A/N: I don't really know where this came from. It's really quite random. Maybe it's a representation of the sorry state of my own mind at the moment. I don't know. I very much doubt it makes much sense.

Sarah x

"Time of death, twenty-one forty-three," Hanssen heard Jac unwillingly sigh. She stalked away to her office without another word but Hanssen knew she was fighting back tears. That patient had been her special project tonight. He had watched her determined to save the young woman who didn't want to be saved.

Cautiously he knocked on the door. "Come in!" she called.

"Are you alright?" he asked gently, sitting in the chair on the other side of her desk. He guessed it was only hormones causing the outward emotion but he didn't say anything. She didn't know he had noticed she was pregnant – after all, why else would Jac Naylor be eating everything in site?

"Yeah, fine," she lied, putting her feet up on the desk. "Just not too keen on the nightshift tonight. I'd much rather be sleeping."

"I know you were hell bent on saving Elena Stewart," he said, "but in the end she wanted to die."

"She was nineteen years old," snapped Jac. "She was intelligent. She was beautiful. She had a life ahead of her.."

"She obviously didn't see it that way," he challenged her. "I may not like it when people take their own lives but I do understand why they do it."

He knew he had said too much when she gave him that penetrating stare he had received many times before, most recently in that old flat in Stockholm. There were many reasons he could understand those who committed suicide, and not least because it had caused his mother's death. He did not like it – the feeling or the result – but he was in a position to understand where others failed to comprehend the issue.

"There are other ways," Jac argued rather fiercely. "You can get through anything if you try hard enough. I'm not saying I don't understand it. I'm saying there are other ways. But I do understand why people can't find them."

"You've never felt it, have you?" he asked her softly. His tone caught her attention as her head spun to fully face him.

"You'd be surprised what I've felt."

The bluntness surprised him. He didn't know much of her past but from what he had heard, she never claimed to have lived in a rosy garden of happiness. It actually explained a lot about her traits., and it was a bit of a relief to Hanssen to know Jac Naylor wasn't just born the Queen of Ice.

"The hopelessness of seeing no future?" he raised an eyebrow at her. "No, Jac, you're too strong willed for that." She looked surprised at the use of her first name and that he was so obviously laying himself bare.

Jac seemed to think very carefully about her next words because she took a moment's pause before saying, "There's always a future. As long as we survive, there's always a future."

Hanssen gave a small smile. "That's where you differ from most of the human race. You don't question that you have a future." She smiled openly at the backhanded compliment.

"Most people do question it at some point," Jac agreed slowly. "Most also don't act on the answer if they don't like it. If you kill yourself, you're guaranteed no future." It was true and based on flawless logic, but he also knew that it was difficult to contemplate in the moment. "The thing I hate is when people call it selfish. Who are we to tell someone in abject despair that it's against the rules of our self-imposed morality for them to put a gun to their head to find some relief?!" she ranted.

He had rarely seen Jac get so uptight and reminded himself not to get her any more wound up. Pregnant women were not to be wound up, after all. He was relieved he hadn't opened his mouth to the wrong person, too. "She didn't have to do it," Jac sighed, putting her head back against the chair. "Elena. There help out there for her."

"You didn't want her to die," he replied. "She's your patient. I'd be more worried if you were unfazed."

"It's not just that. She was young. With the right help she could have had a good life," she explained her thinking.

Henrik sighed and leaned forward slightly. "In the moment, when you feel like you have no way forward and nobody to help, you don't think about anything else. It's so painfully suffocating you don't think that there is a way to get out of the dark hole you're stuck in. It's like..." he struggled for the words for what little he could remember. "...a storm with no calm centre."

He felt a little like he was defending Elena, and his mother, and himself, but he knew Jac held no ill will over the matter. He knew she was just saddened that such a young person had chosen to take her own life and Jac, as a doctor and as a fellow human being, couldn't save her. She was the kind of person to be inwardly affected by it, but hormones had forced her considerable emotion to the surface.

"Sounds like you know the feeling well," she commented quietly. She wasn't judging; she was stating a fact.

He said nothing, and knew he didn't need to. That he would never need to. Not to Jac.

He was mildly amused when her hand came to rest over her abdomen – and her baby – and he decided it was time to put her out of her misery. "I do realise your hormones have exaggerated your emotions but I would advise against letting Nurse Maconie see you get upset. He'll only worry," he smirked as her head snapped around again to see his face.

"What are you on about?" she demanded, clearly hoping to deny the fact she was expecting a child.

"The only reason Jac Naylor would walk around the hospital clutching to a biscuit tin like her life depended on it would be if she was pregnant," he explained. "And Jonny Maconie has been fiercely protective of your safety of late, which leads me to believe he is the father."

"You should be a detective," she smirked.

"It's called being observant, something many of our colleagues seem to be utterly hopeless at," he answered, barely disguising his smile.

"Not Mo. She knew before I did."

What Hanssen would have given to see the moment when Jac, known specifically for a lack of maternal instinct, was told she was pregnant. "I take it motherhood isn't a path you would have chosen for yourself."

"More like I wouldn't inflict my motherhood on a child," she laughed bitterly. "It's a sad moment when you realise you don't envy your own child."

He remained silent for a few moments as he contemplated her worries. In his eyes they were unfounded. Although he had never been able to see her as a mother, he had also never seen her as a bad mother. She had it in her. He didn't think it would come naturally to her but he had complete confidence that it was something within her capabilities.

"Have faith in your abilities. You might surprise yourself."

"Who are you and what have you done with Henrik Hanssen?" she asked. He smiled gently at her. "Well, if I'm a crap mother then Jonny will be a brilliant dad and make up for what I lack."

Her lack of confidence surprised Hanssen. She was adamant that she would fail as a mother. "I'm sure between you and Jonny you will work it out," he reassured her. It was a rare thing to see Jac in need of reassurance, which is why he didn't hesitate to give her it.

She just smiled doubtfully and reached into her desk drawer and pulled out a big box of chocolates. Placing it open on the desk, she said, "Help yourself."

He obliged, and said, "Stop doubting yourself. One of your greatest strengths is that when you're left with no choice, you do your best and get on with it."

Jac smiled and replied, "Everything will be OK."

"At least you have a future," he commented. "You have more than most can say they do."

"So do you," she quickly retorted. "You're a man of compassion. I've seen that for myself. One of these days, someone will see past that front of yours and find they love you."

"Pregnancy had better not make you soft," he answered. It was the only things he could say; after all, he did not take compliments well, perhaps because he rarely received them. So he cracked a joke. What else could he say?

"I'm serious!" she insisted. "You have a future. You just don't know who with. Or, more to the point, you don't know who's mad enough to put up with you," she grinned cheekily. "Jonny puts up with me," she added with a shrug, tossing a chocolate happily in the air and catching it in her open mouth. "There's someone out there for everyone."

It was an unusually sunny outlook to hear from Jac, and it brought a smile to Hanssen's face. Finally, the woman was content. It was obvious. While she tried to rebel against impending motherhood, she was also clearly intending on making her best effort at it. She always did her best at everything, and he knew family life – whatever version she and Jonny created for their child – would be no exception.

There was a knock at the door. "Come in!" Jac called.

"Elena's parents are here," Jonny stated. "Do you want me to tell them or-"

"No, that's my job," she sighed, resigned to the fact she couldn't stay in here all night. "Just get them into the relatives room in case they kick off. I'll be there in a couple of minutes."

"Course," he replied before he left, shutting the door quietly behind him.

"I'd better go," Jac finally said, taking her feet off the desk with a sigh. When they reached the door, she turned around and added, "Just remember, Mr. Hanssen, everyone has a future. You just have to see through the pain to find it."

"Always," he smiled, watching as she met Jonny in the corridor. As he passed them, he stopped them, and said to them, now that they were together, "Congratulations. You'll both make wonderful parents."

He walked away satisfied with the shocked look on Jonny's face and the expression of light indignation he left Jac wearing.

Hope this is OK, and makes some degree of sense!
Please feel free to review and tell me what you think!
Sarah x