Hello again! Once again, I apologize for the delay in updating. Also, in light of the fact that Tuesday's episode featured similar elements as my last chapter, I do feel compelled to say that the chapter was written prior to the February 3rd episode. Anyway, thank you all for continuing to read and, as always, I hope you continue to enjoy!

Chapter 9:

It was only a few minutes at most. It felt much longer, though—to both of them. Several sixty second increments stretched into an eternity of suffering. For Vlad, it was a pain unlike anything he'd been dealt before; the assassin had been nothing short of true to her word when she promised to make him suffer. Though he tried to hide it, Shaw's medical knowledge and vast array of firsthand experience told her plenty about the pain she was inflicting. For Shaw, each little grain of sand slipping inside the proverbial hourglass served to intensify the anger, fear, and anxiety in her gut that held an intensity in it that she'd long thought herself incapable of feeling.

Both of them stared each other down on separate sides of the table, sweating for different reasons. John looked on, debating how much longer he should let this continue while a bruised and bloodied Denisov bored into Shaw with his gaze. The defiance was still there, but it had slowly been reduced to the mere flicker of a dying flame. In addition to the knife in his left hand, the Russian now sported a shattered pinky on his left hand, two other missing fingers, and a bloody nose and several bruises from the beatings he took in between Shaw's handiwork with the pliers.

After taking a few moments to collect herself, Shaw questioned him once more. "You ready to talk yet?"

"Please…" Vlad wheezed pitifully, still trying to convey strength even as the pain of his injuries started to cripple his resolve, "They'll kill me."

"Not if I beat them to it." Shaw growled, drawing her gun on him and aiming straight for his head. On the surface, he appear unmoved, laughing at the gesture only to begin coughing until blood coated his lips.

"Go ahead…you Persian bitch."

"Oh, I'll kill you either way, but if you don't tell me what I need to know, it'll be slow and painful…and you've still got a few fingers and all ten toes left."

John spoke her name as if he were about to protest and Shaw turned to silence him with a sharp look that said she would do it whether he supported it or not. In reality, that look was purely for Vlad and Reese recognized the underlying edge to it that told him she didn't intend to drag this out much longer. Shaw had already considered her options and decided that wasting too much time with the man would be counterproductive, no matter what he knew or how much she wanted to cause him pain.

Apparently, her words were the last stones needed to topple his wall of resolve. He sighed in resignation, slumping back into the chair. "Fine, Fine…those people; The people you're up against? They came to me…offered to take care of threats to my reign in return for a small cut of business profits and a place they could use for their operations if necessary."

The picture became more clear to both agents as they listened, with Reese chiming in once Vlad had finished speaking. "And in return, they supplied you with more sophisticated hardware. Is that about right?"

Denisov nodded in response as Shaw took over the questioning, "But that still doesn't tell us where our friend is."

"I'm getting to that…" He was interrupted by a coughing fit and more blood spattered onto the table in front of him. Even if she didn't put a bullet in his brain, she'd caused enough internal bleeding in her rage that he might well die without medical attention. "There is a shipping company at the harbor. It's part of our trafficking operation. That's where you'll find them."

"What's the name of that company?" Reese asked as the man lapsed into another coughing fit.

"Sparrow Shipments."

In a fit of conscience, Shaw briefly debated treating the man's injuries, but knew that nothing could be done about his internal bleeding at this point. Neither Shaw nor Reese had much time to consider what should be done with Vlad, anyway. Moments after he'd given them the information, the sound of glass breaking somewhere in the library sent the pair into a state of full alert.

Reese and Shaw looked at each other curiously as they drew their weapons. Hopefully, it wasn't a serious threat; they only had thirty rounds of ammo between the two of them. The cage, the lack of cell phone, and their turned off ear pieces ruled out a Russian cavalry…as did the fact that they knew they hadn't been spotted by Hotel Moscow during their operation. All of those things also meant that it was highly unlikely they had been tracked here by any technological means, unless there was something they hadn't accounted for.

"Sit tight." John quipped, knowing full well that Vlad couldn't go anywhere at the moment. He followed Shaw out of the cage and they made their way toward the source of the noise. Shaw stopped John at the end of the book lined hallway and motioned for him to listen. Footsteps. It sounded like there were at least three different sets; obviously they were doing a sweep of the room before heading into the pair's direction.

They waited for just the right moment.

When the first man came around the corner, Shaw grabbed him before he could process her presence and kneed him in the abdomen a couple times before incapacitating him with an elbow to the face. Meanwhile, John darted from behind her and took cover behind a table as the remaining two men opened fire in his direction. The two men ducked behind cover near the door of the library. One of them was clipped in the shoulder with a bullet from Shaw as he ducked behind a table.

"Cover me." Reese said after they exchanged a few rounds of fire. It was apparent that the two sides were equally skilled in firefighting and the two agents of the machine didn't have the ammo to waste on a lengthy firefight…especially not if their adversaries had more clips. This would have to be finished by hand.

John carefully came out of cover and zig-zagged his way across the room as Shaw drew fire from the two men. Reese ducked back into cover near his targets and Shaw picked up on his plan. She strategically distracted them from the fact that her partner was inching his way closer to them behind cover. After a few moments, Reese reached out and swiftly grabbed the gun from the man closer to him and kicked the gun away from the other one when he went to aim it at him. Shaw took that as her cue to join the fray, charging across the room to tangle with the second man while Reese brawled with the first.

The room became a mess of kicks, punches, elbows, and chokeholds as the four fought. Surprisingly, Reese and Shaw found that the men were almost on par with them in this area as well. Even so, both were eventually able to gain the upper hand. Reese took his opponent down first with a sharp overhand punch to the face when the man left himself open for just a moment. Shaw wasn't far behind, working her way behind the other man and yanking him down into the floor in a sleeper hold.

"Well," Shaw breathed, "That was fun."

"Let's see if we can find out who these guys are." Reese stooped to search the man closest to him while Shaw did the same, moving on to the third man after a few moments.

"This one's got a Sat phone." Shaw held up the bulky satellite phone to show Reese, coming to stand next to him.

Reese spoke, still crouched next to his victim examining the unconscious man for an identity. "Expert shooting skills, proficiency in Krav Maga, a sat phone, and a radio…" He noted the earpiece protruding from the man's right ear. "What does that sound like to you, Shaw?"

"Government. But who?"

Reese had gone to the man's belt line looking for his radio on the off chance that it might provide any clues since there was no cell phone.

"I think I might have an answer to that."

Shaw peered over Reese's shoulder and saw the word hidden on the radio's battery, "Indigo". That could only mean Control was behind this, but that raised more questions than it answered.

"ISA." Shaw confirmed, "But why send the rookies after us? Sure, these guys can fight, but they made a scene of their entrance and didn't clear the room properly. Why would Control send rookies knowing that they were gonna get their butts kicked?"

It was a quandary that defied the woman's usual modus operandi. Clearly she didn't want them dead, or she would've sent a more skilled team after them. John pondered the situation for a moment. It was possible they had stirred something up in alerting Control to the activities of Anarchy Council and the remains of Decima.

"Maybe it's not about us." Shaw looked curiously at John, silently asking him to elaborate on that statement. "I think this might've been Control's way of sending us a message."

"She's about to get her hands dirty." Shaw realized, sharing a knowing look with Reese. Their situation was about to get even more complicated.

"We need to hurry and get to Root before this turns into a war." John agreed, "ISA won't care about collateral damage if they get to Decima and the AC before we can get out."

Without a word, Shaw swiftly moved back toward the cage. They needed to get to the harbor, but there was something else that needed to be handled first. She felt strangely contrite about the brutal extremes she'd gone to get answers from Denisov. There was no time to patch him up, but it was the least they could do to get him to a hospital. That might also ease Finch's reservations about their actions.

Shaw yanked her knife from Vlad's hand and ignored his pained scream, speaking to him brusquely. "Get up."

John had turned his earpiece back on to speak to Harold. From his place in the subway, Finch's shoulders dropped in relief when he saw John's blip pop back up on the screen.

"Mr. Reese? Oh, thank goodness. Are you two alright?"

"We're fine, Finch, but we had a little company."

"Ah yes, I was concerned about that. The machine is not yet fully functional, but it did pick up multiple blips proceeding toward your location. I would've warned you, but unfortunately, I was cut off."

The last part of Finch's transmission was spoken with just enough accusation in his otherwise neutral tone to make Reese feel a slight twinge of guilt for his actions. As reprehensible as the Russian in the other room might have been, Reese and Shaw had intentionally gone against Harold's wishes in order to get information from him. Reese had stood by and allowed Shaw to become the monster that Harold always vehemently insisted none of them should be. Worse than that, they had both shut him out entirely in the act of cutting off communications. There would be a lecture; that Reese was certain of. But for now…

"It's alright, Finch." Shaw answered, having turned on her own comm to listen to the conversation, "They gave us plenty of warning on their own, but we have another problem. They're feds…ISA."

"Oh, dear."

"We think Control may be planning to take action against our pest problem." Reese added as the group made their way out of the library, "Do you think you can do anything to slow them down a little bit?"

There was nothing he could do about that, but there was an old adage that could be applicable to this situation. "The enemy of my enemy is my friend."

"You know…" Finch pondered for a moment, the light bulb going off over his head. " I think you may be thinking a bit too hastily into this situation, Mr. Reese. Control and the ISA are…dubious bedfellows, to say the least, but you could use this situation to your advantage with a suitable measure of finesse."

At his feet, bear whined and scratched at his leg, looking longingly up at the stray chew toy that had migrated to the corner of the desk. Harold picked up the toy and held it above Bear's head with a kind smile. "Bear…wachten." The response from the dog was a sharp whuff as he sat back on his haunches and looked at Finch with anticipation. Finch threw the toy up in the air and Bear grabbed it, running off happily with his tail wagging.

Harold turned his attention back to the conversation. "Sorry about that. I take it you were able to gather useful intelligence." He didn't know exactly what lengths his agents had gone to in order to get valuable information, but he felt his throat run dry and his stomach turn at the mere thought. He knew what they were both capable of, and what Shaw in particular was willing to do to find Root.

"Yeah." Shaw grunted with the effort of hoisting the partially comatose Russian into the back seat of their car. "You wouldn't be able to dig up an address for Sparrow Shipping, would you, Harold? It's at the harbor."

Finch turned to his keyboard to find the answer. "That's strange." He narrowed his eyes at the result on his screen in a perplexed manner. "There is indeed a listing for a Sparrow Shipping, Incorporated in the city harbor, but…it's only a partial listing. No address, no building number, and this number…" He did a quick search on the phone number, finding it suspicious. His intuition was confirmed by the result. "…is registered to a phone sex hotline operating out of Scranton, Pennsylvania."

Reese sped down the street, heading for the nearest hospital. He kept a keen eye on the road, but his mind was on Harold's information. He looked in the rearview at the unconscious Russian in the back seat. "Well, we can't rule anything out with Decima, but my guess is that the fake number has more to do with the Russians."

"Yes, but New York Harbor is one of the largest in the world. I'm afraid trying to find a building with only a name to go on would be rather like trying to find a needle in a haystack."

Shaw brooded quietly in the backseat. She took in the new pieces of information with a great deal of frustration. The feeling of being so close to her goal, yet so far was horrible. She chanced a glance at Vlad, considering waking him up to get more information, but she knew he wasn't in any shape to be any more useful. She sat that way as Finch's voice went on in her ear for what felt like hours. The numbing disappointment that permeated the air around her was only broken apart by the unexpected vibration of her cell phone in her pocket.

She pulled it out to look at the display, sensing Reese's gaze on her. Caller unknown. Shaw swiped right and put the phone to her ear and was greeted by the voice of Harold's machine. Her eyes lit up as she processed the information. The machine was telling her what they needed to know.

"Hey Finch, you know how you find a needle in a haystack? With a magnet."

Root didn't know how long she'd been left alone. Had it been an hour? Maybe three? Or perhaps only a few minutes. It had to be after dark by her reckoning; it was late afternoon when she'd been abducted. She couldn't tell. There were no windows in this room; only the single chair she sat in and painting tarp that covered every surface of the floor and walls. Her guess: it was for easy disposal of bodies. She assumed it wouldn't be for her, at least, not yet. She was still valuable to her captors.

It had been some time since she'd seen any sign of anyone. She'd been questioned by Lambert and Gabriel, then tortured, and left to sit in silence ever since. They were probably trying to wear her down leaving her alone with just her thoughts. No Machine…no sense of time. It had been quite a while since Root had been completely alone. Even in the nut house there were the visits with the doctor, the mutterings and shouts of other patients, and the occasional chats with Her. After, when she'd found her place within Harold's group of mercenaries, there was still the work, the looming threat of Samaritan, and The Machine to occupy her time. Even during periods when She was silent Root still had distractions in the battle against Samaritan, the numbers, and her growing feelings for a certain woman in black.

This was different.

Root was well and truly alone with her thoughts. The haunting visions of everyone she was ever foolish enough to care about took full advantage of the Machine's absence and the silence. It was these visions that Root kept at bay with all the distractions she didn't have now plus a well crafted mask of flirtatious confidence. A mask she'd let slip for each member of the family she had in Team Machine, but only removed completely for one. Visions of her mother, her father, Hannah, and a few lost numbers flowed through her mind in the stillness. Even some of Shaw from that day in the stock exchange…then that face when Root plunged the needle into her neck days earlier. This all continued until Root was struck with a spark of inspiration.

The good thing about being left alone with her thoughts, as she was, was that it provided her with the chance to be creative; to think of a new distraction. She decided that distraction would be trying to work out an escape plan. The visions faded back into the corners of her mind where they usually resided as she began to concentrate on working free from her bindings. Now, she was practiced to a certain extent in the art of escape, but each of her limbs was bound to a separate part of the chair. This would prove to be particularly complicated. Shaw had taken the time to pass on some of her knowledge to Root on various things from fighting to escape; she just had to focus. What would Shaw do?

For several long minutes, the hacker worked at her bindings, working one limb free at a time. Her right arm was freed first, closely followed by the left. The feet took a bit more work. It wasn't so easy to work her boots free of the zip ties at her ankles. With enough effort, sweat, and even a little pain, she was able to work the ties into just the right spot on the chair to allow her to slip free. Root stood, rubbing at her sore wrists with satisfaction. She knew, unfortunately, that this had been the easy part.

The thought had no sooner passed through her than the door knob in front of her began to shift. With agility worthy of a feline, she dashed to the only hiding spot available—the hinged side of the opening door. Root watched from behind the open door as the boy stepped back into the room. She couldn't see his face, but his hesitant body language denoted his confusion. She carefully closed the door and locked it before slipping from the corner with a smirk on her face.

"Back so soon, kid?"

He gave an almost imperceptible jump at the sound of Root's voice before turning to face her. "I'd prefer Gabriel, if you don't mind."

Root shrugged, "Alright then, Gabriel." She offered the boy a playful roll of her eyes, "What brings you back? Are you here to play again?"

"Not this time." Gabriel smirked, "I'm just here to chat."

"Oh?" Root scoffed, "Well, I'm afraid you're out of luck. I'm not really in a talking mood at the moment." This boy's arrogance was amusing; the way he could act as if he had any control over her when he was locked in the room with her and she was twice his size.

"You don't really have a say in the matter. You are, after all, in a building full of armed operatives."

"Yes," Root grinned with her best pirate smile, a slightly predatory smirk that had instilled fear into many a man. "…and judging by the silence outside that door, none of them are close by at the moment. I don't think you realize the seriousness of your situation, kid."

"Why don't you enlighten me, Ms. Groves."

He was testing her. He had to be. There was no way a kid of his intellect could believe that he actually stood a chance locked in a room with an experienced killer. But, what angle was he playing?

"Well…" Root drawled, "For starters, you're locked in a room with a killer twice your size. Of course, killing a kid would be a new low, even for me, but I'm sure I could manage." She was rewarded with a hint of nervousness in the boy's eyes as she stalked a bit closer and continued to speak, "And we talked about this earlier, Gabriel. You might think you're in charge, you might think you're the brain, but you're not. You're just another ambitious fool, blinded by his own ego."

"Really?" Gabriel scoffed, his confident mask faltering just slightly just as it had before. "There may not be anything left of Samaritan's programming, but we will get that code one way or another. When we do, Decima will make a new machine."

Root laughed openly. The veil was so far over Gabriel's eyes, he was practically stepping on it. Such was the trouble with narcissistic geniuses…or really anyone with a narcissism complex. They were often blind to certain aspects of reality; perhaps even willfully blind.

"I think you're overlooking one tiny detail, Gabriel. Decima and the Anarchy Council both want the code for one reason only, but that reason is not shared. One of them wants to make a new machine, the other wants to shut down the existing machine. This alliance they have will break at some point." Root looked at him curiously, cocking her head to one side. "How will you fit into the picture when that happens?"

There was silence for a few moments. Root watched Gabriel intently. He stood opening and closing his mouth several times, looking as if he wanted to say something but the words were lost in his throat. Root took his silence as an opportunity to continue to chip away at him.

"Any one of those people out there can gather information and torture. But you? You're the only one they know who's capable of hacking into the machine. You're just an expendable pawn now."

As she spoke, Gabriel's façade gave way under the weight of her words until he stood in front of her stripped of his mask. With Gabriel baring his true soul before her for the first time, Root could see the many emotions written all over his face: Worry, fear, anxiety, apprehension. She'd broken him, but down to what she couldn't exactly be sure. What came next was not unexpected, but still came as something of a surprise.

"I know." Gabriel spoke, resignation in his face and on his tongue. Root cast a quizzical gaze over him at the admission, prompting an explanation. "Everything you say is true."

"So, why go along with it, then?" Root looked at him warily. She didn't think that this was a ploy, but she couldn't be too careful.

"The old man had my parents killed." The man in question was, of course, John Greer. It hardly surprised Root that he would sink that low to secure an analogue interface for his machine. The suspicion was confirmed a moment later. "He told me I would do great things, that I was needed. Then he took me into his care until Samaritan came online. After it was destroyed, Decima's remains didn't waste much time coming for me. They told me I would help them or die."

Root searched Gabriel's face and body language for any sign of deceit. There was none to be found. The truth and the pain of his ordeal were written plainly across his face. At first, she'd thought he was just a foolish brat. It turned out he was just another number, even if The Machine hadn't been able to assign it to her…to them. In that moment, it became clear to her what she had to do.

"Well, Gabriel. That won't be a problem for you now." She smiled, "What do you say to a little team up, hmm?" The boy returned her smile, picking up on her suggestion. "What did you have in mind?"

"Well, first you can tell me where I can find a weapon."

There's nine! Thank you all for reading! Please R & R!