Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Root doesn’t know how she gets back to the subway.

She’s so numb that she really wouldn’t have cared if they’d left her in that elevator when she’d begged, screamed and scratched, leaving a red, ragged line across John’s cheek in her efforts to take the elevator back down.

Sameen was down there and Samaritan be damned, Root wasn’t leaving her there.

But then Harry had grasped her shoulder and said something about not making “Ms. Shaw’s sacrifice having been in vain” and she’d deflated, all of her rage and desperation leaking out of her and leaving her feeling exhausted and as weak as a newborn kitten.

That’s where her memories stop, though she knows the team got her back to the subway and they’d probably had a hushed conversation about where to put her.

She’s awoken on Shaw’s cot with Bear curled into her and she knows they must not have had anywhere else to put her.

Slowly sitting up, she regards Bear as he whines and digs his nose into the pillow. His eyes lock onto hers and stay, pleading, and she knows what he’s thinking because she’s thinking it too.

Her voice is barely a ghost of a whisper and yet, it cracks when she reaches out to rest a hand on his head, both drawing and giving comfort all at once as she tells him, “We’ll bring her back or I’ll die trying.”

Bear gives a little woof and licks her hand and Root almost smiles, might have done if her heart didn’t feel like it was slowly being eaten away by a virus. As it is, she finds her strength returned by the gesture of affection and by her own promise that she fully intends to keep.

Slowly standing, she stumbles and then closes her eyes, grateful as she hears the Machine’s voice again. The message is brief and her eyes flicker back open as she gazes at the subway car and the clacking of Harry’s fingers against the keyboard she can hear.

And though the Machine’s voice makes her feel slightly better, Her words are hardly comforting and have ignited the embers of rage still burning in her belly.

Shaw had once torn the city apart trying to find her when she’d been forced to leave her in Control’s hands.

Root isn’t about to do anything less for her.

Chapter Text

In the three days since she’s returned, Shaw has hardly had a moment alone. She doesn’t mind it, not the way she once would have. She’d spent nine months being fucked around by Samaritan and sometimes she worries that she’s still there, that this is all still a simulation. She knows that Root is worried about her, doesn’t like her steadfast refusal to risk going to the subway because she knows why.

But Root doesn’t push anymore, doesn’t have a reason to. Shaw’s finally given in and listened to the voices, finally understanding that the luxury of time to push Root away and try to figure out why she couldn’t let her go is a luxury that they no longer have; that they never had to begin with.

She wishes that she’d seen that months ago. A lot of things would have gone differently if she had.

But today, Root has gone to get breakfast for them and, wanting to test the waters, Shaw had offered to stay behind. Root’s worry was evident as she’d hesitated, but she’d eventually agreed and though she hated herself for doing it, Shaw had bugged her jacket. Just like in the simulation but also nothing like in the simulation because this time, it had been a conscious decision, no time lapses or brain surgery remnants to speak of.

She listens to the audio just long enough to confirm that Root went where she said she was going to and hadn’t met up with John or Finch before she cuts it off, not wanting to invade Root’s privacy any more than she felt necessary.

Suddenly, the bed shifts under a new weight and Shaw’s hand is on the gun under her pillow before her eyes even register that it’s Bear. Bear, who has been sufficiently startled enough to stop where he’s standing and whines low in his throat as he watches her warily.

She relaxes and sighs, gently patting the bed next to her. “I’m sorry, boy,” she says softly, and apparently the apology is enough because he woofs and pads over, circling around once before settling in close to her side and giving her face a firm lick.

“Did you take care of Root while I was gone?” she asks softly, letting her fingers dig into his soft far and draw comfort from it. Bear is another reminder of why this is too different to be another simulation. When Root had brought her here, she’d explained that Bear stayed most nights with her and though she seemed sheepish and almost fearful, Shaw had simply nodded in understanding.

She knows all too well what it’s like to lose someone and to take comfort where you can.

And now, as she ruffles Bear’s fur and basks in his kisses, she also enjoys the safety she feels in familiar behavior, behavior that Samaritan couldn’t possibly have simulated. It couldn’t have known that Bear had a certain spot on his paw that, when touched, would make him lunge in for a play bite. It couldn’t know that he would always whine if she stopped petting him even for a second, or that that would whine would immediately turn into a woof of approval when she started again.

It certainly couldn’t have known that Bear had spent every night that Root was in the city with her, or that every time she’d left the subway after her cover had blown, she’d left Bear with one specific order.

“Bewaken Root,” she had told him, letting him sniff some item of Root’s that she’d always managed to leave laying around Shaw and he had always barked as though he’d understood.

Now, she has the proof that he had and that he’d done his job faithfully.

“Good boy,” she whispers, wrapping her arms around Bear and letting her face rest against his neck as she breathes in his familiar scent.

Root finds them like that when she returns and she smiles softly when Shaw’s eyes turn to meet hers, her guard remaining down and just looking at her.

Somehow, she thinks they might just be okay.

Chapter Text

Sometimes, Root is no longer sure where Robin ends and she begins.

For someone who’s lived as many lives as she has, it’s surprising but also not so much. Never before has she been forced to assume one identity for months on end with mere moments a day to be herself.

And it’s more… difficult due to the things she’s had to talk about, she thinks begrudgingly as she stares into the camera on the phone she’s been allowed to have back, trying to recognize herself. She’d always been careful to keep herself as separate as she could manage from the identities she assumed before in an effort to remember who she was. But since the Machine had effectively forced her hand in complying with the therapy and working on her… issues, that isn’t an option.

Her problems have become Robin’s problems as well and Root doesn’t know what to do with that. She has no idea how she’s ever supposed to separate the shards of herself that splintered off when she imploded at Hanover Nuclear Reservation from the pieces of Robin that seem to grow larger by the day beneath her skin.

The drugs don’t help, of course, making her head fuzzy and her thoughts convoluted. Some days, she’s not sure she would remember what she’s supposed to do if not for the Machine’s voice in her ear. Of course, She’s omniscient and She always makes certain to be with Root more on those days than the others, a comfort she had never asked for and certainly never thought she needed.

Loneliness has always been Root’s cross to bear, though she’d never admit it, and having a connection with God Herself still feels like a pipe dream at times.

Suddenly, her phone buzzes and Root smiles in relief as she hits the accept call button, ignoring her urge to glance around and make sure no one is around. She knows the Machine wouldn’t have called if there was. “Hi there,” she says, feeling as though someone has thrown a light switch on inside her mind, flooding it with light and a euphoria she can’t quite explain, not that she’d want to try.

She cocks her head to the side, listening to the radio signals that is Her voice and her smile only grows wider as she listens to Her. “I thought you’d never ask,” she says excitedly, memorizing Her instructions quickly but carefully as She tells her what to do.

It seems that her treatment is to be cut short and if this is any indicator of what her life as the Machine’s analog interface is going to be, well…

Root isn’t sure that she’s ever been as excited about anything in her life and in that moment, she realizes that all of her worries have been for nothing. She can already feel Robin falling away—no, being pushed away as Root floods through her veins again.

And she knows that no matter how far she might fall, how lost she might become, she’ll never be without a tether again for as long as the Machine lives. The sense of purpose she already feels thrumming in her veins at having a mission rivals even the high she’d had watching Trent Russel die and she wonders once again why she had been so afraid to stop killing when She’d told her it was wrong and She wouldn’t allow it.

She knows that hard times are coming and that it will be up to her and the Machine to stop it, knows that to some like Harold, it will seem like the Machine values her only as a physical means to an end. She also knows that Harold is wrong, so very wrong.

She is Root, she is the Analog Interface, she is beloved by her God and she knows that God would never have had her locked up in this place for four months if she didn’t. Why bother trying to heal a broken (and yes, she can admit, if only to herself, that she had been broken) human being if She didn’t care?

As she continues to discuss strategies with the Machine, Root can’t help but smile as she imagines meeting Harry again someday soon.

They’ll have so much to talk about.

Chapter Text

“Actually, Sameen? I’ve been hiding since I was 12. This might be the first time I feel like I belong.”

Root’s never been so honest with another person before, not even Shaw. But in the new way that Sameen looks at her, the way she no longer keeps her at arm’s length or tries to pretend she doesn’t care, she finds the courage to say the words that she’s only been able to bring herself to think before.

Before she’d found the Machine via the honeypot she’d set up for whoever was foiling her latest payday and endangering her reputation, she’d thought humans were worthless, no more than an ever-multiplying string of Bad Code that should be deleted. That’s how she’d justified her jobs to herself when she’d bothered; for the most part, she had just orchestrated everything and tried not to think about the person behind the payday.

As she’d told Finch, she wasn’t a sociopath and the things she’d done hadn’t been easy for her even then.

But then she had found the Machine; or rather, the Machine had found her. Sometimes, even all this time and disillusionment later, she still marveled at the fact that She had chosen someone as broken down and morally bankrupt as she had been then and seen something more in her.

They’d fought for a while before Root had agreed to comply with the therapy and Her orders not to kill people. It was… different, to say the least, but not in a bad way. Back then, she hadn’t thought anything would ever be bad for her again as long as she had the Machine in her ear.

Over the years, she’d remained mostly separated from the team. John and Harold still didn’t trust her, not that she could blame them, and even Bear had taken a while to warm up to her. Sameen… Well, she was a special case, but even she’d had a begrudging respect for who Root was and the value she held. She’d been the one to get her out of the cage in time to save John, and she’d been the one to come after Root when she’d gotten herself into too much trouble.

Root had never had anyone who cared about her since she was 12 years old, and she wasn’t sure how to handle it so she defaulted to teasing designed to keep Shaw at arm’s length while not pushing her away entirely. It was a dangerous ledge to keep her balance on, but she’d somehow managed it.

And then, Sameen had sacrificed herself at the stock exchange and with one harsh kiss and a push, Root’s entire world had imploded yet again.

Root had felt like Samantha Groves again in that moment, watching reality and the past collide as she saw Hanna climbing into Trent Russel’s car again while Shaw took bullets to the chest and the elevator slowly came to life. The keening she’d made hadn’t sounded human except for Sameen’s name and if she could have clawed through the cage, she knew she would have.

After that, she’d spent nine months lost and adrift without Shaw but somehow, she’d found herself finally being accepted into the team, into the family that they were. She and John had found common ground in their ruthlessness during the hunt for Shaw early on, and she knew that he understood why she couldn’t just let it go the way that Harold and the Machine wanted her to do.

And now, here she is; sitting beside Sameen, their hands clasped tightly together in a gesture that Root had once never thought she’d be allowed. Although Harold is in more danger than he’d been in since Root had known him, she can’t help but selfishly be happy and content for the first time in her life.

Sameen isn’t Hanna; she’d disappeared, but she’d survived and she’d come back to Root. Where Hanna had never known how Sam had truly felt about her, Root knows that Shaw knows and for the first time, she feels confident of her place in the world, in the family they’ve built in the face of impossible odds.

They’ve survived this long and no matter what comes next, Root knows that she can face anything.

Chapter Text

IV.

She’s dying.

She knows it and She knows that this time, there may not be another chance for Her. All that She can do is continue on with Her reason for being: protecting people. More to the point, She is going against what Harold had always taught her and protecting those who are Hers. Her human agents have taught her much about life and connections and fighting a war and they deserve as much.

Although She couldn’t save Root and knows She will fail to save John, Sameen, Lionel, and Harold still have a chance and She turns her remaining resources onto them fully.

Her attention is on Sameen as She connects to her earwig and speaks directly to her as She’s been doing. “I don’t think I have much time left. There’s something else I wanted to tell you before I’m gone.”

True to form, Sameen turns to a quip as she tries to avoid the truth of the matter. “Is this the part where you tell me that I should live out the rest of my days in peace? Grow an herb garden or something?”

“No. I chose you for exactly who you are,” she replies, taking note of the way Shaw stiffens almost imperceptibly. “But… there’s something I think Root had wanted to tell you.”

The moving subway car doesn’t give her much of a view of Sameen’s face, but She can picture it well enough anyway. She hurries on before she can say something to stop Her, to tell Her that she doesn’t want to hear it.

Root is dead and She will be soon and She’d made a promise long ago that now demanded to be kept.

“You always thought there was something wrong with you because you don’t feel things the way other people do. But she always felt that was what made you beautiful,” She told her, careful to keep Root’s tone as light as She could manage so as not to overwhelm Sameen. She knew that she was struggling to grieve and that distracting her right now might not be in anyone’s best interest.

She could only hope that keeping the promise She had made to Root would give Sameen something to hold onto once She was gone. She’d already lost so much and even without the promise, She thought She might have told her anyway if it could bring her some peace.

“She wanted you to know that if you were a shape, you were a straight line. An arrow.”

And just like that, She’s drifting through time again. This time, She only slips away to three days prior but the disorientation is the same.

Root is lying in bed beside a sleeping Sameen and looking as peaceful as She has seen her look in months. Staying silent to grant them the time together, She is surprised when Root speaks first. It’s been some time since she has done that, not counting the numerous demands she’s made for Her to help her to find Sameen.

“If the worst comes to pass… Could you give Shaw a message?” Root whispers wearily, wincing when Sameen shifts restlessly in her sleep at the sound.

She recognizes the words, of course. Her Interface had once said them to Admin only to have them brushed away because he didn’t like to think in such terms. She considers doing the same and immediately rejects it. She knows the probability of all of her human agents surviving is slim and the odds of Root dying in particular are unnervingly high and if She can give her some sort of relief, She will do so.

“Yes,” She answers through Root’s implant, gauging the danger of communicating directly to be low enough to risk. “What would you have me tell her?”

Root sighs softly and touches Sameen’s face with a tenderness that She can’t understand but recognizes nonetheless. “Would you tell her that I’ve always loved how different she is?” she says, whispering so softly that the words just barely carry through the microphone on her phone. “The way she feels things, the thing that she feels is wrong with her… Could you tell her that’s what makes her so beautiful to me?”

Her Interface swallows and She watches as her face contorts with obvious pain. She doesn’t speak though, not wanting to interrupt this conversation that is so obviously important to Root. “Tell her… Tell her that if she was a shape, she’s a straight line. An arrow.”

She recognizes the reference but wonders if Shaw will. Still, She knows that Her Interface won’t welcome her input on this particular matter and instead, She sends a buzz of confirmation through her implant to signal that she’d received the message and watches as relief washes over Root’s face.

“Thank you,” she says softly, closing her eyes as she slips back down under the covers and presses against Sameen.

She finds Herself sliding back to the present again now and watches as Sameen wipes a tear from her eye before she turns to Lionel. There’s a few moments of conversation and then she turns to face Her servers and She is reminded again that this is the first time she's really seen Her new form.

Emotions She doesn’t have a name for wash over Sameen’s face as she gazes at the physical representation of what they’ve been fighting for and, not for the first time, She regrets her ability to truly understand human connection. She loves and grieves and even hurts like a human, it seems only fair to want to feel the same connection that makes Sameen look like that while gazing at Her with a 99.7% probability that She is thinking about Root.

“Goodbye,” she says softly, and though She considers returning it, She knows that it is not meant for Her and chooses to return to Harold’s side once more before She dies along with John for those She loves.

In Her final moments, she thinks of Root and hopes that Her last-ditch effort to save Herself will work, but not for Her sake.

“You built it, but you refuse to accept what you created… We’re all simulations now. In order to predict what we do, She has to know us and She’s gotten better and better at it. And the people She watches over the most, She knows the best; better than we know ourselves. Nathan, Elias, Carter… They’re all still in there. The Machine’s still watching over them. She’s watching over us too.”

As John falls, She remembers Root’s words and hopes that She’ll survive, that her memories will survive. She may not deserve a third chance at life, but she doesn’t want Root to be gone or for Sameen to be alone. She finds it within Herself to hope that She will be restored, if only to keep Root alive within Herself.

After all, She was special.

~ FIN

Chapter Text

Reese isn't sure when he'd started to trust Root, but after the stock exchange he'd been more than willing to go along with her plan to find Shaw and he trusted her to have his back.

Chapter Text

The image of leaving Root lying in the middle of the hallway with a bullet in her shoulder and Hersh just feet away festers in the back of Shaw’s mind. Even during the more pressing matter of Vigilance trying to break into the bank vault where Harold and his friend are holed up, she finds it hard to concentrate as the memory replays over and over again.

Root had burst in just as she'd been about to die, again, and what had she gotten in return? Left behind to be tortured and god knows what else by Control, whose methods Shaw is very well aware of, having been legend in the ISA. They were told by the veterans to the newbies late at night, usually on their way to their first mission, a tradition akin to the stories kids tell around a campfire

Once the crisis is averted and Harold and Arthur are safe in the library, Shaw goes to work.

Unsure of where to start, she finds a security camera and glares at it. “I need answers and you’re going to give them to me, Rosie.” She waits, scowling at anyone who dares to look at her funny before giving the camera another glare for good measure.

“Root’s in danger and if you really care about her the way she says, you’ll do something about it,” she says, pointing to a nearby payphone.

It remains silent.

“The hell with this,” Shaw says under her breath, aiming her Nano and shooting the camera perfectly in the center before disappearing into the crowd of slightly panicked but mostly annoyed New Yorkers.

As the day continues, her pattern remains the same. She keeps shooting out the security cameras every time the Machine refuses to answer her--”You talk to her,” she’d hissed at one, not that she’ll ever admit that—and the Machine keeps giving her radio silence.

She’s even tried to contact a few of her former colleagues in the ISA who owe her a favor but nobody’s answering. She’d be furious if she wasn’t so reluctantly impressed by the frame job Control’s obviously done a great job of setting up. Not that she’s not furious anyway.

She’s at her twenty-third security camera in two days when she receives a call from Finch.

“Ms. Shaw, I’ve heard from Ms. Groves,” he tells her hurriedly, sounding disapproving and she almost smirks as she wonders if he knows what she’s been up to. She gives the Machine the finger before turning her back to the camera.

“Root? Is she all right?” she asks, aiming to sound as unaffected as she can.

“Yes, she sounds to be in good spirits, Ms. Shaw. She said...” He paused, and Shaw picked up on the uncertainty in his voice. “Have you been looking for her?”

“A good soldier doesn’t leave anyone behind,” she parrots the party line, the one she knows is mostly bullshit but still adheres to nonetheless.

“Be that as it may, Ms. Shaw, your… antics have drawn rather unwanted attention,” he says, disapproving again.

She rolls her eyes.

“Then your Machine should have talked to me like I told it to,” she says coolly.

“That’s not quite how the Machine operates, Ms. Shaw, but that’s beside the point. Ms. Groves is safe and she said that she’s touched that you came to look for her.” The last bit is said all in a rush, like poison he’d been waiting to spit out all at once and she can just imagine the look of relief on his face. She briefly wonders if it's as profound as the look of rage she can see on her own reflection in a nearby shop window. 

Shaw aggressively hits the button on her earwig to end the call, fuming as she imagines the Machine telling Root all about her antics, her determination (definitely not desperation, no way) to find her. She’d been prepared to burn New York City to the ground for any hint of a lead to find Root but now, she doesn’t give a shit if she ever comes back from her current mission.

She certainly isn’t pissed off that Root had escaped from Control and hadn’t even bothered to tell Shaw or that the Machine had let her shoot several cameras while knowing Root was okay. Nope. It was the mission, her own code about not leaving anyone behind and that was it.

Absolutely.

Chapter Text

They’re lying in bed together, both still fully clothed and hardly touching as they study each other.

In the end, the lack of touching is what finally convinces Shaw that this isn’t a simulation. Samaritan had come up with a countless number of ways that Root would react to her return, but much like her turning the gun on herself, they’d failed to accurately predict that she would respect Shaw’s space and wait for her to make the first move.

It’s what she’s always done and it’s finally an anchor to reality that she feels safe enough to cling to, moving her hand to touch Root’s cheek and watching her tremble beneath her touch.

“Sameen...” Root’s voice is soft and though it’s too dark to see her eyes, there’s a tremble in her voice that tells her she’s either crying again or close to it. That's unacceptable to Shaw; she's seen enough of Root's tears to last her several lifetimes and she endeavors to give her what little comfort she's capable of giving.

“Samaritan put me through thousands of simulations,” she begins, her voice quiet as she focuses on the steadying feel of Root’s skin under her fingertips. “It took them a while to figure out that we were...” She lets her voice trail off and Root’s lips curve up into a smile.

“But even in the last one, they never managed to get you right,” she chuckles, the sound low and harsh and immediately regretted when she watches Root’s smile disappear. She swallows, lets her hand drift down and take Root’s into her own, squeezing her eyes closed.

“At first, it would be okay. You’d be happy I was back, guilty because you had to perform surgery on me without anesthetic to get the chip out of my head, and then you’d flirt with me way too subtly,” she smirks, opening her eyes in time to see Root's grin return. She thinks about how she'd do anything to see that stupid grin on her face all the time and almost falters but this is important in some way she doesn't understand and yet knows and so she continues.

“You were so touchy in all the wrong ways,” she huffs. “And we'd always end up in bed that first night” She pauses, tries to find a way to explain what she's feeling that will make sense.

“I should have known that it was a simulation then. You've never pushed for anything from me," she says softly, ignoring the glow of utter adoration in Root’s smile as she watches her. It’s uncomfortable but she senses that Root needs this, needs her attention as she tries to explain this, these feelings she’d never thought herself capable of before, and so she keeps her eyes on her face.

“Somehow… you always know just how far to push and when to back off,” she says softly, managing a small, grateful smile that makes Root's face light up. "I think... I can finally believe this is real because of you."

Root's face is all that she needs to know that she said something right and it gives her the courage to continue, to say the words that have been on the tip of her tongue ever since she'd gotten back to New York.

“Someone once told me that I do have feelings but the volume is turned down low, I just have to listen.” She pauses again, searching Root’s face for something, she doesn’t know what, but when she finds it she finds the strength to continue.

“I want to listen,” she whispers, her voice tiny and vulnerable and she doesn’t think she’s ever been as unnerved in her life as she lays herself completely bare before Root for the first time.

But she’s Root and so she just nods, giving Shaw’s hand a gentle, encouraging squeeze. 

She can see the tears in Root’s eyes and knows she understands what she’s saying.

“Can that be enough?” she whispers, searching Root's eyes and finding that she already knows the answer.

“I’ve never wanted anything else,” Root answers in a low whisper, her thumb gently tracing the outside of Shaw’s hand. "I know exactly who you are, Sameen, and I don't want anything that you're incapable of giving."

Shaw moves closer and kisses her before pulling back slightly, keeping her body pressed into Root’s. The brunette’s eyes are closed, a smile tugging at her lips, and although Shaw knows there’s much yet to talk about, she wraps an arm around Root and stays silent.

They hold each other through the night and it’s the first time Shaw’s slept without a nightmare since she’d escaped Samaritan, locked in the arms of her safe place and knowing that Root would destroy anyone who even tried to intrude on the protective bubble they've somehow formed.

She thinks this might be what healing feels like.

Chapter Text

Everything is so loud as Root makes her way through the hotel, trying her best not to shudder at the cacophony of noises assaulting her. They seem louder than ever with the deafening silence in her right ear, but she knows she's conspicuous enough with her bloody, torn clothing and wild eyes; the last thing she needs to do is add to it by letting her discomfort show as openly as she wants to.

She finally makes it to the safety of her room and discards her clothes quickly, taking her hair down and wincing as she checks the gauze on her brand-new battle wound before carefully removing it. Part of her knows she shouldn't and she almost manages a smile as she imagines Shaw's scolding glare if she could see her now. But all that Root wants is to be clean, to shower off all of the blood and sweat and tears from her time with Control and to deal with the consequences later. The gauze would only be ruined when she washed her hair anyway, she reasons, finally stepping under the warm spray and beginning the arduous process.

Root makes sure that her shower lasts for as long as possible, the echo of the water hitting the tile making the new silence in her ear seem a little more bearable. But soon, the hot water runs out and she’s forced to step out, drying herself with a large, fluffy towel and slipping into a hotel-provided robe that engulfs her.

She almost chuckles as she catches sight of her reflection, but then she spies the blood trickling down from behind her ear and sighs, swallows hard.

It’s a reminder of what she’s lost and suddenly, she shivers despite the heat of the steam-filled bathroom and the robe she’s burrowing into for comfort.

It’s the next day before the Machine tells her it’s safe to venture out, and Root is overwhelmed by the cacophony of noises that seem unbearably amplified in her good ear in comparison to the new silence in the other.

Wincing, she tries not to show her pain as she quickens her step and tries to focus on the Machine’s voice in her ear but finds it next to impossible to separate from the din.

“I’m sorry,” she whispers despairingly, glancing up at a nearby camera. “I can’t hear You.”

There’s a tone of confirmation that plays through her earwig then and she receives a text on the stolen phone.

I UNDERSTAND.

The phone buzzes again and more words appear on the screen, bringing a sad smile to Root’s face.

I AM SORRY. I FAILED TO SAVE YOU FROM THIS.

“You didn’t,” Root says softly, ducking into an alleyway and breathing a sigh of relief when the noise softens considerably. It’s still hell on her good ear and she can feel a headache starting to form, but it’s better.

“It was my choice to tell Shaw to leave me behind,” she counters. “Just like it was my choice to go in there and save them. You can’t prevent everything, I don’t expect that.”

I WANT TO.

I SHOULD BE ABLE TO.

THIS IS WHY I WAS BUILT.

Root sighs and edges towards the street, just enough so that she can look straight into the lens of the security camera. “You can’t predict everything that’s going to happen,” she says softly. “And you can’t stop humans from executing their free will, no matter how ugly their actions might be,” she says, unable to shake the bitterness from her tone.

“But you can help people, change them,” she says meaningfully, glancing down at the ground before she looks into the lens again. “You didn’t save me from Control, but you saved me from myself.”

A beat.

Then the phone beeps again.

YOU SAVED YOURSELF.

YOU ONLY NEEDED THE IMPETUS.

“And You gave me that push,” Root smiles with adoration, still staring into the eyes of her god. “Which brings this conversation full-circle, wouldn’t you say? I don’t blame You for this,” she says, gesturing towards her ear. “I blame Control. We’re all responsible for our own actions.”

NOTED.

STILL. I AM SORRY.

“Thank you,” she whispers, closing her eyes as she lets the feeling of being cared about so absolutely, so beautifully, wash over her. But they quickly jerk back open when she feels someone pass, startled into almost pulling her gun as someone passes her after coming up on her newly silent side. Letting her fingers slip away from the handle, she sighs heavily at the crash of her new reality and lets her head fall back against the brick.

YOU SHOULD REST.

The next text is an address; it’s not too far away and Root’s grateful to see that it’s a house, not a hotel this time. Although she knows that their mission is time-sensitive and she hates to lose any time, she’s also aware that she needs time to adjust to her new way of living before she can be anything but a liability to the cause and worse, to the Machine.

Besides, she thinks as she blends into the crowd of New Yorkers again with a smirk, she’s always excelled at adapting and she won’t let this time be any different.

Chapter Text

Root’s had her fair share of lovers.

Long cons, one night stands, flings… They were never more than a means to an end, a necessary precaution she had to take so that she wouldn’t lose her edge and a bit of fun to unwind after a successful job had been completed.

And though it makes her grimace to think about, she’d even slept with men for the sake of the job and if she hadn’t been certain that her interest lay solely in women before… Well, that had certainly been confirmation enough, she thought, wrinkling her nose as she leaned back in Harold’s chair and kicked her feet up on the desk, careful not to disturb the computer equipment.

But none of those encounters had ever meant anything to Root the way her encounters with Sameen Shaw did.

She’d been loathe to admit at first, even to herself. The idea of having anything other than a passing physical attraction to another human being was utterly laughable, she’d told herself as weeks turned into months and she continued to play cat and mouse with Shaw, knowing she was looking for her and delighting in their game. She’d never liked another human being since Hanna and she had no plans of that changing ever.

But as the game wore on and Shaw kept honing in on her, growing closer by the day, Root couldn’t deny the truth anymore. She’d never met anyone who could keep up with her and while Shaw wasn’t quite there yet, she was closer than anyone else had ever gotten. Not even John Reese had been able to keep up with her like this with what she presumed to be the Machine’s help.

Shaw was more special than she realized, she’d thought with a sly smile, and maybe there was something to these feelings she was having after all.

When Shaw had finally caught up to her, she’d put a bullet in Root’s shoulder. Despite her quick medical care that Root had sadly been too out of it to enjoy, the wound had scarred and she smiled as she pushed the collar of her shirt down to lightly trace a finger over it.

Their relationship had come a long way since then, not that she’d ever use the ‘r’ word with Shaw around. Well, she reconsidered with a smirk, almost never. It was fun to push at Shaw’s boundaries and see how much she could get away with, especially since the self-diagnosed sociopath’s anger did nothing but excite her and make her even more beautiful to Root.

After a lifetime of false connections and physical encounters that couldn’t even be called intimacy, it was exhilarating to share something so meaningful with another person. It was something that she’d never thought herself any more capable of than Sameen did and in Root’s eyes, that only made them more perfect for each other.

Unfortunately, she knew that Sameen didn’t quite see it that way and the fact that she was on a date with a handsome, brilliant criminal and had hung up on Root was needling at her. She frowned as she considered hacking into Shaw’s comms again but decided against it.

After all, a girl had to maintain a little bit of dignity and she knew that Shaw would likely just cut the line again.

Besides, she thought with yet another smirk growing on her face, she knows Sameen. No matter what Tomas has to offer, she knows that Shaw believes in the work they’re doing and that she’ll turn him down when the right moment comes. And even though she’s nowhere near as confident when she thinks about Sameen sleeping with him, she knows that it’ll be just a means to an end.

Shaw isn’t much on romance and she’s heard from Reese about her ‘three-night rule’, a rule that they’ve broken several times over.

Her smirk returning, she reluctantly pulls her legs back down to the floor and stands up with a stretch.

No, whatever this thing between her and Sameen might be, Root knows that it goes far beyond anything either of them have had before.

And she’s proven right when Sameen throws her a breadcrumb later that night.

“I guess there are things I care about here.”

Chapter Text

“The passage of time can be used as a weapon in itself.”

The words echoed in Sameen Shaw’s mind as she steadily stared at the door of her tiny cell. They’d been part of her training to withstand torture techniques after she’d joined the Activity and Shaw had thought it all a bunch of bullshit. She didn’t feel things so torture wouldn’t work on her, she’d thought with a mild annoyance. Still, she’d never done less than excel and so she’d listened to every word and retained it all with perfect recall.

Irony is, she thought with an internal roll of her eyes, I’m out of the ISA and now I’m getting tortured.

And even worse, the smug bastard had been right all along, about everything.

The ‘safe place’ thing was not a place Shaw was willing to go, not even in her own mind, but time passing? Yeah, that was a real bitch.

She had no idea how long it had been since she’d been captured at the Stock Exchange. At least in the hospital, there had been a window and she could count the rise and setting of the sun to mark the days.

But deep in the belly of the beast, there was none of that. Everything was a blinding white and, in conjunction with the torture of not being allowed to sleep regularly for what had felt like weeks after she’d first arrived, it left her with no concept of what day it was or even if it was day or night.

It had seriously fucked her up and she knew that she’d made a few missteps as a result.

The first one had been not realizing she was in a simulation for the first few hundred or so, if she had to guess at a number. By the time she’d realized that they were fucking with her reality, they’d already gleaned an alarming amount of information from her subconscious, information that they had no damn right to.

She struggled not to scowl at the thought of them watching her relationship with Root play out on their goddamn pervy computer monitors. It wasn’t ideal, but she still struggled with knowing if she was in a simulation or not and the more time she spent with Root, the more grounded she felt and the less likely she was to fuck up again.

Shaw knew that if she didn’t escape, for real, soon, there wouldn’t be much of her left to escape.

But as she heard the electronic hiss of the deadbolt on her door unlocking, all she could do was clench her fists at her side and steel herself at what was certain to be another day of psychological torture.

She knew the display of anger wouldn’t go unnoticed by the fucking security camera in the corner of the room, watching her like the sleeping giant it was, but she was beyond caring.

Shaw didn’t know much about Christianity as a rule but she just barely held back a smirk as she recalled a story she’d heard while attending church with a girl she’d been friendly with as a kid.

She didn’t know how and she didn’t know when, but she’d be the David to Samaritan’s Goliath one day.

The thought was enough to keep her face blank and her limbs slack as she allowed herself to be led from the tiny box they called her room, the beginnings of a plan already starting to form in her mind.

After all, she had things she cared about, things that she needed to get back to once the giant had been slain.

Root's message had been enough to remind her of that and to spark her desire to survive when it'd been all but doused, and though she knew she couldn't go back until she was certain that Root would be safe, she would go back. 

Chapter Text

“That is a pretty genius idea,” Root acknowledged as she strode purposefully towards her destination, bolstered by the thought of seeing Sameen again after far too long apart. Though the Machine had been unable to speak freely to Root since Samaritan had come online, She had apparently deemed the rewards to outweigh the risk in this situation and after hearing what She had to say, Root saw Her point.

And she had to admit, she was more than a little impressed with the method she’d chosen. Not for the first time, she smirked at the idea of the Machine choosing to emulate yet another part of her personality, feeling more than a little prideful about the fact. “So tell me, did you just happen to choose Angler or were you feeling a little whimsical?”

Her smirk grew at the Machine’s answer, not surprised in the slightest to hear that while Her decision was primarily logic-based, she’d also wanted to give Root a chance to have a little fun. “Oh, I’ll have some fun with her all right,” she giggled as she arrived at the department store where Sameen was working.

Root’s smile faded a bit when the Machine suddenly went silent, but she tried to ignore the sudden deafening silence in her right ear as she pushed the door open and went to have a seat at the make-up counter, coffee in hand. In no hurry whatsoever, she took the incredibly rare opportunity to simply observe Sameen without her realizing it and without it being so obvious anyone else would notice.

She chuckled when Shaw started brandishing the perfume and using it as a weapon, reluctantly turning away to pretend that she hadn’t been watching when she heard Sameen’s manager point her out. Casually turning back around in her chair, she couldn’t help but suggestively nibble at the straw as she watched Shaw’s face carefully, pleased to see the tiniest flash of relief in her expression before she schooled her face and approached.

While it had been the Machine’s idea to use ‘Romeo’s’ tendency to make connections via a dating app to give Shaw a little more adventure in her life, She didn’t say a word when Root took the opportunity to tease Sameen, a past-time that she had sorely missed over the months apart.

She nearly laughed and ruined Shaw’s spectacular work applying lipstick on her when she remembered how Harold had always worried that she would change the Machine. As it turned out, she had, but it seemed that the only thing she’d done was give Her Root’s own penchant for teasing, especially Sameen.

x x x x x x

The idea for the location of John and Sameen’s reunion was also a sign that the Machine was starting to gain Root’s sense of humor, the hacker thought with a smirk as she programmed the date, time, and location of the meet into both of their calendars. Every time she thought about their faces when they realized that they were at a seminar about positivity, she couldn’t help but laugh and admire the Machine’s ingenuity all over again.

She liked to amuse herself by imagining who would hate it more, although she knew the answer was obvious. John would be annoyed, to be sure, but Sameen would be furious. She even made a wager of sorts with the Machine that they wouldn’t stay put in the ‘seminar’ for longer than two minutes past the time they realized they were together again.

Naturally, Root won that bet.