Catch Me When I Fall
A/N: Thank you to everyone who has read and commented so far, and to the guests who I can't reply to but always appreciate.
I have received multiple requests about a very popular theme: bank robbery. And since I like to please my readers and appreciate their support, I decided to go for it. The plot for this one was inspired by one of my favorite episodes of The X-Files, 'Monday'. Some of you might be familiar with it. I of course left out the supernatural parts of the original story and only used what could be adapted to the Five-0 world. I also used some of the original dialogues as an homage. Hope you enjoy it.
I do not own Hawaii Five-0, The X-Files or any of the characters, and no copyright infringement is intended.
Screeching to a halt outside Hawaii National Bank, the first thing Lou Grover noticed was the SWAT team getting into position behind the crime scene tape. Two police cars pulled up alongside him, adding to the number of HPD vehicles surrounding the building. Exhaling loudly, he climbed out of his Suburban, ducked under the yellow tape and approached the Lieutenant in charge.
"Captain," the officer nodded at him curtly, his face grim. "Is Five-0 taking over?"
"What can you tell me?" Lou asked, ignoring the question.
"Silent alarm tripped 30 minutes ago. We think one robber, armed. Probably handgun. Definitely no pro or he would have been long gone. Single gunshot about 20 minutes ago. Blinds are down but it looks like there's a body on the floor. Where's the rest of your team?"
Grover glanced at the building, his stomach knotting in dread. "I think two of them might be inside."
Kneeling on the floor, Steve's head in his lap, Danny couldn't help thinking back to his New Jersey days, when he had barely escaped a similar situation on his first week on the job. With his partner half conscious and bleeding heavily from a head wound and a trigger-happy, unstable robber staring down at him, he knew whatever chance they had at getting out of there alive depended on him and his superhero powers, as Steve called them, to wear people down.
Talk the guy out until he surrendered.
He had done it before, as a rookie on that fateful day and countless times after that. He could— had to do it again.
Because it wasn't only his and Steve's lives on the line. Twelve other people, eight unlucky customers and four tellers, were currently on the ground around them, scared out of their minds. And if he didn't want their deaths on his conscience he had to find a way to get through to him before it was too late.
"...n'd to take'im down, D'ny..." Steve's hand gripped his shirt, pulling him closer to his level as he moved to curl on his side, his slurred words the unmistakable sign of yet another concussion.
"It's alright, Steve, I got this," he whispered, tracing his fingers along his friend's face in a soothing gesture.
Take him down.
As if it was that simple.
He raised his gaze to face the robber, who was breathing heavily and waving his gun unsteadily in their direction. "Look, you're in charge here, everybody knows it. It doesn't have to end like this..."
The man wasn't facing the entrance, so he didn't notice the SWAT team standing outside, ready to barge in. He leveled his weapon at Danny, a dangerous glint in his eyes. "Yeah, it does."
A moment later, a shot pierced the air.
One hour earlier
"I know, I'm late, I don't need to hear it," Steve said as soon as Danny walked into his office. He was sitting at his desk opening an envelope, brows scrunched up in concentration, movements sharp and brisk.
"Hear what?"
"The lecture about how it's appropriate to stick to schedule when dealing with a government official."
Danny watched him take his paycheck out and turn it around to endorse it, unable to hide the smile on his face. His partner was a lot of things but tardy wasn't one of them. Punctuality had been drilled into him by the Navy, and he took great pride in respecting that. "I wasn't gonna say that."
"You weren't?"
"No."
Steve nodded, signing his full name on the piece of paper. "So am I?"
"What?"
"Late to the meeting?"
"No, no you didn't miss the meeting," Danny replied, putting his hands in his pockets and shuffling on his feet. "You're just uncharacteristically late for it. Everything okay?"
Steve glanced at his watch. "If I didn't miss it why are you here?"
"We, uh... took a short break and I came looking for you. The Governor is not pleased that her golden boy's late."
"It's just... it's just one of those days, Danny," the Five-0 leader admitted, leaning back in his chair with a resigned expression on his face. "Roof's been leaking at the house so I'm having it fixed, but the check I wrote to cover the repair work bounced and I have no idea why. Took me half an hour to convince the guy I wasn't trying to scam him and that he'll get his money by the end of the day, so now I need to deposit my pay or I'll be sleeping in a house with no roof tonight."
Danny shook his head, barely stifling a laugh. "Didn't you set your account up for direct deposit?"
"Yes, of course I have, but for some reason it isn't working and I really need that roof fixed." He stood up, looked at his watch again. "Bank's just down the street. I'll be back in ten. Cover for me, will you?" he said before fleeing the room, not giving Danny time to reply.
The blond detective rolled his eyes. "When do I not?"
A few minutes later, Steve was standing in front of the ATM, glaring at the words 'out of order' mocking him from the video terminal. He looked at the bank's entrance with a scowl on his face, wondering if he'd have enough time to get in and solve whatever issue was holding up his money before the Governor decided to fire him.
He had slept in the weirdest places in the direst condition during his deployments, but right now the 'no roof / no job' scale tipped firmly towards the former.
Sighing, he said a silent prayer that the place wouldn't be crowded and headed inside.
There were twelve customers before him, he noticed, standing in three different lines. Steve chose the shortest one, only to realize with dismay that it was also the slowest. As the minutes ticked by, he watched four people do their business and leave while his line didn't move an inch.
I'm screwed, he thought to himself. I am totally and completely screwed.
Had he not been distracted by the wail of a child in a bright red stroller, frustrated by how slowly the line was moving, and eager to get away, he would have easily noticed the man standing by himself in a corner, nervously looking around, wearing a zipped-up, tattered army green jacket that was unusual for the day's warm temperature.
Had he recognized he was up to no good, he would have warned the tellers or moved closer to try and tackle him to the ground.
All these thoughts ran through Steve's head the moment he saw the man draw a weapon from under his jacket and make his intentions clear.
"Everybody on the floor, face down! You know what this is!"
A chorus of hysterical 'oh, god!' and 'please don't shoot us!' echoed around the room as everybody froze in their tracks and instinctively raised their hands.
"Shut up! On the ground, right now!"
Mid-thirty, about six feet tall, he had unruly blond hair loosely tied into a ponytail and a stubbled face. His skin was pasty, his eyes crazed, and the hand holding the gun betrayed a slight tremble that made the hair on the back of Steve's neck stand on edge. The man was obviously high on something, and in a room full of civilians things could go downhill fast. Real fast.
He knelt down, motioning the others to do the same. "You're the boss," he said in a flat, non-threatening voice as he lay on his stomach next to a young woman who was sobbing quietly. "It's alright," he tried to reassure her. "It's gonna be okay."
"You heard him, I'm in charge so let's start setting some rules!"
Moving with surprising agility, he reached for a grocery bag one of the customers had left unattended and spilled its content onto the floor. "Cell phones, toss them inside," he ordered, passing the bag to one of the hostages who promptly got on his feet and started to collect them. "Any of you tries something, you're dead, you hear me?"
Everyone nodded, complying with the instructions and filling the bag with their devices as the man watched, gun still trained on the cowering group.
Steve held onto his a second longer, trying to figure out a way to call for help until the young man holding the bag stopped in front of him with a pleading look in his eyes and he caved in.
No point in upsetting a deranged robber.
Plus, he still had his gun, safely hidden by his shirt and his prone position.
He would find another way.
Task completed, the man took the bag and tossed it to the far corner of the room, away from everyone, and approached the tellers that were huddled in a separate group near one of the large, glass-covered windows. He pointed the gun at one of them, a middle-aged Hawaiian woman with a white plumeria flower in her head, and motioned her to go behind the counter.
"You, put the money in a bag, right now."
The woman nodded and did as instructed.
"Quickly! And don't try anything stupid!" He wiped a hand over his sweaty face, eyes darting nervously around the room. "Nobody moves, you understand? Nobody moves, nobody gets hurt!"
The frightened teller began to remove the money from the register. "Let's go, lady. Let's go. Let's go. Let's go! The quicker you go, the quicker I go!" Unbeknownst to the robber, she also had the presence of mind to push the silent alarm with her foot. She had been a faithful employee for over twenty-five years, and was determined not to let the skinny haole in front of her ruin her last week on the job.
Steve met her gaze as she handed the bag full of money back to the man who was, if possible, even more nervous and started filling another one. He, along with the rest of Five-0, was a regular at the bank because of its proximity to the Palace and all employees knew who they were so when she nodded at him slightly, he understood that she had called for help.
He just needed to distract the robber until they came.
"... and we've witnessed a twenty-percent drop in the homicide rate and a thirty-five percent drop in the overall crime trend..."
Danny was in hell.
Despite his major in Economics, sitting in the Governor's office listening to a nameless suit from the Mayor's team give a boring report, complete with PowerPoint presentations and multi-colored graphics, was his personal idea of Hades. The guy's flat delivery and meaningless pauses would've put any sane individual to sleep, and after thirty-two minutes he was genuinely surprised no one had stopped him or called another break.
"The crime report." Governor Mahoe's voice filtered through the fog in his mind, bringing him to attention. "That brings us to Commander McGarrett. Is he going to grace us with his presence?"
Danny's gaze moved from the conspicuously empty chair next to him to the woman's stern, disappointed face. "I, uh... I don't know, ma'am, but I'm gonna find out."
Giving her the sincerest, most apologetic look he could muster, he excused himself and left the office.
"Hey! Hey, leave her alone!"
If there was something Steve McGarrett couldn't tolerate, it was the thought of innocent people hurt or endangered for no reason. Or for entirely the wrong reason.
From his position on the ground, he watched the robber roughly grab the teller's arm and push her forward, his other hand still grasping the gun pointed at the woman who apparently wasn't moving as fast as he wanted. The pale, sweat-dotted face turned, pinning him with a sharp glare.
Steve didn't budge. "She did what you asked, man. Let her go. We're all doing what you asked…" He wasn't the patient one, the one comfortable with doing all the talking. Danny usually mastered that task while he focused on the action. But Danny wasn't here, and Steve was very grateful for that so he figured he could try and reason with the guy as he waited for his chance to take him down.
"I'm not done..." the man muttered, as if to himself, scratching his temple with the barrel of his pistol. "We're not done yet… Keys, get your keys!" he barked at the woman. "We're gonna open up the ATM!"
Grabbing her by the collar of her shirt as soon as she did, he directed her towards the machine.
Steve's gaze followed them as they moved, until it faltered and then completely stopped as soon as he saw his partner approaching from the other side of the street.
Shit. Shit, shit, shit!
He was up on his feet before his conscious brain could register the movement, drawing the gunman's attention. "Hey, lock the doors! You forgot to lock the front doors!" But it was too late. Danny sauntered into the bank, oblivious to the threat, paused for a second as he took in the scene in front of him and immediately reached for his weapon.
Steve did the same, aiming his own gun at the man's back. "Five-0! Drop your weapon!"
His voice rose over the collective gasp coming from the hostages and the teller's panicked yelp as the robber tightened his grip on the woman and yanked her close, using her as a shield.
"You drop it!" he countered, training his Beretta on Danny.
"I'd do as he says, man," the blond detective responded, unfazed by the threat. "There's two of us and one of you."
He could see Steve inching closer and figured it was only a matter of time before he had the man subdued and cuffed.
Boy, was he wrong...
Gaze shifting nervously back and forth between the two task force members, the man stubbornly refused to comply. "I ain't dropping nothing. You put yours down or I'll shoot her!"
"And what do you think I'll do then?" Danny snapped. He loved his job, but days like this put a damper on the positivity he was trying to live by and made him reconsider the idea of giving up the restaurant. And all because of stupid sons of bitches like this one who had decided it would be a good idea today to rob a bank and risk innocent people's lives.
As the three men stood in a standoff, pointing guns at each other, the kid in the red stroller let out another piercing wail that made everyone jump. Startled, and not really familiar with how to properly handle a firearm, the robber turned towards the sound and instinctively fired a shot.
He wasn't aiming at anyone in particular, and sure hadn't planned on things to fail so spectacularly. He just needed some quick money. Should have been in and out in ten minutes before fricking Five-0 ruined his day. Now, he thought to himself as he looked at the body in front of him and heard the hostages' panicked screams, he'd be lucky if they handed him a one-way ticket to Halawa.
Taking advantage of the commotion, the Hawaiian woman he was holding twisted away from his grasp and ran to hide behind the counter.
He didn't stop her.
If he was going down, he'd do that with a bang.
Taking a deep breath, he faced the blond cop and raised his weapon in warning.
"I said you drop it."
Danny stared at him in shock, then slowly lowered his gun.
"He's... he's not dead... You're not a murderer yet."
The Jersey native didn't recognize the terror-stricken voice coming out of his mouth, nor did he realize that the wetness trailing down his cheeks was his own tears. The only thing he was aware of was the blood, the frightening amount of it covering his best friend's head, face and chest, and the feeling of everything going in slow motion.
Steve hadn't stirred since he had fallen to the ground. How long ago, Danny couldn't say. He had watched in riveted horror as the bullet from the man's gun had hit him on the side of the head, flinging him backwards, stared powerlessly at the way the back of his skull had bounced off the floor thinking this was it, that SuperSEAL's luck had finally run out and this worthless piece of trash had actually killed him.
And the worst thing was, it hadn't even been premeditated.
The robber had sensed danger and reacted without even thinking, squeezing the trigger just as Steve was making his move to disarm him and firing a lucky shot that could now have potentially devastating consequences.
"Please. He needs medical attention..." As much as he hated to plead and show him weakness, Danny knew it was vital to the cause. Just until he could check on Steve and get them out of this mess. Then he would end him. "We're not going anywhere. Just... let me help him."
The rise and fall of his partner's chest did nothing to quell his fears. He had seen his fair share of head wounds and knew they bled a lot. He also knew that a few millimeters could make a difference between a graze, a fractured skull and irreparable brain damage, and the fact that Steve wasn't moving sent all kind of alarms off in his brain.
"What's your name?" he blurted. He had tried anger, threatened to shoot him, appealed to whatever shred of decency was left in his drug-addled brain. All to no avail. The pool of blood under Steve's head was growing larger and larger and Danny gritted his teeth, chasing away the thought that his best friend may be bleeding to death while he was just standing there doing nothing to help. "Look, I gotta call you something, alright? How about John? It's a nice... honest name. John?"
Everything was quiet around him, customers and employees all staying silent despite their own fears out of respect for the fallen man.
The robber stared at him for a long moment, a bewildered expression on his face like it was the most ridiculous question he'd ever been asked. Then he lowered his gun. "Bernard."
"Bernard," Danny repeated in a broken voice. If it was any other day, he would've laughed at the odds of a Hawaiian with such a peculiar name. Today, he didn't care. He just needed Bernard to understand. "Let me check on my partner, please. I give you my word I won't try anything."
"Your cell phone. Toss it," the young man instructed.
He wordlessly complied. Spreading his arms out in surrender, he crouched down to place it on the ground before kicking it away.
Then Bernard finally nodded his head.
Releasing the breath he didn't know he had been holding, Danny rushed to his friend's side.
There was a cold, hard surface underneath him.
Voices filtering into his consciousness, disjointed words penetrating the fog of pain blanketed around him.
A warm presence at his side. Hands touching him, fingers reaching for his arm, his face, his throat.
Steve instinctively rolled his head to the side and stopped, wincing when the throb in his skull flared and threatened to flicker out what little awareness he had managed to accomplish.
"Hey… Steve, hey, stop. Don't move…"
Danny…
Grasping onto the familiarity of the voice, he tried to force his way back to full consciousness. His senses awoke one after the other, and the first thing he became aware of was the feeling of something warm trailing down his face. He frowned and carefully tried to open his eyes. As soon as he got them to a half-mast the thick liquid seeped in, and all he could make out was a dizzying blur of white.
"Can't… see," he rasped, one hand reaching clumsily toward his friend in an involuntary moment of panic.
Danny grasped it gently, leaning closer. "It's alright, you're alright, just... just give me a sec." He looked up, eyes darting wildly from side to side, searching for something that could help. A moment later, a woman's hand appeared in his field of vision, holding a scarf. "Here, use this," she urged.
Nodding gratefully, he accepted the garment and used it to wipe the blood off his friend's face, then cradled Steve's head in his lap. "Better?"
Steve peeled his eyes open again and blinked sluggishly, willing them to focus. The light assaulting his retinas sent a stab of white-hot pain through his skull, but at least now he could see. "Y-yeah…" He barely managed to force the word out over a sudden wave of nausea and turned feebly into his friend's touch as his heart continued to beat in sync with the merciless throb in his head.
"What h'pnd?"
He should know, he chastised himself, he should remember, but everything was fuzzy and he just couldn't think straight. There was a sense of urgency around him though. He could see it on Danny's face, feel it in the way his partner's hand was gripping his arm, and that spurred his confusion into awareness.
He gazed blearily up, taking in his surroundings.
Bank.
He went to the bank.
There was a robbery.
A gunshot.
The burning feeling of hot metal flying across his head.
He sat up with a gasp, face twisting into a pasty-white mask of renewed agony at the movement that he tried to push down, deep down where it wouldn't hurt because if they were still at the bank they were in danger, Danny was in danger, and he couldn't let that happen…
"Hey, what did I say? You need to stay still, alright?" Startled by the sudden move, Danny firmly planted a hand against Steve's chest, feeling the rapid pounding of his best friend's heart as he pushed him gently back down.
His other hand was still grasping the now bloodied scarf, applying pressure to the wound to his head. The bullet had grazed the scalp, pulling chunks of skin and hair off as it passed. Judging by its location, if Steve had been standing to his full height when Bernard had fired, he would have hit him in the brain.
The whirlwind of emotions of the last few minutes had left Danny completely drained. Anguish, for not being able to tell where or how bad Steve had been hit, panic as he had dropped to his knees to check for his pulse, relief upon finding the reassuring heartbeat under his fingers.
"It's not safe," he added, referring to both Steve's physical conditions and the situation they were in. The former SEAL seemed to have trouble tracking what was happening around him and he didn't want to endanger any of them with a startled reaction or an untimely statement.
As if on cue, a shadow loomed above them and they both looked up to see Bernard staring at them, a menacing expression on his face.
"I have to get my partner out of here," Danny said hoarsely. "He needs a hospital. You can do the right thing here, man, let him go."
"Sir, please. Listen to him," the teller intercepted. "Don't hurt anybody else. A whole lot of police are coming."
Bernard stared at her, eyes widening in recognition and distress. "You tripped the alarm..."
"They're supposed to call, right?" Bernard asked as he paced back and forth, sending worried glances every few steps at the SWAT and PD personnel gathered outside.
Danny shook his head, not even bothering to look up at him and focusing instead on keeping his partner still and his wound sealed. "I, uh… I don't if they're going to call."
After the revelation that the teller had ignored his command and alerted the police, Bernard had nearly lost it. Three angry holes in the wall behind them remained as proof of the outburst. A forth had ricocheted and hit one of the prone customers in the leg. A minor wound, thankfully, that the mother of the wailing child had promptly dressed with an extra pair of sweatpants she'd packed for her son.
The man heaved in a few harsh, ragged breaths. "I swear I'll kill everyone in this freaking place if they come in here!"
This time, Danny raised his gaze. "They don't know that, you understand? Hey, hey, look at me! They can't see you. They don't know what your plan is!"
"They better know... They damn well better figure it out!"
"Look... just take the money and go, alright?"
"Nice try, cop," Bernard sneered. "The minute I get near that door they're gonna blow my brains out!"
Danny looked down at Steve, who appeared to be barely conscious, and released a weary sigh. "I just want everybody to live, man, that's all," he said softly as his hand reached out to stroke his friend's cheek. "Just... just go. I'm not gonna stop you."
"I didn't want this!" Bernard replied in a high-pitched tone as if seeing for the first time the consequences of his actions. "I didn't want any of this…"
"Then maybe you shouldn't have tried to rob a bank and kill a cop…" the blond detective growled darkly, calling on his last reserve of patience.
Steve heard the anger coursing through his partner's voice as awareness set in again, heard the depth of pain beneath the statement, and his first instinct was to launch himself at the guy and choke the life out of him for what he was putting Danny and all those innocent people through. His second, smarter response was to just stay where he was, allow the fog to clear from his brain and wait for the right moment to strike.
"...n'd to take'im down, D'ny..."he muttered, reaching up to grasp his friend's shirt to get his attention. Through the blood rushing in his ears and the nausea building in his stomach, an idea had formed in his head and he shifted to curl on his right side, pulling his knees up to his chest.
"It's alright, Steve, I got this," Danny reassured him, and the affection he saw in his partner's blue eyes and felt in the gentle touch on his face made his heart flutter with feelings that after so many years he still felt oh-so-lucky to experience.
Then Danny squared his shoulders and faced the robber, who had grown more and more nervous by the second and Steve tensed, getting ready for action.
"Look, you're in charge here, everybody knows it. It doesn't have to end like this..."
Through the glass door, the Jersey native could see the SWAT team approach the entrance and instinctively tightened the grip on his friend's huddled form. He felt him tense at the same time he saw Bernard raise his arm to point the weapon at them, whispering a cold, detached "Yeah, it does..."
A heartbeat later Steve shoved him aside, pulled his backup gun from his ankle holster, aimed and fired a single shot. Startled, Danny stared as Bernard's body hit the ground, the weapon he had been holding clattering down next to him.
"Shit," he whispered breathlessly.
The front doors swung open and the SWAT officers swarmed in, fanning out with synchronized precision to secure the building.
Danny barely gave them a second glance. Beside him, he saw Steve drop the gun, go still for a moment, then sag from his sitting position back to the ground, his pale face contorting in a grimace of pain.
"Steve!" he called as he crawled on his knees back to his side. "I'm right here, buddy, what's wrong?"
He got his answer a second later when Steve rolled halfway, braced one hand on the floor to support himself and started to heave. Nausea had clawed at his throat as soon as he'd sat up to shoot Bernard, who was now laying on his stomach a few feet from him, and despite his attempts to force the bile down the painful cramps contracting his stomach had pushed everything up and out.
Danny's own stomach lurched at the sight of his best friend struggling to breathe, white as a sheet and lathered in sweat. "Get the paramedics in here!" he yelled as he reached out and wiped the sweat off his forehead with the bloodied scarf, rubbing his back in soothing circles with his other hand as Steve leaned into him and continued to retch until there was nothing left.
"Danny! You guys alright?"
Lou Grover's baritone voice suddenly materialized behind him. "Lou... thank god," he sighed in relief at the familiar presence. "Steve's hurt, we need help!"
"I'm on it," the older man reassured him before heading back out.
As the hostages slowly left the bank, casting them rueful glances on the way out, Danny's arm tightened around his partner's shoulders. "Steve... hey, you're alright..."
Steve swayed slightly and sank into his friend's embrace. "My... h-head's killin' me..." he rasped out, his throat sore from all the retching. The room around him continued to swirl and he squeezed his eyes shut, swallowing convulsively.
"I know. Just hold on, help's coming."
"Ev'rybody okay?"
"Yes," a female voice said, and they both looked up to see the teller smile gratefully at them. "Everyone's okay. Thanks to you, Commander."
Danny smiled back, nodding at her before one of the SWAT officers escorted her outside.
"Look at you, huh? Saving the day again..."
Steve's brows crunched in confusion and he blinked dazedly at him. "Don't feel good, man…" he admitted, running a trembling hand over his mouth. "What is wrong with me?"
Danny frowned, but decided not to panic. Still holding on to him, he brushed the scarf over his friend's lips, wiping away what he had missed. "You got shot. Bullet grazed your head." Thoughts raced through his mind, memories of a similar injury in a different building, of nights spent on the bathroom floor as Steve fought against the poison ravaging his body. He had been there through it all —the concussions, the bullets, and each time it was more terrifying than the other, because he feared that it could be the last. "You're one lucky son of a bitch, you know that?"
Steve's only response was to close his eyes and go lax under his touch.
"Hey, no sleeping until the paramedics get here, you hear me?" Danny cried out, tapping him lightly on the cheek to rouse him from his slumber.
Despite feeling wrung out, disoriented and weak, the former SEAL allowed a faint smile to stretch his lips. "Okay, Danno..."
At the hospital, they sutured the gash with eight stitches, gave him fluids and antiemetics and admitted him for observation. The doctor asked him a bunch of routine questions to evaluate memory and concentration skills, and tested coordination and reflexes. He also ordered a CT scan to rule out bleeding or other serious brain injury. Danny insisted they did an MRI too, just to be safe, and both came back negative.
At the mere mention of the words 'overnight stay' a few hours later, Steve announced that there was no way he would spend the night there when there was nothing they could do for him and he had a perfectly good bed waiting for him at home.
That was before he remembered about his leaking rooftop, and that he had never deposited his check or solved his issue.
Not to mention the missed meeting with the Governor.
Danny once again came to the rescue, informing him that he had updated the Governor while he was asleep and that she'd passed along her congratulations for a job well done and her wishes for a speedy recovery. He had also sent Lou to his house to tell the guy doing the repair work that the head of Five-0 had just saved 12 people during a bank robbery and deserved his roof fixed ASAP if he didn't want the whole team unleashed on his ass.
Complying with the Commander's request, the doctor prescribed him medications, gave instructions they both knew by heart and recommended follow-up medical attention if the symptoms worsened before releasing him into Danny's care.
Steve spent the ride home slumped in the passenger seat, eyes closed, right hand perched on the window and holding his throbbing head. It was weird to see him so compliant and quiet but then again, the man was used to licking his own wound in silence.
When Danny helped him into bed after a light meal and the first round of medications, frowning at the whimpering sounds his friend tried to restrain but couldn't, he promised him that the pain was only temporary, and that he would be okay soon.
It turned out to be a lie.
TBC?
So apparently my muse decided to leave the ending open and is considering a second part. What do you think? Should I explore what's going on with Steve and why it looks like he's not healing as he should?