One More Knight Please

Chapter 19: White Bird Must Fly Or She Will Die.

We neared the gas station, and rain was still dumping from the sky in waves. The vacuum was not covered, it was exposed, so if I was going to vacuum Kitt out again, I would end up getting soaked.
"Susan, you can do it tomorrow if you'd like," Kitt said.
"No, I already told you that I'd do it, besides, I may forget."
"Alright, but know, I don't want to be soaked,"
"It won't take that long," I said as I got out of my car, then shut the door. I stuck my hand in my pocket, looking around for some spare change. I had a dollar in quarters, which was enough. I shoved the four coins into the slot of the machine, which then roared to life with the loud mechanical noise. I grabbed the tip, then opened the black car's door. I first started with the hairs I had missed, then went on to continue cleaning out the car.  I missed quite a bit of dirt the first time I vacuumed him out, mostly because my main priority was cleaning out the rat poop and getting rid of the awful smell. I went to clean under the driver's seat when I found a small little locket under it. I pushed the vacuum off to the side, then grabbed the necklace.
"What are you doing?" Kitt asked after he had observed that I had stopped cleaning.
"There is a necklace under the seat," I answered.
I put the small heart-shaped necklace into my pocket so I could inspect it later.  I kept vacuuming the interior, making it spotless, until the vacuum shut off on me. I reattached the vacuum to the machine it was fixed to when I arrived, then got back inside Kitt. I manually drove him to a parking spot, glancing at his fuel gauges for a moment. When we stopped, I pulled the necklace out of my pocket.
"Who's is this?" I asked Kitt.
"I don't know Susan, why don't you open it and see what's inside," Kitt suggested
I did what he said, opening the small heart with a Click! There was a small photo inside of it. A woman with long wavy blonde hair. She had blue eyes, and a face so white it appeared to be made of porcelain. Her skin appeared to glow in the lighting in the picture.
"May I see it?" Kitt asked as a small drawer opened up under his two screens.
I slipped the small necklace with the open locket in it, then it closed. Kitt remained silent for a second, his 80s technology beeping, whirring, and buzzing, like a fax machine.
"Susan, I need to return this to Micheal right away!" He exclaimed the drawer opening back up with the necklace inside of it.
"Why?" I asked.
"This is a picture of Stephanie Mason, but he always called her Stevie. She was Micheal Long's fiance, and later in life, Micheal Knight's wife. She had just married him when she died. She was shot right after being pronounced husband and wife."
"Why would someone do such a thing!" I exclaimed, interrupting Kitt.
"I think they meant to hit Micheal. But as I was saying, she died in Micheal's arms." Kitt finished.
"Does that mean you went to their wedding?" I asked
"Of course, I was their ride to and from, although I didn't voluntarily do it," Kitt responded.
"Did they have you decorated?" I questioned, adjusting my posture so I could sit a little taller.
"Yes Susan, it was humiliating!" He exclaimed. "They painted my windows, strung cans from my rear bumper, and made me drive in public! I wouldn't even call it 'decorating!' I would call it vandalizing!"
"Oh wow, and to think people do that for graduations too," I said sarcastically.
"No offense or anything, but I am very glad I met you after you graduated." He said.
"That says something about your ego." I teased.
He didn't respond, just sat there. I can only imagine if he was human he would be rolling his eyes at me.
"Okay, I'm sorry, don't give me the silent treatment."
"Oh, I wasn't giving you the silent treatment, I didn't say anything because I thought it would be best if I didn't try to defend myself after that comment, considering you would most likely throw another insult at me."
"Kitt, that's the silent treatment."
"Oh, well then, the silent treatment seems to be very effective."
"Let's just drop this off at Micheal's house then head to my apartment, I'm expecting company."
"I've heard that one before."
"Hey, I'm not Micheal."
"I know."
He caught me off guard and sharply pulled out of the parking spot himself. He merged back onto the highway, heading towards Chicago. As he drove, I couldn't help but take the small necklace out of the drawer. I fiddled with it in my hands for a minute.
"Kitt, I don't get it," I said.
"What don't you get?"
"If this necklace means so much to Micheal, why did he leave it?"
"If I had to guess, I'd say that it slipped out of his pocket. But if he had lost it, why didn't he go looking for it."
"Did Stephanie have an identical necklace that he could have mistaken for his?"
"Potentially."
"Don't you have pictures of Stephanie in your memory banks you can refer to?"
"I don't take pictures of people's wives, Susan. That's weird, especially for a car."
"That isn't what I meant."
"Then what did you mean?"
"I mean, don't you have a picture of her that you can identify her by? For reference."
"I have one, but it is only on her face. However, you are holding one."
I opened the locket again. It wasn't a full-body picture, but she wasn't wearing a necklace.
"If she was around Micheal as often as you say she was, why don't you have more pictures?"
"One is all I need. Besides, I never paid attention to my chassis when they were in it together."
"Ewww! Kitt!"
"Sorry,"
I quickly darted my gaze from Kitt's voice module to the window, trying to get that image out of my head. We were cruising at a steady speed, passing a few cars. I looked at the cars around us, there was a Honda Civic, Ford Focus, Toyota Camry, Mazda CX-5, and a few other cars sharing the road with us.
"So, how long will it take us to get there?" I asked Kitt.
"About another 20 minutes, traffic is light this time of day."
"Oh okay."
I pulled out my phone and texted Bo. "I'll be home by 5:00, don't be alarmed if you knock on the door and nobody answers."
A few minutes later, he responded with a thumbs-up emoji.
"Do you like Pac-Man?" Kitt asked after a minute.
"Yeah? Why?"
His one screen flickered on and popped up the home screen of the game.
"Micheal always liked to play games while I drove, just for fun. I feel like it is my priority to entertain you." He said.
"How do I play? Are there any controllers?"
"There should be one in my glove compartment."
I climbed over the center console while Kitt drove to the passenger seat. I popped open the glove compartment where a bunch of papers sat. I dug through them, dust coating my fingers. Under all of the papers, was a single rectangular controller.
"Why is it so blocky?" I asked, removing the item from the compartment.
"What do you mean?"
"It doesn't look like much of a controller."
"What are you talking about?"
I pulled up a picture of a modern-day Playstation controller on my phone and sent it to Kitt.
"Oh, well this controller is part of the Nintendo Entertainment System, I believe it was the first gaming console made by Nintendo. It wasn't released in North America until 1986, however, Bonnie got it imported from Japan in 1983 and equipped me with it, for you-know-who's entertainment." Kitt explained.
"So you're saying it's an antique?"
"Yes."
"So that makes you an antique?"
"I suppose so."
I laid back in my seat, sometimes I forget I can do that because I spend most of the time looking at Kitt's voice module. I guess I feel like it is similar to making eye contact with someone when they are talking to you, which is odd because Kitt can't see out of his voice module. He has a series of small cameras planted around that give him the ability to see inside and around the car. I need to remember that Kitt isn't the car himself, he is more of an AI that lives inside the car. His scanner is what gives him the ability to sense things around him, like how you can sense someone behind you without turning around and looking to see someone behind you. That's what my Grandmother told me at least, but if anyone knew how Kitt works, it would be her.
I managed to let the rest of the ride slip by. I was submerged by my thoughts about Kitt. I had a few questions that I had asked him before, but he had done a poor job at answering them, either that or they are just that hard to describe.
We advanced toward the mansion I recognized as Micheal's house.
"I gotta ask," I said as Kitt pulled up to the metal gate.
"What is it?" He responded.
"How did Micheal get so much money to have a Mansion?"
"I'm not sure, I know it wasn't the Foundation, they didn't pay him nearly enough for that."
"But didn't they also supply him with a place to stay?"
"Most of the time. Other times he slept inside me."
The gate opened itself after a split second and Kitt slipped inside the property.
"Did Michael give you an opener?"
"No, I micro-jammed it, just like I did the garage door."
He drove up and parked in front of the garage door, but under the overhang, so he wouldn't get as wet.
I opened the door, got out, then walked up onto the porch. I knocked on the big red-painted door. I sat there for a few seconds, waiting for a reply, but there was no response. I looked around for a second when my watch buzzed.
"Have you tried ringing the doorbell?" Kitt texted.
I just about slapped myself in the face, he has a huge house, of course, he may not be able to hear me knocking on the door. Turning my focus away from my watch, I pressed my finger to the small button next to the door. There was a buzzing noise that echoed from the walls inside the house. I heard footsteps approaching the door, then the door creaked open.
"Susan? I thought you were at work." Micheal answered.
"I got off at three, I uh, I found this inside Kitt," I said, digging through my pocket to find the necklace. I grabbed it by the metal chain and held it up for Micheal to see.  He instantly grabbed it out of my hand.
'I've been looking everywhere for this, never in my life would I have thought Kitt was holding on to it." He announced, looking at the picture inside the locket.
"Small confession, I may have looked at the picture inside of it. Who is that?" I asked, of course, I knew, but I wasn't going to rat out Kitt.
"Here, come inside, I'll tell you everything." He said, opening the door wider for me to come inside.
I followed him to the dining room table, where he pulled me up a chair, and sat across from me.
"Her name was Stephanie Mason. Back when I was Micheal long, I was set to marry her. But then the tussle with Tanya came around and I became Micheal Knight, I'm sure your Grandmother has told you the story." He started. "I think around 1982, I found her again, well technically, she found me."
"What do you mean by that?"
"She came to the Foundation for help, I thought I was going to help a secretary whose boss was getting her involved in criminal activity, turns out it was not just any secretary."
"How ironic."
"Eventually, there was a point in time where I was going to quit the Foundation, you can ask Kitt, I think I scared the crap out of him. I found Stevie again, and she and I went on a nice vacation together to a beach house. Kitt came along, he insisted on it."
"Makes sense, he was programmed to keep you out of harm's way"
"Well, what happened to lead me to debate quitting was that I was injured by a group of criminals, one of which was an assassin, probably out to kill me. Those same criminals caught up with me and Stevie at the beach and they blew up our beach house. Luckily, Kitt was able to detect the explosives before tragedy struck, and I got Stevie out and to safety as soon as Kitt gave me the heads up."
"Wow... That's crazy man."
"Stevie and I were able to recover, and we were going to get married. We had Kitt all decorated-"
"VANDALIZED" Kitt's voice boomed from in front of the garage.
"Well, anyway, we had just been pronounced Husband and Wife when the criminals came back again. This time, they missed. Instead of shooting me, they shot Stevie, and she died, right in my arms." Micheal finished.
I couldn't help but notice tears beading up in his sky-blue eyes. 
"I don't know what to say.." I said, not wanting to rip open any more healed scars.
"It's alright, it was 1986... It's done and over with. But, uh, thanks for returning this to me. It means a lot." He started, clutching the necklace in his fist.
"Yeah, you're welcome," I said as I stood up from my chair and headed to the door.
"Susan, don't be afraid to visit me, it gets a little lonely around here."
'Don't you have Kitt?'
"He can be a little smart at times." He joked.
I let out a small chuckle and waved goodbye. I slipped out of the door and walked over to Kitt. Approaching the car, I checked my watch. It was now 4:00, I had just enough time to get home and get something to eat before I would be expecting Bo. I opened the door and slipped inside the car.
"Ready to go home?" Kitt asked.
"Yeah."
"Manual or auto cruise?'"
"Auto cruise, I'm going to text Bo to pass the time."
"Is Pac-Man not good enough?'
"No, I just like to have a little human interaction once in a while."
"You mean, companionship."
I let out a small snort of amusement at that comment as Kitt pulled out of the driveway, and hit the road again.
"Can I at least interest you in some music?"
"Sure," I said as I pulled my phone out of my pocket.
'Little Lies' By Fleetwood Mac began to spill out of car speakers. It was just the right volume, not too quiet, not too loud.
"Hey, what time do you plan on stopping by?" I texted Bo.
"Around 5:30, why?" He responded.
"Just making sure I had time to make something to eat."
"I was thinking of taking you out to eat."
"Oh really?"
"Yeah."
"Where?"
"Not telling."
"Oh come on, please?"
"You'll see."
"What if I don't want to go now?"
"Then I won't take you."
"But I want to go"
"Okay, now you're confusing me."
"Just meet me at my apartment at 5:30."
I noticed we came to a stop.
"What's the hold-up, Kitt?" I asked.
"It seems that there was an accident a quarter of a mile ahead of us, most likely due to the poor weather. This will take a while."
"Is there a detour?"
"Even if there was, I would have no way of accessing it, the cars around us have me boxed in."
"I have an idea."
"I hope you're not thinking what I think you're thinking."
"Kitt, manual cruise."
"As you wish."
There was enough room for me to back up far enough to get a bit of a running start, but I came pretty close to the Highlander behind us, and it honked at me. I just put my hand up to say I was sorry.  The car in front of us moved forward a little, making even more room for me. There was not a car in front of that one, so I knew what I had to do. I pressed my foot down on the accelerator, causing Kitt's turbine engine to roar, like a menacing vacuum cleaner. As we almost hit the car in front of us, I pressed the small button that was labeled "Turbo Boost" and Kitt leaped into the air like a blank panther chasing after its prey. The motor made a loud whooshing sound, as the car jumped off of the ground.
"Oh my word, you were thinking what I thought you were!" Kitt exclaimed in the air.
He landed with a giant THUD! in front of the collection of cars, and I turned his gullwing steering wheel sharply to the right, veering him off of the road. We passed the crash sight quickly, making some of the first responders stare at us with their mouths gaping open. Once we passed, I turned Kitt back onto the road, where there was significantly less traffic.
"Susan, may I suggest slowing down?" Kitt said.
I glanced at his speedometer, we were going 150 miles an hour.
"Holy crap, if I didn't know any better, I'd say you accelerate faster than my Tesla," I said, gently applying the break and reaching highway-appropriate speeds.
"How fast does your Tesla accelerate?"
"0-60 in 3.5 seconds, I think"
He didn't say anything after that. I spent the rest of the ride in silence, I quite enjoyed it. I texted Bo some more, and I was excited to meet up with him tonight.