There are actually a few like this that I want to write, you know, changing scenes to accommodate the team's dragon nature.

Shout out to Phoebe Miller for beta reading!

Fact #13: Dragons are always good to have on your team.

Season: "Ki'ilua", Episode 10, Season 2

They were in untamed territory. Wild and dangerous. Off the grid. If they screwed up and got caught that was it. North Korea was not somewhere you wanted to have a screw up without a solid exit strategy. And Chin was pretty sure they had been flying by the seat of their pants ever since they got that call from Jenna and then since they had found her body at the bunker.

Joe and the members from SEAL Team 9 didn't look out of place here in the dense jungle, but the Five-0 taskforce sure as hell did. They were cops, not trained ninjas stalking through the jungle. Chin felt a bit better that Kono was relatively safer feeding them information from their basecamp. Lori was off redirecting the convoy in the helicopter. Him and Danny, though, were out of their element with these SEALs on hostile turf.

He glanced Danny's way. He was the one to have gotten the call from Jenna, and he had been taking charge for the most part. The man was a lot tougher than Chin thought people gave him credit for. But the whole helicopter ride out he had caught him sneaking rocks into his mouth. He was gearing up for the worst.

"Brah, you okay?" he asked quietly.

"Sure, sure, you know, just another day in the life of Five-0," Danny said. There were a few jittery undertones present in his voice, something Chin had learned were only present when he was nervous. Danny confirmed his suspicions when he continued, "We're just all going to get killed here and no one will know where to look for the bodies. This is such a stupid plan."

Chin placed a hand on his shoulder. "It's the only plan."

Danny inhaled deeply. "I know."

"You boys ready?" Joe asked as he doubled back towards them.

"Are you seriously asking that and expecting an answer other than 'No, I just wanna go home'?" Danny questioned, but as he was speaking he was shrugging off his gun.

He handed the weapon to Chin and walked off at an angle into the jungle, pulling his shirt over his head as he went. Joe shook his head as the jungle swallowed him. This was the plan. The plan that everyone was sure was probably Plan Z, as Danny had said earlier. Chin wouldn't admit it out loud, but he wasn't sure how well this plan was going to work out either. Or if it did work, what kind of shape they were going to find Steve in.

"Steve sure knows how to pick his partners," Joe said to him as they went about setting up the rest of their plan.

"Danny's a person you want to have at your back," Chin said.

A tree snapped in the distance the way Danny had disappeared to. Chin shared a look with Joe. It was now or never. They were sprinting towards show time.

Steve was in and out of it. The drugs that he had been given were screwing with his shifting abilities. His mental faculties weren't affected, thankfully, but he was unable to get his body to obey any command to shift. He was shift locked. He had heard of being shift locked, but it was nearly impossible to get a hold of the drugs needed to interrupt the signals that fired between the nerves that controlled shifting.

Then again, Wo Fat was one of those people that could get a hold of anything, it seemed.

The truck jerked to a halt.

He numbly rested his head against the back panel. Had they been driving that long? Maybe his mind had been affected. The bunker must have been a long ways behind them. They were passed the point of no return. He was trapped. Trapped with Wo Fat. He was convinced he knew something. He would torture him until he spoke or until he died. Those were the two options that his life had been reduced to.

There was gunfire.

An opposing group? Rebels or guerillas or something?

Screams. Men were screaming. They were running, too. He saw one flash by through the crack in the canvas cover on the back of the truck.

Smoke. He could smell smoke. It was oil and gas and rubber burning. And there was a woody smell, too. Trees were on fire. Was the truck on fire? He could barely get his legs to move. Death by inferno? Man, he was jumping from one hell into another.

A shadow blocked the light coming under the canvas. Wo Fat was coming to get him. He was going to move him so he could continue grilling him over Shelburne. Couldn't have him burn to death, no, then he wouldn't get answers that Steve didn't have. Saved from one hell only to suffer another?

The canvas flexed and thick, curved claws that vaguely looked familiar lifted the curtain. Blinding sunlight struck him in the face and he had to squint, seeing only a silhouette. Broad shoulders and a feathery crest of spines is all he could see. Then the beast yelled.

"Chin! I've got him over here!"

He knew that voice. "Danny?"

"Steve, it's okay, we've got you," that was definitely his partner's voice.

The large silhouette vanished and there was a shuffling outside of the truck along with a few more voices. He frowned. Time was really blurring now. He wasn't sure if it was seconds or minutes later when someone jumped into the back of the truck with him.

"Steve?" it was Danny. He was all disheveled and looked like he had just thrown on his pants and shirt, which may have been what had happened, and his hair was a disaster. Mud splattered his arms and hands, too.

"Danny," he said his name more to reassure himself that his partner was actually there. Actually there in North Korea. To save him.

"Yep. Come on, Super SEAL, we've gotta go," Danny pulled a mean looking knife from his belt and sawed through the ropes encircling his wrists. He sheathed the blade once it had cut through and slid one of his arms over his shoulders.

"You're all smoky," he commented upon getting a good whiff of his partner. That was the wood smoke he had been smelling. Danny absolutely reeked of it.

"Yeah, well, I guess you walked into the right hornet's nest," Danny said.

Chin and Joe and SEAL Team 9 were waiting on the outside of the truck. They had all come to save him. As he was helped down he glanced around at the havoc that had been wreaked. They had done a number on the convoy.

They stalked away from the truck. Hanging his head, he looked at the ground. Dragon footprints were imprinted all over the mud and he could see scorch marks where blasts of fire had just missed fleeing men.

He groaned.

"You okay, Steve?" Danny asked.

"It took me getting kidnapped in North Korea for you to finally shift," he muttered. "And I was too damned out of it to get a good look at you."

Almost saw Danny. So close, so close...his reveal chapter is already written and edited and locked in for early November. Next week, though, is going to be pretty Danny centered.

Thursday on "Dragons", Steve refuses to go to the dentist and his day rapidly goes downhill from there.

Also, please feel free to suggest ideas or facts or even types of characters you'd like to see! Like, don't feel shy. I don't bite. ;)