I do not own Hawaii Five-0 or any characters. No copyright infringement intended.
Notes: thanks to Phoebe for the quick sanity check!
H5O* H5O* H5O* H5O* H5O
Danny paced relentlessly by the side of the Camaro muttering nonsense under his breath and completely ignoring the amused looks Lou Grover was aiming his way.
Steve had left him. Steve had left him behind. Demanded actually that he stay with Lou "up top" as he so blithely put it.
"What makes him so much better at this, huh? So much more prepared?" Danny griped, turning with an unexpected swiftness on a startled Lou Grover. "He was affected too! This is bullshit! What am I supposed to to do, huh? Just sit and stay here like a damned dog?"
"You wanna go down there and take a look then?" Lou drawled calmly. "Seeing as it went so well the first time." Arms folded, he was casually leaning up against the Camaro and refusing to take any of Danny's bait. Danny glared at him; Lou simply stared back, his face far too bland. It was a blatant challenge; tried and true sarcasm from the older man, and Danny felt a flare of anger. But did he want go back down to the old bunker? No, he certainly did not and his teeth nearly chattered inside his head just at the thought. There was a distinct problem though. He also didn't want Steve to be down there alone. It was as if he'd made that lousy choice anyway and had given the damned thing what it had always wanted in the first place! Stuck and annoyed at Steve for telling him to stay put and mad at himself for actually doing it, Danny kept pacing nonstop in a desperate attempt to quell his nerves.
"Well? Do you?" Lou had the gall to ask again and Danny whirled his way in his annoyance.
"I ... what ... down there? Me? No, no ... shut up, Lou!" Danny stammered, feeling the hot red flush creep up his neck when Lou dared smile. But that didn't change his general opinion of things because he should be down there with his partner. Not with some ignorant DPW foreman and a native Kahuna who weighed about ninety pounds soaking wet. What kind of backup was that? Danny should have argued Steve's orders. In fact, Danny should just get off his damned ass and walk down the trail: ghosts and goblins be damned! But as the hair on the back of his neck began to itch, he had a serious commitment issue.
"This is stupid. Why'd he have to do this? Huh? Why did he have to go back down there?" Danny bemoaned his partner's decision to keep an eye on the Kahuna as he waffled by the trail head. "She seemed pretty damned competent to me!" He felt helpless to act. His hands were sweating and a deep V of moisture traced down the front of this tee-shirt, staining the dark blue material almost black. He simply couldn't make a decision though.
"I dunno," Lou said from where he roosted, before recanting just a bit. "Well, maybe I do."
"Do you? Well, I sure as hell don't!" Danny complained loudly, drawing the attention of a few of the DPW men. His heart was somewhere up in his throat though and his throat was on the verge of closing. He thought he'd be fine. Had been positive in fact, but Steve had known better and now Danny was all kinds of upset and embarrassed as he loitered helplessly by his own car.
"That Kahuna is fully capable ... I'm sure ... of handling ... it," he muttered as he errantly toed a small rock before kicking it off to the side. "Still ..."
"Calm down," Lou said as Danny began to cough uncontrollably. "They should be almost done and once they are, this whole area will be gated off." Lou gestured over his shoulder to the crew of men from the Department of Public Works who were readying many feet of chainlink fencing.
"A fence isn't going to keep that thing ... in," Danny hissed. He stopped walking then to look down the dusty path in the direction of the old bunker. He could just make out its outline through the heavy jungle. He shivered, taking an unconscious step backwards. To him, the shadow was obvious. It could have been a trick of the light or just his eyes, or even his own imagination, but a dark shadow seemed to have flit like ink across the path. He suddenly felt dizzy as his heart rate spiked.
Down below, he could hear the kahuna, her voice a nonstop timbre of sound without words. Her pitch seemed to have increased and Danny backed up another step. Something was wrong. He should go down and check on them. Steve, a brave DPW foreman, and one lone Hawaiian priestess were not enough to take on whatever the hell it was ... and all of them who'd sometimes whispered chaotic warnings and admonitions. Them ... who lined up to do its bidding.
"We should go down there," Danny murmured to himself, wanting for his legs to at least commit to the action. He shook his head though as he heard the woman's voice rise yet again. Something was absolutely wrong. He could feel it now.
"I don't like this one bit, Lou."
Behind him Lou continued to talk, but his voice had become a drone of sound much like the woman's. Danny scrubbed his fingers surreptitiously through his hair and then over his ear. Bees. They sounded like bees droning inside his head before Lou's voice gelled into actual words again.
"No, but it will keep innocent people out," Lou was saying out loud about the fencing. "Whether or not there's something down there ... whether or not that Kahuna purges all of that bad juju out or not. This isn't a safe place for anyone. It should have been closed off years ago."
Danny snorted in disgust or at least he tried to as his feet finally began to move. "IF there's something down there?" He challenged Lou right back, turning on his heel and aiming himself down the trail. Lou's voice raised in alarm just as the drone intensified and Danny shook his head against the rising crescendo while automatically drawing his gun even though it would be of no help at all. Its familiar weight in his hand was enough to make him at least feel better. The buzzing grew thicker, deafening him, and he knew then what it was all about.
They were happy and they were letting it know. He was there ... and he was coming.
Though distant, Danny heard a pleased chortle inside his head before literally sniffing the breeze and stifling a gag. The acrid odor was overwhelming. That combination of wet rot and decaying death made his head spin. Danny paled more but he kept walking, his forearm instinctively covering his nose and mouth. Then he saw it and he had no where to go.
It was supposed to have been bound to that one central spot. The Kahuna had said so ... so, what the hell was it doing coming up the path? Maybe it wasn't real at all. Maybe his eyes were playing tricks on him because even Danny knew how impressionable he could be at the worst of times. His own imagination had gotten him in trouble enough and pretty much of all his life. But as the shape flowed over the ground and he spied Steve struggling up the hill, hand in hand with the Kahuna, his eyes wide, there was no doubt.
And when Steve saw Danny, he broke into a long-legged sprint, almost ruthlessly toting TashiʻAukai along. To her benefit, the Kahuna seemed to be steadfastly chanting the entire time despite being off balance and quite incapable of really keeping up with his partner.
"Danny ... get out of there, man!" He heard Lou shout out his name once just before the big man cursed in surprise. From the area above, a faint sound reached Danny's ears. Something akin to a small stampede as the DPW crew scattered in various directions. Not a one towards where Danny was on the trail though.
"Shit," Danny muttered under his breath. If they all could see it too then it was real enough. He couldn't take his eyes off of it either. Horrified and mesmerized at the same time, he knew Steve was yelling at him, too. To stop and go back. His shouts were enough for Danny to at least slow his jog but then the thing seemed to stop midway, shifting and pulsing; maybe even beckoning him and Danny paused entirely. Steve was gaining ground on it with TashiʻAukai at his side. But the thing had stopped entirely.
Danny grinned.
It couldn't go any further.
So, it was limited then. Cautiously, Danny took a step forward but then moved to the side, taking a parallel track. It followed him but its distance didn't change.
"You're stuck, you bastard," Danny said while watching the pitch black of the shadow elongate in front of him. His private celebration didn't last long though because it shifted again, narrowing into a rivulet that flowed away from him and Danny blanched.
Am I? It whispered haughtily, its tone smug. Am I? Or, is it you who is ...stuck?
"Shit," Danny muttered because it was moving back and directly towards Steve. This wasn't what he thought would happen. Danny hadn't anticipated the damned thing doing something like this at all.
"Hey!" He shouted as he strode forward, breaking the invisible line within two or three steps. "Hey! Get the hell back here! I'm talking to you!"
It didn't stop though. If anything it picked up speed, overtaking his stunned partner. It was far too late for Danny to do a blessed thing as Steve fell to his knees, his finger scrabbling wildly at his neck. For the first time since her incantations had begun, TashiʻAukai lost her voice. Her resolve faltered and she fell to her knees, her hands reaching through thing in a vain attempt to help Steve breathe ... to do something.
"No!" Danny shouted as he bolted forward, eyes wide as Steve's face began to turn a sickly dark shade of red.
No? No ... What? The thing taunted him while it laughed, the sound grating dangerously inside his head.
"Get away from him!" Danny shouted back. "Let him go!"
Will you choose now? The thing asked coyly, toying even more with Danny as Steve began to lose consciousness. Will you?
"It's me, you wa- ..." Danny started to say but that was as far as he got when the thing released Steve and darted back to drape itself over Danny from head to foot. With a dim sense of deja vu, Danny knew this had happened before. Whatever the thing wanted - even if it didn't make much sense - this is how Danny had blacked out before. This was how he'd gotten lost inside with it and this was exactly how it had made him watch Steve die ... the first time.
Struggling to breathe through a rising sense of panic, Danny couldn't move or see beyond its thick cowl. Remember? It asked as it draped itself around him, hanging on his body. A weight which he could literally feel. Its thoughts and unearthly promises were now his again, deafening everything else around him.
Will you choose now? It asked again and Danny remembered what it had done to Steve, vaguely cognizant that the knife hadn't been real. That Steve hadn't actually been killed by it because he hadn't made a choice and he almost felt a sense of relief until it taunted him.
Are you sure? It asked him as it seemed to read his very thoughts. Are you sure I won't do it ... now ... for real?
Wondering why it wanted this of him, Danny grimaced against the smokey vapors which whipped around his head, entered his nostrils, skirted around his lips. Cringing as one, much like a gentle finger, traced his cheek, then his cheekbone, only to circle round to cup the back of his neck. Like a thin necklace, it joined in the front and Danny dropped his gun as he lurched onto his toes, drawn up higher by his neck.
Kill for me.
The noose tightened, slowly cutting off his air and Danny gurgled his hands going to his neck to find nothing there at all.
Forsaken beliefs. Lost causes. Holy wars. Kill for me.
The gurgle he heard was his.
Impossible ... loyalties. Kill for me.
'No. I won't ...' Danny thought tenaciously even if it felt as if his toes were completely off the ground now. He refused to choose to kill as he was assaulted with the most horrific of images. He dug in refusing to believe it could do anything to anyone even as something changed around him and the thing chuffed an angry sound. Danny choked as it flung an image of Steve at him, broken and bloodied. Dead. He fought it as it paged through his mind like it was nothing, showing him the same images now with Grace ... Charlie ... warning him that it was capable.
'Why do you need me...,' Danny asked it nastily. '... if you can kill? You're ... nothing.'
Kill for me.
It growled at him and Danny wondered just how true it was. Could this thing kill? Could it kill by frightening someone to death? But could it really ... kill? It growled again at him in a rage and Danny choked as his breath was cut-off entirely. He didn't understand as the smell of tannic blood filled his nostrils. Sticky and warm ... the stench flowed over him ... taking over all of his senses. He saw red flowing within the blackness of it until ... some change made it angry again ... it faltered ... as
...something ... good ... flowed over Danny and he grabbed for it with his mind's eye. Clean. White. Pure. TashiʻAukai was there and Danny grinned boldly into the thing's darkness. He sensed its hold loosen and he pushed harder, fighting it off for a moment before it turned its attention back at him. Once more Danny couldn't breathe as it spewed angry words at him.
'I won't do it,' Danny thought. 'You can't ... you're nothing.'
Kill for me. Or I show you ... an image of a blood-soaked Charlie filled his mind ... he whimpered in disbelief ... and then Charlie was gone. The thing faltered. It blinked out, leaving Danny a juddering mess. Its resolve faltered for a second and Danny felt it waver. Longer now ... long enough for him to see the faint outline of Steve's silhouette in front of his face where pitch black was giving way to a more gossamer veil of a whitish-gray. TashiʻAukai was gaining ground and Danny could now feel Steve's hands on his arms and then on his face. He was pulled, tugged and torn away. Somewhere, somehow he heard a woman's voice - TashiʻAukai voice - shrill and demanding.
He could still die. Danny knew that much as a tug of war began about him - around him - for him - he was plainly stuck within two different worlds.
"Danny!" Steve's voice was far away but there and Danny chose to follow it as the thing's hold began to give way.
There was another sharp tug, this one more inside his head and Danny winced in agony at the same time it shrieked. It was going to find a way to kill him as its final prize. It clawed at him and abused his soul even as it began to fade. Danny wheezed in one sharp, whistling breath and then another. He still felt its anger and its hatred but it was weakening ... withdrawing ... running back to the bunker. TashiʻAukai was chasing it back with a vengeance of her own. Banishing it and forcing it to disperse into splintered bits of shade and shadow.
Danny lost track of time and place as he watched it go, painfully still attached and drawn along with bits and pieces of what remained. In a dead faint as it vainly fought to keep him, Danny started to fall like a puppet whose strings were being sliced apart one by one. As the final connection was severed, he fell hard and fast, half wondering that it was going to hurt when he hit the ground and yet, that didn't happen. Instead, his cheek fell against rough material. He sensed that the sickening malodor was gone, replaced by that of man-made nylon mixed with the scents of stale sweat and what was most probably cordite and gun oil.
Steve.
He still felt disconnected though. His eyes refused to open as his body fought against the shock of it all.
"I got you." Danny heard Steve say practically in his ear and relieved, Danny tried to at least mouth Steve's name. But he failed as he was bolstered up into his partner's arms and fingers drilled into the side of his neck.
"Danny? Breathe ... come on ... breathe for me!" Steve chanted and Danny frowned because he was ... wasn't he? "Danny! Shit ... Lou! I need an ambulance ... now!"
Eyes closed, Danny's head lolled against his partner's shoulder, his cheek practically melded to the very real material of Steve's heavy tac-vest. He felt himself laid flat on his back as calloused fingers once again groped at his neck, seeking his carotid artery to be sure.
"Breathe damn you!" Steve shouted at him again and Danny fought to argue that he was ... he was ... confused when he felt Steve's hands on his forehead and chin, tipping his head back to conceivably open his airway more. Danny wanted to tell Steve to stop. To stop worrying because he was okay.
"Breathe Danny," Steve whispered. His tone was desperate, pleading. "Please ... it's gone ... so, just ... breathe."
Danny was sure that he was breathing even as Steve began to give him mouth to mouth resuscitation and he saw himself from above, arms flung wide, hands palm up, his pallor ashen around lips turned blue.
From high in the air, floating calmly, Danny simultaneously saw Steve pause in his reps. He felt those strong fingers checking his neck while Lou elevated his legs and called for that bus. Below on the ground, Danny watched himself twitch - he tried again to tell Steve that he was fine because yes, it was gone - instead though as Steve bent again over his body, everything just stopped.
~ to be continued ~