“On it, Finch.” Shaw says, slowly pulling open the bag’s zipper as not to set off any potential tripwires. She’s so focused she almost doesn’t hear it as Root slides down to her knees beside her. She does however feel it as Root hovers close enough she can feel her breath on the side of her face. She clenches her jaw. “Root.”

“What? I’m focusing on the bomb.” 

Root is smiling, Shaw can tell just by the innocent tone of her voice, even as she doesn’t have the time to raise her eyes and make sure.

Instead of responding to that particular falsehood Shaw finishes opening the bag and starts trying to identify where in the mesh of silicone wires is the ignition and how to safely remove it from the C-4 it’s attached to.

“Six blocks of C-4.” She informs Finch, ignoring the very, very closely sitting Root. “But I don’t see a-”

She removes the plastic covering hiding part of the structure of the bomb from her and reveals the sight of a dark screen of a phone. “Wait, there’s a smartphone attached.“

“Scoot over.” Root says and this time Shaw listens.

“What are you thinking, Miss Groves?”

“Well, Harry, why risk setting it off by cutting the wrong wire if I can just hack the phone?” Root says as she takes out her own phone and starts doing whatever it is she does to presumably wirelessly connect the two devices. 

There’s the sound of a groan from the body beside them so Shaw gets to her feet, ready to knock the guy back into the land of the sleeping when Root pushes her arm up into the field of her vision, a small bottle and a rag of cloth dangling from her fingers. 

She snatches them out of Root’s hands, annoyed as she reads the inscription on the label. Chloroform.

“You’ve had this the entire time?” Shaw says, annoyed. “Why didn’t you just give it to me before we cornered him in the elevator?”

“You know I love to watch you work, Sameen. It’s the… second best part of my day.” Root says, the flirty in her voice turned up to a hundred now that she’s too busy with the bomb to show it on her face.

There’s the short burst of sound of their comms going dark.

“I do believe Harold hang up on us.” Root says with exaggerated offense.

“I wonder why.” Shaw says back dryly, and pours the chloroform over the cloth before she smacks it over the goon’s face. “And shouldn’t you be working on that phone.”

“Already done, I’m all yours.” She says and when Shaw looks at her she does have the phone that was previously attached to their Number’s bomb in her hands.

“Great.” Shaw says with as much faked sweetness as she can manage and turns around to smash her hand over the button that gets the elevator moving again. She can feel Root pouting through the back of her head.

There is five seconds of silence and then the doors of the elevator slide open and they’re met by the amused face of Reese. Well the face is blank enough but Shaw can see the amusement pouring out of him anyway.

“So how did it go?” He asks like he hasn’t been just as privy to what has been happening over their comms as Finch.

Shaw throws a glare at him and then directs it toward Root for good measure too before she finally marches off. They can do the cleanup for the cops to find themselves.

           “About to be sick. Any moment now. And definitely tomorrow night.” This would be so much easier if she could break his nose. He didn't even have the decency to own a car that she could have slashed the tires on for a bit of stress relief, and there were only so many times she could steal his metrocard before it stopped cheering her up.

           Her supervisor sighed and straightened his glasses. “Very amusing. Now you're to be here tomorrow evening at 5pm. No excuses.”

           Shaw thought her day couldn't get any worse than that, but as he was walking away her manager turned back and added, “Oh, and you'll need to bring a date.”

           Shaw ripped the paper off her sandwich. “This has to be illegal.”

           “Which part, making you go to a party, or making you bring a date?” Reese asked.

           Shaw slapped his hand away when he went for one of her fries. “Either? Both? Some part of it is illegal.” She paused, fry halfway to her mouth. “You're a cop now.”

           “I'm not arresting your boss.”

           “I don't think he's the one who planned this party.”

           “I'm not arresting the owners of Macy's either.”

           “It's not a--” Shaw gave up. “Well, you're going to have to come with me then.”

           Reese froze, hand halfway to the fries again. “Me? Why me?”

           “I can't very well take Romeo.”

           Reese scowled, visibly unnerved by this change in course. “You're not even supposed to know me.”

           It was a fair point (and why they were eating lunch together in the subway where no one could see them), but since this entire situation was unfair Shaw didn't much care.

           A devious smile spread across Reese's lips and Shaw's eyes narrowed.

           “Have you seen Root lately?” Reese asked, innocently.

           Shaw was genuinely confused by this change in direction. “Root? Not for a week or two, why?”

           “You needed a date to this party, and…” Reese's smile was a smirk now.

           “Root is not going to be my date, we do not...we don't do that.” She'd biked across a cesspool of a state to save Root's dumb ass onceand now everyone thought it meant all sorts of things that it definitely didn't mean.

           “Whatever you say, Shaw.”

           Reese was limping rather badly when he left the subway later, but Shaw felt a little better.

           Shaw wasn't at all surprised to find Root waiting for her at her makeup counter when she got back from lunch. The nosy AI she worked for had probably sent her here to keep Shaw from murdering someone to get out of this party.

           “I hope you're making some real progress with your super secret war on Samaritan,” Shaw snapped as she walked behind her counter. “Progress, as in the two of you will have blown it up before tomorrow.”

           “Good to see you, too, sweetie.” Root picked a tube of lipstick up off the counter and toyed with it. “What's happening tomorrow?”

           “What, like you don't know already?” The Machine must have told her and now she was here angling to tag along and embarrass Shaw in front of her coworkers.

           Root smiled enigmatically. “Humor me. What's happening tomorrow?”

           Shaw stared at her for a moment, trying to determine if she was stringing her along with the whole pretending not to know thing. But Root didn't look like she was hiding anything--she just looked tired.

           “Nothing. Just a stupid thing I have to do for this dumbass cover identity.” She glanced down the aisle to make sure her manager wasn't watching. The last thing she needed was that annoying little cockroach noticing that Root was a frequent customer. “Why areyou here then?”

           “Just checking in. Making sure you're not doing anything to break your cover.”

           “Well, I'm not. Unfortunately.”

           Root nodded absently. “How's the petty thievery going?”

           “Shouldn't you know all this? I figured the Machine would be giving you hourly updates or something.” There was something else going on here, Shaw was sure. If she hadn't known better she would have said that Root looked sad, but that couldn't possibly be right. “Is something going on, Root?”

           Root set down the lipstick with a decisive click. “Sorry, sweetie. Have to run now. Be good.”

           Shaw watched her walking away. She wasn't even prancing like she usually did on visits here.

           Shaw cursed under her breath.

           “Root, wait.”

           Shaw bruised Reese's other shin when he made a snide comment at lunch the next day. It was none of his business who she took to a stupid party for a stupid cover identity. He kept smirking anyway.

           “That's what you're wearing?” Shaw asked.

           Root smoothed the green dress over her hips. “It's a party, Shaw. Generally one dresses up for parties.”

           Shaw had chosen to wear jeans and a casual shirt and jacket (all black, of course). If she had to go to this thing, she intended to be comfortable.

           “I'm not putting any more effort into this bullshit than I have to.”

           Root looked nice though, she could admit that much.

           “How bad can it be?” Root asked. Somehow she'd moved from a respectful distance away on the sidewalk to walking in Shaw's personal space, but Shaw decided not to say anything about that. Notbecause she enjoyed the line of warmth that was Root by her side or anything. No, it would just encourage Root if she told her to knock it off.

           “It's a mandatory company party in the store we work in all day thrown by a bunch of greedy corporate overlords. How could it notbe bad?”

           “Point taken.”

           The inside of the mall Shaw's store was in was much warmer than the winter air outside had been and she took a minute to enjoy the change before heading to the escalator.

           Root was quiet on the ride down to the lower level. She leaned against one side of the escalator and looked out over the abandoned mall.

           “What's with you lately?” Shaw asked.

           Root arched an eyebrow at her. “What's with me?”

           “Yeah, you're--” Shaw didn't know how to describe it. Moping? Sad? Unusually quiet for sure. It was none of her business, though. “Never mind.”

           Shaw let the silence stand the rest of the way down.

           “Well, this is festive,” Root murmured when they stepped into the store.

           The store was exactly the way Shaw had last seen it when she'd clocked out earlier: an unending mess. Holiday shoppers were the worst.

           “Ah, good, you're here.” It was her annoying supervisor, appearing out of nowhere like an especially persistent mosquito. “Just in time to help clean up for the party.”

           “Seriously?”

           The true purpose of the party quickly became apparent--unpaid labor to clean up the store. She thought about walking out right then, consequences be damned, but instead she gritted her teeth and smiled at her supervisor in an unfriendly way until he cleared his throat nervously and left.

           “The world already sucked without an evil AI. How much worse can Samaritan really make it?”

           Root smiled, her first smile of the night, and leaned down so her lips were almost against Shaw's ear.

           “I love it when you're optimistic, sweetie,” she murmured. “How about a little incentive to play nice and be exploited like a good little gear in the capitalist machine?”

           Only Root could talk about the evils of capitalism in a husky voice and make it work.

           “What sort of incentive are we talking?”

           “It'll be a surprise.” Root's lips brushed the shell of Shaw's ear for a fraction of a second.

           “Fine. It better be worth it though.”

           Root, Shaw realized almost immediately, had no intention of helping. Instead, she perched elegantly on the edge of one of the counters and idly rummaged through the merchandise. Shaw's supervisor came over, probably to try and force her to help, but Root fixed him with a withering stare that made him scuttle away. Shaw smirked to herself as she discreetly kicked the contents of an overturned display behind a counter.

           Once the store was reasonably tidy, the ‘party’ began. There was one bowl of punch and a few plates of cookies that looked stale. Tinny Christmas music played over the store speakers.

           “The Machine owes me big time for this,” Shaw grumbled as she leaned against the counter next to Root.

           “I'm sure She'll make it up to you when She can.”

           “And when will thatbe?”

           Root fell silent again and understanding dawned on Shaw. She felt dumb for not figuring it out sooner. She considered pressing the subject, finding out exactly how little Root could communicate with the Machine now, but something about Root's previous lack of response stopped her. If Root wanted to discuss it, she'd have talked Shaw's ear off already.

           Around them, the train wreck of a party continued to unfold. Shaw's supervisor was noticeably drunk (he must not have realized that Shaw had spiked the punch) and wearing a grimy Santa outfit. The other employees were all in various states of intoxication and all had the grim looks of people trying very hard to survive the next few hours. The highlight of the next half hour was tied between someone locking inebriated supervisor-Santa in a stock room, and when Gary from menswear threw up in a fake plant and then passed out in the aisle.

           Shaw watched Root out of the corner of her eye, and while Root definitely looked maliciously satisfied at the fall of Gary (and Shaw was almost positive she'd somehow been behind her supervisor’s incarceration, but she couldn't for the life of her figure out how), her heart didn't seem to be fully in it.

           Neither of them had budged from the counter Root had taken up residence on, especially since Shaw had kept most of the flask she'd used on the punch for herself. They passed it back and forth every few minutes and by the time it was gone Shaw felt warm and slightly tingly with just the right amount of a buzz. She didn't even bat Root's hand away when she pulled the bottom of Shaw's shirt out of her pants in the back so she could brush her fingers along Shaw's skin. It felt kind of nice and nobody at the stupid party was watching so why should it matter?

           Three times one of the others came over and attempted to make conversation. Root sent the first two away deeply regretting their attempts to mingle, but the third person she just tuned out and ignored until Shaw had to growl at him to shove off.

           “You must be very popular here,” Root mused as she watched Henry from sportswear beat a hasty retreat.

           “They don't pay me to be nice to my coworkers.” Shaw snuck another glance at Root out of the corner of her eye. She looked about as done as Shaw felt, and even though this was the sort of situation where Root would usually turn things excitingly violent or at least orchestrate an escape for them, Shaw had a feeling Root wasn't going to this time. She wondered if maybe this whole charade bothered Root even more than it bothered her.

           “Let's get out of here,” she said.

           “Aren't you required to stay til the end of this farce?”

           “Bathroom break. Come on.”

           Shaw didn't take them to the bathrooms though. Instead she led Root to the elevator and punched the button for the top floor. Once there, she headed to the back staircase she'd discovered while snooping around and easily picked the look. Being a petty criminal had its advantages if it meant getting away with stuff like this without alerting Samaritan.

           She breathed in deeply when she pushed the door to the roof open. An hour ago she'd been glad to get out of the cold, but now it felt like freedom.

           “Needed some fresh air,” Shaw explained even though Root hadn't asked for an explanation. Shaw liked that about her, that she so rarely required explanations for things Shaw did. It was sort of freeing.

           They both walked over to the edge of the building in unspoken agreement to look out at the city around them. There were strands of little white lights hung everywhere making the whole city glow softly.

           It was windy on the roof and the cold air cut right through Shaw's clothes and made her teeth chatter. Root must have been freezing in that dress, and upon a brief, surreptitious inspection Shaw noted she was definitely shivering.

           “Heads up.” Shaw gave Root less than half a second of warning before tossing her jacket in Root's face. She glared when Root looked like she was about to comment on the gesture. “Next time wear something with sleeves.”

           “I did, but it's downstairs because you didn't tell me we were coming outside.”

           Fair point, but Shaw wasn't about to acknowledge that. “Thought you were supposed to be clever. You could have figured it out.”

           “I suppose there's always room for improvement.” Root slipped her arms into the jacket and wrapped it tightly around herself. “Aren't you going to get cold now, Shaw?”

           “I don't get cold.”

           “Really.” Amused disbelief hung on the word.

           “Yeah, really.”

           She pretended not to notice when Root inched close enough that their sides were pressed together. Clearly Root was just still cold and trying to steal her warmth.

           “You have plans for the holidays?” Root asked after a couple chilly minutes of gazing out at the city around them. “Other than murdering your coworkers, I mean.”

           Shaw snorted. “Holidays aren't my thing.”

           When Root didn't say anything else Shaw wondered if she should follow up on the question.

           “Uh, what about you?”

           “That's not clear yet, but She'll let me know.”

           “Well, you can--” Shaw paused, unsure what she'd been about to suggest.

           Root tilted her head to one side, curious. She almost looked like herself again for a second. “I can what?”

           “Uh, nothing. Wanna go give me that incentive you mentioned now?”

           Root chuckled and led the way back to the door. “Let's get you all warmed up again, sweetie.”

           “So how was your date with Root?” Reese asked around a bite of the sandwich which might be his last meal as a living man if Shaw had anything to do with it.

           She threw a ketchup packet in his face.

           “It wasn't a date.”

           “What was it then?”

           “A...mission, to help keep my identity intact.”

           The ‘mission’ had ended with them using some ties in the menswear department for purposes other than their intended use, which had gone so well that they'd decided to continue things back at Shaw's apartment.

           Shaw had woken up in the middle of the night to find that they'd both passed out before she'd had a chance to kick Root out or at least banish her to the couch and that Root was still on the other side of the bed, cocooned in almost all the blankets and about as deeply asleep as Shaw had ever seen her. She’d thought about waking her up and sending her to the couch, but then she'd thought about the dark circles under Root's eyes and how happy she'd looked when Shaw had invited her back that night.

           In the end, she'd let Root sleep undisturbed and had gone and gotten herself more blankets since Root was a cover hog on top of all her other failings.

           Root had still been sound asleep when Shaw had gotten up to go to work, and in the end Shaw had decided to let her stay that way. At least one of them would be well rested.

           “Just a mission,” Shaw reiterated before diving back into her sandwich.

           “A mission,” Reese repeated. “Right.”

           She threw another ketchup packet at him.

           Root was standing at the kitchen counter when Shaw got home from work (it had been a short work day since it was Christmas eve). She looked up from the note she was writing when Shaw came in.

           “I was on my way out. Sorry I stole your bed. I must have been more tired than I'd thought.”

           “Wasn't a big deal,” Shaw said and was surprised to realize that she meant it.

           “Careful, Sameen, or I might get the impression that you like having me around.” Root smiled and her eyes were mischievous and lit up the way Shaw remembered them usually being.

           Shaw scoffed for the look of things and kicked off her shoes and jacket. At least she didn't have to work for the next day and a half.

           “You off to save the world?” she asked as she watched Root gathering her things.

           “Something like that.”

           Shaw was getting the hang of when Root was being cryptic and when she was just lying to cover up for not knowing something.

           New York City had been in the process of shutting itself down when Shaw had walked home. Not completely, of course, since it wasNew York after all, but most of the shops had been shuttered and people on the streets had been hurrying home rather than heading out. The city streets would be about as quiet and empty as they ever got by nightfall.

           She thought about Root wandering around the empty streets by herself in the cold with only the absence of the Machine to keep her company. She scowled as she watched Root open the door to leave.

           “You could--” She hesitated, because even though she was sure, it still felt weird.

           “Shaw?”

           The tiny hint of hope that Root hadn't quite been able to hide from her voice freed Shaw to act. She walked over and firmly shut the half-open door.

           “Don't make a big deal out of this.”

           Root smiled and Shaw turned away, feeling slightly embarrassedof all things. This was why Root was such a pain in her ass.

           “And don't make a mess either. And this is only until you get a new mission or something, okay?”

           “Of course, Sameen.”

           Root was back to being her irritating self for the remainder of her stay, and, when she vanished the day after Christmas, she left everything in a mess anyway. Shaw sighed and set about restoring order to her apartment. Root had better come back soon and in one piece so Shaw could yell at her.