Medicine (Houses)
"Please don't make me do this." You're begging, you're pleading with the Machine, broken on so many levels you can't count. You're here in this unseemly, empty police station, no one to notice you, a frenzy of tears and agitation sitting on one of those uncomfortable benches in the corridor. You can hear very well the Machine giving you directions to go to a particular room, but this isn't your first time in a precinct - you are aware that she is directing you to the morgue.
"Why are you making me do this??" you beg, restless and desperate to get out of here, but at the same time unable to disobey the Machine in the helpless state you're in. You need her, you're so suggestible right now you can't help it, and you're drained of all your energy to continue arguing with an all-seeing AI. So you drag yourself up and towards the door, your knees feeling heavy and your mind in utter confusion over all the emotions you were feeling right now.
Right before you make your way to the door, you stop as you realize something.
"You don't know, do you?" you ask out loud, not caring in the least that someone hears you. The Machine was silent, for the first time ever, the Machine didn't have an answer to your question, and that scares you further.
"You don't know - and you want me to see if she's alive or not!" You scream, pain coursing through your veins as your mind touches on the very likely possibility of what you will find on the other side of the door.
The Machine was still quiet as ever, and you realize that you can't do this. It was crushing your heart to even think you were considering opening that door to see what was obviously going to be there.
"You know you can put 2 and 2 together, I don't have to do this." At that The Machine just repeated that you go forward through the door.
You bite your lip at that, your body feels so lifeless as you push the door and walk through the glass doors of the morgue. There is no one there, completely empty and utterly silent, a few bodies lying lifeless on the steel beds of the morgue, covered in white sheets. There's three of them there, bodies of other agents killed in the crossfire at the stock exchange. To your surprise, the Machine gives you a number.
655321.
You don't know what it is - and right now you aren't in the mood to go on one of the Machine's mad hunts. Your fingers are trembling as you approach the centre steel bed, the one which still had its observation lights on.
As you take a step towards it, your hand brushes against the tag hanging of the toe of the body, and you slowly take it in your fingers to get a look at it.
655321.
That takes the wind out of your lungs, literally. You fall to the floor, gasping and crying at the same time, the cold floor not consoling you much.
"I'm so sorry Sameen, I'm sorry." you beg earnestly, utterly broken.
You aren't sure how long you've spent on the floor, curled up in a ball and cold - crying your heart out. The Machine had been silent thus far, allowing you to have your space, your moment with her, till now that is.
"I'm sorry."
You don't pay much attention to that, slowly bringing yourself to get up off the floor and go to the bed, and taking a minute to build your resolve before you slowly peel the white sheet off Shaw's lifeless face.
At the sight of Sameen, lifeless and pale face you gasp and tears start flowing down your face. You aren't crying yourself, but the tears wouldn't stop. The burden your heart feels now was unbelievable. Right now - you've summed it up in your head that all that you had done had lead Shaw to get shot, it feels like you shot her yourself. You close your eyes and the sight of her body falling to the ground as Martine fired the first shot comes to your mind and you can't bear it. The Machine, as if reading your mind - begins.
"You are not to blame for - "
"I AM!" You scream back, turning as if you were talking to someone, only to see there was no one there.
At that, the Machine stopped, and the silence of the world was starting to weigh on you.
It has probably been a few hours now, and you don't remember how you got in this position, but you don't care. You're lying on the very narrow steel observation bed, holding Shaw's lifeless body close to you and with the powerful white lights still shining bright in your face.
"I thought you would like to say goodbye to her." The Machine offers, as a sort of peace offering between you and herself. The Machine's words make you realize that Samaritan's workers probably had a sordid plan to get rid of Shaw's body, and the Machine forced you here so that you could spend a moment with her, alone before Samaritan began to decide to get rid of the body.
You just hum in reply, utterly spent and feeling more dead than alive. Your mind is replaying all these moments you had with Shaw, teasing her, annoying her, bargaining with her and loving her.
"She just wanted to take care of me." you sofly reply in a monotonous voice, hollow and heavy.
The Machine starts warning you that Samaritan's operatives were on their way now, and that you had to go, but you can't bring yourself to move. You couldn't leave her, not now.
"It's Okay. I'll take care of her now." you mumble, not really understanding the seriousness of the situation.