A/N: Happy Friday! I hope your week was a good one. Sorry this is so late today, I've been insanely busy all week, but I am going to try to stick to Fridays as my update days.
Chapter 13: Too Easy And Too Hard
Arriving well ahead of the start time, Kono and Chin parked in the lot nearest to the garden entrance while Steve and Danny ditched the Camaro around the back of the location and moved inside via their contacts and a lock pick. There they sat and waited, out of sight of people driving in, but in plain view of the main entrance.
"What if he doesn't show?" Steve asked as Danny paced and fidgeted. "What if he knows we're on to him and he bolts?"
"Toast is on finding a residence for this guy. I'm sure we're not going to like what we find there, but that will be the next step," Danny said.
"And after that?" Steve asked just to keep his partner talking.
"I don't know, we've put his picture out to all the agencies, we know he's on a no fly list. If he's on the island the cameras will find him, and Toast will relay that information to us," Danny said trying to be optimistic but the conversation was making him more anxious.
"We have to catch this one," Steve said and looked away.
"This time," Danny added but his attention was drawn to the arriving workers.
One by one, trucks entered the garden's parking lot and drove to locations they were assigned to work. Kono and Chin watched and recorded every person until finally the suspect was spotted. He drove in, parked the vehicle with his partner, and then exited to get started. He was stopped by the yells of the four members of Five-O, as they rushed toward him yelling at him, and before he knew what had happened, with all his co-workers looking on, he was grabbed by Danny and his arms were twisted behind his back.
"You're under arrested for the attempted murder of Aubrey Strahan," Steve said in a harsh whisper and Emerson's face betrayed him.
"I don't know what you're talking about," the fugitive stated defiantly.
Knowing that the man was lying, Danny also clammed up. He read him his miranda rights and after that, said nothing at all to anyone.
Back at the office, and with the fugitive locked in an interrogation room in the basement, Danny broke his silence, growled, and stomped around to alleviate his anger. "He believes he killed her, it was written on his face when you told him what he was arrested for!" Danny yelled at his partner.
"Like you had any doubts," Steve countered.
"I'm not mad at you, I'm just furious with the monster in the basement," Danny continued to yell.
"You need to calm down, we need him to tell us where that other girl is," Steve said as he watched Danny were out his negative energy.
"There are probably so many more than are even known to us," Danny said as if Steve's commented had completely deflated him. He ran his hands through his head, breathed deeply and paced, struggling to fight back the outburst that was brewing.
"And we need him to confess to that," Steve said.
"We need Toast and Jerry to find us a location for his current residence," Danny added more calmly now as the detective took over again.
"So we're going into a full on assault in this interrogation, like it's life or death and I need you to read every nuance and every tell this guy let's slip," Steve continued. "Are you ready for that?" He asked.
"I can't promise that I won't kill the guy," Danny confessed.
"We're on the same page there, and I have a plan to make him suffer, but I need you to be the cop I know you are and I need you to break him down even more than my methods will," Steve said.
"What are you going to do?" Danny asked.
"You're not going to go all human rights activist on me, are you?" Steve questioned in return.
"Not with this one, Steve. He's killed too many children and mine are scared of him. My kids, who went to school yesterday only to come home to know of this monster and that I'm on this case. No, I don't think he deserves any kind of sympathy. I'd strap him to a chair and throw the switch myself just to make sure he was dead, but I can't do that, we can't do that because I'm sure there are others, Steve, and we need him to lead us to them," Danny's words were exactly what Steve had wanted to hear but at the same time he realized that Danny shouldn't talk like that.
It was proof to Steve about just how much this was affecting the father of two and a part of him wished that the capture of this monster, this less than human creature they were now holding in a cell in the basement, would have given him relief or that he would have had reason to shoot him just to end it for Danny's sake. But in his head, death was too good for this guy. He needed to suffer, he needed to see the consequences of his actions. They needed him in a maximum security prison, known to the inmates as a child murderer and sexual abuser. His life would be a living hell after that, till his dying day, and that's what Steve needed for himself, and for Danny.
"If I'm right, and there are others, are you prepared for that horror?" Danny asked when his partner's silence had lasted too long to be comfortable anymore.
"I've been to war, Daniel. I'm ready," Steve answered sympathetically.
"This isn't going to be like the child casualties you saw in your war days. Hell, it's not even going to be like having to kill a child because they are pointing weapons at you. This is about a man, messed up enough to hunt and abduct children, to do unthinkable things to an innocent and then to throw them away when he's done using them. This is why people make up stories to scare their children into cautiousness. This person is enough to destroy your ideas of humanity all together, and seeing children in paupers graves, discarded like trash, that is what you're going to find now. And once we get past that horror, you're going to have to finally bring closure to families. To see their hope fade away into nothingness when you snatch it from them because their hope to find their child alive, as small as it might be, will have been there the whole time and you're taking it. Then you'll have to tell them the where and the why of the whole situation because they will ask, and you'll relive the horror every time through someone else and how their brains interpret it. This is not war, not even close to knowing what war is, this is so messed up that it's going to mess us up. I will see my children in these children, I already do, because I'm a parent and these are the nightmares that you have, and you pray that they never become reality. You hope that your mind is just playing a sick joke on you, but it's not. The guy is sitting smugly in a cell downstairs," Danny rambled on as he paced the length of the office space and ranted away his anxiety to prepare his partner for the absolute worst he could imagine. His feelings and actions ebbing and flowing back and forth from anger to despair and every emotion in between. "I'm not ready for this undertaking, you can't be prepared for it either."
"I'm not, but I know that someone has to do it for the families and for these victims. So I'm ready to take on the burden," Steve said as he breathed deeply to steady himself as well. "I know this will affect me for the rest of my life."
"Good, now be ready to pray that we never encounter this kind of evil ever again," Danny said as the door to the office was opened and Kono stepped in.
"Don't mean to interrupt, but I thought you'd like to know that Aubrey is awake," Kono announced as she apologized.
Danny snapped from his anxiety to look at her. "And?" He asked breathlessly.
"She isn't exhibiting any deficits at this time, which is a miracle, and so the doctors have okayed her to speak to you. Her parents want to be cooperative but they also want to be present when you speak to her," Kono answered.
"Prep a suspect line-up and send it to my phone," Danny ordered and threw the Camaro keys at his partner.
"What about the monster?" Steve asked.
"He can sit and wait and contemplate his capture. We're going to have this little girl pull him out of a line-up and we'll have the proof we need to prosecute him. We have leverage now," Danny said and rushed out of the office.
Steve had to run to keep up.