Sorry for the delay guys! Long story short, my sister is moving cross country and got to town a few days earlier than she thought they were going to, so I took some time off to visit with her since I haven't seen her for eight months.

Shout out to Phoebe Miller for beta reading!

Fact #162: Survival can be summed up in three words – never give up.

-Bear Grylls

Season: 5th Season

Rescue

"It was a prank."

"What?"

"Kurt didn't want to hurt them. He just wanted to knock them down a peg or two."

Kono gripped the safety railing on the boat. She still couldn't believe what Kurt Kemp's wife had told her.

"He was gonna take them out on his boat with a few of his buddies. They were supposed to go camping for a few days, have a good laugh about it."

No one was laughing.

Kemp's boat had never shown up in any marinas and he had failed to make contact with his wife since the day Steve and Danny had gone missing. When they had gotten Kemp's buddies' names, they had been unavailable and their wives and girlfriends had confirmed that they'd gone with Kemp and had been out of touch for longer than they should have been.

It was with a combined effort of the women left behind and one of Kemp's buddies that hadn't accompanied him that they finally came up with rough coordinates for the deserted island Kemp liked to camp on.

"We're going to have to turn around soon, Detective," the captain said.

"Give us ten more minutes," Chin pleaded.

"Ten minutes then we'll have to get back to shore before that storm blows in. You don't want to get caught out here in a storm, eh," the captain said.

Kono glanced at the bank of storm clouds on the horizon. The sun had set them ablaze with fiery reds, but a heavy darkness was closing in fast.

According to the weather reports they had fished up around the time the boys had gone missing, this area out in the ocean had been hammered with some severe rainstorms and winds. Kono had a bad feeling about the lack of contact. A small personal boat out in huge swells? A wreck seemed very possible.

This boat was bigger than what Kemp's wife described his boat as being. It wasn't an official Search and Rescue boat, but it belonged to a volunteer who had enough experience and did enough ocean rescues to give them a boost of confidence.

Still, she was torn between continuing to look and not wanting to get caught in a storm.

"There's your island," the captain said.

It wasn't much. It had a bit of a hill that loomed like the back of a black bear in the falling night. From this distance, it was hard to make out anything on its shores.

"Can we get closer?" Catherine asked.

"I don't feel comfortable taking her in real close in the dark," the captain said.

"There must have been somewhere that Kemp could anchor his boat securely," Kono said.

"Well I'm not Kemp and this tub is much bigger than his was," the captain said. He gestured to the searchlight mounted on the bow of the boat. "Kick that on and start sweeping the shoreline. Hopefully, if someone's there, they'll see it and give us a signal. Otherwise, we'll have to try again once the storm's gone."

Chin eyed the clouds then the island. "How long before the storm passes?"

"This time of year they start hanging in with their teeth," the captain said vaguely.

Kono took that to mean they had to look now or they may not make it back for another week.

Catherine was already manning the searchlight, dragging its high powered beam along the shoreline.

Kono held the railing with a white knuckled grip, her binoculars dangling around her neck, ready to be brought up. The shore was fenced in by tall trees and jagged black rocks. No one had any clue where Kemp normally left his boat on the island. There was a chance that anyone who knew was at the bottom of the sea.

They may have all been at the bottom of the sea.

She gritted her teeth.

No.

No, Steve was a Navy SEAL and an Amphibian crossbreed. Drowning him would be like trying to drown a fish. He would have made sure he and Danny got to land. They would survive. If anyone were survivors, it was the Five-0 Team.

The white beam illuminated the nooks and crannies of the rugged shoreline. The black rocks cast strange shadows that twitched with each movement of the light, and the imposing trees forming the dark barricade blocked the light from traveling much further than the ocean facing boughs of needles.

An open space briefly yawned in the shoreline, swallowing the searchlight and spitting it back out once the shore picked up again. It looked like more trees back in the little cove.

The boat powered slowly through the waves, giving them enough chance to get a good look at this particular side of the island. This may not have even been the side Kemp brought them to, or the side they washed up on.

Kono's heart dropped as the captain looked at his watch and shook his head at Chin.

"We've got to turn it around," the captain announced.

Kono cast a longing look at the island as the boat began to turn in the water.

"Wait!"

Catherine's yell startled them all. She swung the searchlight back towards the little cove.

"What's that?" she asked.

Chin joined Kono at the railing. Kono brought her binoculars up and tried to zero in where the searchlight was pointing.

A flicker of orange glowed on the trees for a moment.

"Is that fire?" Kono asked.

Chin nodded.

Another jet of fire glowed on the trees.

"Dragon fire," he said.

Kono grinned.

That was twice in his life he had never been so happy to see a boat. Once when they had been floating in a dinghy off the coast, and right now. Kono and Chin and Catherine had been waiting there on the aft of the boat for them. The water had been frigid and the short swim grueling, but he would have attempted a swim through lava to get to that boat and his waiting teammates. He had never been so happy to see a towel and a pair of dry clothes waiting for him, either.

It was only once he shifted down into human form and put on his clothes that he realized he was shaking and felt like he had been drained of all his lifeforce.

"Woah, easy there, brah." Chin steadied him.

Danny let himself be guided into the narrow booth while Chin slid into the one opposite of him. The cabin below deck was small with a tiny table, tiny booth seats, tiny cabinets, a tiny bunk, and an even tinier bathroom. If he wasn't so tired, he'd be claustrophobic. His mind and body just didn't have the energy to put up a fight against the enclosed space.

"You look like crap," Chin said.

"Thanks. That's very flattering," Danny said. "It's not like I just survived living on an deserted island for a week."

"You two had us worried," Chin said.

Danny didn't like the way Chin's eyes roved over him with concern. He knew he had dropped a few pounds, but he wasn't a walking skeleton.

When Steve emerged from the bathroom dressed in a pair of sweats and a 'I Heart Canada' long sleeve on, though, Danny got a better idea of what Chin saw in him. Steve's face was gaunt with dark circles under his eyes. Week old stubble lined his jaw and his hair was a disaster despite them having been in dragon form their whole stay. It was one of the many mysteries that surrounded dragons and shifting.

But it was the way the shirt hung off his arms that was concerning. His collarbone seemed starker than normal, his shoulders bonier, his gait slow.

Catherine trotted down the stairs and paused. "Wow."

"Yeah. If you need to lose a few pounds, the deserted island diet will do the trick," Danny said and weakly gestured toward his slightly too big shirt and then Steve.

Catherine enveloped Steve in her arms, holding him gently like she was afraid she would break him. Danny thought they were coddling the two of them a bit, but he wasn't going to complain. He had been roughing it the last nine days and could use some kid gloves treatment on him right about now.

Kono came down the stairs and about ran into Steve and Catherine.

"This place is about the size of your first apartment on the island, Danny," Kono said as she squeezed around the other two.

"Well, if your island didn't charge such ridiculous rates for apartments and I didn't have to pay out child support to my now rich ex, I could have wound up in a nicer one," Danny said.

Kono chose to let his comment be and instead handed him a paper cup and scooted into the booth next to him. It was a bit of a tight fit with everything being tiny, but he appreciated the human contact.

"What's this?" he asked and sniffed it. Not coffee like he had been hoping.

"Broth," Kono said. She handed the other cup in her hand to Steve. "The captain is a Search and Rescue volunteer, and said to get you guys hydrated while we head back to shore."

Steve leaned against the cabinets with Catherine tucked under one arm, though she appeared to be supporting him more than cuddling him. He sipped at the broth and Danny followed suit.

He wrapped his hands around the warm cup. The pale yellow liquid sloshed with the motion of the waves.

"Would much rather have a double bacon cheeseburger," he muttered.

"With malasadas," Steve added.

Everyone looked at him.

"Since when did you get a sweet tooth, Boss?" Kono questioned.

Steve shrugged. "All Danny could talk about was food while we were there. Got me craving something fatty."

"Apparently they don't have malasada bushes in this part of the country," Danny said and cracked a grin.

"Or coffee trees."

Danny's grin wavered as Kono hugged him with the same gentle touch Catherine had hugged Steve with. It was weird being with his friends again. Being inside a manmade vehicle. Wearing clothes. Drinking broth.

With a twinge of horror, he realized he was going to miss the island somewhat.

But definitely not his bed of dirt and twigs. He was not going to miss that.

He cleared his throat and tried to focus on something else. "So, I'm guessing since you found us, you know what happened."

Kono slumped forward on the table and Chin just shook his head sadly.

"What?" Steve asked.

"Do you guys remember anything that happened before you disappeared?" Chin asked.

Danny shook his head. "Maybe a bar, then waking up in a sinking boat and freezing cold water."

"Haven't been able to come up with the missing hours," Steve said.

"Do you remember meeting Kurt Kemp, a local Vancouver officer?" Catherine asked.

"I don't know, we met a lot of people while we were at the conference. A lot of people had questions about Duncan Hughes and the Breeders case," Danny said, hand flapping in a poor imitation of his usual gestures.

"Apparently, he and a couple of his buddies invited you guys out for a drink," Chin said. "They roofied you guys and took you out on Kemp's boat."

Danny's chest tightened. He'd been drugged and taken to a boat before. The thought of Marilyn's ship sinking while he had been trapped inside that shipping container sent a spike of fear through his heart. That was a newly unlocked fear for him to worry about at night.

"Why?" he asked. He couldn't fathom what they had done to cross someone in the short time they had been in Vancouver.

"From what his wife said, it sounded like he was jealous of the success Five-0 has had. Wanted to knock us off our high horse. It was supposed to be a prank," Kono said sourly.

Steve's face looked even more severe when he frowned with his weight loss and lack of good sleep. "But the storm capsized the boat."

"He and his buddies were going to take you guys camping with them for a few days on the island. Have a good laugh about it or something," Kono said. She sighed. "And I thought the time I pranked my cousin went horribly wrong."

Chin folded his hands on the table and looked at him. "Did anyone else make it to shore with you guys?"

"No," Steve answered. His frown turned into a scowl. "One guy pulled me overboard, but I didn't know what was happening and attacked. Scared him off when I shifted."

Danny winced at the guilt he detected in his partner's low tone. "No one made it to shore but us. We didn't see anybody else on the island. Nothing from the wreck washed up where we were camped out."

"That's what Kemp's wife was afraid of," Kono said.

They sat in silence after that, with the hum of the boat's engine and the swaying of the waves providing the only sound. Danny had been prepared to learn of a masterplan by some big bad crime boss, or a revenge plot, or literally anything else. But a prank? All this pain and suffering and death because of a prank?

He almost missed the not knowing and the quiet of the island.

Next time on "Dragons", Danny loves his bed and shower, Grace has a school project, and the team gets a new case. Not necessarily in that order.

And that would be the end of the arc! The next chapter will be a sort of follow up, but not as directly tied to these chapters. I'm not super sure if it'll go up next week or the following week. I have this bad feeling May might be busy for me.

Thank you all so much for continuing to read, review, PM with questions and ideas, favorite, and follow! I couldn't have lasted this long without you guys! Also, I hadn't realized that I cracked 600k words. Wow. Like wow.