Harder To Remember Than To Forget

Summary:

Trauma has a way of popping up when you don't expect it. Wouldn't it be nice if you could just pretend it wasn't there?
[takes place shortly after KITTnap]

Warnings:

gun talk, brief discriptions of gore

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"Michael… I'm sorry about the other day. At the container storage yard. I shouldn't have let them corner me like that."

"Hey, don't be so hard on yourself, buddy. They laid a trap for us. People like Martin and Cavanaugh… they're tricky like that. Always one step ahead."

California sunlight warmed the car's interior as it poured through the glass panels of the T-top. Ahead of them, the quiet road seemed to stretch on forever, winding between hills and trees, surrounding them on all sides by a swath of brown and muted green. Just a few days prior, the two had been caught up in another case. Though it had finally come to a close, there was still something eating at the Trans Am's processors — in a rare turn of events, he'd let his guard down just enough to give their adversaries the upper hand, leaving himself in danger and Michael without his help.

"Michael, I know better," KITT insisted. "I was being careless. It never would've happened if I hadn't been so afraid."

"Afraid?" Michael chuckled. The mere suggestion had him rolling his eyes. "KITT… You're hardly afraid of anything. A couple of forklifts are what gotcha?"

"That's exactly what's been bothering me. We've dealt with much worse. A couple of forklifts shouldn't have gotten to me. But when I saw them coming after me like that… oh, Michael, it's humiliating."

"Humiliating?" This time, the choice of word was enough to make Michael scoff. Playfully, he smiled down towards the light display above the steering yoke. "Alright, mister dramatic. What's the matter?"

"Michael, I'm serious."

Something about KITT's voice gave his driver pause. After big cases like that, it wasn't unlike KITT to complain. Whether it was the nights in police impound, dust and debris caked onto his undercarriage, or Michael spending a bit too long off gallivanting with his latest fling… to both of them, the grousing was par for the course. This, however, seemed like something bigger.

"Okay, big guy. Pull over."

When they rounded the next turn, dirt and gravel crunched beneath the tires as KITT eased off onto the shoulder. The background whir of his engine softened as he settled into park, idling just off the main drag.

"You're seriously worked up about this. That's not like you."

"I-I'm sorry, Michael. It's just… I should've been there for you. You needed me. Karen could've been hurt. You could've been hurt."

"KITT, KITT, it's not your fault, alright?" Michael pinched the bridge of his nose, exasperated, before gesturing vaguely at the car's interior. They had places to be, time off to take advantage of. Mustering up what sympathy he could, he looked down at KITT's dash. "Are you gonna dwell on this for the entire trip, or are you gonna be okay?"

"Define okay."

Michael sighed. He leaned back, propping an elbow on the door. "Listen, KITT… I shouldn'ta had us split up. We're partners. We're s'posed to work as a team. Using you as bait like that, especially when we knew it was a set-up… maybe that wasn't my best idea. I'd feel a lot better if you could just forgive me for it."

"Michael, for once, this isn't about you."

Michael tensed. His brows furrowed. KITT's voice was soft, but there was something sharp beneath the surface. The words stung as they hit his ears.

"I was afraid. I shouldn't have been afraid. I don't like being afraid," KITT pressed. "But you remember what happened the last time I came face to face with one of those monstrosities."

Michael froze. His heart dropped. That was the root of it. Of course that was the root of it.

That night at the waste disposal site several months prior still seared his memory like a hot iron stake. The last time they'd dealt with a machine like that, it had lifted KITT off the ground and dumped him into a pit of toxic sludge. The way KITT called out for him as he sunk, tires unable to gain traction, body pulled down by the slurry, voice breaking as his systems began to fail… if that photographer hadn't been there to hold him back, Michael would've jumped into the acid to rescue his partner himself. He still felt guilty that he didn't. But it wouldn't have helped. If he went in, neither of them would've made it back out. The days that followed as he awaited KITT's repairs felt like an agonizing eternity. He could only imagine how it felt to be the one who'd gone through it firsthand.

"But KITT, you made it through that," he consoled, speaking just as much to himself as to the computer. "You're tough. You've always been tough. It's not like those things were gonna kill ya."

"That's just it, Michael. I… I don't know that that's true."

The words caught Michael off guard. His mouth felt dry as he scowled in disbelief.

"Bonnie told me how much work she and the original team put into my reconstruction," KITT said plainly. "She seemed proud. I have no doubt in her skill set, not for a second. I'm just not sure that level of work truly constitutes—"

"What are you talking about?" Michael snipped, cutting him off. "You made it through that just fine! She fixed you up, just like always, and—"

Suddenly, he went silent. Bonnie's words that day came flooding back, hitting him dead in the chest like a thousand rounds of buckshot. The car had been torn apart. Everything but the strongest bits of his shell and chassis had been disintegrated in the pool of chemical waste. It may as well have been his bones that they finally dragged out onto the truck. Despite her seemingly miraculous ability to bring KITT back up to par after every one of their bends and breaks, the look on Bonnie's face and the tone of her voice made it clear just how much damage that night had done. There was nothing left. You don't repair something like that. You can't. Not once it's gone. Not once every system had been disintegrated, every memory wiped, every wire and circuit and line of code lost to the depths of liquid toxin.

You have to recreate it.

Michael winced at the thought. His hands clenched, knuckles going white, nails digging into the handles of the gullwing yoke. Repair, rebuild, recreate… what difference did it make?! KITT was here. Now. With him. His KITT.

Just… different.

Something in him snapped.

"That's like saying I didn't make it through that night in the desert!"

His words came out sharp. Loud. Harsher than he intended. Instantly, he bit his tongue. He let out a breath. Then another. His chest heaved as he went suddenly slack, practically collapsing into the soft velour of KITT's front seat.

"I'm sorry." The apology slipped out in a whisper. He shook his head and sighed, running a hand through his hair, fingers catching on ringlet curls. "Look, I didn't mean to yell at'cha… I just…"

Michael didn't like to dwell on his past. In the eyes of the law, Michael Long was dead. That was something he'd long since accepted. It was easier that way. To accept it and move on. If you didn't think about it, eventually the pain would dull. Wounds would scar and fade. He was Michael Knight now. The events that led him there were secondary. What did it matter, if things were already the way they were?

Still, there were things he'd never forget. Things he couldn't forget. On paper, the sheets were almost blank. Michael Knight was a nobody. He was designed to be just that. He was FLAG's toy — Wilton's toy — meant to simply be a cog in this machine. But Michael Long was still the heart. He didn't start from scratch. Not completely. The life he lived before left the same foundation even in its absence.

"KITT," Michael started, carefully breaking the silence that had settled heavily in the cockpit like an icy fog. "When I… became Michael Knight, I didn't lose everything I had as Michael Long. I lost… a lot." He sighed. His chest felt tight. For a moment, his gaze drifted far over the horizon, his vision blurred as the stared out through the glass. "But the memories I made, the life I lived, the person I am… that didn't change just 'cause some billionaire gave me a shiny new coat of paint."

When his partner didn't respond, Michael forced a crooked smile — for both their sakes — looking down at KITT's darkened voice display as though they were locking eyes. He gripped lightly to the steering yoke. Affectionately, he rubbed a thumb across the smooth black surface, caressing the column of the grip. The contact seemed to ground him. "I can't go back to the life I used to have. Those relationships… they're not mine anymore. But you've always had us. You've always had me. Our memories together, our experiences…" He trailed off. "If I… if I lost you that night at Birock's…"

Michael swallowed thickly, words catching in his throat. He shook his head. He couldn't bear to even entertain the idea. Not after he'd lost so many partners in the past. "KITT, you're so much more than your components, alright? Nothing in the world could destroy you. Not the real you."

Even as the words slipped past his lips, he could only hope the sentiment was true.

Finally, KITT's quiet voice joined Michael's own, the red lights of his synthesizer glowing to life. "I suppose it's like a modern ship of Theseus."

Michael paused. Still, he chuckled softly, just happy to hear his partner speak. That, too, had become a grounding force over the years. "You've always been too smart for me, y'know that?" he quipped. "Even your little references go right over my head."

There was something melancholic in KITT's tone as he replied.

"I don't think this is one you'd much like to discuss."

For a while, they sat in silence. The familiar white noise of KITT's turbine and the occasional rumble of passing cars seemed almost deafening. As much as Michael would've liked to pack everything up in the back of his head and continue on their way, he just couldn't get himself to switch gears. Clearly, neither could KITT.

"I still can't believe I let them trap me like that," the computer spoke, his voice hushed and solemn. "I let fear get in the way of our mission."

"Fear's not always a bad thing." This was something Michael had always abided by. "Sometimes a little bit's good for ya." After all, fear had become a staple part of his own life. The rush, the risk, the chase… in a way, it was almost addicting. It's what kept him moving forward.

KITT didn't feel the same.

"Not when it means putting other's lives at risk. Michael, I was paralyzed."

When the forklifts surrounded him in the shipping yard, alone without his partner, he'd panicked, every memory of that dreadful night rising back up to the forefront of his program. The first forklift was bad enough. When he rounded the corner to find two more lying in wait, it was like his entire system malfunctioned. If it was any other machine, he could've woven his way between them, deployed some sort of distraction, some sort of offense. At the very least, he should've been able to boost his way out of the container they backed him into. But he couldn't think. He couldn't focus. He couldn't act.

All he could do was call out for his partner. His partner, who he was designed to protect. Who he cared for more than anything in the world. And he couldn't even reach him.

"Michael, it's my job to keep you safe. I want to keep you safe. It's not my job to make mistakes."

"Mistakes happen, pal," Michael said, resting a hand on top of his partner's dash as if giving him a pat on the back. "So you got a little scared and acted a little off. It happens to the best of us. I mean, c'mon… it's only human."

"But I'm not human."

"You're a lot more human than you give yourself credit for." Absentmindedly, Michael clasped his hands together, fidgeting as he tried to find his words. "KITT, feeling scared is just part of life. When bad things happen to someone, it's bound to stick with 'em. This isn't some unique failure on your part." His voice grew quiet as he glanced out through the driver's side window. "Believe me, I've been around the block a few times myself."

"Then why don't you panic the way I did?"

"I used to. I mean, sometimes I do. I just… you can't let yourself get caught up in it, y'know? At some point, you force yourself to move on. If you don't, it'll eat you alive."

"Michael, I-I don't know how you people do it. Compartmentalizing things like that. I'm not sure I could pull it off. I didn't think I'd ever be jealous of the faulty human mind's ability to forget, but…"

The thought gave Michael pause. The ins and outs of all the science and technology that went into making KITT tick were far above his pay grade. With how human his partner seemed, it was easy to forget there wasn't a brain of flesh and blood behind the scenes. He'd never really considered just how differently they worked. "Must be hard having that data so accessible all the time, huh?"

"You know, Michael… sometimes I think it'd be a lot easier if it wasn't."

At that, Michael fell silent.

"When my backup memory banks were transferred into my new body… when you helped Bonnie get everything in order… why didn't you omit the events of that night?" The question sounded earnest. For KITT, it only seemed logical. "Wouldn't it have made things smoother for us? I… I almost couldn't perform. I heard what everyone said during my initial test run. That I may not be able to work. That I'd lost my nerve. Even when we went back to Birock's site, I wasn't sure I'd be able to complete our mission. And at the shipping yard the other day…"

KITT paused. "That night in the desert," he continued, echoing Michael's words from earlier. Back at the waste disposal site, Michael had compared the experience to KITT's own fears, insisting that all he needed to do was power through. In the moment, it had helped. He'd pushed his worried thoughts aside, doing what needed to be done, driven by a sense of justice and the desire for revenge, just as Michael had done with Tanya. But in the long run, it clearly served as no more than a temporary fix. Just trying to work past it put a strain on his systems. He couldn't imagine how Michael managed to do the same, time and time again. "If you could forget about what happened, wouldn't you?"

"KITT, no, I—" Michael winced. In truth, the thought had crossed his mind many times before. But he'd never admit it. Not to KITT. Not now.

The muzzle flash never fully seemed to fade away behind closed eyes. Sometimes he could even still feel the impact. The bullet tearing skin and flesh, breaking bone as it ricocheted off the metal plate in his skull; the splitting pain that rattled his brain and radiated out from his head through every nerve in his body. The idea of forgetting… of never having to fight the urge to flinch when his own partner's headlights caught him off guard, bright and blinding like the flash of Tanya's gun… of never waking up in a cold sweat, his mind reeling from nightmares he felt much too old to be having… of not having to worry that every encounter on the field could lead to another repeat, another point-blank shot, this time maybe not so lucky… it sounded like heaven. But he couldn't. He knew that. Things like that… they're not easy to let go of, whether you'd like to or not. What would be the point in pretending otherwise?

KITT, on the other hand, could. Every piece of his memory was embedded in a string of code that could, in theory, simply be removed. A single keystroke is all it would take to delete it altogether. The thought almost scared him. When KITT's circuits had been fried earlier in their partnership, he'd run off like a lost dog, seeking solace and companionship in the first person he came across. It was like he and Michael had never met. Things would've stayed that way had Michael been unable to swap in the backup memory drive. Even what he considered KITT's soul was contained in circuitry and code. He'd seen it changed, manipulated, lost, stripped completely from his body… and yet it never seemed to sink in. He wouldn't let it. Messing with the very core of someone's being like that — it wasn't right. It shouldn't even be possible. KITT was KITT. It was as simple as that.

"If Tanya's bullet took my memory with it, I wouldn't be sitting here right now."

"I see it's your turn to wax philosophical," KITT ribbed, unamused.

"I'm serious! The only reason I joined FLAG is because of what she did." Even just the mention of it sent a shiver through Michael's spine. It was all too vivid. The gun in her hand, shining in the moonlight mere seconds before the bullet pierced his skin. The way she'd tricked him, playing into his noble drive to help the innocent. The body of his partner, Muntzy, lying wounded in the parking lot, Tanya's team behind his murder. In more ways than one, it was her who was responsible for Michael Knight's very existence. It was her who lit the spark that burnt the phoenix. And it was Michael Knight who carried the flame beneath his wings.

"What we go through," Michael continued, "the things we experience… that's what makes us who we are. Michael Knight exists because Michael Long went through hell. Without that… I'm not sure where I'd be."

For a split second, he let his thoughts drift. Perhaps, had everything that night gone according to plan, he and Stevie would've gotten married. Perhaps they would've settled down, built a quiet life together. In a way, it could've been everything he ever wanted. He toyed idly with his own hands, grasping at his ring finger and stroking this thumb over the knuckle. He couldn't help but revel in the idea of a life like that. But with what he had now… if given the chance, he wasn't sure he could ever go back. He wouldn't know how to.

The sudden shift in Michael's biosignals was impossible to ignore. As always, KITT's system picked up on it before Michael was even aware of it himself. His heart was pounding in his chest, beating firm against his ribs like a drum. His breath was heavy, neurons in his brain firing rapidly as his mind raced. He stretched his fingers before balling them uncomfortably into fists against his thighs. Small tears pricked at the corners of his eyes, welling up from a place he couldn't quite identify.

"Michael, if this isn't something you'd like to talk about…"

If he were to be frank, it wasn't.

What good did talking do if it didn't change the past? What good did talking do if it didn't get things done? The present is what mattered now. FLAG picked him, and he picked FLAG. He was a fighter. A protector. A man with a cause. A man with a purpose. He had things that needed to be dealt with, people that needed him.

Maybe… maybe KITT needed him.

Maybe he needed KITT.

Michael sighed. Slowly, the brain of the computer watched as his heartbeat slowed, the tension easing in his muscles. There was a long pause as the man in the driver's seat did his best to pull himself together. He'd never liked being seen that way — so vulnerable, so caught up in everything he insisted didn't bother him. That wasn't Michael Knight. Or at least it wasn't meant to be.

"KITT…" Michael's voice was but a murmur. His words came slow, as if taking time to think through each one before it hit the air. "If Bonnie wiped your databanks of everything happened that night, you'd be missing a part of who you are. And I like who you are. Who we are, as a team." Gently, Michael traced his thumb over the bottom of the steering yoke, brushing against the vibrant red of the Knight insignia branded in its corner. It was this they shared the most: two parts of a whole, pieced together by a man he hardly knew. "Bad things happen. And God, I wish they didn't. But you can't just pick and choose."

"Then what can I do?"

"Unfortunately, pal… not a lot." Michael's gaze fell to the side. "All I know is… it's a little bit easier when you've got someone there beside you."

For a moment, it was quiet. Only after Michael glanced back up towards the dash did KITT respond.

"Promise me you'll be there? Even when things go wrong?"

"I promise, KITT."

As he spoke, Michael leaned in, his expression soft and weary. With an elbow propped on the gullwing yoke, he laid his hand upon the dash and gently stroked his thumb along the column of indicator lights bracketing the side of KITT's voice display, almost as if cradling his partner's cheek.

"Michael?" KITT's voice was soft, the lights of his synth barely rising more than a few ticks.

"Yeah, partner?"

"I promise to be there for you, too."

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End notes: This fic had been in the works for SO LONG. I kept telling myself I'd write it and then not getting around to it. But, finally, here we are. I didn't quite get to do EVERYTHING I wanted with it, but that just means I have more ideas to put in writing sometime later down the line.

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