"What?" "Don't look at me like that, I'm already regretting it myself, without you adding to my guilt thanks dog." Her babysitter hisses from somewhere behind the sofa Root had retreated to after her newest pausing of whatever mind game torment Samaritan had cooked up for her under the cover of 'giving her more insight'. Like Root would ever consider believing Samarian capable of such things.

"Oh, so you've finally made it to that part huh?" the other one says noticing the jealous way Root was now glaring at the apartment table. The dishes settings mockingly unbroken compared to the smashed remnants teasing her along with the toying sounds of Shaw's moans in her one working ear.

"Well good. At least your past the worst for a blip." She adds as if in attempted comfort as she crosses back towards the whistling teapot she'd left to boil since the last time Root had needed to restart the offered video from the beginning having been unable to force herself beyond the sounds of Shaw's pained screams as her own simulation created counterpart had pushed the unsterilized blade into Shaw's neck after they'd reunited in that corner shopping outlet.

"Hey, Bear remind me to go thank our friend Bobby Jackson." Root had said aloud not bothering to acknowledge the possible dig at her upset over having to watch Shaw so willingly kiss someone who looked like but wasn't her when the watchful dog had padded back to her side a more pocket-sized package of tissues between his teeth. It had only been then that Root had realized she had been crying over the already known torment device that was the open video playing on her computer screen.

"Come on Sa—Sa—Sss…Root, you need it."

Root rolls her eyes at the struggle over her chosen name. the same struggle she'd once thought of Hannah having during one of her more reflective moments laying alone in the library with only Bear for her company as her not-yet teammates had worked without her help in the early days.

"Guess I'll be needing a better lock on my mental diary." Root sighed to herself grumpily taking the offered mug.

"Huh?"

Root shakes her head not the least bit interested in giving any verbal confirmation on how very clever the not-so-weakened Samaritan was getting at probing into her mind.

But she wasn't going to give up just yet. She had to keep fighting.

For Shaw. For the Machine. For herself.

She had to keep fighting.

The sudden burning of steaming hot chocolate rather than the fragrant smelling tea Root had been sure had been brewing scolds her tough and blisters her throat when she swallows it down on impulse before her next attempt at a mouth-cooling breath.

"Proof enough for you yet?" Root's watery-eyed scowl deepens at the teasing question. "Oh, come on even you have to admit cocoa makes even something as serious as the end of the world as we know it a hell of a lot smoother."

"Seriously who in their right mind thinks today of all days is a good day for molten hot, hot chocolate?" Fusco's voice cuts in saying the exact thing now running through Root's mind as she looks from the steaming mug up to the watching face of her captor.

"Hannah."

"I do."

They say it at the same time both of them looking towards the opening door much to Leo's amusement as he gingerly closes the door behind himself. "Don't worry I circled the block half a dozen times, and all that other stuff Robo Lug said to do before I came up. I'm clean." The cop calms whilst Root can only flounder a little more at the possibilities of the Samaritan given the identity of her newest keeper.

Not that she was all that surprised Samaritan would cook something like that up in her should-be final moments. Heck, its not like she'd never considered the possibilities at her lowest points the last few months without the real Shaw around to give her a much more tangible distraction.

But then Root quickly shut those thoughts down shoving them so far deep into the back of her mind that not even Samaritan would be able to see them. But even then, some questions linger.

Would Shaw be able to handle them both as willingly and easily as she'd done with copy Root in the glimpse she'd seen into Samaritan's prison world? Would Hannah have even turned out to like girls the way Root does? Would Root have been able to share Shaw so intimately even when her closest of best friends?

Glimpses of memories and phantom sensations from her treasured time with Shaw in the CIA safe house have Root's skin tingling in longing at the mocking reminder of the sounds of Shaw's needier moans.

How has Shaw put it?

"Not in the right mindset." Root echoes taking another measured sip of her drink.

This was just a trick Root reminds herself.

A good one.

Harold's unprotected, Shaw was who knew were tracking him down in a haze almost as strong and unpredictable as the one Root was in now, and John…..

Root feels that punch to the gut guilt all over again when she gets to him in her mental listing.

Was he really dead? Was it just another trick of Samaritans?

Root had no way of knowing.

"Recovered Reese," she hears from the kitchen as the jingling of Bear's collar padded away to follow Leo's retreat past Root's haven of her seat in front of the sofa. "What was left of him that is."

Root's watering eyes cast around for something, anything to ground herself as her heart rate once again began to climb as she shoved the paused laptop off her lap.

The image frozen on the slyly smiling face of her perfect partner.

Root wonders again if she'll ever live long enough to see a version of this more open, tender Shaw for herself as she crawls trembling away from the set-aside laptop of torment.

A gaming cabinet catches her eye ahead of her as she swerves around the coffee table.

"Better than nothing." Root sighed straining her loan fully useable ear for signs the two in the kitchen or Bear had noticed her movements.

Nothing yet. Still talking in low voices between themselves with Bear's pained whimpers breaking the low hum of voices all ripping new wounds into Root's somehow still beating heart.

"I'm gonna turn you into a Cassio when I get out of here." Root vows to the closest camera looking at something as she fumbles with the latch until her clawing fingers brush against the reason for her struggling she pushes her unruly hair from her eyes to get a better look at her adversary as Bear comes padding back to her after that his collar jingling on every step he takes as Root turns her full attention on that small teasing hunk of heard wear.

"Quite the fancy lock for such a low-grade cabinet." Root muses her mind already whirling with the possible meanings behind the thing.

The similarities do not interlay lost on her as she admires it. Her fingers drifted toward the space where her slim connection to the Machine had been before the snipper's bullet had taken her off the chessboard.

She'd already known Samaritan was fixated on her implant, so she wasn't all that worried about mourning the loss so openly.

"Sorry about that." Root hates the way she starts in surprise at the softly spoken comment. "But we had to take it out to sell the fake She'd had made up."

"Yeah, and thanks for the heads up on that by the way." Lionel says in scolding as he joins them from the kitchen. Bear padded at his side only to break away to snuggle back against the dazed hacker like a grounding anchor until Shaw got back. "Don't get us wrong I'm glad you're still kicking to be a pain in my side but come on Cocoa Puffs you couldn't have at least given me some kind of warning?" Fusco huffs easing himself down onto the sofa.

"And spoil the game?" Root sighed hugging a little tighter to Bear "Come on L, what fun would that be?"

"Some game," Lionel huffed into his mug as Root's eyes drifted back to the yet-to-be-finished video as Bear nudged closer against her side in grounding comfort.

"Some game." Root agrees tugging the laptop closer. "Here we go again."