CHAPTER FIFTY

Title: "Forever and Always: For Eternity"

Author: Michelle Heath

Rating: MA for adult situations and language

Summary: Story #6 in the Salvation, Forever and Always Series. The honor of your presence is requested at the wedding of Lana Palea and Chin Ho Kelly.

Disclaimer: I so do not own Hawaii Five-0; unfortunately! All original characters are the sole property of the author!

Date Written: June 20, 2011

(As soon as Senior Chief Evans leaves Sam's office, she calls Steve from her cellular phone and her anger is simmering just below the surface.)

"Hey, Beautiful, what's up?"

"Besides my blood pressure? Plenty. Can you meet me for lunch?"

"Absolutely, Sam, where?"

"That little Italian restaurant just outside the base at 1100?"

"I'll be there, Sam. I take it I need to leave Danny at the office?"

"Yeah, unless you want both of us to be guilty of disobeying a direct order from Adm. Henderson."

"Okay, no Danny. See you at 1100 hours."

(Sam finishes getting the information she'll need for the budget meeting together, deals with a couple of things related to base operations, and, telling Adm. Henderson's secretary, Mrs. Tyson, she's going to lunch, leaves to meet her husband. Steve is already at the restaurant when Sam arrives and she smiles when she realizes that "Super Seal" has requested a table in the back of the restaurant and one that is no where near any other diners so they can have a "private" conversation. Ever the gentleman, Steve stands up as his wife approaches their table and gives her a quick kiss on the cheek before holding out her chair for her. Once they're seated, have placed their orders and glasses of iced tea are sitting in front of them, Steve takes one of Sam's hands in his and gives it an encouraging squeeze.)

"I take it Senior Chief Evans had some luck."

"Oh yeah. He found three different instances of data being altered over the past several months. All three times, the data altered related to the number of simulated 'kills' attributed to my aircraft during training exercises."

"That son of a bitch!"

(Steve is furious and Sam's reaction stuns him into a few seconds of being momentarily speechless because, at Steve's angry outburst, Sam bursts into laughter. If the situation weren't quite so serious, the expression on her husband's face would be truly priceless. Quickly getting a grip on her amusement, Sam explains why she's laughing.)

"Sorry, Steve, but that's exactly what I said when I realized Thorne was behind everything. Senior Chief Evans is pretty sure it's Thorne, too. Problem is, we can't prove it, and, we know there are at least two other people helping the bastard; someone in Washington who contacted JAG, and one here at Pearl who did the actual hacking. We don't know who these people are, and, again, we have no proof. The two computer specialists from San Diego N.A.S. are arriving at 1600, though, and Senior Chief Evans is personally meeting their plane and escorting them to my office. If Thorne, or anyone else, tries to approach them or speak to them, Lt. Atkins will step in and deal with the situation."

"That bastard actually thinks he's going to discredit you by altering data in a computer?"

"He may think he's going to, but it's not going to happen, Steve. The Pentagon is aware of what we suspect and the two computer specialists from San Diego are going over all our computer systems with a microscope. Hopefully, it won't take them too long to track down who went in and altered the data."

"This explains a lot, Sam. I guess Thorne thought that having someone contact the JAG office and raising questions about you would prompt them to dig a little bit and they'd find the discrepancies which would cause them to dig deeper and make it appear you'd falsified information in your service record."

"Bingo."

"I want to get my hands on this guy so badly I can. . ."

"Hold up there, my Ninja, Adm. Henderson and I have this covered. Let's not give Thorne and real ammunition against either one of us, okay?"

"Yeah, okay, but, Sam, if I happen to run across the guy in a dark alley . . ."

"I love that you want to take Thorne apart with your bare hands for me, but, as I told Lt. Cmdr. Monroe, we're going to take the high road on this one, Steve. I'm going to give Thorne just enough rope to hang himself and he most definitely will. What we have to do now is find out who the hacker is and get some hard evidence."

"You can be sure that whoever your hacker is, he or she is very good and they've done everything they can to cover their tracks; finding them isn't going to be easy."

"No, but we will find the hacker, Steve, and when we do, they'll give us Thorne on a silver platter."

"Still think you can save him, Sam?"

"No. . . I was completely wrong about Thorne, Steve. I should have listened to all of you a long time ago."

"You were trying to give him a chance, Sam. Yet another reason I love you; you always look for the good in everybody you meet."

"Yes, well, if I hadn't of been so stubborn, this whole mess could have been avoided. I'm sorry, Sailor."

"You don't ever have to apologize for trying to be a good person and a good officer, Sam. I'm just sorry that Joel Thorne decided to throw away the chance you offered him to become a good officer."

"Did I, Steve? Did I really try to help him or did I try to blindly impose my will on him?"

"First of all, you gave the man more chances than most people would have, and, secondly, you're his superior officer, Sam, you issued orders that he did his best to ignore without actually being insubordinate. Joel Thorne is an arrogant, self-centered, malicious individual and now he's trying to destroy your career. Yeah, you tried to help him and he threw it back in your face. Once you have the proof of what he's been doing, he'll be court-martialed and probably be given a prison term. The man made his bed; now he has to lie in it. You've done nothing wrong, Sam."