POI Season 309 – 5 Redux

Chapter 18

A/N: Thank you so much for the favs, follows and reviews it means a lot. This is a follow up chapter to 17. Harold will be returning to the action as soon as he finishes getting his groove back. Lol. I don't own POI but the mistakes are all mine. ENJOY!

Lying in bed, back propped against the headboard Harold found a weirdly shaped spot on the ceiling and focused on it. Guilt was trying to make inroads into his conscience and he was doing his best to beat it down. Fusco was still dealing with the mayhem twins in their search for Carter and Shaw and he was none too happy with being tied to the subway while they left a swath of scorched earth in their wake. Harold had limited his contact with the beleaguered detective knowing the first question out of the man's mouth would be if he was on his way back but Harold had basically tuned out of the situation for his own selfish pleasure. It was late evening he and Monica had spent the early part of the day in workshops and networking at the seminar. They had rushed back to the hotel at the conclusion of their required attendance and spent the rest of day making love. He listened to the sound of the shower. Monica decided to clean up and he tried not to imagine the state of her beautiful body covered in soap lather, her hands and water running over it. Just as the water stopped his cell phone buzzed diverting his attention, he had received a text, IT'S DONE. Was all the message read. He turned to face the opening bathroom door with the cloud of steam Monica emerged wrapped in a towel. She noticed the sad smile he gave her, she crossed the room and crawled on to the bed placing a soft kiss on his lips, "what's wrong?" She asked quietly.

"I think I know how we can find the guy that robbed us, I remembered there was a placard of symbols on the back of his motorbike." He took a notepad out of the night stand drawer and procced to draw out the characters. "Wow you have a really good eye and a good memory." Monica praised as he bristled inwardly.

"Since I was able to relieve some of the stress of the situation, it helped to improve my memory." Monica had to laugh at his statement. "Okay sure," she took the notepad to inspect the symbols closer. "It means curry leaves, it's a restaurant, and motorbike was a delivery guy." She glanced back at Harold then the thought flashed in her mind. "Let's go get our stuff back but first," she let the towel fall from her body leaning in to give Professor Whistler some much needed encouragement.

Later that night they had made their way to the restaurant Curry Leaves, that they had deciphered from the symbols from the back of the motorbike. They stood across the street waiting for the man to come out. His eyes focused on the entrance. Monica glanced at the building then she turned to face Harold. "He should have come out to deliver some food by now." Harold said, as he continued to watch the building from the spot they claimed across the street. "Maybe they're backed up." Monica reasoned. "I realize why you disagree with my work by the way." Trying to ease the tension from what they were about to do.

"Oh?" He focused on her.

"You don't feel the ends justify the means." She saw what? Regret, sadness flash in his eyes before he responded.

"Don't I? I know what it means to build something troubling because in the end it might help people and I know what it means to regret it so I suppose you could say it depends."

"Are you having second thoughts about what we're doing here?" Monica's question holding double meaning. Harold looked longingly at her their gaze locked for a moment then his eyes shifted back to the restaurant where the robber exited to get on his motorbike.

"Excuse me." Harold moved around Monica toward the man. As the robber pulled off to make a delivery Harold stepped out of the shadows swinging an umbrella he borrowed from the hotel knocking the man to the ground. "Where are our things!?" Harold moved around the disoriented man lying on the ground.

"There." He pointed toward the pouch on the back of the fallen bike. Monica ran out to join Harold as he pulled their belongings out of the pouch. A crowd began to gather to check on the biker still on the ground. "We should run!" Harold grabbed Monica's arm and they made off with their retrieved property.

They had made their way back to her hotel, sadness hung in the air as she checked out of her room. They waited in the lobby for the car that would take her to the airport to arrive. She wondered if this would be the last time she would run into her mysterious knight in shining armor.

"Harold what are you doing next month?"

"Why?"

"I have to be in New York, angel investor nonsense, I thought we could have a coffee." She smiled suddenly coy.

"I would like that." She reached into her bag and retrieved a business card the touch of their fingers lasting longer than it should have as she passed it over.

Monica grabbed the handle of her luggage, stepped into Harold and placed a long lingering kiss on his cheek. Harold couldn't help but blush. "Try not to get mugged before then." She whispered in his ear. Harold chuckled as she walked away his demeanor quickly changed. It was time to get back to the business at hand.

Harold made his way back to the Curry Leaves restaurant where he found robber guy outside smoking a cigarette.

"You're sure you installed it in her computer?"

"Quite sure, what were you thinking knocking me about like that?"

"You're being well compensated." Harold passed him an envelope stuffed with money.

"You're well rid of that woman she's a bitch!" As motorbike shifted thru the money to make sure it was all there.

"Don't call her that." His gaze turned sinister. "Our business is finished go."

Monica had one final piece of business she decided to handle on her way to the airport, she pulled out her cellphone. "And have you enjoyed Hong Kong?" Monica's contact inquired.

"Oh, yes very much, it gave me a few thoughts on phase one." She responded enthusiastically.

"Indeed."

"I'll present them to you when we meet in New York get your checkbook ready."

"We're very eager to meet with you see you in a month."

Monica's contact disconnected the call and made his way to another room where a large monitor graced the wall with various computers and techs were dispersed throughout. In front of the monitor facing it was none other than John Greer. "Morning sir" The young man greeted Greer brightly. "Just wanted to give you a quick report on Asia; the startup in Guangzhou, and the factory in Mumbai."

"Oh yes." Greer took the tablet and perused reports briefly. "And the seed money for the new company in Tokyo." He flipped thru the pages on the tablet till he got to her picture, finally placing a face to the name. "Monica Jacobs, Samaritan is becoming very interested in her algorithms."

"Why?" The young man had the nerve to ask.

"I have no idea." Greer replied nonchalantly. His trust only in Samaritan.

Harold settled into his seat closed his eyes and waited for the plane to take off. He wasn't sure of Samaritan's plan for Monica, for that reason he had a spoofing software to track any moves the AI would make against her. Because of the AI he had lost much too much. He did not want to risk losing this beautiful woman to Samaritan's clutches. He resolved to end this war as soon as he possibly could.

Root gripped the steering wheel so tight her knuckles were turning white. She was trying to stay calm thru the anticipation. They had nearly torn the city down they weren't trying to delicate, Everything they had done was to lure one person out into the open, the one person that had access to northern lights and now to Samaritan. She and John watched the young man the machine had pointed them too as he managed to hop on board the departing train to Canada, when the big black SUV, that she and John had tracked flashed it's lights pulling out of the darkness to entrap their quarry.

That was their cue. Root gunned the engine then pulled out of their hiding space in the black Jeep they were riding in while John mounted the rocket launcher firing an explosive overturning the SUV and its occupants.

Joss helped Shaw stumble to her bed. "That's enough for today, you may tear those stitches.

"I'm not worried about that, I need to be as close to recovered as possible so when they find us we'll be ready to kick some Samaritan ass. She groaned as she maneuvered her body to a comfortable position. "The first thing I'm going to do is give that evil witch an attitude adjustment."

Joss smirked at Shaw. "Let's get you in healed and then we can talk about adjusting attitudes." Since Jeremy died Martine had made it her personal mission to make the two of them as miserable as she could. Her boss had given the word they were not to be harmed at least physically, but that did little to stop her attempts at verbal and physiological abuse.

Joss still couldn't wrap her head around all that Shaw shared with her, that they recently discovered she was alive and how John had mourned for her, how he went after Quinn leaving a trail of destruction behind him. How even now he was probably leaving a similar destructive path to find them. Just as Shaw settled Martine appeared. "Speak of the she devil." Shaw whispered to Joss who stifled a smile.

"Ladies time to move you to another location." Martine sneered. "Let's hope the accommodations are better than this." Shaw quipped.

Martine's hatred blazed across her face. "Don't' you worry, after Samaritan is done with the next phase of this project I'm pretty sure you won't mind or remember anything at all."

A/N: Okay so I kept Harold and Monica in bed a little longer. Just wanted to have a little fun with those two. Some of the dialogue was taken from the episode Pretenders.