Post-CIA
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John after returning to New Rochelle from Ordos.
In February, a wounded Reese, now sporting a beard, travels to New Rochelle, New York to look for Jessica. He discovers that she has died in a car accident two months prior to his arrival. Distraught, he breaks into the Arndt residence and watches one of the videos of Jessica and her husband Peter's wedding, realizing she had most likely been abused and murdered by him as car accidents make excellent cover-ups for murder. When Peter comes home, Reese confronts the man who he holds responsible for her death and attacks him. Unbeknownst to him, Finch has also been investigating Jessica, and presumably him, as part of the Contingency operations. Reese bumps into Finch's chair on the way out of the hospital where Jessica worked, but is not paying attention, unlike Finch, who double checks Reese against the soldier pictured in the file with Jessica. (“Many Happy Returns”)
Reese later begins to live anonymously in a homeless encampment. He is looked out for by a woman named Joan. (“Risk”)
Working with Harold Finch
Deteriorating mentally and physically, a bearded, homeless Reese is attacked on a subway by a gang. Disarming and defeating them with no effort, Reese is taken into custody. Some men collect Reese from the precinct, but not before Reese's prints run through the database. He is taken to the Queensboro Bridge, where he meets a mysterious man going under the name Harold Finch, who offers to stop crimes from happening. Though he refuses at first, Reese soon changes his mind when Finch forces him into experiencing a scenario where he'd be helpless to prevent a murder from happening.
Finch tells Reese of the Machine — a device Finch built for the government after 9/11, which detects terrorist activity as well as other 'irrelevant' crimes by using thousands of cameras and an advanced database. It would give them a list comprised of Social Security numbers, each belonging to a person involved in a violent crime - either the victim or the perpetrator. Upon the completion of his first case, Reese manages to recruit Detective Lionel Fusco, a corrupt cop who would eventually become a useful asset. (“Pilot”)
One such case that Reese takes on is that of Zoe Morgan, a resourceful fixer who Reese is able to protect while posing as her driver. (“The Fix”) Zoe later returns to help Reese on numerous other cases and their relationship has been wavering between friendly and romantic.
As Reese takes on more cases regarding these persons of interest, he catches the attention of Detective Joss Carter, a homicide detective who Reese had met after the subway attack. (“Pilot”) He also gets the attention of the CIA, who believe him to be dead until they find the prints run on Reese by Carter. (“Number Crunch”)
Reese eventually convinces Carter to help him and Finch. (“Legacy”) The two begin helping each other on cases and even become good friends. Though Carter and Fusco didn't initially know they're working for the same people, they realize it after Carter suspects Fusco of working with the crime organization HR, and the two begin to assist Reese on many of his cases. (“Firewall”)
On his birthday, Reese eventually comes across the case of a person of interest which Finch has been keeping a secret from him, worrying that it will bring back painful memories of Jessica's death. The woman is on the run from her abusive husband and Reese is eventually able to save her life, delivering the husband off to a Mexican prison after framing him for drug running. Finch's birthday present to Reese is a key to a large apartment which becomes his home. (“Many Happy Returns”)
The FBI begin to pursue Reese after linking him to past crimes, dubbing him "the Man in the Suit". (“Identity Crisis”) Reese is eventually caught and arrested along with three other men by a team led by Special Agent Nicholas Donnelly while helping another person of interest. (“Shadow Box”) With the help of Finch and Carter, Reese is eventually released from jail but kidnapped by his old partner Kara Stanton. (“Prisoner's Dilemma”) Reese and Mark Snow are forced to run errands for Stanton while wearing rigged bomb vests, but Reese is eventually rescued and saved by Finch. Snow, meanwhile, catches up to Stanton and they both die when Snow's vest explodes. (“Dead Reckoning”)
Reese and Finch eventually save the life of Sameen Shaw, a government assassin on the run after being betrayed by her employers, and Shaw eventually becomes part of their team. (“Relevance”)
The Machine finally gives out Reese's Social Security number after HR places a bounty on his head. He assists Carter in bringing HR leader Alonzo Quinn to FBI custody, and is arrested but eventually released from police custody by Carter. However, both Carter and Reese are shot by HR lieutenant Patrick Simmons with Carter dying in the arms of a wounded Reese. (“The Crossing”)
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Reese searches for Simmons (“The Devil's Share”)
Carter's death causes Reese to go on a vengeful hunt for Simmons and he brutally interrogates many HR associates in an attempt to find him. Reese finds Quinn after fighting his way through the U.S. Marshals guarding him and demands to know Simmons' location. Finch arrives and convinces Reese not to kill Quinn and Reese collapses from his prior injuries. He pulls the trigger on his gun, but finds that it's empty. Reese is eventually hospitalized and Shaw states that the doctor has declared Reese will be fine. (“The Devil's Share”)
Leaving the team behind, Reese flees to Colorado and goes to a bar, returning to his habit of drinking and begins to ignore violent crimes. Fusco finds Reese at a bar to persuade him to return to New York. Reese refuses and tells Fusco to leave, but Fusco stays, pointing out that Reese was the key reason behind Fusco's stoppage of his bad habits, including drinking. Reese states how the work he's done is pointless and Fusco is appalled at how Reese could say such a thing. Fusco then challenges Reese to a fight and the two engage in a fistfight outside the bar in the rain. However, the police arrive and find the two. (“Lethe”)
Reese and Fusco sit in a cell where an increasingly pessimistic Reese says how things will return to what they used to be. Fusco disagrees before leaving.
Reese eventually decides to go back to New York and he and Fusco save Finch from Vigilance during a bank raid. At the Library, Reese says that the only reason he came back is because Finch is too valuable a friend to lose. He then leaves despite Finch's efforts to convince him to come back. (“Aletheia”)
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Reese and Holly, a flight attendant (“4C”)
In an attempt to leave the team behind, Reese boards an international flight to Istanbul, but the flight is mysteriously switched to one to Rome. Reese suspects Finch of doing so, but Finch denies it, leading both to realize that the Machine is acting on its own to get Reese back.
Reese learns that the Machine placed him on the flight to protect Owen Matthews, a programmer associated with an online drug market. Finch learns that Owen is a relevant number due to connections with the ISA. Reese reluctantly protects Owen from numerous assassins and the plane finally lands safely in Rome. There, Reese meets with Finch and agrees to rejoin the team. (“4C”)
Reese's personality returns to its old form rather quickly upon returning to the team. However, he still remembers Carter and honors her by pouring a drink for the team's "missing member" during a celebration of the completion of another case. (“Provenance”)
Having returned to New York, Reese helps Finch run surveillance on Sandra Nicholson, a 911 Trainee Supervisor, where Finch has gone undercover as a 911 Call Center employee. Reece and Shaw head over to rescue Aaron, a young boy who's the target of a kidnapping, when he calls Sandra, who directs the police to the same location. However, both the team and the police arrive too late as the kidnappers have heard Aaron's low battery signal and located him. When Finch brings up the footage of the kidnapping, Reese realizes that the kidnappers are not ex-military, based on their lack of tactics, and identifies them as Templarios, a Mexican kidnapping gang, based on the ring on a gang-member's hand. Reese calls Fusco and the detective confirms that the Templarios hang out at El Certero, a local bar. Reese goes into the bar and spots the man, Solano, wearing a number of piercings. The other Templarios come over and Reese advises them to let him through. When they refuse, Reese admits that he was hoping they'd choose the hard way.
Shaw arrives at the bar as Reese finishes knocking out the last one. They turn to Solano, who tells them that the caller pays him anonymously and there's nothing more he can tell them. Shaw grabs a pair of pliers and turns to Solano, demanding to know where they're keeping Aaron.
Then, Reese and Shaw proceed to the location where the Templarios hold Aaron and, using a suit as a decoy, befuddle the gang members long enough to take down a few of them. Reese identifies the bomb on Aaron, and as he prepares to charge in, Shaw delays him and says that she'll clear the way. She starts taking them down one by one, while Reese starts defusing the bomb. While working on the bomb, Reese tries to distract Aaron by talking about baseball. He cuts the last wire with just seconds to spare, just as Shaw takes out the last Templario.
Later, he and Shaw join Finch at a park where Finch met Sandra, after Sandra has left. Finch thanks them for their help. When the mysterious caller who had orchestrated the kidnapping calls up Finch via the relay, after hanging up, Finch tells Reese and Shaw that the call was of no consequence, while discarding the battery of the relay phone, to prevent tracking.(“Last Call”)
Reese then helps Finch when both Finch and Root independently receive the number of Cyrus Wells, a janitor who has retinal access to Maxwell Limited, a front for the NSA, which has a micro-processor on its premises which can run Samaritan. Reese helps the team fight off attacks from both Vigilance and Decima, either alone, or teaming up with Shaw and Fusco, depending on the situation. When Decima capture Cyrus and use him to access the room where the chip is stored, Reese and Fusco fire at them, providing cover while Root successfully rescues Cyrus, while unarmed and taking a bullet in the shoulder, as Cyrus is afraid of guns. However, they lose the chip to Decima. (“Root Path (/)”)
In the Library, Reese and Finch evaluate a new number's, Maria Martinez records and activities. After Finch then gets a call from Root, who is following Greer in a subway station, Reese leaves the Library and sits with Shaw at a diner where Maria and her associate are meeting. The man Maria is talking to mentions something about his brother being released, and Finch identifies the man as Jamal Risha, brother of Omar Risha, who was recently detained at JFK airport under accusations of terrorist activities. Jamal, meanwhile, gives Maria an envelope, which Reese suspects of having a bomb inside. Reese says he'll follow Jamal while Shaw decides to go after Maria.
He and Finch later pose as international officials and meet with Rene LaPointe - a French diplomat part of the UN which Maria secretly watched and placed the GPS tracker she took from the warehouse underneath his car, at his office. Finch requests that LaPointe allow them to look at the paperwork naming Omar a terrorist and LaPointe agrees to let them do so, but only in his office. He says the letter is from the Ministry of the Interior, which Reese points out is full of corrupt people. LaPointe responds by saying that two terrorists also posing as translators were caught in Kentucky. Finch takes it into consideration and thanks LaPointe for his time before leaving.
Reese is present when Maria is taken to Finch's safe house. After hearing about Omar's situation, Reese suggests that they have Omar meet with his lawyer and implies that Finch can pose as one.
Finch is watching Omar get taken into a truck for deportation because of his knowledge involving the generators and Ken Davis and tells Reese that he is going to pursue them. Reese poses as a truck driver and knocks out the other guard and drives Omar to safety. Shaw reports to Finch that Maria is headed off to LaPointe's office and they both know she will almost certainly die. Reese, Fusco, and Omar arrive at the building posing as firefighters after receiving a smoke call that was started by Shaw. They enter the building, but are confronted by more hitmen. Shaw fires another smoke grenade in the building and it blinds the men who are taken down by Reese and Fusco. They manage to rescue Maria and cleared all of diplomatic immunity involving Sevon and arrested by the NYPD for the murder of LaPointe. After Maria's case concludes, Finch tells Reese, in the Library, that Davis hasn't been heard from and could be anywhere. (“Allegiance”)
Reese and Shaw are watching their latest number, Leona Wainwright, who Finch says works at the office of personnel management and is living in Washington D.C. Leona gets in a taxi and Reece gets out to approach the taxi Leona got into, only to find a man pointing a gun to her head. When he gets close, the man reveals a grenade and the car explodes.
Finch announces that they got a new number, Matthew Reed, and assign Reese and Shaw to Westchester under the aliases Frank Mercer and Betty Harris while Finch and Fusco go to D.C. to investigate Vigilance who are involved in Leona's murder. Reese and Shaw arrive at East Springs High School in Westchester where a high school reunion is taking place. The job is mostly uneventful, with the only notable thing is Reese gets slapped by three different women which Shaw explains that is because he became engaged with a brunette (the first woman to slap him), but then had an affair with a blonde (the second girl), only to have another affair with a redhead (the third girl), whose mother he seduced. They found out that Matthew's girlfriend Claire Klein was found death in his car because of a drug overdose and she is Doug's - the caterer of the dance - best friend and secret crush. Reese leaves while Toke talks to a man named Phil in order to call Fusco to ask for the police report on Claire's death. The bowling alley's lights suddenly turn off and the TV screens switch to images from Claire's death. Matthew appears frightened and leaves. During the ballroom dancing event, Reese and Shaw spot Doug chatting with Phil. Balloons begin to fall, but a mannequin of Claire falls with it; Matthew leaves. Reese asks Toke if he's seen any suspicious activity and Toke points out Phil's increase in height and masculinity. He follows Phil into the kitchen where they begin to fight. Toke walks in and Phil grabs him, threatening to kill him unless Reese drops his cleaver. Reese does but then throws a plate immediately afterwards, hitting Phil's leg and tripping him. Reese quickly knocks out Phil and finds a picture on him. He gets down to wake him up, but Phil dies, having consumed cyanide. Reese realizes Phil is a Vigilance member - the photo has a picture of Reese and Shaw. He places Phil's body in a cooler, pointing out that Phil was sent to observe them. Shaw sees Alice and several others unpacking hydrocodone prescriptions out of the goodie bags, the same drug that happened to kill Claire. Shaw gets a text on her phone from Claire, saying to meet her at the chemistry lab. She sees that the message was sent to Doug, realizing he's the one being terrorized, which means Matthew is the perpetrator. It was revealed that Doug accidentally killed Claire in an attempt to calm her down and ultimately to help her feel relaxed while having sex. After convincing Matthew to spare Doug, they get attacked by Vigilance. They ultimately defeat Vigilance while keeping Matthew's alive and got Doug arrested. (“Most Likely To...”)