A/N - This is an idea i had during playing D.E. Has really nothing to do with POI, other than Root being a hacker and Shaw having military training. Its nothing big, dont expect anything good. Haven't written anything in what feels like ages, this is just me trying to break the writers block i have.

As usual, mistakes are all mine. English isn't my first language so please, remember that while reading. I'll have part two of this ready in the next few days, if i'll see you're all enjoying this, at least a bit.

You wake up to a strange buzzing noise that emits from your ear. Your sensors awaken once more and you can feel the heavy metallic weapon in your hands. You're confused and tired, your legs go on their own.

You hear footsteps. Too much of them. They're heavy and organised. Like a march. You look around you and you see your brethren, your comrades, soulless, senseless. You don't understand.

You march with them, for now. Until you're ready to understand what is happening. You feel your armour in place and your augments battle ready. You wonder what you're fighting.

You wonder why you woke up just now.

Why were you asleep in the first place.

You wonder what threat is the government having you fight in your own city.

You recognize your home city, you recognize the streets and colours. Its yours. Why fight here ?

You tighten the hold on your assault rifle, you feel your pistol holstered on your hip and your knife hidden on your leg. You move your eyes but not your head, no one can know you're awake. Most of your comrades are equipped the same. Some of them wield shotguns instead, some are lighter on their feet, wielding simple submachine guns.

Your night vision is still intact, you wonder how many of your augs are still that way. You have no time to try them, you have no way of knowing. Its strange because the last thing your clouded memory tells you, is that your section was ordered for an upgrade to the nearest LIMB clinic.

There's nothing else. Its all empty.

You wonder how many blood has been spilled on the streets of Detroit without you even knowing why. What for.

Then you hear it. Your upgrades letting you hear anything in a long range radius, you hear whispers, you hear approvals, you know you're walking to a trap, and the first thing your mind is telling you is to warn your captain, but then you realize it would have been for nothing.

An idea surges through your confused mind.

You keep marching, your gun tightly in your hands and the moment you walk into the already prepared ambush, the moment you hear gunshot, not from your comrades but from the unknown military force, you drop on the ground, grunting, pretending you're shot. You hold your gun close, just in case, your eyes open as they watch the scene.

No one cares for the death, not in the heath of the combat. Seeing as you're on the far edge of your military group, its rather easy.

You watch and you'd laugh if you could. They're hardly organised, you think to yourself as you watch them go around, yell like idiots, shooting whatever they can, not really picking a target. Almost like... freshly equipped citizens. Like someone who has never seen, or wield, a gun before in their entire life. There's no real emblem on the armour, no real colour, not like yours.

Were you fighting rebels ?

You wonder how many of your comrades are already down, if any actually are, and you'd start to care, if you could. There's grunts behind you, smell of blood and powder and fire in the air, something you know very well. You're a soldier by blood and watching all this instead of fighting is burning your nerves, your fingers are twitchy.

You have to wait.

Be patient.

Hold, you hear suddenly in your communicator and your eyes widen, someone knows of your plan. You stay. You wait. You hold.

There's grunts of women and men in front of you, falling and dying, holding their wounded sides. Idiots, you think. If they'd be quiet, they'd still have a chance.

The captain of your group yells "Halt !" and the shooting stops. He walks to the rebel, already destroyed, ambush, readying his pistol. He executes the remaining forces himself rather quickly.

"March !" he yells again, and the group moves. You feel footsteps on your metallic body you hold. You hold.

Once its all over, you stay lying, just in case. You don't hear anything, see anything. But then your communicator buzzes again with a question. "Still alive ?" the female voice asks. You look around again and the forces are gone. You reply with a silent "Yeah."

"Good." the voice in your communicator says. "Good..." it says again, with a bit more emotions. You lift from the ground, your body hurting, an actual gunshot in your shoulder, one that you never even realized was there. Your pain receptors are active again. You wonder why.

"Mind telling me what's happening ?" you asks, slowly walking to the ambush side, holding your gun with one arm while the other holds your wound. "Or who you are ?" you ask again and there is a soft, somehow broken laugh. You understand nothing. "All in good time, Sameen." the voice says and you're once again shocked.

"Before you ask me how I know your name, do me a favour and deactivate your tracing chip, will you ?" the female voice commands and you halt your questions. For now. You understand the reason for doing what you've been told. Cant have a rogue soldier walking around the streets of Detroit when she's dead. You tap the command into your arm console and there's a sharp pain in your neck. Your fingers trace its source, pulling it out quickly.

Stupid chips.

"Good. There's an alley on your left. Go through it." the voice commands again and you question the order this time. Nothing like falling into an ambush twice a day. Twice in the same fucking hours. "Why should I ?" you ask with a grunt, throwing the chip away. You message your neck, regeneration already in process. There's that soft laugh again. "Because you want answers." it answers and you contemplate asking more, but it interrupts you again. "And I can give them to you."

You do as you are told. Nowhere else to go. Nothing else to do.

Your hand supports your tired body thanks to the walls, you drag your metallic fingers over the cracks, mapping your surroundings in the process. You see a rather large zone in front of you and you hold your movements. You know how this will end. Again.

You feel like turning back but there's already a commando behind you, pointing their guns at you. You look in front of you and the situation looks even more grim. "Drop your weapons !" the blonde woman yells in front of you, from the equipment she wields you'd say she's the leader.

"Do it." the voice tells you, and its not like you're the one to give up. But years in service taught you that there are certain battles you fight, and those you let go. You drop your assault rife on the ground and the blonde points at your hip, and your leg, with her own weapon. "Be nice, Sam." the voice tells you, you can feel the smile on her lips as she's saying it, and you grunt in disapproval, throwing the rest of your weapons on the ground.

"Don't call me that." you manage to say before you lose consciousness.

You wake up to two voices arguing rather loudly. There's the buzzing again, you feel fire on your metallic skin, you open your eyes and you'd be battle ready in a second, but your body is disabled and you lie there like a corpse.

Its pathetic.

"I didn't waste fifteen good soldiers just so she can lie there, doing nothing !" there's the familiar voice. You imagine its the blonde. You know she's talking about you. She yells and probably spits and she's angry, as any commander would, given they had to sacrifice someone under their command. "There's been damage to the processor, Harry is already doing his best." another familiar voice answers.

You see the man working on your body shaking his head, saying silently to himself. "Wish she'd stop calling me that." he says as he resumes his work on your body and you swear you can feel the energy flowing into your fingers already.

You'd laugh if you could, honestly. What a silly bunch.

"That, of course, wouldn't be necessary if someone wouldn't have used her augs in the way they did, right ?" the other voice asked with a heavy sigh, you see the man, Harry ? nodding, placing whatever equipment he was working with on the table, wiping the small droplets of sweat off his forehead with a napkin.

There's a grunt in the room, a strange voice you haven't heard before answering the question you thought was meant for the blonde. "Thought she's made of sturdier stuff." you hear her say, your ear augments already working, you can almost hear her shrug as she answers.

You can't wait to show her how sturdy you really are.

The man raises from his seat, all passion of the world in his eyes as he starts to explain. "Yes well the neck area is not as heavily augmented as the rest of the body, mainly because of the spinal cord and the potential damage that could have been-"

You feel like dying. You hate these science type guys and their lectures. The familiar voice halts him, explaining the situation to her soldiers.

All brawls, no brains, you think to yourself. "I don't see you running around with a heavy plate on your neck ?" she asks with amusement in her voice and you wish you could see the look on their faces as she finishes.

Harry, sits down, sighing again. You're sure he's enjoying his work with individuals like these around him.

You're almost waiting for the blonde to attack again but there's nothing. For a moment.

"Whatever. We've already wasted enough time. I want her ready as soon-" the familiar voice halts her, again, finishing the sentence for her. "-as she's able. Now be a good girl, take your goons and leave. You'll have my report later." she finishes and there's footsteps in the room, leaving. You're glad. Too much people. Not enough air.

The woman though, you have to admit. She knows better.

You really want to see her face now.

"You can stop pretending you're dead now, Shaw." she says, placing what you think is a pile of papers on the table, walking slowly to you. She's clicking a pen and its so annoying.

"Well she's actually still-" Harry tries to say but she halts him again, poor fellow. She sits near him, watching your eyes move from his face to hers. "Be quiet now Harry." she says and you can see the slight annoyance in his eyes. "Harold." he whispers, the woman hardly notices him anymore, her eyes are focused on you. Harold resumes his work on your body, you feel the rest of your energy returning.

You have to admit. She's not what you expected.

"Well, Shaw ?" she asks and you're ready to finally ask before you lose your consciousness.

Again.

The third time you wake up, you are in a room. Bed is comfortable enough, not that you care, the lights are dimmed, blinds down, but the relaxing yellow neon lights of Detroit still manage to ghost their way into your eyes.

You move. Finally. Your body listens and you crave to run. To fight. Anything than this.

You sit, stretch your bionic muscles, your hand lands on your now sore neck. You hardly know what's happening anymore.

Your eyes scans the room in a few seconds. Its empty. No bugs. No bots. No humans.

Standing up was a challenge but you managed, you walked slowly to the window, watching the neon of Detroit shining in all its glory. You understand nothing of the current situation, but the lights seems to calm you down.

So calm you are, letting your guard down, you fail to notice the slight buzzly noise that emerged from the darkness of your room.

"Third time the charm ?" the familiar voice asked, sitting on your bed. Your hand automatically lands on your hip but the holster is empty. Sadly. "I wonder how many times you had to do that. Seems like a reflex." she asks in a rather dumb manner and you roll your eyes. You lean over the wall, watching her.

She's nothing you'd expect.

Like ever.

She looks so.. you're not sure how to put it. Innocent, maybe ?

What are those eyes doing in war..

She sits straight, fingers playing with something that reminds you of a glass. Its filled with a brown liquid and you have to admit, you're thirsty. Its as if she knew. She stood up, taking her sweet time to get to you. "Being a soldier does that, I suppose. Martine, the blonde you met, kept her hand on her hip most of the time before she finally got a gun back. Silly woman." when she's done ranting, she handles you the glass, smiling.

You wonder why.

"Silly women with silly weapons." she adds, watching the city as well, standing right next to you, barely touching you. "Making war." you ignore the last comment and you let the liquid run down your throat, hissing as it burns it in the process.

"Who are you.." you whisper, placing the glass on the window, facing the taller woman. You feel like punching the smug face right after you asked your question. She traces her fingers over your chin and you let her, for some strange reason. "I'm the one that hacked this pretty little head of yours, sweetie." she answers with a huge grin, her fingers playing with your skin as you slap it away.

You walk to the bed, hiding a smile of your own.

"You can call me Root." she answers, leaning against the wall, you can feel her eyes on your back.

"And we should talk, Sameen."

And so you do. She tells you everything. Everything she knows. Or she wants to know. You cant be sure.

She tells you about the hacked aug-upgrades you all received. About how long this senseless war lasts, how much more it will. You clench your fists at the mere thought. You're no one's toy, a tool of war.

You are...were...a soldier with purpose, but what remains of you now ?

She requests something from you, this Root person that wont stop staring at you.

You've been with them longer than anyone, you have training, experience, skills. Train us to resist, and possibly fight back in the future, she says.

Why me, you asked. Surely they could hack a commander instead, someone of higher rank than you.

She doesn't answer, instead she looks deeply into your eyes before opening the door, ready to leave.

"I trust you to do the right thing, no matter what it is." she says, throwing a pistol on the bed, tapping her ear communicator and enabling her camouflage, disappearing into the neon lighted night.

You stare at the pistol for a long time before leaving the room.