Marissa

Chapter 1: Knight Before Destiny Begins

Full Summary: Michael and the gang go to Montana for a convention, as well as a vacation. Kitt goes to a forest to debunk rumors of a ghost haunting it, but what he does find will herald significant changes for FLAG, and begin something irrevocable within the AI itself.

Author's Notes: KITT, Devon, Michael, etc belong to Glen A. Larson. However, Marissa, Verona, Parkson, etc. all belong to me.

She knew that her back was to the waterfall, and the long descent to the bottom. That night, she had taken all that she could stand. The master felt that she had been too slow and punished her, as usual. It had been more horrible than she could have imagined, very painful. That waterfall would take it all away, for good.

As she turned and started to bend her knees, she heard a voice behind her. She had never heard it before, not the master's for certain. It had an accent, a soft one, that she definitely understood. As alien as it sounded, it was firm, yet…maybe not-hard. It was calling her to not jump.

She turned around and saw the strangest thing. In front of her were a pair of soft, bright lights. The full moon shone into the forest enough that she could see the source of those lights, and it startled her, not to mention…awed her. She couldn't move at all.

In front of her was a black car. She had seen them before, they sometimes could be seen just beyond the forest, but this one was unlike any other. She could see something odd that the car was changing into. It was a faint outline, but the black car seemed to begin a change toward…a human. A person.

The moon and the two lights merged, and her vision faded, first into bright white, then faded into black.

When she could see again, she found herself surrounded by a single sound: a heartbeat. That's what her mind told her, anyway. Faintly, in the distance, she could see the car-man. She got the feeling that just by seeing her, he had begun changing into this.

"Who…are you?" she moved her mouth to say, and shrieked when her little voice echoed.

The car-man said nothing.

As she tried to ask again, she saw a golden glow surround her. Little by little, the glow increased in brightness as well as color.

"Pure gold," she heard the car-man whisper.

Once the light was bright enough, a tendril of gold began to steadily appear, and then grow in length. Within minutes, the gold tendril was halfway between her and Car-man.

She felt frightened, although at the same time, she wanted the tendrils to connect.

Within moments more, they did, linking the child to the car-man.

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In a wooden shack, a small, dirty, disheveled child was sleeping in a corner. She didn't wash much, wasn't allowed to, but she had seen once that her hair was light blonde. The hair was also jagged in many places, where the other resident had yanked it out.

Now, that other resident, a large, angry man with red hair, a body like that of at least someone that had been lifting weights, stomped towards the child, then yanked her harshly by the arm from the floor.

She whimpered, still asleep, and murmured something.

Growling, the man used his usual method of waking the little…creature up.

He bent his hand and then backhanded both sides of her face.

There was a yelp, and then terrified hazel eyes opened, staring at his face.

"M-master Parkson…" she squeaked.

"Didn't I tell you to clean the fireplace before you get any sleep? Well?" he roared.

"I-I did. J-just as you—"

"Liar!" he spat out and backhanded her again. "The fireplace isn't cleaned out, just did your half-brained version of it! Well, if you think you're going to get away with it, you're wrong."

"M-master…?"

"As soon as I take care of your punishment, you'll go back in there and do the job right this time. And, creature…you can forget about food for a couple of days. That'll make you remember to do what your master says!"

This made the child whimper and beg, which made him even angrier and used the full fist this time, in the stomach, before he dragged her off in the other room, to begin the punishment.

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Far away, in the middle of the night, an older man was in the middle of a strange dream, if his utterings were of any indication. Strange…and painful.

"Ch-child…dirty thing," he murmured, his accent British by birth. At first the voice sounded quiet, awed. He added, "Familiar…?"

After a moment, his voice became pained as he called out, "How long…Verona? No, she can't be dead…! The other…? No!"

A sharp, sorrowful cry issued from the man as he immediately was sitting up, his eyes snapping open.

The man tried shakily to regain calm, but when it came to things like this, it was next to impossible. Not after what had happened so long ago.

A light came on in the room next door and he heard the sounds of someone familiar, a woman, running.

"Devon?" he heard her seconds later, "Wh—what happened…?"

The man, Devon, took another shaky breath before he turned to his left, where a brunette woman ran in from. She looked about suspiciously before she lowered a single, long item in her hands.

"What happened?" she asked again, concerned.

"N-nightmare," he replied quietly.

"Another one…? About the war, right…?"

Devon shook his head and replied, voice still pained, "No, Bonnie. Verona…"

She winced sympathetically. The man, Devon Miles, would, at times, have nightmares, but most were about what he termed as "the war". However, there were some nightmares that were more personal, and certainly more traumatic in their own ways.

"I don't doubt it," she said quietly, "Considering what time of year this is. What was it about this time…?"

After he took a deep breath, he replied, "A child…or what looked like a child. Filthy, from head to toe. A man beating her, constantly, calling her a creature. Golden vines coming from somewhere and ensnaring her."

"A girl…?" she replied. "And you mentioned Verona."

"Yes. Reliving…when I found out. And then saw her calling for help."

Bonnie shook her head and said quietly, "Devon, it was just a nightmare. There's no possible way you could help her now."

Both were rather quiet for a long moment while he fought to get his tremors at the dream under control.

"Are you going to be okay?" Bonnie asked.

"Yes…I think so," was the quiet reply.

She simply nodded and said, "We'll be arriving tomorrow for the convention. It'll be strange, attending something this long."

There was only a small chuckle at that from the older man. Bonnie, Devon, RC3, Michael and Kitt were traveling by semi to a city in Montana for a month-long convention. For Devon, it meant work, although for the rest, it was a vacation. Michael and Kitt would be separated during this, of course, no matter how much he disliked it.

Michael would be going up into the mountains to simply relax. At the same time, Kitt would be going to a natural retreat (or, in human terms, a vast forest) a short distance from the city, doing some research on his own. The fact that Kitt requested that no-one accompany him had startled everyone. The only way that had been permitted was for the AI to promise to contact either Michael or Devon daily, as well as to keep his homing beacon on.

RC3 had not told Michael where he would be at, although he did tell Kitt and Devon…and from the sound of what was said, the Street Avenger would be paying a visit to the city. Not something Devon liked, but then again…not many knew that such a one was working for FLAG.

"Any idea what Kitt wants to do at that natural retreat?" he asked, trying not to think about either the convention /or/ the nightmare.

"All he said to me was that he would be relaxing as well as debunking some rumors. According to what we've heard, there's some kind of urban legend going around in that area. Something about a ghost scaring the visitors off just by sight." She saw that Devon was about to object, but she reminded him, "He did give his word to keep the homing beacon on and to report in daily."

He nodded. He still didn't like this, although now…

Bonnie saw a strange look on his face the second time he nodded and said, "Devon…another whisper?"

"Yes…and this one says that Kitt will be all right by himself."

Her eyes widened at this, but she said nothing. From long acquaintance, she knew that at times, Devon would have what he called "a whisper in his heart", something that told him whether a course of action was to be followed or not. Only twice was the whisper ignored, and as she knew from personal experience, they had ended with disaster. The first time, years before, Devon had been too cold one too many times and Michael was a half-step away from completely walking out of FLAG for good. The declaration to leave (the younger man even had his bags packed and in the office) had deeply shocked him, a shock he needed. Even now, the Englishman felt deep regret over the incident, even though he had learned from it…and didn't want to know what would have happened if he had not left his office without notice and gone after Michael.

The second time, Devon had nearly died, when he had been kidnapped, drugged for Kitt's MBS formulae, then left in a building, along with Jennifer Knight, that had time bombs equipped. Ever since the second time, he stopped ignoring the whispers. Of course, Bonnie was the only one alive that knew about them.

"All right, then…good night." At the long silence, she simply sighed and left for another small bedroom that was built into the semi.