I do NOT own anything, but the plot.

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As always, thank you and I hope you continue to enjoy what's to come!

Nalo a loaʻa

-loosely translate to "lost and found"-

CHAPTER TWENTY

With his head in his hands, Danny tried to rationalise how they were back in this position again.

It felt like only yesterday they were waiting on news of Steve and if he had survived the last injuries he had sustained. He knew, like back then, that it was bad.

Snapshots from the ride over were assaulting his brain, moments of Steve distressed and desperate replaying on mindless loops, torturing him.

"Dan-no," he managed between ragged breaths. "Y-you got-ta know… D-Dan-no, h-how sorry I-I am."

Danny gripped his hair a little tighter, trying to shift Steve's struggled words, but it was futile.

"L-lost M-Mary and Ca-Cath."

A ragged breath fell from Danny's lips as Steve's voice taunted him.

"Di-didn't want t-to lo-ose an-anyone el-se."

Danny didn't know if he could live with these memories if Steve didn't make it out of this alive. He was already struggling with trying to make amends with the past and how he had treated Steve.

"Danny! Hey Danny!" Chin called as he and Grace rushed forward.

"Where's Charlie?" he asked as he stood up, taking Grace into his arms, embracing her tightly.

The weight of his daughter made the memories of the ride here lessen in severity.

"Kono's got Charlie, they're just finding a space to park. Lou's securing the scene. He found a knife under your car, so we know how Steeve got that other wound," Chin mentioned. "Everyone will be here soon."

"Where is he, Danno?" Grace asked, looking around the ER.

"Grace," Danny started, taking his daughter's hand. "Monkey, you know Steve was really hurt so they've taken him to stabilise him so he can go to surgery."

The wild panic that ignited in Grace's eyes was unforgettable. It was like watching her shock dissolve and the realisation of the moment was hitting his daughter full throttle.

"So, he's alone?"

The innocence in Grace's voice sent ice plummeting into his stomach and Danny couldn't help but grimace. He didn't want her to think any less of him, but she would never know how long he held Steve's hand and how he fought to stay by his side.

"I tried to stay with him, but I wasn't allowed."

And it was true - Danny had begged and pleaded, but in the end, he could only yell at Steve to come back to them. The weak thumbs up Steve had managed was enough to make Danny believe his partner would fight to stay alive.

"As soon as we can, we'll be with him," Danny stated, trying to keep himself rational. "I just don't know when that will be."

And then Grace murmured a line Danny thought would break him entirely.

"It's just like last time, isn't it?"

Grace had broken a lot of rules that day back in April to be at the hospital. Under her own initiative, she had snuck out of school when word of the explosion at the warehouse and Five-0's involvement had erupted in the corridors and ran into the hospital thinking the worst had happened to her father. When she had found him, Danny didn't yell or get mad, he held her tight as if he's life depended on it.

"He's coming back," Danny vowed, his voice not breaking. "It isn't like last time."

"He saved you back then and he saved us today."

Danny hated how painfully astute his thirteen-year-old daughter could be. Just newly a teen, she was wise beyond her years, and Danny both loved and hated that fact.

Grace was right - Steve had saved him back then.

He still remembered the hard shove Steve had given him, pushing his body behind a crate that offered sturdy protection as the bomb his partner had spotted detonated. His vision had cleared enough to see Steve thrown and connect with a crate, crumpling like a rag doll upon impact. With fire raging and ears ringing, he had dragged Steve to safety regardless of adding injury and hadn't looked away. After that the rush to the hospital was a blur right up to the moment the doctor stood before them with sad eyes.

I'm sorry, we did everything we could, but Commander McGarrett didn't make it off the table. The damage was too much for his body.

Danny didn't know if he could cope with hearing those words again.

"Go get us some seats, Monkey, I'm going to see if I can get any news," Danny ordered, trying to do anything to kill time. "I'll be over in about two seconds."

"I've just checked …" Chin said on approach. "Only news she could tell me was they're still working on him. That's all we're getting."

Putting hands to his head, Danny tried to open his chest up, to force air into his lungs, to not suffocate on the rising panic he was feeling, and how was it possible to feel this claustrophobic in such an open space?

"Danny…" Chin started, reaching out.

"Chin, he kept apologising," Danny started, his voice quaking as he dropped his arms back to his side. "H-he was in and out the entire way here, but the entire time he kept apologising."

All Chin could see Danny was unravelling and decided to intervene. Without a word spoken, the older detective led his co-worker away from the main waiting area, keeping Grace's nervous form in eye line.

"I have no idea how he's going to deal coming out of this."

"With us by his side," Chin assured, placing a hand on Danny's shoulder. "We know everything now ... he'll see we're not going anywhere."

"Is it that easy? Because I don't know if it is, Chin."

"It will be … we just need to get him through surgery first."

Danny wasn't as convinced.

"You should've heard him … he kept apologising to me, wanted me to apologise to the kids, to the team." Danny cleared his throat as the lump formed harder and harsher in his throat. "He kept mentioning Mary and Cath as well. That he tried to contact them, and it didn't work out well. Given how Mary is in these situations, I'm going to refrain from contacting her for now, but Cath ... what do I do?"

"Right now, we wait for information," Chin rationalised, the calm in the storm. "From what I gathered from the little he's said, we don't contact either until we know what Steve wants to do."

Nodding, Danny tried to get onto Chin's wavelength.

"For now, we sit and wait like Ohana should," Chin argued, putting his best offer on the table.

"You're right," Danny said, glancing over to where Grace sat alone. "He needs to survive this, Chin."

"And he will … we know he's the toughest son-of-a-bitch we know."

Danny wasn't sure he still believed that, not after witnessing the series of emotions Steve now blew through, but he took optimism from Chin, and so he nodded and moved towards his daughter. Heading over to the row of seats Grace had occupied, Danny sat next to his daughter and just stared ahead. There were no easy words in this moment, only companionable silence.

She didn't react at first to her dad taking the seat next to her, lost so deep in her thoughts to react. Grace felt nervous. Her hands wrung together, twisting and turning as if to shift some of the overbearing energy. Unconsciously she searched for her dad's hand. No amount of anxious moving would help, she needed her father's hand in hers, the anchor in this storm.

When Kono came in with Charlie, Grace didn't let go, even when Charlie clambered onto his father's lap. The only thing Danny was grateful for was Chin contacting Rachel, and the almost quiet of the room.

"Why are we here, Danno?"

"Er, Bud," Danny started, sitting up straighter. "Your Uncle Steve got a little hurt back at his house. We're just going to get him cleaned up and then we'll be heading back."

"Danno..." Grace's warning tone came. "Tell him," she prompted.

The little boy looked from his father to his sister and a frown fixed between his eyebrows.

"He got really hurt, didn't he?" Charlie asked, his head tilting slightly. "Like last time?"

Danny felt like he couldn't breathe. After all this time, his little boy had known?

"I thought his big mission was to come home. He got hurt and couldn't come home because of it." Charlie's bottom lip began to wobble. "That's not going to happen again is it, Danno?"

"No, Buddy, we're taking him home this time."

"And we'll look after him as well?" Charlie asked, his eyes watering.

"Yeah, Charlie, we're going to look after him as well," Danny agreed, forcing his words around the lump forming in his throat.

They ended up settling into the comfortable silence, Danny's eyes on the doors he'd lost Steve through, one hand in Grace's, the other cradling Charlie to his body.

"Hey Charlie, shall we go and find some food?" Kono suddenly asked after hearing the little boy sigh. "We can get ice cream for everyone."

The four-year-old didn't need asking twice.

"Can I, Danno?"

"Ooh, I don't know… are you going to get the worst flavour?"

"I'm going to get chocolate!"

"Okay, okay, I'll allow it," he said, grinning at the little boy.

He let Charlie go, watching his son go off happily, unaware of the turmoil the others were reeling in. He would forever thank Kono's maternal side for how she had dealt with Charlie since Steve left, and he honestly, couldn't wait for Rachel to arrive to help him support their children.

"The only easy day was yesterday."

"What was that, Gracie?" Danny asked, looking down at his daughter.

Sitting up, Grace looked at her dad, her eyes watering.

"That's what he kept saying," she whispered, her words almost mute. "The only easy day was yesterday and it's all I keep thinking."

"Do you know what it means?"

"Yeah," she replied with the tiniest of head shakes. "Uncle Steve told me before. He said it was one he learned during his training. That every day you have to work harder than the last." She looks into her father's eyes. "He said that every day brings challenges, but it isn't always a bad thing."

"And what do think?"

"I don't know," she murmured, trying to quill her trembling lip. "But I know it can't have been easy for him, because he's all alone in this world, isn't he?"

Danny tried not to make Grace feel worse, but he couldn't lie to her, so he gave her a small affirming head nod.

"At least I had you ... and I had Charlie. And mom. When all this happened, I wasn't alone." Big, doleful eyes met her fathers and a tear slipped free. "He was on his own while we grieved for him, but who did he have? Danno, who looked after Uncle Steve?"

"Gracie-"

"I think Uncle Steve worked really hard to get back to us and we all left him behind." Her lip wobbled and Grace bit it between her teeth, trying to stay strong. "And he always says leave no man behind, Danno. He's taught Charlie that so many times, you moan about him doing it, and we all forgot about it." A tear broke free and her body stiffened. "And what makes this worse is that Uncle Steve has never left us behind. Not once. Not without reason." More tears gave way to confusion as anger hit her face. "But we gave up on him so easily."

Watching Grace dissolve, Danny couldn't anything but grab her, wrapping his arms around his daughter as he felt her body shake with her sobbing, and he held on even tighter as her hands gripped his biceps. Suddenly, Grace started to push against him, trying to rein in her emotions.

"What if he never hears me call him Uncle Steve again, Dad? And what if the last time we truly spoke was me being an absolute brat?"

"Hey now," Danny started, releasing her hand so he could slip from his seat and crouch in front of her. "You're going to get a second chance, Grace."

"I had my second chance and it ended like..." Unable to finish her sentence, Grace merely looked at her hands, taking in the pale blood stains she'd been unable to fully clean. "H-he could die, Danno. For real this time."

"He very nearly died last time," Danny truthfully admitted, covering her bloody hands with his. "His injuries were bad last time, Grace. I know you thought he came back fine, and everything was a lie, but Steve's injuries were severe last time. I didn't get to tell you how bad it was for him."

"What do you mean? You said he was hurt, but he looked fine…"

"Gracie, I didn't tell you how badly he was hurt, but that explosion caused a lot of damage to Steve, and he spent a long time trying to recuperate and come back from it. According to the governor, he still is, but he didn't tell us that."

There was a moment of pure contemplation on Grace's face, the only noise coming from her was the minor sniffle she gave.

"I saw his leg," Grace started to say, her eyes dropping. "When I was trying to stop the bleeding … his board shorts rose a little and I noticed the scars on his leg … he didn't have those before. Danno, he dealt with all of that on his own?"

"Yeah, Babe, he did."

"He's still dealing with that on his own," she surmised.

"Gracie, he's not … he was, but he let us back in. We were slowly making up for the way we've been treating him." Tightening his grip, he wanted her to understand that the situation was changing. "Your Uncle Steve is struggling, and he will struggle for a little while more, but we re-evaluated, and we stepped up. Sure, we should've done it three weeks ago, but we didn't, but we are."

"Your dad's right, Grace," Chin interjected, listening to Danny starting to ramble. "Finding out Steve was still alive was a massive blow to us all, especially after the last five months, but we're trying to make right on everything. This, what happened earlier, is a setback, but we have the chance to really show him what his Ohana is made of."

Grace looked into the Hawaiian's eyes and mumbled, "Right now, he's probably got a really poor idea of what we're made of."

"I wouldn't blame him if he did," Chin sadly agreed, flicking his gaze to Danny's before looking back at the teenager. "But if anyone knows most about second chances, it's your Uncle Steve … and he'll do everything to get back to us just to make everything right."

"We all know what a tough SOB he is," Danny added, remembering the countless times Steve has been hurt. "He'll fight."

There was a moment of quiet, just the noises of the hospital filtering around them, until Grace dipped her head and choked on a cry.

"He can't die," she managed as her voice cracked and she broke down into a fresh torrent of sobs.

"Hey, hey, hey," Danny quickly reacted, letting Grace's hand go merely to drag her in close, allowing her tears to soak into his shirt. "Enough of that. No one is dying today."

"You said that before!" Grace fought her father, but he wouldn't let her go. "He died last time."

"But he didn't," Danny stated, firmly. "We got him back, and we need to have faith in Steve and the doctors, Grace."

Danny knew it was fruitless. They had a waiting room full of faith before and it ended with funeral plans and the biggest, darkest cloud over all of them. Yet the partner in him didn't want to lose hope, Steve had proven the odds copious times before, why should this one be any different?

"He'll fight for us," Danny vowed, more to make himself believe it than anyone else.

From the way that Grace's knotted muscles began to relax, Danny felt like maybe she believed him too. Either way he wasn't going to let her go just yet, so he sat with his daughter bundled in his arms, and Chin taking guard on her other say, allowing her to be protected in her emotional breakdown and they sat and waited.