Chapter Text
NOVEMBER 9TH, 2038
12:02 PM
DETROIT
“You strapped in?”
Connor glanced over, visibly confused at the question. Quinn smiled to himself, adjusting the rearview mirror to look at the flashing lights in the distance that his companion hadn’t noticed yet.
“Is there any particular reason you ask? We’re at a light.”
“Oh, no reason, just making sure you follow all safety and traffic laws, y’know.”
”Police rapidly approaching from behind. You’re not thinking of doing it, are you, Quinn?”
There it was. Quinn, completely unbothered, simply readjusted in his seat while Connor wheeled around to look behind them.
“Heh. You know me too well, KITT. Any thoughts, anything you might wanna add?”
“If I could sigh, I would. But I doubt that would change your mind any.”
“Damn straight.”
Connor kept glancing between the cop lights fast approaching behind them and the lizard in the seat next to him, clearly growing more on edge at Quinn’s lack of concern.
“I’d highly advise you do something soon, I’m starting to think the police are after-”
“Yep, they’re after me. They think I kidnapped you after I broke out of the DPD station, actually, courtesy of your little friend Gavin. Looks like he’s good for something, the little shit.”
Connor took a moment to mull that over before responding.
“...But you didn’t? Why would he think that?”
Quinn smirked, laying a hand on the gearshifter. “Because believe it or not, Hank’s pretty fucking important, and so’s his job. If I take the fall, that leaves Hank to worry about Deviants and you to help him do so.”
Connor paused for a moment.
“I- suppose it does make sense, you were a DPD convict…”
“Yep! That just makes it fun, actually.”
Quinn fiddled the radio dial as a new song switched over, raising the volume a little. He could hear the cop sirens now, and still, the light hadn’t changed.
“Quinn? They’re getting closer…”
”Whatever you’re planning, I highly suggest you enact it sooner rather than later.”
Coming up fast. Quinn reckoned he’d be able to read their license plates here in a bit.
“Make sure your seatbelt’s buckled, Connor, we’re in for a helluva ride!”
’I live for the applause, applause, applause, I live for the applause-plause, live for the applause-plause, live for the-
WAY that you scream and cheer for me, the applause, applause, applause-’
And just as he’d planned, he’d timed it perfectly.
As soon as the beat drop hit, he jerked the gearshift back into reverse, slamming on the gas as soon as two cop cars tried to box them in from the sides. Connor quickly ducked as the sudden acceleration and tight squeeze sheared the side mirrors off the cop cars on either side, leaving no trace of a scratch on KITT. Before either of them even had a chance to react, KITT kicked in, slamming the brakes and pulling a quick 180 before pulling back and letting Quinn punch the gas, directly towards the other four or so cop cars.
”Quinn, I hope you know what you’re doing here!”
“A little warning would’ve been nice!”
“I told you to buckle that seatbelt, Connor, not my fault!”
Two cops swerved, but the other two didn’t budge, staying on direct path with the oncoming vehicle.
Quinn didn’t flinch. He slammed on the brake, wrenching the wheel hard right into a tailslide. Both cop cars realized what was happening a litte too late, and just barely had time to slam on the brakes as KITT rammed into them , crumpling both front ends and pushing them both aside. The impact jolted Quinn and Connor both, but KITT’s nigh indestructible frame didn’t take so much as a dent. Quickly whipping it into gear, KITT floored it, leaving two cop cars totaled and the other two scrambling to turn around after them, by which they were already veering hard left onto a side street and away from the main road.
“When you said you wanted to take a drive, this wasn’t what I thought you meant!”
Quinn didn’t say anything, only smiled. He flicked the rearview, showing even more cop cars behind them.
“You have to have a plan here, right? You can’t just be driving them around aimlessly, they’re going to get you eventually- especially once they use androids, because they will use androids!”
“Connor, I’ll let you in on a little secret.”
KITT jostled, throwing both his passengers around as he drove straight over heaps of old, discarded wood and trash, leading the cops closer, but not too close.
“I never have a plan.”
Connor looked at him in utter amazement. Quinn didn’t respond, simply shifted before gunning it hard right into another alley, the cops quick on their heels.
“This alley doesn’t have a clear exit, it’s blocked. I assume you want to use plan B?”
“I’m almost offended! It’s like you don’t trust me, KITT!”
KITT made a robotic sound, nearly akin to a scoff. Quinn laughed, physically turning to check behind them this time. Sure enough, the cops were following them, single-file down the cramped, cluttered alleyway. Connor kept glancing back between the approaching brick wall and the line of cop cars behind them.
“Whatever you’re going to do, I suggest you do it soon!”
“Give me the word, Quinn!”
Fifty feet, forty feet, thirty feet-
“NOW!”
KITT launched, hitting the upper part of the wall and blowing though it like it was made of Legos. The first couple of cop cars didn’t brake in time; the crunching and screeching of metal meant they’d hit the wall too. KITT landed on the other side, managing to control his slide and brake on the other side, near the end of the alley. The red and blue lights illuminated the other half of the dark alleyway, all that they could see from their impromptu entourage not a moment prior.
Quinn opened his door, admiring his handiwork. Sure, he hadn’t had a plan, but it felt damn good to outrun the cops, with a police android in the passenger’s seat, no less! He crossed his arms, taking the demolished brick wall and flashing colored lights in like they were his personal museum exhibit.
A hand on his shoulder brought him back.
“What was the point of this?”
Quinn immediately froze. There was no way in hell he could tell Connor the real reason.
“Uh- shortcut. DPD’s only a mile from here. You had to get back.”
Connor took his hand off Quinn’s shoulder, but he could still feel his eyes boring into his back.
“You’re lying.”
Quinn turned, staring Connor directly in the eyes.
“You’re too good at that, y’know? Not nice, poking into other people’s vital signs like that.”
Connor didn’t say anything, only taking in the scene again, before turning away from Quinn, who put his arms out beside him in frustration.
“Hey! The hell’r you going?”
“Back to the station. I can walk from here.”
Quinn watched Connor walk off, then scoffed. All that, just for the android to walk away from him like nothing had happened.
“I also don’t understand what that was for. I thought we were-”
Quinn scowled as he closed the door, rocking the car a little more than he meant to. “Oh please, like you’d be able to understand-”
”I was under the impression we were a team.”
“Yeah. We are.”
KITT didn’t respond immediately, but Quinn could pick up on a subtle tone shift when he did.
”Then as your team member, and your friend, I have to intervene. This isn’t the proper way to-”
“To what? To what, KITT? Go ahead, I know you’ve got some smartass comment about how I’m ‘unstable’ and ‘destroying the stability of this timeline’ or some bullshit like that!”
Quinn angrily kicked at one of the empty cans littering the ground, staring daggers at it as it clanged out into the road. He leaned up against one of the alley walls, rubbing his eyes in frustration.
“I have a plan, but I need you to just trust me, goddammit!”
KITT stayed silent, the gentle whirring of his scanner the only indication he was listening. After a while of massaging his eyes, Quinn sighed, defeated.“Just- get back to Jericho, will you? The march should be happening any minute now, and I’d rather you not be in the streets when it happens.”
KITT didn’t say anything for a moment, then the stickshift clunked forward into drive.
“Very well. Planning the route now.”
Quinn didn’t even look up as the car left. After he’d been alone for a few seconds, he couldn’t help but turn to darker thoughts.
’What if KITT was right?’
’What if he really was doing this for the wrong reasons?’
’What if, what if, what if? ’
The dam broke, and all the pent-up emotion, the anger, the pain… all burst forth at once. With a primal scream, he punched the wall behind him.
His fist never made contact.
By the time a lone car came speeding by, running over the can in the road and sending it skittering back into the alley, the flash was gone and Quinn with it.
–‡—‡–
He blinked awake.
Slowly at first, and everything was extremely blurry. A couple more blinks didn’t do anything; he still couldn’t see shit. It took a couple of minutes before his vision cleared enough for him to make out a circular light inset in a white popcorn ceiling above him. Staring him directly in the face. Constantly.
Damn, it was bright.
Feeling around, Quinn hissed in pain as his elbow hit something behind him. A- toilet. Glancing up, it became apparently where he was:
A bathroom. A very plain bathroom, but still a bathroom.
Getting up nearly took him out; Quinn ended up having to hoist himself up using the edge of the sink, and even then he nearly pulled the towel rack out of the wall. Leaning against the counter, he managed to get a good look at himself in the mirror.
His hair was matted and dirty from Jericho, the bags under his eyes were so comically visible he could’ve passed for half raccoon and he doubted he’d ever be able to get that goddamn Thirium stain out of his shirt. Even more alarming was how dead his eyes looked…
God, he looked like shit.
Turning the water on and splashing his face, he watched the dirt and dust swirl around the inside of the sink. A couple more times only served to prove how long it’d been since he’d had a good shower, judging by how the water dripping off his hair and swirling down the drain was a disgusting shade of dark grey.
Quinn could only stand to stare at his reflection for so long. Between the bloodshot eyes, dark bags and the soulless stare, he couldn’t even recognize the person staring back at him.
He sighed.
How long had it been? When was the last time he’d actually had a proper frame of reference for the passage of time? His phone’s date hadn’t changed since the alternate version of his world, and even then it was a few months after when he’d left. Assuming he even did make it back, how long would it have been? A year? Ten? A hundred?
Quinn hated the quiet sections of this shitshow. It always made his thoughts spiral.
Forcing himself away from the mirror, the door behind him opened up into an equally sterile hallway. Barely any decorations, just wood floors, beige walls and a steady tapping coming from an open door further down.
It was then Quinn realized he wasn’t alone.
The tapping was irregular, stopping occasionally then starting with no warning. As Quinn nudged the door open, he noticed a silhouette against a lit screen, back turned to him. It seemed to be… writing something, some kind of document open, the sounds he’d been hearing the clack of a keyboard typing. He leaned against the wall, unable to read what the person was writing but still interested nonetheless.
After about ten minutes, the unknown figure reached up, taking their headphones off. Quinn shifted ever so slightly to get their attention, and the figure wheeled around, finally turning to face him.
A moment of dead silence.
“No… no fucking way…”