A/N: So I'm off to another lesson on how to sing jazz and make it swing. This is for SWWoman because she didn't get her grease fire wish and Jhill88 who foresaw what The Machine couldn't.

As always, enjoy x

Friday 9th September 2016, 8.31pm, Downtown Manhattan

Joss didn't know exactly where they were other than they were at least four storeys below ground level in Downtown Manhattan and this subterranean abandoned car park led to small rooms; 8 by 10 feet max.

"What is this place?" Joss asked, though the mop with the dried blood on it down the hall suggested there was a torture room nearby.

"Somewhere good for conversation." Shaw replied.

"Or interrogation." Joss thought aloud. "So what's this all about?"

Shaw's room opened with the key around her neck and the walls were the whitest grey. There was little furniture and no other escape. Sitting in one of two metal chairs was Zoe Morgan in a pale pink shirt dress, matching lipstick and a long white coat. Joss thought she looked tired, run down, even though she was wearing an extra layer of makeup. "Joss, hi." She wasn't expecting her, that much was clear.

"Zoe, how've you been?"

"Well. You?"

"Great."

Shaw bought this polite act as much as she thought all gummy bears were created equal. She got straight to the punch because she had to get back to watching 'Mucus Dabrowski' as she now called him. "Now we got that out the way, Zoe has something to say to you. Say it, Zoe."

Looking at her made it real; the ring was gorgeous. But Zoe snapped herself out of it because of something greater. "Actually I...this would be better with John."

"It really wouldn't." This was what Shaw called 'helping'. But some people didn't want help.

"Why?" Joss asked. "Are you in trouble?"

"No, she wants to be though." Shaw thought aloud.

Joss didn't understand the tension. "I'm confused."

"I'm...trying." Zoe revealed.

One of Joss' eyebrows raised higher than the other, Zoe and motherhood didn't go together in her mind. "Oh, well, congratulations. I didn't think..." She shut herself up in time, something she undoubtedly inherited from her father's side of the family. "Congrats."

Shaw instinctively edged between them because she'd seen Carter's mean right-hook up close when she rearranged Laskey's face. And that wasn't real. Zoe nodded as though she was in a trance; this was much harder that she expected. "It's not easy."

"I've heard."

"…Especially when you're doing it solo."

Joss smiled a faint and insincere smile. "I know something about that."

"And when you can't find the right..."

"Man? Tell me about it."

Zoe couldn't take the slow burn because she was running out of time so she dropped the bomb. "Donor." Jocelyn Hope Carter didn't need to finish Law School to see where this was going.

8.36pm, Finch's Townhouse, Carnegie Hill, New York

Finch's Sencha tea was going everywhere because he couldn't hold the mug still. Finally, an update.

- Subject engaged.

- Status: Orange alert

"Already?"

- Affirmative

"I don't suppose we can listen in."

- Negative

- Connectivity: Very Poor

"What about emergency lines?"

- Emergency service: Ambulance

- Status: on standby

8.49pm, Downtown Manhattan

Even though the room was hardly big enough for a double bed or some bunk-beds, Joss broke off into a side conversation with Shaw. "Is she out of her mind?"

Shaw made a medical assessment. "Pretty much."

"That's why you brought me here?"

"Yep."

Zoe interjected. "I'm standing right here."

"Not for long." Joss said, under her breath.

Zoe stood up, even though she felt heavy on her feet. "Hear me out. Please?"

For a reason unbeknownst to her, Joss started laughing; hysterically, uncontrollably, maniacally. When she looked back on it weeks later she'd probably say she was stunned. "Zoe. Zoe Morgan: the Uptown princess who's never heard the word, no. Well I'm saying it; no. In fact, I'm saying helllllllllll no."

Zoe didn't know what she resented more, Joss slapping her down or the assumption that she was a princess; she'd eaten way too much boxed Macaroni and Cheese in Queens to be a princess. "You know nothing about me."

"I know it's been over, if it ever was, and the most you're getting out of John is a fixed game of poker."

Shaw snorted at her inside joke. "Poke-her." She was only one who found it funny.

"I don't want John. I just want my baby."

"Bullshit." Shaw couldn't remember hearing Carter curse, ever. But she liked it, she really, really liked it. Her mother was coming out like Buddy Love in the Nutty Professor, and she wasn't in the mood to stop it. "You don't want him but you want something that will bond you for life. Explain that."

Zoe hadn't thought about the eternal commitment a baby would bring. At least she thought she hadn't thought about it. "I have standards; I don't just want anyone. If I did it would be much easier. Trust me."

Joss humoured her. "What do you want?"

"Good height, great health, high intelligence, athletic ability." She was too embarrassed to mention race in mixed company.

Joss processed it. "In other words, John."

"John meets my criteria." Zoe clarified.

"John is your criteria. Shaw, what came first; the chicken or the egg?"

Shaw gave the same answer she gave to get into Medical School. "Matter formed into a living organism that over time and due to environmental factors evolved into an egg."

"Exactly."

"I don't follow." Zoe said to Shaw, because Joss was burning a hole through her forehead with her 'that look'.

"You think John's your end game, the chicken, when really he's the egg; it starts with him." Shaw was succinct because they were the facts, after all.

Joss couldn't help but feel compassion even though she still wanted to push her in the Hudson. "Zoe, John's in a good place; the best he's ever been, because he's with me. And it's gonna stay that way. Now, you can have your baby, but not with my man."

Zoe had nothing to lose. "Do you have any idea what I'm going through? Feeling like an alien took over my body and my mind, just to take test after test to find out it's not working."

"No I don't. I just know what it's like to raise a child by myself; I didn't have the luxury of making that choice."

Shaw thought she'd rather tie her tubes in a knot and a bow and throw them over her shoulder like a heat-packing soldier than be in either of their shoes. Women.

"Well, it's clear where you stand." Zoe replied, making a resolution.

Joss knew it was futile to try, as she would never understand. "I'm not the bitch here, Zoe."

"I beg to differ." Zoe replied.

"Oh crap." Shaw saw sirens, slowing singing and flower bringing ahead.

So much for an olive branch. "You would. But even if I died, or I wasn't his wife, or we'd never met; John would still say no." That truth hurt more than any insult or physical attack could. "I want out of here. And next time, Shaw; call me about the job." For the first and probably the last time, Shaw didn't have a snarky comment to get the last word with.

9.21pm, Finch's Townhouse, Carnegie Hill, New York

Although this was a highly-stressful situation, Finch found it quite thrilling. Unlike his usual protocol for John; ascertain identity and proof of life and obtain ad-hoc medical care, this evening was unfolding with greater complexity. The likes of which was a challenge to him and The Machine.

- Subject in transit

- Status: Orange level

"Orange? You said Blue, you distinctly said it would go down to a general level of risk. So what took place in the last 20 minutes to change that?"

The flashing red dot on the birds-eye view map of Manhattan could only belong to Zoe's taxi, as it moved North. Finch held on to the smallest hope. "And her destination?"

- Destination: 40m from Base location.

Finch could see the end of the street through the window. "This is not good."

- Affirmative.

Finch was never good with women especially when they cried and he couldn't comfort them. But whatever tears Zoe had cried in the car on her way to him were not up for discussion; she came to him with one purpose – to speak to John. "Eventually, he'll show up here and I'm not leaving 'til that happens. I have a laptop, a cell phone, a protein bar, a change of clothes and a PA on speed dial. So Harold, please tell John I'm waiting for him."

"Ms Morgan."

"Zoe."

"Zoe. What if you don't get the answer you desire?"

"I need to hear it from his mouth. I want John to look me in the eyes and tell me he won't do it."

He wanted to ask her what would happen then, but it was no use; neither he nor the Machine could predict what her next move would be.

10.00pm, Joss' apartment, New York

An outsider looking in would've seen a husband fixing a leaky tap and a wife with frown lines in her forehead. Joss dropped her keys on the kitchen island. He could sense something was wrong with her. "Heavy workload, first day back?"

"No - just a truckload of bull to shovel." She sorted through the bills and tore the letter about the windfall from her distant Nigerian relatives in half.

"Tell me more."

She should've told him to put down the wrench. "Zoe's on treatments right now so she can carry the baby."

The wrench made a loud clanging sound as it bounced a few times in the sink. "What baby?"

Joss inhaled and unbuttoned her coat. "Your baby; she wants your sperm. Oh, and the missing Canuto brother wasn't missing after all; he's been at Canaan Prison this whole time while his brother ate dirt and died. So, yeah. That's me. TGIF."

When they were in the "whatever this is" phase, John used to listen to her talk about her problems knowing he couldn't so much about them because she wouldn't let him and didn't want his help. But he figured being her husband meant giving his help whether she knew she needed it, or even wanted it, or not. "Go to Canaan and get the answers you need. I'll handle Zoe."

"John-"

"Unless you want me to make a donation; I don't think it's that complicated."

"Are you telling me to be quiet?"

"No, I like having all my front teeth." She smiled. "I'm telling you; it's not worth the headache."

"And if she pushes your buttons? With her sad story?"

"I've been waterboarded. What can she do to me?"

Suddenly Joss' problems were put into perspective. "Okay. Mouth shutting right now."

To John, it was water off a duck's back, nothing to worry about, just like a leaky sink. Poor naïve John. "Let's have breakfast. Steak and eggs?"

"It's dinner time." She realised what he was trying to do. "Okay, breakfast for dinner it is." She took off her coat and filled in the Sudoku puzzle on the back of the newspaper. The unusual feeling of someone else dealing with things for her was unsettling. One afternoon when they were having pedicures, Evelyn asked her if she was afraid of being taken care of. She was tongue-tied then, and she was now. Because if this is what is was like to have someone around to fill in the gaps and do the ugly things she didn't have to, why did it take her so long to have it and where was it in her thirties?