Chapter 72
Steve was still relaxing in the rocking chair and held his breath as little Kaia creased up her face in her sleep and then he let out a sigh of relief when she quickly settled again. As he took in her tiny features in wonder, he contemplated on the fact that he had both of his children to thank for still being here today. The first time was when Johnny was just a toddler and had come down with a bad case of chicken pox. It had really struck him hard and he was in a lot of discomfort from the itchy spots, as well as just being generally sickly. Mia was working and Steve had been able to wrangle a few days off work to look after his son, not wanting Mia's parents in the house; her dad had never had chicken pox and it could cause very serious illness if you caught it later in life.
Danny automatically assumed leadership of Five-0 in Steve' absence and had been very concerned about a new drug smuggling ring, which was flooding the island with deadly meth. They needed someone to pose as a pilot to fly a shipment onto Oahu. It was a perfect case for Steve, but he was not about to up and leave his sickly son with someone else – the little boy clinging to him like a limpet with only the magic of children's Tylenol providing some respite. Danny had suggested finding someone from HPD with a pilot's license and he would provide backup. Steve's control-freak tendencies meant that he didn't like the idea of Danny's safety being in the hands of an unknown officer and so he advised his partner to pass the case onto the DEA as they had much more experience with this type of operation.
The whole thing had been completely FUBAR, a rival gang appearing in a helicopter alongside the smuggler's plane and pumping it full of bullets. The undercover DEA agent posing as the pilot had been shot multiple times and was unable to land the plane. A drug dealer by the name of Dae Won had been in the back of the plane and he had shown his true colors by ditching into the sea and abandoning the 'pilot' in his haste to escape the sinking plane. There was a certain poetic justice in that the cowardly man never made it back to shore, his body was found washed up on a remote beach a couple of days later.
The saddest thing had been the autopsy results on the pilot, which showed that he had actually drowned and so had still been alive when the plane crashed into the sea. Five-0 had launched into action and tracked down the rival gang and put them down hard, but that was sadly too late for the undercover DEA agent. Steve shuddered as he thought about what would have happened if it had been him and Danny in that plane, they both would have been killed for sure.
The other case was one where some missing uranium got into the hands of expert bomb maker, Desmond Abati. Five-0 tracked Abati and the nuclear material to a terrorist training camp deep in the Waimea Falls jungle and normally Steve would have just gone in with Danny. However, he had received a panicked call from his wife, she had been spotting blood and then when a series of painful cramps had started the doctor was really worried – she was just reaching the end of her first trimester with baby no. 2 and so many things could go wrong at that critical stage of pregnancy.
Steve barked out orders to his team as he rushed from the office to meet Mia at the hospital, telling them to request an urgent meeting at JBPHH and share the intel with the Navy – something of this magnitude was a job for the special operators. Mercifully, both Mia and the baby were okay with a week of bed rest prescribed to bring down her blood pressure. In the meantime, the Navy had quickly scrambled a SEAL Team to infiltrate the camp and neutralize the threat. It had been a textbook mission, right up until the point that Nadim Taha, the mastermind behind the plot, had managed to arm the bomb in his dying moments. The Team leader quickly requested a direct video link to the EOD experts but it soon became clear that they could never disarm the device in the limited time available, such was the complexity of the failsafe mechanisms.
One brave SEAL had volunteered to remove the uranium core before the bomb exploded – the device would still cause some damage to the immediate area but would be without its deadly nuclear component. The man had taken all the precautions that he could, but had later suffered from debilitating radiation sickness that ended his career and would most likely result in secondary cancer later in life. Steve just knew that it would have been him removing the uranium core, he never would have let Danny take the hit. As the leader of the Task Force, he was responsible for the safety of his team and the buck would always stop with him.
Steve's thoughts turned to his loyal partner, who had stuck with him through thick and thin. He could have taken up many tempting job opportunities but had resolutely stayed at Five-0 and was always there to provide backup and unwavering, albeit very vocal, support. Steve had thought many times about how lucky he had been that it was Danny who had been assigned his father's murder to investigate. His lips twitched as he remembered their first meeting, Danny's sarcasm on full display when Steve had suggested showing each other their ID on the count of three. From this less than promising first meeting, a lasting partnership and friendship had grown and this man was most definitely his brother from another mother. Although, the effusive Clara Williams had been quite happy to 'adopt' Steve as her son and so they sort of shared the same mother now as well.
Detective Daniel Williams was in a very different place now and that was one of genuine happiness. For those who knew Danny well, the significance of this was huge. His partner had once confided in Steve about how his mind always went to the worst case scenario, even when something good was happening. He had told him that it was not in his DNA to be happy and that he couldn't just enjoy the moment because his focus was always on when it was all going to end. Steve had been saddened to hear Danny explain that while he was looking at Rachel on his wedding day, all he could see was the day that she would be serving him with the divorce papers.
Maybe it was the calming influence of the islands, that indelible tranquillity and peace, that had worked their magic on Danny's troubled soul as he was now a very happily married man. It all started when he met a very lovely researcher at the island's Bishop Museum during a case involving fake 'treasure' which had actually not been about gold coins at all, but involved a deep-sea diver called Blake Spencer trying to recover the remains of his grandfather who had been lost at sea. Dr Gabby Asano had been their scientific contact for the case and the two of them had immediately hit it off. She was highly intelligent and a calm gentle lady – the perfect foil for Danny's high intensity. The thing that had sealed the deal was that Grace absolutely loved her.
About a year into their relationship, she had travelled to Morroco and spent 9 months working on a project in the North African city. If anything the time apart seemed only to intensify their feelings for each other. She was completely different to Rachel in her outlook and temperament and that was a good thing; Danny had finally been able to let go of any residual feelings he had for his ex-wife and concentrate all his emotions onto a woman who wanted to be with him.
Danny and his daughter were beside themselves with excitement as they waited for Gabby to arrive home from her long trip and he surprised even himself by proposing to her on the spot, right there next to the luggage carousel. The other passengers standing around the carousel had cheered as she had said yes, Gabby holding her hand up to her mouth in shock at the sight of Danny down on one knee in front of her with an elegant diamond ring. Grace had presented her with a lei and giggled with delight as Gabby whisked her off her feet and spun her around.
Danny was now a proud father to two children – his wonderful Gracie, of course, and a bright little boy called Alfie. He was a bundle of energy with dark hair from his mother's genes, but otherwise the spitting image of his Daddy. Alfie was a little bit younger than Johnny and the two munchkins were as close as brothers – Danny calling them 'partners in crime' as they were invariably up to no good whenever they got together. Before Alfie had come along Gabby had been offered a curatorship in Colorado, but turned it down – she had a better life here on Oahu with Danny.
Steve couldn't have been more pleased for his partner, in some ways that awful fallout from Photogate all those years ago had given the man the jolt he needed to let go of his love for Rachel and that conscious decision had left him free to find it elsewhere. Steve wondered if Danny would ever had found 'the one' if he and Rachel had continued to get closer after his near-death experience from the sarin gas exposure. Even if Rachel and Stan had split up, would that have led to a lasting reunion with his ex-wife?
As it was, Rachel had gone on to have a baby with Stan about a year after Photogate – the businessman absolutely delighted to have a son. They named him Charles, which quickly became Charlie as he just didn't look like a 'Charles', although Rachel reserved the right to use his given name in the future if he was being particularly naughty. He had been a large baby, requiring Rachel to have a C-section in order to deliver him safely. As the nurses measured him at just over 21 inches long, they commented that he was going to be tall just like his daddy. Grace soon got over her initial disappointment at not getting a sister and absolutely doted on the baby boy. Danny had smiled, thinking of all the times that Charlie would be coerced to play dress up and have his nails done - he had lived through having an older sister and knew just how sneaky they could be.