Chapter 70

Steve laid back in the rocking chair, with baby Kaia fast asleep on his chest. She had just been fed and burped and they now had a couple of hours of blissful peace to look forward to before the whole cycle repeated itself. He took the time to reflect on where he was in his life since his return to his island home in 2010. His thoughts drifted back to the long journey from South Korea to Hawaii when he had been reeling from the death of his father and the loss of his prisoner. At that time, all he could think of was that Freddie had died in vain and it was all his fault - he had been the weak link that had allowed Victor Hesse to get a lock on their position and launch an ambush on the convoy. The pilot had invited him into the cockpit of the USAF C-17 Victory that brought him home to Oahu and he could vividly remember exactly how he had been feeling as he looked down on the meandering coastline of the place he had been born but no longer felt like home.

The SEAL had endured his father's funeral, feeling a profound sense of loss without understanding why - they had become virtual strangers and that last anguished phone call at gunpoint had been the most he had heard his father say for years. His Dad's declaration that he loved him had blindsided Steve and left him confused. He had been guilt-ridden, adrift and utterly alone . . . and now he wasn't. He had a wonderful wife, was a father to two beautiful children and had the support of his extended ohana. Plus he had the satisfaction of knowing that Freddie didn't die for nothing, Wo Fat's entire empire had been systematically dismantled.

His thoughts then turned to Five-0, the task force had seen some dramatic personnel changes, but the good work that they did was constant. His first new hire had been Lou Grover, the head of the HPD SWAT division. Steve's more collaborative approach had helped him build a strong working relationship with the competent captain and the two men had hit it off almost immediately.

About 4 years ago, Captain Grover had hardly gotten the chance to unpack his bags from the flight over from Chicago before he was thrown into a tense hostage negotiation at the Palace. Five-0 had arrested a dangerous human trafficker and the other members of his crew didn't want him talking to the Task Force. They stormed Iolani Palace and were threatening to start killing the hostages. Some years ago, Steve had wanted to be prepared for this very eventuality and conducted a number of training exercises that enabled SWAT and HPD to try out various strategies and expose potential weaknesses. He had already coordinated with SWAT about his intentions to distract the hostage-takers by pretending to bring them their prisoner and they were able to carry out a perfectly-timed breach of the building. Chin had been hiding out of sight during the raid and so when he popped up behind the criminals at the same time as SWAT stormed into the Palace, they had no choice but to surrender and shortly after that found themselves as long-term guests of Halawa prison. The Governor had been delighted that the tense situation was resolved without bloodshed and that another people-smuggling ring was disrupted. By coming to them, the hapless criminals had saved Five-0 the trouble of trying to track them all down. It also sent a powerful message to other criminals that messing with the Task Force was a really bad idea.

Steve had liked the bold approach of the new SWAT captain and started to invite him to his 'ohana' cook outs and other events. They both had their demons and helped each other deal with them in their own way, Steve stepping in to deal with a reporter who had been threatening to expose the reason why Lou had left Chicago. It had incensed Steve that a tragic hostage situation in which a toddler had been shot by his own father would come back to haunt a man who was already suffering deeply from his decisions that fateful night; it wasn't an exaggeration to say that it had nearly destroyed him. There was no telling what would have been the right decision the night, if the police snipers had killed the man then all Lou would have been able to think about was how a young boy was left without a father and people like this journalist would have been berating him for not trying to talk the disturbed man down first. Hindsight didn't help anyone in this situations and it was just sad that brave men and women who would step up and be prepared to put it on all the line for total strangers would always be open to second-guessing after the fact by sanctimonious non-operators.

Later that same year, Grover's daughter was kidnapped by a computer hacker trying to get his hands on $100 million of confiscated drug money. Five-0 were coordinating the transport of the money to the airport so it could be shipped out for Third World development. Unfortunately a corrupt Dept. of Defense employee called Agent Novak beat Grover to the cash. Five-0 helped Lou recover the money and they used it to lure in the hacker, a young man called Ian Wright, who badly underestimated the skills of the Task Force and just how far a desperate father would go to save his oldest child.

What Ian Wright hadn't counted on was a military satellite being made available at Steve's request that located him as he waited just out of sight at the pre-arranged drop for the truck full of money. It took the expert intelligence officers just minutes to trace his previous movements all the way back to a suburban house. HPD immediately sped to the address and found the poor girl trapped in a large dog cage. They wasted no time in patching through the message that Samantha had been rescued. Danny had held Lou as he cried, completely overcome with relief upon hearing his 'little momma' was safe.

It meant that they didn't have to pander to the young hacker anymore and Lou had volunteered to hide behind the crate of money before Steve drove the truck to the drop site and then walked away. The over-confident thief had reached the truck, completely sure that no one would try anything when he still held the key to his hostage's location. The enraged captain had popped up from his hiding place and surprised Wright, who had stumbled backwards out of the truck. He had pulled a gun on Grover but never got the chance to fire it. Kono had picked him off from her sniper's perch and he was pronounced dead on arrival at the hospital.

Although the money was safely recovered and all guilty parties either arrested or killed, the Governor had no choice but to fire Lou for gross misappropriation of SWAT resources. Steve wanted to offer the man a place on his task force and the whole team had gone looking for Grover; they found him on his favorite golf course and been delighted when he accepted the shiny Five-0 badge on the 18th hole, where the bored man had been playing his second round of the day and wondering just what his life had come to.

Jerry Ortega had been retained as a Special Consultant and had proved so useful that Steve had presented the grateful man with his very own Five-0 badge about a year ago. The talented conspiracy theorist never lost his passion for the unexplained, but also found that he rather liked helping solve crimes that could be explained as well. Steve secretly loved it whenever they all got a 'Jerry Alert' on their cell phones, as it invariably led to the team solving particularly tricky cases involving Chinese spies, secret military hardware or mysteries from the past.

Chin was now living on Maui, heading up his own task force. He and Laura had got married about 4 years ago and then Laura had been offered an amazing job on the beautiful island. She was prepared to turn it down but Chin didn't want her to miss out on the opportunity of a lifetime, her career becoming more important to her when it transpired that they couldn't have children. Steve was torn, he didn't want to lose his friend and colleague from Five-0 but also recognized that it was way past time for the highly competent lieutenant to head up his own team. He almost immediately realized that it would be selfish of him to try and convince Chin to stay and had promptly talked to the Governor. Sam Denning was quick to highlight the considerable skills of Lt. Chin Ho Kelly to the Maui County Chief of Police. He must have done a good job as the island's officials decided to create their own, albeit somewhat toned-down, version of the task force and hired Chin to head it up. The team were all very disappointed when Chin didn't take any notice of their many and varied ideas for a name, resolutely deciding to call it 'Maui Task Force' which became known simply as MTF. He liked having a three-letter acronym to shout at suspects, just like the FBI, CIA or DEA. Those seemingly innocuous three letters soon had the island's criminals wishing the task force had never been formed and Maui's Chief of Police was delighted with the successes of the MTF.

Steve spoke to Chin on a regular basis, offering advice when it was asked for and just happy to talk family when it wasn't. Maui was only a short flight away and so Chin and Laura returned to Oahu for 'Auntie and Uncle' visits as often as they could. They also both had family on Maui and had started to look into the process for becoming foster parents after Laura's uncle had invited them over for dinner and noted that they would make wonderful parents to some of the many island children who had not been so lucky in life and were desperately in need of love and guidance.