Hm
My first reaction to the end of the episode was indignation: Finch wouldn't just run and leave Reese and a wounded Shaw high and dry! Not unless he thought he was protecting them.
My second thought: Well, no, he wouldn't. Which is what he's doing. (I do love you, Harold, you high-handed little bastard. Reese is going to be pissed, though.)
So, I see this shaking out a couple of different ways:
A) He's trying to figure out what's "wrong" with the Machine, and if he can get it back on track (more on that below), possibly fearing it's gone HAL on them all;
B) He knows that Vigilance is out there, and likely, he's target number 1--best to save collatoral damage, however willing Reese is to be so;
C) He knows that Reese and Shaw, being who and what they are, will find it easier to be ghosts without him tagging along; or
D)???
The thing about Harold is, as much as Root has been enthusiastically anthropomorphizing (and deifying) the Machine, Harold has worked damned hard to de-humanize it: he repeats to himself (and Root) it's just a machine, a machine he created, and it can't be anything else. He is, of course, also the ultimate control freak, which is why he made the machine in the first place. Which is why I think he's convinced himself that "I programed it to save EVERYone" is a viable argument--and he seems to have forgotten how difficult a proposition it was in the beginning to teach the Machine not to protect Harold, individually, BEFORE it attained the level of autonomy it has now.
So here's my question, that I don't know if Harold is avoiding asking himself right now or not: Did the Machine set them on their Number for the episode to protect itself or Harold?
And does the Machine actually see a difference at this point? The fact that it labels Root its "analog interface" tells me its got boundary issues, still. Which, really, why should it be different than every other character in this show?
Hm, indeed.
Separately, I loved so much Reese's reiteration that he did not trust the Machine, but he trusts Harold.
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