Alzheimer's.
What a *terrifying* word.
"No, it's not true I can't have Alzheimer's," Michael Knight speaks out loud in denial after being informed by the sympathetic doctor at FLAG's headquarters. "I'm tired, that's all. Sometimes I forget things. Nothing major - insignificant things like where is my razor? Where is my other sock?" The man cries as he tries to go over in his head that he has a disease that will cause him to forget everything and everyone he fought for.
The Foundation for Law and Government.
Bonnie Barstow.
Reginald Cornelius III.
Devon Miles.
Wilton Knight.
Stevie Mason Knight.
Kitt - oh God, Kitt.
Kitt is ever faithful and loving. "How am I supposed to tell him? I can't face him right now, yet I must tell him." Michael spoke loudly, with only one other person in the room.
Sometime later:
"Buddy, I have something to tell you..."
"No! Michael! The doctor is wrong!" Kitt uttered, not believing what he heard with his audio system. "You're tired from overwork. It can't be...!"
"I'm sorry, Pal."
Man and machine have no other words to say to each other. The man knows eventually, he won't be able to recognize the machine in only a few years. A machine is more human than most humans. A machine who, at this moment, is hurting more than he's letting on. A machine that can't protect the man he loves from a disease that will eventually rob him of his memories, his fitness, his dignity, and lastly, his life.
Finally, Kitt asks quietly, "What can I do, Michael?"
"Stay with me, Kitt. I need you more than ever."
"Always."
Twenty Years Later:
"Let me out of here! NOW!" Michael shouts out in anger, not recognizing the worried face of RC3. The man stumbles before rushing out of his bedroom inside the small cottage he now resides in. He had forgotten he was only in his underwear at the time.
"Michael, come back! Go back to bed. It's ok, you're safe here." RC tries to explain to the angered man in his seventies.
Michael Knight reaches the front door, opens it, and walks outside. He has no idea where 'here' is. "This is not the mansion? Why am I here? What is this place? WHERE'S KITT?" The man yells, frightened - terrified.
"Michael? Michael! Everything is alright. I'm here. Please go back inside. It's time to rest now," said the soothing voice from a black car parked in the driveway close to the front door.
"Kitt?" The man barely recognizes the Trans AM.
"Yes, Michael, I'm here."
"Can I stay with you?"
"Of course, Michael," Kitt said gently while automatically opening the driver's door in invitation.
Michael slowly enters the cabin, sits down, and looks at the voice modulator. "It's gotten worse, eh, Buddy?" and starts to cry again. It's a rare moment when Michael has any lucid thoughts.
Kitt is silent. Instead, he warms up the cabin temperature to make his best friend comfortable and plays some of Michael's favorite rock n roll tunes when the man was much younger.
It doesn't take long for Michael to relax and fall asleep.
Kitt observes the sleeping man and worries. The past twenty years of watching the man who had been his partner, best friend, and loved one slowly deteriorating before his optics. No additional medicine can slow down the progression of this disease. Things can only get worse. How can things get any worse than this? This slow, living death!
Kitt feels everything in his circuits - fear, sorrow, despair, and love for the man in a fight he will eventually lose.
When can Michael find peace?
Can the AI resume his life and be happy again when the inevitable happens?
It seems both Michael and Kitt were carefree without any worries. Both were newly retired from FLAG with the rest of their lives to live happily together.
Or so they thought.
The day of the diagnosis.
Alzheimer's.
The thought of leaving did cross Kitt's CPU - once for only an instant when the man in his life blamed him, Bonnie, RC, and the world in general for this horrible disease. There was a profound apology immediately with several loving pats on the top of the car's dashboard.
For a time, they were happy together doing the things anyone would do in retirement - fishing, long drives, and talking. Hours and hours of conversations mainly about the past - the good and the bad.
The times of clarity inside Michael's mind at first were months, gradually weeks, days, and hours, until, now, it's only mere minutes.
The wandering came next. Michael would go for a walk and couldn't find his way back. Kitt had to contact Bonnie or RC to help find his best friend.
Now Kitt can only offer comfort as best he can, knowing even comfort won't be enough.
Several hours later, Michael wakes up, looks around, confused, and opens the driver's door. What is this strange car? He briefly recognizes the place he calls home and walks toward the cottage. Five minutes later, Michael is back in bed.
An alarming sound is heard from Michael's mouth while he's in bed - the coughing has started.
Kitt hears the coughing with his audio receiver and performs a full medical scan on the man.
Fluid in his lungs.
Immediately, Kitt calls for the doctor who has visited Michael during the past ten years.
The doctor arrived as quickly as she could and five minutes later diagnosed that Michael had pneumonia.
Michael wakes up and asks for Kitt. He rises from bed despite the doctor's orders to remain, dressed in his bathrobe, and slips into his slippers before walking painfully toward the waiting car outside.
Kitt again opens his driver's door and waits for Michael to enter without voicing any objections to his sudden appearance, only eight hours after the man left the car to go indoors.
"Kitt, it's time. I can't fight this any longer. I'm so sorry." Michael said sadly with tears in his eyes. Those eyes, once a brilliant blue, have dulled almost lifeless. "I'm not the man I used to be. It's one battle we can't win."
"It's ok, Michael. I- I'll watch over you. I'm sorry as well. Rest now. Sleep. I love you, Michael." Kitt said softly.
Michael closes his eyes for the final time, and each breath comes out more shallowly, slowly until thirty minutes later, there's no movement. There's only silence inside the car.
Kitt performs one last medical scan and cries out in grief his best friend has moved on from this plane of existence. Moments later, he stops and looks at the face of his loved one. 'Michael looks so peaceful at last.' the AI thought as he prepared to inform RC and the doctor of his best friend's death.
"Goodbye, Michael."