I do NOT own anything, but the plot.
Thank you for reading and reviewing!
There's a lot of angst coming!
Nalo a loaʻa
-loosely translate to "lost and found"-
CHAPTER SIX
Book 'em, Danno, the words hung on his lips as Danny cuffed the newest suspect. Each syllable a weight in themselves and he swallowed each of them down before they were given life.
He could just imagine the passionate rant saying that term would cause, Danny might even punch him again like he had in their early days. After all, he was banished from calling Danny anything other than his name or rank in the police department and Steve wasn't as daring as he used to be.
Walking away from Danny and his team, he headed back to his ride, his leg throbbing at the idea of being cramped in the back of Danny's Camaro for yet another day.
"Ride with Danny," Chin said from a few steps behind Steve, forcing his boss to stop and look over his shoulder. "I'll go with the others."
"Chin," Steve started, unnerved by the change of plan. "I don't think-"
"He's your partner," Chin admonished, cocking an eyebrow.
"He was," Steve hesitantly said.
"We might have partnered up after what happened, but I could never replace you, Steve. I remained too calm for his liking. He could rant in peace … or not rant at all because I never broke protocol." Chin gave Steve a wink, patting a hand on his shoulder. "We'll see you back there … you're too tall for the backseat anyway."
Steve dipped his head and chuckled lightly. He really was too fucking tall to keep using the backseat, but he didn't want to cause any more ripples by saying that.
"Just let him drive," Chin encouraged. "He's really enjoyed driving himself places."
"I bet he has," Steve replied, a small smile threatening to pull on his lips.
Chin gave one more smile at Steve before heading over to Lou. Steve remained where he was, watching Danny heading over to him, hands in his pockets.
"HPD are good with finishing up processing the scene," Danny said as he approached his car. "Shall we head back?"
"Yeah… apparently, I'm with you," Steve said, already preparing to head to the passenger seat.
"Yeah, Chin told me the plan, but you're relegated to the passenger seat, and I don't care what argument you give … I don't like you much anymore so you're not getting a hand on my keys."
"You used to hate me," Steve joked, almost managing a twist of a grin. "Guess not liking me is a step up."
"Don't flatter yourself, Steven, and get in," Danny replied with an eyeroll heading for the driver's side.
It wasn't even a few minutes later, Danny was pulling on the collar, flexing his head side to side to get comfortable.
"You okay?"
"Hate this damn place," he muttered, the same tone he always used to say he hated his home of the last six years.
"Thought you would've preferred this place without me," Steve joked and realised almost immediately the consequence of saying such a thing.
"Yeah, well, definitely got a taste of it," Danny groused, trying to resist the urge to tighten his grip on the steering wheel. "And really, a lot of it was just the same thing every day but without the extra bullet holes and things blowing up. My blood pressure valued it."
Steve didn't add anything else to the conversation, still regretting the comment he made.
"I should've known something was up when the house didn't go to Mary, or when your truck stayed on the drive, or when your position wasn't filled at work. We were told every story under the sun regarding it, even went to governor to pull some strings, but Denning's said he couldn't overwrite legal actions."
"To be honest, I didn't have much of a hand in that side of it all," Steve admitted, albeit feebly.
"Well, you wouldn't if you're busy hunting down the bad guys," Danny jested humourlessly. "Thought it was hard work with a partner, but you decided to ditch an entire team that could've helped."
Steve remained silent, gazing out of the window because he didn't know what to say anymore. When a semblance of their old relationship shone through it was quickly demolished by Danny's ranting about how Steve had gone off alone.
"You know, it wasn't just us affected by what happened. Mary and Joan were devasted. Even Catherine … God, Steve she…"
"I know," Steve back quite harshly, effectively cutting Danny off. He didn't need a reminder. "I know what it did to them."
Danny went to speak, glancing right only to find Steve's jaw set solidly as he looked out of the window. He couldn't read his partner right now and that worried him.
"So, I guess you've spoken to them both?"
It wasn't hard for Danny to make that assumption. If anything, Danny knew Steve well enough to know he would contact his sister, the last remaining McGarrett that wasn't dead or pretending to be.
"Yeah, I spoke with them both," Steve replied, briefly throwing a gaze Danny's way. "No need to worry, everyone knows, and everyone's let me know where I stand. Nothing to worry about. Case closed."
"Not really case closed, though, is it?" Danny asked, disdain lighting his words. "Case closed would not be dealing with your resurrection back in our lives. We might not have been fully over it, but we were dealing with your death. We were adapting to not having you lead us, or using your training to improvise, or watching your aneurysm face when shit hit the fan. Then you come back looking the way you do, like the last five months never happened and you're probably only sad over the fact that you didn't get to take Franklin down yourself."
Danny didn't know just how true that statement was. Steve thought about taking Franklin down on many occasions. He called it some more of closure or weird retribution, but really Steve hated Franklin Wright with every fibre of his being for what he had created of his life.
But yet he said nothing.
Steve stayed quiet, letting Danny rant and rave. It felt like only yesterday that he would react, and they would sound like an old married couple, but now Steve worried that by replying he would push Danny further away.
Apparently, Danny noticed this, too.
"Y'know what's annoying me more? The fact you just leave me alone!" Danny admitted, he twisted slightly in his seat, placing his body at Steve all the while keeping his eyes on the road. "And that's your guilt talking and that says more than anything else. Your silence is incriminating you."
"My silence is incriminating me?"
"Yeah, Mister-always-has-a-response-to-everything, sure you kept it to mostly one words and grunts, but now you barely string a sentence together in the office … and now out of the office apparently. I mean you were a man of few words, but a lot of faces. They said everything, but now nothing." Danny's hand is cutting the air, adding intensity to his words. "Everyone's noticing it, too. When we found you in Denning's office you were so keen to make things right and make us hear you out, but you've given up and it's not even been two weeks."
Steve scrubbed a hand over his face, finding it harder to bite his tongue. For him, he wanted to reprise his role, square up to Danny and regain his relationships, but while he was coming home, that wasn't how the team saw it.
"So, like I said, your silencing is incriminating you."
"Have you ever thought that I'm just trying not to tread on your toes more than I already am?" Steve asked, trying to hold back his bitter tone. "You all do a real good job to keep doing your job, but I can see what the last few months have done, okay? I can see that the team doesn't need a fifth wheel, but because the governor snapped his fingers, you've all just accepted that I have to be here."
"Steve…"
"No … you say it all the time how braindead I am, but I'm able to observe what I'm doing to you all. So, I stay quiet in the hope that by doing that I won't make it any harder on any of you." Looking out of the window again, Steve tried to calm his building anger. "Because regardless of what you all think of me, Ohana means the world to me ... apparently, I was wrong on that one, though, right? Never knew a damn thing about it to begin with."
Danny contemplated it for a moment before he spoke again.
"Apparently," he said with finality as he pulled into his space next to Steve's blue Silverado.
Steve couldn't bring himself to be cloistered in the small confines of the Camaro any longer. The moment Danny was parked, Steve was out. He noticed the others entering the building and he just focused on that.
"Steve," Danny started, catching up to Steve's strides.
"I know you hate every minute of this," Steve observed, his throat going tight. "Me being back. Me being your partner. I saw how well you and Chin worked together."
"Whatever happens you are always my partner," Danny told him because whatever he said, Danny was happy to hack his partner back. "I love Chin, but we all know he's best looking out for Kono. You've always had my back … until you didn't."
"I would lay my life down to make sure you went back to the kids," Steve argued, having never voiced that vow he made himself. "I would never do anything to jeopardise you going back to them."
Steve meant that with every ounce of his being. When the threat Franklin brought to his life escalated, Steve knew he would do absolutely everything to keep them all save – especially Grace and Charlie.
"I know," Danny agreed, his voice softening. "For what it's worth I know you'd turn every pineapple over in this hell hole to do that."
Pushing his way into HQ, Steve felt like some part of he and Danny still existed and he wanted to revel in it, push the boundaries.
"Yeah, well, whatever it's worth, I'd even buy you a drink to prove it," he said, hoping the idea of him actually producing his wallet would be a saving grace and evoke a normal response from Danny.
It was a poor olive branch, but it was one he was extending.
"You … buying drinks?" Danny said, chuckling at the idea. "I'll believe it when I see, my friend. Would also like to see your wallet."
"I have money, regardless of what you think, Danny. I'll even prove it to you when we catch a break."
The jovial mood was broken when two words punctuated the air around them: "Uncle Steve?"
Every molecule of air around him shrivelled up and died in that very moment. Frozen to the spot at the mere sound of his token nickname, Steve stared into the innocent face of Danny's daughter and felt his heart readying to explode.
Grace's eyes shot from her uncle to her father and back again, every second adding a pound of confusion and a new dose of hurt.
And Steve wanted the ground to open up and swallow him whole.
"I don't understand," she said, her face pinching in puzzlement. "Danno…"
"I can explain," Steve started.
However, the moment he took a step forward, Grace took one back.
"Y-you're dead," she stated dumbly, her frown increasing. "I know you are … I was there when they…" she paused, her eyes glossing with tears. "I stood next to Danno wh-when the doctor said it."
Grace remembered that moment every day she woke up. She remembered the clammy feel of her dad's palm against hers, the slight shake that tremored through hers as her fears escalated. She remembered the profound sadness on the doctor's face as he told them Steve died on the table following a complicated surgery. The grief that flooded her never left, it never waned. She was stuck in the molasses of grief every single day because she missed her surrogate uncle with a passion.
Now, it seemed to be for nothing because he was alive, and he looked very much undead to her, and her mind just couldn't keep up.
"I can't do this," she murmured as the tears gave way.
Grabbing her school bag from outside Danny's office, Grace dodged around Steve and Danny and made a run for the door, but Steve had to stop her.
"Gracie!"
"No!" Danny bit at him, placing a hand in Steve's direction stopping him from going further. "You've already made a great mess out of everything just by being here."
The familiarity of venom from Danny wasn't getting easier, but Steve took it like a martyr. He knew his kids were a sensitive spot for the detective, he had lived enough moments to see that, but when it was aimed at him in this way, Steve felt like he couldn't breathe.
"I didn't know she'd be here," Steve started, his tone apologetic. "I never thought she'd b-"
"Look, I'm going to find my daughter and try and sort this. I'm sure there's some paperwork you've already neglected or your next mission you want to plan. Why don't you do that while I try and comfort my daughter. You wouldn't even know where to start."
Steve couldn't say anything, and he could only watch as Danny left in haste, following Grace's distraught steps. His head bent forward a little in defeat as he tried to steady his breathing, but it was no good, he could feel that familiar pain in his chest.
"Steve…" Chin started.
"I need to leave," Steve whispered, rubbing the back of his head, but was yet to turn to face them.
He was broken and so was the team and he couldn't do a damn thing about it.
Not caring for anything in that moment, Steve absentmindedly left HQ, hoping that no one would stop him on his way out. Ducking his head a bit, he tried to make sure he went as unseen as possible. He almost didn't believe it when he broke free of the building and into the mid-afternoon heat of O'ahu.
"Monkey, stop!"
Danny's voice stopped him dead in his tracks, forcing him to take a step back and pray that Danny had this handled.
"Grace, Honey, I know this is a lot to take in."
"A lot to take in?" he heard Grace's bitter tone. "He's meant to be dead! We buried him!"
"I know," Danny sighed, unable to find the appropriate words.
"How long have you known?" she asked, but her tone said she already knew the answer. "Danno, how long have you known he was alive?"
"A week or so," was Danny's weak response.
"A week?!" she questioned incredulously and laughed. "You've known a week and didn't think Charlie and I deserved to know?"
"Gracie, it isn't that easy," Danny started, his voice was small, but his honesty was loud. "I didn't know how to tell you."
"Maybe… hey kids, your Uncle Steve's back from the dead … that would've been a better start than me watching him walk back into the office, clearly doing his job like nothing ever happened."
Putting his head up to the sky, Steve didn't know what he was meant to do in that moment. He could hear how thick Grace's voice was with tears, and he wanted nothing more than to hug her and tell her everything was going to be okay, but he had lost that right.
"I've tried every night this week to tell you, but I'm barely able to make sense of it and I've had to work with him," Danny tried, feeling like he was making up excuses. "If it's messing up head, I didn't know how I was meant to support you through finding out."
"There isn't anything you can do," Grace admitted, almost in a whisper. "I don't want to see him," Grace remarked, sniffling. "He can't just come back, Danno."
"That's your decision to make, Grace, but I think he'd be really happy to see you."
"I don't care," Grace scoffed.
Gazing up at the blue sky again, Steve tried to steady his breathing. Over the years, he and Grace had grown a rapport that even Danny didn't question. She was every inch his niece without actually being it, but to hear him lose her was enough to push him closer to the edge. Every lifeline he held dearly was slipping away and he was barely holding onto them.
Then he heard one sentence that he knew he would never recover from.
"It'd just be easier if he had never come home."
Cutting a loss, he didn't hang around to hear Danny's response.
In a daze, he rounded the building of the palace, and kept walking.