The Legion of Doom, an unholy alliance between TKR's most lethal enemies was defeated, but at great cost. All five TKR vehicles, Dante, Attack Beast, Plato, KAT, and Domino were heavily damaged, and it would take days or even weeks to repair them completely.
And in the process Mobius, the team's most dangerous adversary, and creator of the Legion of Doom, had succeeded in his master plan. He had broken into Sky One, TKR's mobile HQ, and stolen the matrix of KITT, the heroic artificial intelligence from the glory days of FLAG.
KITT's final message sent the team to a mysterious island in the Florida Keys where they found a tombstone bearing the name Michael Knight, the long vanished first FLAG driver. And to further add to the chaos, an unknown figure appeared at the grave site, claiming to be Knight himself...
Team Knight Rider: Knight's End
Part I - The Vault
On an island in the Florida Keys...
While the blinding tropical sunlight beamed down upon their backs, the squad of five TKR drivers stood over the supposed grave of the legendary Michael Knight in the blinding Florida sunlight, the expressions upon their faces a mixture of confused and morose.
"I can't believe it, he's dead." said Jenny Andrews, who had the most to lose or gain at the discovery, for she had long suspected that Michael Knight was her father.
All were silent, with the roar of the nearby surf the only noise, then after a moment Duke broke the quiet.
"Shadow leads us all the way out here to show us this?"
"What does it mean?" asked Erica, than all five looked up in amazement, as o enraptured at the grave marker had they been that none of them had noticed a tall figure had joined their mourning from the nearby jungle.
"Maybe I can tell you." the stranger announced to his enraptured audience, "I'm Michael Knight... Or at least I was..."
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Ten hours earlier...
The motorized wheelchair departed from Sky One with no resistance. Mobius's mind controller prototype was working perfectly. The evil mastermind could control up to three people within a ten meter radius and that had allowed him to easily gain access to TKR's HQ and steal KITT's matrix.
Moments later he was aboard his own private jet and handing the sphere containing KITT's essence over to his bodyguard Roland Laschewsky.
"Hook it into my computer, quickly! Kyle will soon be here. I know he'll figure out my diversion."
He signaled the cockpit and the jet took off under the skilled hand of the beautiful blonde Liz "Starr" Starrowitz, Mobius's lover and partner in crime. Once airborne and on autopilot, Starr left the controls and headed back to the cabin. She embraced Mobius warmly and watched his gnarled hands move across his chair's computer keyboard.
"What are you doing now, lover?" she asked, her eyes straying to the large metal sphere hooked by coaxial cable to the jet's onboard computer, "Is that him?"
"Your moronic question is answered by the metal plate on the matrix, Starr." Mobius criticized.
Starr read the plate.
"KITT? So this is the brain of one of TKR's talking cars. So what?" she was already getting bored.
"Not just any brain, you fool, the brain. The first of their heroic machines. And the most brilliant. He holds the key to world domination. And without his connection to Sky One he is helpless. There! I have it!"
Mobius typed a final sequence on his key board and a map of the USA appeared on his computer screen. A single red dot blinked in the desert of Arizona.
"That's it!" he said ecstatic, "That's the location of the FLAG Vault. Victory is at hand. Starr, alter the jet's course for Arizona." he ordered and she ran back to the cockpit.
Mobius reached out with a withered, shaky hand and tapped KITT's matrix. "See that, Roland? Soon the entire population of this planet will be under my absolute control. And Kyle and his idiotic TKR members have no idea at all what my plan truly is!"
The black and silver mini-jet hurtled toward it's mysterious destination...
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Elsewhere...
The three bizarre figures made their slow way across the blistering terrain of the Arizona desert. They had left behind the mini-jet a half hour before and now it was just a silver speck to Roland, as he glanced back the way they had come across the sandy tarmac.
Roland had put on a white muscle shirt, at Mobius's advice, and also sported a pair of black Oakley sun glasses to protect his eyes from the harsh sunlight. He carried a riot shotgun slung over his shoulder and had a Glock-17 pistol in a hip holster. Mobius had decided that was all the protection they would need.
In front of him stumbled Starr, clad in tight cut-off jeans and a green T-shirt. She carried KITT's matrix in her arms and it's weight was taking it's toll.
"Are we...we almost there y-yet, Mobius?" she gasped, "This damn thing weighs a ton! And the sun is ruining m-my highlights!"
"Be quiet, my dear." replied Mobius in the lead, his electric wheelchair making good time, for him anyway, thanks to the all-terrain tires he had Roland install on their way here. "We are nearly within sight of it."
Two minutes later he ground to a halt, seemingly at random.
"This is it?" asked Starr, bringing the matrix forward as their leader had instructed. She hooked it into the chair's I/O port and Mobius entered a code into the computer. A high pitched whine began to emanate from the matrix sphere.
"Sounds like a modem." said Starr, fanning herself with her ball cap.
"Precisely, my dear. It is a modem, and-" but he was cutoff by a voice from his chair's speaker phone.
"Don't do this, Mobius." came the voice.
Mobius smiled in recognition of KITT's original voice, not the one he had created to hide his identity from both Mobius and the TKR team.
"Even you can't be this twisted." snapped the AI.
"Ah, KITT, I had forgotten you could tap into my chair's phone and use it as a voice modulator. Too bad that's all you can do." and Mobius chuckled wryly, the arrogance of his tone self-evident.
There was a sudden mechanical grating noise, than the sand they were standing on began to vibrate violently. Then they began to sink into the ground. Roland and Starr looked around in amazement as the sand drained away to reveal them standing on a black metal surface, thirty meters by fifteen meters, and it was moving rapidly downwards.
"It's an elevator!" said Starr, "Will it take us to this Vault of yours?"
"Yes, my dear." said Mobius as they continued their trip down.
Down-and-down they went, until one hundred meters below the surface the lift stopped and the three of them moved off of the platform. It reversed and headed back up, leaving them in total darkness. Starr and Roland heard Mobius type another sequence into his computer and the modem hummed once again.
Lights sprang to life high above them and Starr looked upwards blinking at the high black metal ceiling four stories above. Then she looked back down and gasped in amazement. They stood in a vast chamber, hexagonal in shape, the walls grey concrete inlaid with support beams of that same glossy black metal. Along the left wall was a long row of silver garage door's, each two stories high. To the left was a massive command center, with enough consoles for easily fifty personnel. A massive display screen was attached to the wall above the control area and on it was displayed the FLAG knight piece logo.
"Holy cow!" exclaimed Roland, the first thing he had said in hours.
Mobius was already rolling into the command center and up to the console closest to the screen. Activating a final code, he unlocked the control's computer and brought the command centre online. All the consoles began to hum and glow and the giant screen came fully alive, displaying a Utilities menu.
Starr read the listings, than uttered one in surprise, "FLAG Fusion Satellite System? But isn't that-"
"Yes," Mobius cut her off, "it's exactly what I need to activate my mind controller on a global scale. This facility controls it and uses it to transmit all FLAG communications across the Earth. I will be able to take full command of all the five billion humans who reside on this miserable rock."
"You're completely insane Mobius." came KITT's voice from the chair beside him, "It will never work."
"Oh, but it will, my brilliant toaster!" snarled the maniacal genius, "And I'll leave you hooked into my chair's speaker, so you can witness my greatest achievement!"
"Hee-hee!" giggled Starr, "We're gonna conquer the world!"
"How long will it take you to assemble my equipment and tie it into the console?" Mobius demanded of her as she began to unpack the machinery from the field pack strapped to the back of his chair.
"No more than three hours with you directing me, lover." she replied.
"Excellent! Roland, get me out of this chair and into the command seat of the main console. We all have work to do!" and he waited as Roland began to undue his straps.
Unbeknownst to any of them, a green light clicked on the armrest of the wheelchair, as KITT activated the chair's own modem. He prayed it would reach Sky One.
To be continued...