A/N: Hey, guys! I'm glad you enjoyed the last chapter! I'll probably be posting with a few more days in between now. Sorry, I've got things going on. Don't we all. ;) Will getting taken too is a twist, huh? Lol. Now we see how that happened. Guesses on what animal I chose for Fusco were pretty good. The badger one was pretty close, but I actually chose a bear. He just reminds me a little bit of a bear. He's not violent or suspicious unless he needs to be and the rest of the time, he's pretty tame. Now onto chapter 8! Enjoy! –Freddie

Disclaimer: The characters belong to the awesome makers of Person of Interest, except for Walter Shawn. I created him. Story is mine though. Of course these are just my theories based on their stories.

Chapter 8: The Bear

"Will…?" Finch questioned of the figure on the floor and the man moved to acknowledge his presence. What was he doing there? He and Reese were supposed to be the only ones in danger and they had, in a manner of speaking, signed up for it themselves. How did Will get involved in all of this?

"Who's there?" Will demanded snappishly, with suspicion. "How do you know my name?"

"Will, it's me. Harold. I'm over here." Finch replied quietly, desperately wanting to be rid of his cuffs and get his nephew out of there. The young man got to his knees and headed for the voice until he found him in the back corner.

"Uncle Harold—how did you end up here? What the heck is going on here?" Will asked bewilderedly, raising his plastic-bound hands in the air for emphasis. "Why are you here? Why did my father's finance lawyer just take off with me in the back of a stolen car?"

"I…" Finch started, wanting nothing more than to tell him everything, but stopped realizing the foolishness of doing such a thing. The less Will knew, the safer he was. Of course, now that Will was in the same situation as him, he didn't know how long it was going to stay that way. "I can't tell you why I'm here…or why you're here either."

"Why not?" Will shot back in confusion. Finch hung his head, thankful it was too dark for the only person whom he considered family anymore to see his face, the shame, the remorse, the sadness.

"Because…I'm just as confused as you are." He said quickly, hoping his lie was convincing enough for the sharp young man. "I don't know what's happening either."

"Well, that's just great." Will groaned, sitting back against the wall beside Finch. Based on this reaction, Finch assumed he'd bought the lie and gave an inward sigh of relief. "Don't suppose you'd know who those guys who shot at Shawn were then, huh?"

"What guys?" Finch looked up in surprise, at nothing of course.

"There were three people who tried to save me, two men and a woman. One guy looked like he could be a secret agent or something, the other was a bit shorter, and rounder, with curly hair, and the woman had dark black hair." It couldn't have been…they were working together—all three of them.

"Will, what happened before you got here?"

8:45 PM

Reese peered through his binocular lenses up through the window of young Will Ingram's mid-floor loft. He kept pacing about, looking increasingly agitated about something, presumably the open file folder in his hand. Had he not known that Will had already been in possession of sensitive files, Reese would have found that in itself more than just a little suspicious.

"So?" Fusco asked, breaking Reese from his silent observation. He only slightly scowled. "What do you think? Is he alone or not? He's been pacing back and forth for the past five minutes." John exhaled slowly, trying to keep his patience in check. Fusco's constant interrogation had been more than just a little tiresome.

"Can't say." He said in that low, mysterious voice as he continued to watch their moving target. Well, he couldn't exactly call him a target, more of just a…person of interest at the moment. Then he saw their boy look up at something across the room and he had a hunch it wasn't a clock that had caught his attention. Reese looked on intently as Will began to speak to someone. It was then that he caught a glimpse of Shawn's sharp-featured face in the window, as if he'd mistakenly crossed into its field of visibility, before pulling away.

"Shawn's with him." Reese declared to his cohorts in training as they sat in a car.

"Shoot." Carter hissed. "How do we talk to him now?"

"The only reason we would have had to talk to him at all is to find Shawn." Reese replied and motioned to the window as he spoke. "Found him."

"Now we just sit here and wait to tail this guy?" Fusco asked again and Reese shrugged and gave the shorter man a smirk, one of undecipherable mystery and mischief. Fusco didn't like it when he got that look.

"Who said anything about waiting?"

Not but a few minutes later, Fusco was standing outside the main entrance to Will Ingram's building, wearing a blue baseball cap and dark windbreaker, looking the epitome of an "average Joe". He pressed the call button on the pad beside the door and waited anxiously for a response. I can't believe this was his plan.

"Hello?" A young voice responded, Reese watching from the sidewalk.

"Oh, thank God, someone's at home." Fusco started excitedly, worriedly, playing his part well.

"Yeah, I'm at home…" Will restated with a tense laugh. "Is there something I can help you with?"

"Well, yeah, I was out for a walk and, well, there's a woman here on the ground—she's unconscious—and I can't find my phone! Please, I need help! Can you call the police or something?" Fusco kept glancing at his partner playing dead, laying sprawled out face down on the dirty New York sidewalk.

"Just sit tight! I'm a doctor! I'll be right down!" Will assured and ended the conversation. Fusco expelled the breath he'd been holding and waited for Ingram to exit. He couldn't believe this actually worked.

Will Ingram was down almost immediately with a large first aid bag and Fusco was there to meet him like any concerned citizen would act, and while his back was turned, he failed to see Reese slip in behind him before the door could close. Fusco shook his head in disbelief and returned to their new witness as he took to tending to Carter. Of course, the instant he laid hands on her, she ceased to feign collapse, sitting up immediately.

"What the—?" Will started in utter shock and Carter motioned for him to remain quiet.

"Mr. Ingram, we have reason to believe the man you were with upstairs is a very dangerous man." She explained as she showed him her badge, stern brown eyes conveying her seriousness.

"What? No, he's my dad's lawyer, just going over a few things with me—"

"That's what he wants you to think." Fusco took over and the dirty-blonde-haired man looked up to his apartment worriedly. "You need to come with us."

He didn't reply at first, still staring up, but finally nodded after a moment and allowed himself to be led to their awaiting vehicle.

Reese rounded the corner of the third flight of stairs, gun in hand and pointed at the floor. He was on edge to say the least, not that he expected much of a fight from Shawn, but more at the fact that he would have to try hard to restrain himself from shooting the man he sought. As he approached the door, Reese stepped warily, silently until finally opening the door with unnatural force and speed.

He stormed the room, gun aimed and ready, but when he had gotten a full look around, he found no one inside. A ding from the elevator outside caught his attention and Reese cursed before running out the way he'd come. As he peered over the edge of the railing, he saw that Shawn was already on the ground floor and headed out the door. The ex-CIA man thought about letting off a round at him, but he was already on the street and Reese was behind. Shawn was quite the slippery little snake, he had to give him that.

He had just made it out the door when he heard the sound of breaking glass and shouts.

Fusco walked beside the smartly dressed young doctor, trying to be as vigilant as possible, but even he didn't understand how the thirty-something year old lawyer had been able to throw his arm around Will Ingram's neck from behind and force a gun to his head.

"Walter—?" Will shouted in surprise, but was cut short as his air supply was suddenly constricted. Fear filled his eyes as the gun was jammed into the back of his head, Shawn using him as a shield to protect him from the officers who had their guns pointed at him.

"Shut up, Ingram." Shawn hissed into his ear and he fell silent, staying completely still as Shawn began to negotiate.

"Back off! It's two on one here, Mr. Shawn!" Fusco said over his gun, but both he and Carter took cover behind another car as Shawn fired a warning shot that broke one of the windows in their vehicle.

"It's two on three actually. A hostage counts for double." He shot back devilishly as he turned and eased his way backward towards the black four door. Shawn glanced at it with a smirk, a panicked Will Ingram between him and the detectives. "Keys still in the ignition?" He chastised. "How careless of you."

"So, I'll shoot you before you get to them." Fusco warned and Shawn's upper lip only twitched in amusement at the presumed empty threat.

"No, you won't. I'll kill him the second I see your finger twitch on that trigger." He replied with a renewed shove of the gun against Will's head. With that, he pulled a pair of plastic zip-tie cuffs from his jacket and placed them roughly in his hostage's hand. "Put those on." He ordered and Will complied shakily, pulling them with his teeth. "He's coming with me, detectives, and I think you'd rather not shoot an innocent bystander." He nodded to Will to open the backdoor and he again complied, moving carefully so that he was still a human shield, but once Will had ducked into the car, Fusco let off a round that hit Shawn square in the shoulder.

He cried out in anger and pain, returning fire that allowed him to get in the car and turn on the ignition. Fusco and Carter each shot at him a few times before he had the car started, but after that, they wouldn't risk shooting and hitting the man in the backseat, not from their poor angle.

Shawn was off at the sounds of skidding rubber and a revved engine, Reese running towards the car just in time to aim at the tires, but get nothing but rim. The detectives let their frustration known, holstering their guns unhappily.

"I told him I'd shoot him before he got to the keys." Fusco growled, breaking the silence.

"Shoot," Carter sighed, taking to her feet once again as Fusco also rose from his kneeling position. "We lost him."

Reese approached from behind, shaking his head and holding up Finch's phone. "No, we didn't."

"You didn't…" Carter grinned. "You wanted him to take that car."

"Low jack?" Fusco questioned and Reese nodded, accessing the GPS on the smartphone in his hand. "Clever."

"Now we know exactly where they're going."

9:45 PM

Finch listened intently as Will recounted to him the events of just an hour ago. He couldn't help a smile at his partner's action, however much he disapproved of Carter and Fusco's involvement with this case, his rescue. He couldn't deny his unhappiness, but when push comes to shove as it had, he wouldn't be one to argue.

"You're sure you don't know who they are?" He pestered and Finch shook his head in the dark.

"I really don't know who these people are or what alerted them to danger, Will." Finch replied. "But I am glad someone was looking out for you."

"Uncle Harold, do you think this has something to do with what my dad was working on?" Will wondered of him sincerely and Finch again was grateful for the darkness in which he hid.

"Who knows?" He shrugged and they fell into silence for a few long minutes until Will proceeded to break it.

"What are you hiding from me?" Finch stiffened up as Will spoke accusingly. "I know he told you something. He had to. I know whatever my dad made is what got us into this and I bet it's because you know what it is that they took us both." He could hear the anger in his nephew's voice and the desire to tell him everything rose up once again, but the memory of what happened to the last person who knew about the machine and knowing the trouble it continued to cause him and Reese, Finch could do nothing more than continue to lie.

However, he didn't get the chance to reply as the door was swung open, the light switched on, and one of Snow's men threw a key to Ingram, a gun trained on him as he stared back up at him.

"Unlock his cuffs from around the pole and relock them. Then toss the key back to me." The stiff ordered. "Try anything and I shoot you."

Finch and Will shared a look before he kneeled beside Finch and did as told, finishing by throwing the key back to the agent.

"Now, get up. We're moving out."