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Quicksand

Catherine pressed her fingers over her mouth and snorted a chuckle as Steve and Danny made their way into the palace's locker room/shower area.

"You good, commander?" She asked and bent forward to peck his lips, avoiding the viscous mess still clinging to his lower half. "I heard the scanner burst."

"I'm good, no big deal." Steve grinned at his wife.

"Looks like you took a swim."

"He took a swim alright. He took one hell of a swim." Danny waved a hand. "Your husband jumped into quicksand. Actual quicksand, like on a Saturday morning cartoon." The detective looked towards the doors.

Chin entered with his usual easy smile. "Suspect's booked. Hi, Catherine."

"Hey."

"Why are you making small talk? Did you not hear how this lunatic chased a suspect into a … a pit of quicksand?" He looked at Steve. "You could have smothered. Did you never watch old TV shows as a kid?" He raised both arms. "The Hulk, the Lone Ranger, even Gilligan, all had quicksand…"

"And they lived through the episodes, didn't they?"

Two hours earlier…

The hopped up on God-knew-what man in his twenties flailed, his arms making windmills as he grabbed for Steve.

Seconds before he'd been running from the task force through the sandy wetland after tossing his spent weapon at Kono and turning tail to attempt escape.

When he suddenly found himself sinking he froze, eyes wide as he screamed "Quicksand! I'm gonna drown!" and turned towards the man from whom he'd been fleeing. "Help me!"

"You're not gonna drown, calm down," Steve said as they sank into the substance that enveloped him to his waist.

"I'll get rope," Kono called and ran the ten yards to the vehicles, returning with two lengths of paracord. The toss landed one inch from Steve who tied it around the now frozen-with-fear man.

"Relax and float," he directed. "Pull him out and take him in." He waved a hand. "Danny, toss me the second rope."

Danny tossed a line into the strangely moving substance while Chin and Kono led the suspect they'd pulled, winch-style, out of the sloshing sand to the cars.

Catching his best friend's worried expression, Steve said, "I'm good, just add tension while I work my way out."

"You're good? You're in quicksand. Stop moving so much before you sink deeper."

"Danny, it's fine." Steve assumed a back-float position and began to work towards the edge of the area as his partner pulled.

Once he'd extracted himself and was on solid ground, he clasped Danny's shoulder with a "Thanks" and strode towards the car.

Present

"I wasn't gonna smother," Steve said as he stripped off his t-shirt and moved around the walled area to the showers after grabbing a change of clothes from his locker. Two minutes later, without missing a beat he returned in a clean shirt and cargoes to continue, "Quicksand's more dense than a human body. Water and sand separate when there's a porous layer underneath and when it's disturbed, you start to sink. It's hard to move, but you won't sink deeper than your waist."

He tossed the towel into the laundry chute. "Once in Borneo, Hoss was stuck an hour. The real danger is hypothermia if you're in it too long in, say, a desert area and the temperature drops at night."

Danny rolled his eyes. "Forgive me, of course you have quicksand experience, Indiana Jones. We don't have legendary pits of death in Jersey."

Catherine smiled, knowing as usual his bluster stemmed from caring. "If you did, Nonna would have taught everyone how to survive it."

"You got that right." A smile at the mention of his grandmother crossed Danny's face. "Speaking of which, maybe I need to tell Grace the float on your back thing."

"She knows." Steve's lip quirked up in a smile.

"You taught her about quicksand?" The detective's blue eyes brightened. "Seriously?"

"She was camping with the Aloha Girls a lot, I figured she should know." He opened the door and waited as Catherine ducked under his arm and proceeded him through the frame. "She also knows how to build a small game snare and how to follow the flow of water to a stream."

"See that, you give me a stroke because you dive into quicksand, then you tell me stuff like that. That's why I keep you around."

Steve smirked. "That's the only reason?"

They'd reached the parking lot and Danny huffed, "And you made me a godfather to awesome little people. Besides…" He couldn't hold back a smile, try as he might. "It's pizza with Uncle Danny night. I'll follow you to the condo to pick them up." He looked at his watch.

"What's the exciting plan for dinner?" Catherine asked.

Mock glaring at his best friend, Danny gestured. "We may stop and pick up the messiest toys we can find, but first we're going through the car wash because for the five hundredth time," he pointed between Steve and the Camaro, "you owe me a wash." He winked at Catherine with a grin. "And probably new seat covers."

# End. Thanks for reading!

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