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"I'm sorry, John," Root says abruptly.
John draws in a slow breath and shifts his weight in the passenger seat. His right thumb twitches. He could clear the weapon at his hip before she took her hands off the wheel.
He keeps his eyes on the road like she told him to. So far he's done everything she's asked of him to help find Shaw. Taking him out right now would serve no tactical purpose, but Root doesn't have his training and the Machine isn't planning her moves anymore. She hasn't slept or eaten, and although she didn't argue the point with Harold, John knows she didn't like losing the time it took to drop off a blood sample for a test to which John himself is pretty sure all three of them already know the answer.
In his peripheral vision he watches the skin over her knuckles go tight and pale. He'll knock her out and grab the wheel if he has to, get answers from the doctor on his own while she cools down. Root might not even hold it against him once her head clears. Shaw really can't afford any more delays.
John breathes out and says nothing.
"The way I feel right now," Root says. Her voice breaks less melodically than it does when she's faking it. "This is what it was like for you when I took him."
He turns his head and looks at her. She's shaking. Root tends to lose her impulse control when her emotions run this high. John concentrates on her hitching breath instead of the words.
"I want to kill them all," she says. "Everyone between me and Sameen. God, I want to rip them into pieces with my hands. And when I get her back, I'll still -- I can't imagine ever not wanting that."
John watches her and breathes. She glances at him once with round scared eyes.
"I'm sorry he won't let you kill me," she says.
It's strange, John thinks. Normally she loves saying Harold's name, rolling it around her mouth, knowing and possessive. She calls him Harry.
John stretches his fingers. Clenches his fists. Lays his hands flat again. Breathes.
"You didn't want to hurt him," John says, after a while. There's not much else to say. He had wanted to kill her. He'd wanted it to hurt. He'd thought about easily her thin bones would snap. He could do it with two fingers.
"I stabbed him with needles," Root says flatly. "I cut him with a razor blade. I made him bleed."
John's quiet for another minute. He can remember that anger, but it feels old and far away. It would take him some effort to find it and it wouldn't do any good. Harold's safe at home. Shaw needs them right now.
He remembers sharing a motel room in Texas with Carter, and almost smiles.
"You didn't want to hurt him," he tells Root.
She opens her mouth and takes a desperate shivery breath. When a couple of tears finally fall, she slaps them away, ruthless. John doesn't move.
"No," she says, shaking her head. "No." It sounds like please. He thinks she would have died for Harold before she ever met him. It's hard to stay mad at someone like that.
"I found him," John says. They're almost at the doctor's house, and besides, it's the only thing that still matters. Root will learn that soon, he thinks. God, he hopes. "You'll find her," he says, and he doesn't think about how he would have burned the whole world down, starting with her, if he'd found Harold too late.