brain is essentially dormant from a language standpoint. She has a complete recovery, and on the surface there are no indications that she has undergone such a drastic procedure.
Because of his extensive connections in both countries, Jim Nash is approached by the select group of concerned Russians to help with developing a secretive conduit that can be exploited when needed to defuse a potentially calamitous situation. Intrigued by the notion, he figures out how to get information into and out of Sally’s long dormant left hemisphere, so that she can be used as the messenger. The way the information is processed, Sally is unaware of it, cannot verbalize it, and it can only be imbedded and extracted using very sophisticated equipment (Z-Lens), and procedures. Unfortunately, there are consequences to the experiments her father is conducting. Because he is reactivating her left hemisphere’s residual language skills, Sally starts hearing unfathomable noises in her head which she is helpless to articulate.
Sally and the hero are thrown together through a chance encounter. Later she approaches him again, seeking his help with these noises she is hearing that she can’t give expression to. Our smitten hero naively accepts the assignment as a lark, convinced that little of any consequence can possibly result from something as bizarre as noises in her head. Then her father is struck down, and suddenly the hero is stuck with the problem of trying to figure out exactly what is going on. Mayhem, bloodshed, megatons of TNT, and a ticking doomsday clock are what our hero ends up having to contend with before the noises Sally is hearing finally make sense enough to save the world.