I do not own Hawaii Five-0 or any characters. No copyright infringement intended.
Notes: I'm intrigued by the different camps on Kono's actions. Even after considering saving copies, the muse appreciates that opinion; yet firmly believes she would do precisely what she has done (at least for the purposes of this story).
Chapter Seven
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Kono hurriedly returned to their offices to follow through on her own plan of action. She felt good once her task was accomplished and she remained personally comfortable with the decision. It was something she felt she could live with more productively than having two of her friends potentially more damaged in the future. There were two different cameras in the room and she had two saved files to review. Though she could see the far corner of the room, one remained more focused on the suspect seated in the chair. The second was a wider angle shot to take up the large majority of the room.
She especially felt vindicated for her decision after forcing herself to watch both feeds from start to finish, not once but three times; it took her that long to cope with the emotional reaction before she could assess the larger file more coolly. Even then, she was still falling apart as certain portions were repeated. On the third viewing of each though, she tried to determine when the first clue could have been to put their suspect and Danny both in danger.
She saw that easily enough at the thirty-two second mark when Danny intervened between Miller and Steve after the solid abdominal blow. Pushing her feelings down firmly, she saw Steve's back and the expression on the doctor's face when his hair was fisted. She saw the man double-over, gasping in pain and then the speed at which Danny intercepted his partner.
"Thirty-two seconds." She noted the mark out loud and sighed deeply. Her hands were shaking three seconds later as she watched Steve violently hustle Danny back into the concrete wall. Thirty-five seconds into the interrogation, things had unraveled at a startling rate.
She knew that she and Chin had been moving at the forty-second mark when Danny's eyes met the second camera. His expression was a mix of confusion and a plea for help, both doused with a budding knell of fear. It was impossible to watch the fight impassively no matter how hard she tried to convince herself that she could. Kono choked back a sob when Danny instinctively touched his holster which evidently even surprised himself. But by then, he knew he was in trouble and would have limited options. Things got worse when Steve so obviously taunted Danny to go for the door as his one route for escape. She lost sight of Danny as he was physically shoved back into the corner under the camera. But her eyes flicked to the second saved feed where he was picked up again.
When he reappeared so eerily in the far camera, her hand covered her mouth and tears sprang up again. He was seriously in danger at that point and clearly out of options. Steve's next rush took out his knee and he shouted in pain when it crumpled.
"No, no. They don't need to see this." Kono bit her lip as more tears poured down her cheeks. The final methodical maneuver which clearly put Danny in the hospital numbed her mind completely. Seeing Steve capture Danny about the waist with an intentional backwards fall to connect with the concrete floor was something she would never forget. Then there had been the seizure as his body reacted to the stunning force of the unyielding blow.
Watching her other self and Chin slamming the door open to enter the fray was equally nauseating. Her current expression mirrored the same stunned shock as she watched her cousin tase Steve from a different angle. She was still sick at needing to watch herself vainly try to help Danny who lay so scarily still and bloodied as their tapes continued to roll for minutes on end with Steve bellowing in restraints and then both H.P.D. and emergency services arriving.
With her nose glued to the screen and focusing solely on Doctor Arnie Miller, Kono watched the smaller, single feed on the suspect one last time to take notes and commit the key parts to memory. Other than his stunned look and final pleased smirk, her evaluation proved that there was nothing of value there either. There was nothing to hear and definitely nothing worth seeing. But still, her finger toyed over the delete key for each file until she was positive that nothing in either the video or audio feeds benefited the larger case.
"Nope." She honestly couldn't think of a single reason to retain the files. There was nothing of value to learn and only those things that would twist, hurt and inflict so much more pain. With another settling breath and through a fresh bout of tears, she hit the delete key and watched the files vanish.
Without hesitation and a lighter heart, she simply blew her nose, wiped her eyes and returned to the hospital.
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As Kono mentioned, Steve was released within hours of being admitted once blood tests came back as normal. It was all he required to be cleared to return to his job with a clean bill of health, however mentally, he was nowhere near wanting to do that. He had kept both Chin and the doctors busy with demands to hear every detail about his partner's condition. Then, he needed to see Danny for himself. It all lasted more than long enough for Kono to run back to their offices and complete her objective, plus her absence was never questioned.
By the fortuitous time she returned, Steve was just striding towards the intensive care unit with Chin at his side. "Hey, boss?" With a worried glance towards her cousin, Kono jogged up to them. She was holding a hot cup of coffee which was more prop than something she intended to drink.
"Cafeteria?" Assuming Kono had taken a short break, Chin muttered his question tiredly. His eyes showed his fatigue and the level of stress which surrounded the pair was staggering. She nodded quickly before going back to what they were doing.
"Steve." She had been the only one to see Danny so far and she couldn't help being concerned. Still a bit unsteady on his feet, Steve's face was pale and his eyes were darkly unreadable. Bent slightly at the waist, it was obvious that he was in some physical pain from the earlier altercation. "I'll go with you. Alright?" But he didn't verbally answer her. Instead, Steve glanced towards her cousin and walked around Kono, leaving her where she stood in the corridor.
"Chin?" Confused and deeply troubled, she found herself brought to a standstill by a firm hold on her arm. "What's going on?"
"He wants to go alone." Chin explained. At his own insistence and after interrogating the doctors, Steve's first trip was to the ICU to see for himself what he'd done to his best friend. He and Chin already had a soft but adamant one-sided disagreement about his desire to be alone; against his best argument, Chin had lost.
"He's not going to be ready for this." Kono whispered urgently behind Steve's vanishing back. His left arm was held stiffly against his own injured pair of ribs which Danny had managed to badly bruise. However, his shoulders were already hunched tightly together with tension. Having just witnessed the taped events over and over again, Kono was even more on edge and upset. She was absolutely certain that Steve needed them all to be together.
"He's not ready, Chin. We need to go with him." Intending to chase after Steve, she shook his hand off, but Chin quickly regained his hold to keep her back. Frustrated and now angry, Kono gestured with one hand, nearly spilling her coffee in the process. "But .. he's not! "
"It's what he wants and he's never going to be ready, cuz." He absolutely agreed with Kono, but Chin was forced to stop her from following. At a loss of how to help at that point, Kono folded herself into his arms for a badly needed hug.
"I know, but he has to do it his way." She was crying again. Chin could feel her tears soaking his shirt so as he held her tightly, he made a promise into her hair. "We'll be here for both of them and it will be alright with time."
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Inside the ICU, Steve hesitated only briefly to confirm where Danny's room was. The quiet activity reeked of each critically ill patient's special status and yet, Steve was relieved when no one stopped to question him. He was virtually ignored as doctors and critical care nurses efficiently went about their individual jobs. Steeling himself, he noted the correct room and then purposefully entered because he had no right in his mind to feel such personal fear or dread. He was entirely responsible and he needed to face his partner.
He stopped just inside the doorway, aware that Danny was alone in the semi-darkened room. However, Kono was perfectly correct because Steve soon realized that he wasn't at all ready. His mind went numb and his mouth dumb as he stared at the still form on the bed. His mind was slow at absorbing the sheer number of leads, wires, intravenous lines and machines which dwarfed his silent, unmoving partner. Steve had been told the grim details by the doctors, but he couldn't believe what he was seeing.
"Danny." He barely heard his own voice. For the first time he could remember, Steve didn't know what to do and had nothing to say. What little he could see of Danny's face was swollen and littered with bruises. Machines droned, buzzed and whooshed around the otherwise morbid stillness of the room all because of what he'd done.
"My god, I just don't remember. I did this?" He couldn't believe that his brain refused to remember what he was seeing evidence of now. Steve rubbed both hands over his face, almost relishing the way he hurt his bruised cheek. Feeling sick again, he had to fight past a sharp pang of dizziness because Danny's chest was rising and falling in time to a steady mechanical noise. It took minutes for him to remember the ventilator and then to breathe because he was so overwhelmed by the sheer magnitude of what he was seeing.
"Danno." He mumbled tightly as his throat closed. A few seconds later, Steve felt disembodied as his own bruised hand dared to find Danny's lax fingers. Clearly shocked, Steve didn't even recall walking closer to the bed. He stood there for a long time in a silence only punctuated by mechanical sounds and the occasional unintelligible voice heard from outside the room.
"I'm sorry." Steve breathed out before swallowing thickly. A pulse point started to throb painfully in his temple and he rubbed at it in a vain attempt to push it away. There was a chair in the corner, but Steve couldn't bring himself to sit in it. He was stuck in place by the side of the bed, slightly hunched over at the waist and now holding Danny's hand. No matter how hard he tried, Steve could not force himself to remember any more than he had already told Chin.
Steve closed his eyes tightly again but came up with an empty, black hole for the effort. "I'm so, so sorry." He whispered again. Swathed in bandages, Danny's head was almost completely covered and stark white to the purpling facial injuries. The tube for the ventilator obstructed more of his face to make him barely recognizable. But Steve nearly cried when he saw the cervical collar, under which raw obvious bruising snuck out from around Danny's neck and tracing down to his collarbone. Under a lightweight white blanket, his knee lay elevated on a pillow and equally protected in a metal brace.
The SEAL inside had meant business and being tased into submission was never going to be good enough penance. He had forced Chin to tell him that, too. Because with each bit he was told and then pieced together with his own vivid imagination, there had to be ramifications for bringing him down. There would have had to have been a plan if he'd been so out of it. He would have needed to be subdued and because of that truth, his friend had to sink wearily into a chair after admitting what he'd done.
But Steve was thankful. He was truly thankful that Chin had the foresight to be so valiant in protecting their friend.
"Danno. I'm sorry." He brushed his fingers over the damaged hand. It blurred to disappear into a white mist and Steve finally realized he was crying.
"Sorry. So incredibly sorry." His voice broke and yet he still couldn't stop the stupid reiteration of senseless words which were never going to be enough. Never; even if Steve believed that a godforsaken drug had forced him to a space he swore he would never revisit again. Standing over the bed with tears now obscuring his vision, it wouldn't matter if Danny Williams ever forgave him because Steve McGarrett might never forgive himself.
~ to be continued ~