(no subject)

[godcode]

God is either dead or running on double A's.

It feels like days ago since Root said the words to John and Harry, as the three of them walked out into a world without the Machine, Samaritan agents on their tails.

It's only been 5 hours. Funny how that works.

The subway is a risky move, she knows, but ever since those agents ambushed her on the corner of Nassau and Banker, all bets are pretty much off. There are a hell of a lot more cameras, but maybe if she keeps her head down, she can avoid them for a couple of stops, at least. Long enough to get some distance between the last place she was spotted, long enough to make some headway toward where she's going.

She needs to get back to their subway station, but there's a stop she's gotta make first.

The train jerks and starts moving, and now that there's a second to catch her breath, Root realizes she's bleeding. Maybe glass from the car window shattering? Either way, it'll need to wait. Every minute that the Machine is compressed, there's less of a chance they'll be able to restore her. The battery is only going to last so long, and they'll all have to act fast. That is, if Harry and John are safe.

She has to believe they are. She has to believe they've made it, because if they haven't....

Root doesn't have time to even go down that train of thought, because a woman sitting nearby is looking intently at a notification on her phone. And then a man just across the aisle. Before she knows it, the train car is abuzz with the sound of dozens of notifications, and a man is reaching for a wrench in a toolbox he's stashed under his seat.

It looks like a two minute break is all she's gonna get.

"Don't be a hero," Root says, but he doesn't listen. They never do. Which is part of why she doesn't feel the least bit sorry when she takes his weapon in the fight that follows, smacking him across the face with it before knocking out the security guard who joins in. They both get a wrench to the knee for good measure. They're alive at least; Harry would be proud. Even so, now she's pissed and she's going to have to walk the rest of the way to where she's going. The train starts to slow and she glares up at the train's camera. Up at Samaritan, the twisted creation that thinks it's going to take them all out so easily. Not a fucking chance.

"You can just call me Root, bitch."

It's lucky that there's an NYPD officer waiting just as the doors open at the next stop. You'd think they'd be better trained to deal with this kind of thing, but as it is, it's frustratingly easy for Root to incapacitate him and take his shotgun for the couple of blocks she'll have to travel once she's topside. A shot in her direction takes her by surprise, and she unloads a couple of shells on a few more agents as she finally reaches her destination, shooting the lock off of the heavy metal door.

All she has to do is hold them off for a moment. Bela and his men will defend their turf and do the rest.

Sometimes it's not about what you know, it's who you know.

Only, it's not an electronics recycling center she walks into, but somewhere entirely unfamiliar.

"Okay... this isn't part of the plan."

She tightens her grip on the shotgun.

Comments

[primary_asset]

Just them.

That's what Karen wanted out of a proposal and that's what John is going to give her. Something simple, something private, and the best place for it is in the privacy of their apartment without anyone else around. He hasn't tried to make some grand plan, knowing if he did, she would see all this coming a mile off, knowing she still might, even without candles and wine and an expensive dinner. There's champagne cooling in the fridge and he'd gone to her favourite bakery to pick up the cheesecake he knows she likes so much, but besides that, it really is just the two of them.

He's had the ring for a week now, the delicate rose gold band that twists around a diamond and two tiny pearls, and it's in his pocket now, the box nestled safely inside the jacket of his suit. Karen has only been home from work for fifteen minutes and John lets her get changed, lets her settle in before he calls her out into the living room.

His hand is on the box in his pocket when the lock to their apartment door is blasted off. In the next second, John has his handgun out, safety off, trained at the door.

[itsdarkcorners]

It's been a long day, but not too long; she's been busy, but not the sort of busy that consumes her in whatever it is she's focused on. As crazy as things have been lately, it's something of a relief. Karen is thinking mostly about that, and a little bit about what they should do for dinner, when she walks back into the bedroom to take off her heels and change into more comfortable clothes, shaking her hair loose so she can pull it back into a simple ponytail.

What happens next happens quickly. One moment John is calling her back out into the living room, which she supposes from the tone of his voice can't be for anything too pressing or worrisome. The next, just as she's emerging from the hallway, there's a loud bang, the lock on their door gone, and John's gun out. Her own is in her purse, but she doesn't make a run for it, though she will if she needs to, thinking through precisely where she's left it so she'll be able to grab it quickly. There are other weapons in the apartment, anyway. They need to be prepared.

"Shit," she says under her breath, then shoots John a look as if to silently ask if he's got this.

[godcode]

It happens in an instant. Root shoots the lock off of the door and pushes her way into what should be Bela's warehouse, only it's a run of the mill apartment instead. And standing there with his gun pointed right at her is John an some woman she doesn't recognize.

Until now, the silence in her right ear had pushed her harder, a reminder of what they were fighting for, but now Root misses Her voice more than she has yet, knowing that she'd already have an abundance of information on all of this.

"John?" she says, and even though she eases her grip on the shotgun, she doesn't lower it. "What is this?"

They can't slow down yet. Not until they've made it back to the subway. And Root knows there's another task she should be handling, because they're never going to be able to decompress The Machine without enough processing power. Every second counts.

[primary_asset]

It takes a lot to truly stun John, even after years in Darrow, where life is generally far less chaotic than the one he's left behind. He knows Karen is looking at him, looking for some kind of reassurance or instructions in his gaze, the kind of mental dialogue they've been able to fall into after all this time, but he can't look over at her. All he can do is stare at the woman standing in their apartment door with a shotgun.

For the very time in a very long time, he's actually surprised.

"Root?"

He hasn't seen her in nearly three years. He isn't even sure if he's ever mentioned her to Karen, not out of a desire to keep a secret from Karen or a need to pretend Root didn't exist, but simply because it's his way to keep things close to him. She wasn't here. There had been no reason to talk about her.

[itsdarkcorners]

"Wait, what?" Karen says abruptly, brow furrowing as she takes in the scene. At least there are no more shots being fired, no apparent danger they're in, but that might at least have made more sense. The lives they live come with certain risks, and hell, it wouldn't be the first time she'd have been shot at in her own apartment, though it would be the first in Darrow. She's hardly looking to change that, but this is still about the last thing she'd have expected from a situation like this.

She doesn't know the woman, but John evidently does. She doesn't know if the name — assuming Root is a name — is one she's heard before, either, too stunned and put on the spot for that, but that's less important than John's reaction. "I'm... honestly gonna have to second that. What is this?"

[godcode]

Root doesn't give the other woman in the room even a passing glance. There are more serious things at stake right now. Any other time, d she might have assumed that this was another number, someone deemed irrelevant that John has been tasked with saving, even in the midst of all they're dealing with.

She knows that's not the case this time.

The Machine has been quiet for five hours and twenty five minutes.

"We don't have time for this," she says, "Where's Harold? Did he make it?"

[primary_asset]

John lowers his gun finally, clicking the safety back on and holding it by his side as he reaches his other hand out toward Karen. While he doesn't think Root is a threat right now, he knows she can be unpredictable at times and if anything happens here, he's not putting Karen in the line of fire.

Somehow he doubts the explanation of Darrow is going to put Root in a very good mood.

"Harold isn't here," he says. "And we're not in New York."

Finally he risks a glance toward Karen, taking his eyes off Root for just a moment. He hopes in that split second glance, Karen can see what he's trying to tell her. Not to talk about the things he's told her, not to mention the Machine or the CIA or any of his secrets she knows. He doesn't need to keep these things from Root, she knows everything the Machine knew about him, but he isn't sure how she might react to a stranger knowing them, too.

[itsdarkcorners]

Karen has known John for a long time now. Even when they were little more than strangers, they communicated well with each other; she still finds it more than a little amusing that they pretended to be married when they first met, long before they started talking about marriage themselves. Since then, she thinks she's become pretty good at reading him. It's been a necessity at times. So when he looks at her like that, she gets what he's trying to tell her, or she believes that she does. As confused as she is and as badly as she'd like to know what's going on, this isn't the time to start blurting things out that only John is aware she knows.

Considering that the woman in their apartment is armed with a shotgun, she probably wouldn't have anyway.

"You got this?" she asks him quietly instead.

[godcode]

It's frustrating, not hearing Her voice. It's not the first time that Root has been disconnected from The Machine since they met, but like each time before, it feels like a piece of her is missing. A piece that could tell her how many Samaritan operatives are on their tail now. Root is aware of the irony of wishing for The Machine's help to save The Machine.

The woman in the room speaks, and Root finally gives her a passing glance before directing her attention back to John.

"I know you're not typically one for humor in these moments," Root says, "but you've really picked a hell of an occasion to try it out."

She feels antsy, knowing what they need to be doing, like she could jump out of her skin. Millions of lives depend on them decompressing The Machine, and they're just standing here, talking.

[primary_asset]

John nods at Karen, then steps to the side slightly, putting himself between the two of them. He doesn't really believe Root would shoot Karen, not without provocation, but he also doesn't want to run the risk of accidentally doing something that would provoke her. And if it happens, he wants to be in the line of fire, not Karen.

"Root, we're not in New York. You shot the lock off my front door, expecting it to be something else, but all that is gone. All of it. The Machine. Samaritan. Harold. It's gone."

There is so much they'll need to explain to her and he knows Karen will be more useful in that moment, able to fill in the blanks of anything he misses because he's so surprised to see a familiar face after all this time.

"I know you probably just saw me," he says. "And I know it sounds impossible, but I've been here for three years."

[itsdarkcorners]

Karen sees the way he moves, and though it doesn't exactly make her nervous — not any more than someone shooting her way into their apartment already did — she's still aware of it. If John is being that cautious, even with someone he knows, to whom he'd be talking about Harold and the Machine, then she should be, too. Not that she would have been particularly flippant anyway, given that Root is armed and she is not, but she trusts John's judgment on the matter. However much he's told her about the work he was doing back home, it's not her place to comment on it, anyway, having only been brought into the loop in Darrow.

She nods, though, when he says he's been here for three years, as if to support that fact. As odd as it is to consider that it's been that long, she was there when he arrived, dying on the beach. That sort of thing is hard to forget. She doesn't want to intercede where it isn't her place to, but she's been here that long, too, and can speak to what he's said being true.

[godcode]

"I'm not going to shoot the redhead," Root says, nearly rolling her eyes at John's attempt to protect her, "As long as she doesn't get in my way, at least."

Truthfully, she doesn't seem much reason to shoot anyone; it doesn't seem like this woman is any kind of threat, aside from somehow being in the way of what they need to be doing instead of standing here talking. But to her credit, she considers what John says, as ludicrous as it sounds.

"Three years," Root parrots, incredulous. None of this makes any sense, as strange as this situation is in the first place, but she'll humor him. "Okay, so if this isn't New York, then where is it?"

[primary_asset]

"Her name is Karen," he answers, more annoyed than his voice lets on by the comment. He shouldn't be. He knows Root and she's just arrived, but Karen is so much more than just some woman he's conveniently with at the time of Root's arrival.

She has no idea what she's just interrupted.

"We're in a city called Darrow. You're in my apartment." He pauses. "Our apartment."

[itsdarkcorners]

Though Karen doesn't actually think she's about to get shot, especially not with John clearly making sure that isn't going to happen, she still sort of wishes she'd been able to get the purse with her gun in it from the other room anyway. She doesn't like being unarmed, especially not being the only one who is. She flexes her hands at her sides instead and takes a breath, trying to decide how much she should chime in. She doesn't want to add to any tension, but she isn't very good at staying still and quiet, either.

"It's true," she says. "I got here a few weeks before he did. This place seems crazy, but it's real."

[godcode]

"If you're not going to help me, John," Root says, already done with this whole thing, "Then I guess I'm just going to have to handle it all myself."

She cocks her shotgun, and a shell clatters onto the floor. It's not meant as a threat, mostly preparation for whatever Root is going to have to deal with when she leaves them to... well, whatever this is.

"Last chance."

[primary_asset]

There's no stopping her. John knows better than to try. What he does instead is take one of his cards from his pocket and holds it toward Root. She might want to call him, he figures, once she does what she needs to do. She obviously knows where he lives now, too, but he likes to think she won't shoot the lock off their apartment a second time.

"You don't have to believe us," he says. "But take my card. When you decide you want your envelope, it's at the train station. The information booth. And don't shoot anyone, Root. I'm still working under the John Riley identity here, so don't make me have to arrest you."

It's mostly an empty threat. As empty as the threat with her shotgun, although he suspects she's preparing more for whatever she confronts when she leaves. And that's what he's afraid of. Most of this city is like any other. Innocent and unaware. He doesn't want anyone to get hurt.

[itsdarkcorners]

Karen glances towards John when Root cocks the gun, mostly to try to get a sense of whether or not she needs to be worried. It doesn't seem like she does, which is something of a relief. She wouldn't want to underestimate the situation, but she trusts John's judgment, since it involves someone he apparently knows. Later, she'll have to ask about all of this, but now definitely isn't the time for those sorts of questions. They just need to make sure this situation doesn't escalate.

"It'll have some things that might be useful," she offers. "The envelope. Some money, a map." She knows John well enough to guess that anyone who was working with him before wouldn't be interested in the cell phone or apartment, or probably the ID. Still, it's better than nothing.

[godcode]

Root glances at the card and rolls her eyes, not taking her hands off of the weapon.

"I'll find you if I need you," she says, and it looks like she's on her own, now. Though there's a nervous feeling in her gut as she turns to leave. This isn't where she was planning on ending up. And John's not wearing the same clothes he was when she last saw him. They've been on the run; she can't imagine he would have taken time to go find a change of clothes with Samaritan on their tails.

But she has to see for herself. She has to know for sure.

Root takes a step to leave, then turns to glance at the woman in the room first, the first time she's acknowledged her since she shot the lock off the door.

"She's cute," Root comments, then disappears into the hallway.