Disclaimer: I don't own anything that is a proper noun, just having fun. No copyright infringement intended.

A/N: And FINALLY, the last chapter, an epilogue of sorts… Hope you have enjoyed.

"Chin, hey man." Steve stepped up quickly, offering his hand to greet Chin as soon as he came through the door. "I'm glad you decided to postpone your flight so you could be here."

"Well, I couldn't leave without seeing the infamous Steve's, could I?"

"It's not Steve's."

Chin turned to see Danny seated at a table behind him. "Danny," Chin said with delighted surprise. "I didn't think you were going to be here."

"The Neanderthal drug me away from his couch. I was perfectly comfortable and was settled in watching TV," Danny explained. "He said it would be good for me… and… I guess… maybe this one time… he's right... maybe."

"What did you say?" Steve's eyebrows rose.

"I saaaid the name of the place is Kamekona's Italian Bistro, not Steve's."

"Yeah, right, and it would have been Steve's if we hadn't sold out to Kame."

"No… no." Danny began to protest and starting wagging his finger to emphasize his point.

"Well, it looks like a nice place and something smells great," Chin derailed the direction of the conversation.

"That's the Shrimp Fra Diavolo, brudah," Kamekona informed as he approached the men.

"Shrimp. Of course." Chin smiled broadly as he said it. "Well, I can't wait to try it."

"I was just 'bout to say it's almost ready. I hope ya brought your appetite."

Chin rubbed his belly and smiled to acknowledge that he had.

Steve kept glancing at the door. "I thought Kono was going to be with you?"

"She is. She just got a phone call right as we arrived. She'll be in shortly," Chin explained.

Chin looked around and saw Jerry and Noelani sitting at a table not far away and Junior and Tani were immersed in each other's company toward the back of the dining room. "Well, I see Jer and Noelani and the young lovebirds back there. When's everyone else gonna show?"

"I haven't heard from Adam, but Lou called and he's waiting on Renee to finish getting ready. They should be here soon," Steve answered.

"Grace is coming and bringing Charlie," Danny added, with a silly smile plastered on his face.

"I still can't get over how big Charlie has gotten and Grace has turned into a beautiful young lady. Is she and Will still a thing or are you fighting off the gentlemen callers?" Chin teased.

"Chin, please, don't get him started," Steve begged. "I hear this rant at least three times a day."

"You do not," Danny squinted at Steve before turning back to Chin, "and Will is still very much a thing, but that doesn't stop some persistent sad sap from trying every now and then."

"Uh, I'm going to say hello to Noelani and Jerry," Chin said as he inched away from the pair to avoid the ramblings he knew was coming as Steve was about to argue Danny's refusal to admit his most recent rant topic.

"Noelani. Jerry. How's it going?"

Noelani conceded to Jerry when he piped up first. "Fine. I was just telling Dr. Cunha, here, about my special mission that Commander McGarrett entrusted me with."

"Yes. It sounds like it was very important," she politely bolstered his ego.

"From what I hear," Chin added, "he did an excellent job. James Okala's family were kept safe and secure that night, thanks to Jerry. Now Okala is safely tucked away in a facility on the mainland, away from anyone who knows him and his family was assisted by the grateful state of Hawaii to be set up in a nearby location so they can visit."

Jerry beamed as he soaked up Chin's summary of the favorable outcome of his assignment. He knew he hadn't done much, but he had been there and had been available if needed, and just the fact that he was considered an integral part of Five-0, so much so that he was able to represent the task force, made him swell up with pride.

"Maybe, they'll want you to do some more of that dangerous stuff," Noelani conjectured as her eyes sparkled with excitement for her friend. "That is… if you want to," she back off a bit when she heard her own choice of word, 'dangerous'.

"Oh, I hope so," Jerry eagerly answered. "Except for worrying about the rest of the team, that was some of the most fun I've had."

Chin slapped him on the back. "I'm sure McGarrett will have plenty more missions for you to head up for him, my friend."

"Kono said the same thing yesterday. Is she here?" Jerry turned to look for her.

"She's outside. She'll be right in."

~~~~~H50~~~~~

"Adam?" Kono saw the name on her phone.

"Hey, Kono. I wanted to catch you before you went inside. Can we talk a minute?"

"How did you know I was… " Kono was interrupted by a light rapping on the passenger side window. She looked to see it was Adam, smiling at her while he held up his phone and rocked it slightly before tapping the screen to disconnect the call.

Kono stepped out of the rental, but before she could speak, Adam started, "Sorry about that. I just wanted a minute alone before we got inside with all the noise and activity."

"Where were you?" She looked around the parking lot and spotted his Corvette. "Were you waiting for me?"

"If I said yes will you be angry?"

"No. I kinda wanted to talk to you, too," she admitted. "You haven't been around these last couple of days."

"I know and I'm sorry about that."

"Adam, have you…? Does it have something to do with… Masuda or the yakuza?"

After they had found out that Danny was going to be okay and Junior had been released from the hospital, they had all gathered in Danny's hospital room. Steve had informed the team what Gabriel had told him about Masuda and his most recent connections with the yakuza.

Adam had divulged to them that the man in the sedan that had not bothered to conceal his identity from Adam was, in fact, Hijime Masuda, whom Adam had known very well since childhood. This tidbit of information had not come as a surprise to Steve after witnessing Adam's interaction with Detective Katsumoto.

They were all able to put the pieces together that Masuda and his army had been at the airstrip and then later at the slaughterhouse to take care of an inconvenient loose end. Steve believed Five-0 was never a target, but also not considered a protected entity either.

Adam had disagreed with that assessment a bit, believing that the eye contact that he and Masuda shared that day was affirmation that he had waited for certain people to exit and that the explosions had been triggered by a detonator, most likely in the hands of Masuda himself. In his opinion, right or wrong, he believed Masuda had made a conscious effort to protect the Five-0 team.

Chin had let them all know that Gabriel was as good as dead when he had left him dying in that building, but they knew Masuda had finished it, once and for all.

"No!" he spoke up quickly. "No. I've just been… well, doing a lot of thinking."

"About?"

"Well, sure about Masuda, about everything that happened, about Gabriel… and…"

"And?" she coaxed.

"And… about us," he finally admitted.

Kono froze. She saw the lights of the night, the street lights, the car lights, the restaurant lights, the moonlight, dance in his eyes as he awaited her reaction. She breathed out a long, deliberate breath. "I've been thinking a lot myself… about us," she revealed as well.

Now it was Adam's turn to exhale a held breath. He smiled.

"I can't promise anything," she spoke quickly before he jumped to any conclusions, "but, this has been nice, familiar."

Adam grinned as he dropped his head and looked up at her with amusement. "I thought the same thing… and we don't need promises, but maybe we can just explore… go slow… see how things go?"

"Adam, I'm still going back. My work and what I'm doing, what we're accomplishing, it's important to me."

Adam's smile faded and he looked up. "Of course, that's what I… that's what I admire so much about you." He had quickly found a different word, a word a little more fitting. "Do you think I could visit sometime? In a professional capacity, of course."

"Professional capacity?"

"Yeah, you know help out a little? Maybe learn a little? You know, so I could bring back some of your knowledge to the islands?"

"And maybe I could come back home more… in a 'professional capacity'," she mocked his word choice but added a benign smile. "And maybe we can fit in a little non-professional time as well?"

Adam's smile returned. "Sounds good to me. Maybe we should go in. What do you think?"

"I think I'm starved."

"Then let's go." He held out his crooked arm which she accepted naturally, hooking her arm through his and they headed toward the door of the city's newest Italian restaurant that had been reserved for a private gathering that night.

~~~~~H50~~~~~

Ding, ding, ding. Steve tapped his spoon against his fluted champagne glass. "Excuse me, everyone. Can I have your attention?" He was standing at his table looking out over the dining areas of the restaurant where his ohana had gathered. He waited a minute for the individual conversations to die down throughout the room. "Sorry to interrupt. I just wanted to thank everyone for coming tonight. I especially wanted to thank Chin… and Kono… for being here. You put your lives on hold."

He paused as an almost inaudible catch of his breath revealed he was trying to hold back tears. He felt a jostle on his right side. He looked down to see Danny had elbowed him. Steve looked past him to see Grace and Charlie were eyeing him in anticipation. His attention was brought back to his partner when Danny spoke up, "You okay, babe? You had us on the edge of our seats and then you just blanked."

"Thank you, Danno," he teased. Danny's ploy had work and he was back on track. "I was just saying, it will be our last night together before Chin and Kono go back to their lives and we continue on with ours."

"Hey, Steve. Can I rescue you?" Chin stood.

"Sure, brother. Go ahead." Steve waved his hand, offering the floor and sat down, taking the opportunity to elbow Danny back as soon as he did, complete with an eyebrow raise and a grin.

Chin stood and let the moment soak in. He looked around at his family. Every last one of them he considered ohana, even those he had only met recently and had known for just a very short time. That short period of time, though, had been enough. In these past few weeks, they had been through, endured, and survived the personally honed crucible of Gabriel Waincroft together.

"Just a few days ago, many of us were gathered at Tripler, anxiously waiting to hear word about Danny." He tilted his glass toward Danny. "To kill time and, if truth be told, to keep our minds from wandering to places that were too formidable to speak of, Kono was regaling us with a tale from our latest ordeal. I'll not put a damper on the party and rehash the details, but when she got to the point where she punched one of the bad guys," he carefully chose his wording based on his audience as he glanced over at Charlie who was hanging on every word his uncle Chin said, "that brought back a memory and I began to reminisce about that first day, the day that Five-0 came into being. Now, it wasn't called Five-0 yet. That came a bit later, but Steve began building something special that day, and though it took a little more goading for a couple of us," again he grinned at Danny, and Steve had to turn to glance at his partner in smug satisfaction also, "the four of us became a family. And like families do, we grew." He paused to tip his glass to Adam, then Lou and Jerry and Noelani, and then he had to turn backward to acknowledge Tani and Junior who were seated behind him.

When he turned back around, Junior looked at Tani with a warm smile and reached for her hand. She happily accepted his touch and returned a loving smile, a smile that told him there was some exploration of feelings in their future.

"But also, like families do, we have lost some along the way, some just for a while," as he thought about Max, Catherine, and others, "and unfortunately, others we lost forever." There was a lull as everyone reflected on the statement. "Needless to say, though," Chin sped up the pace of his speech to get past the melancholy mood he had wandered into as fast as possible, "we have been through so much… many tears, many trials, many joyous times, and many changes. It's all organically developed into this, right here, right now. Some of us will be leaving and going our separate ways, but no matter where we go or wherever we end up, we will always be ohana. We can always… call on each other."

Chin raised his glass in a toast. "One for all...?" he led them.

"… and all for one," the crowd raised their glasses and chimed in.

Steve held his glass toward Danny with big eyes as though Danny might refuse the toast. "You, big goof," Danny obligingly teased and they touched their glasses together.

"Love you, brother," Steve whispered.

"Love you, too, Steve."

~The End~

Now go get you some wine to go with that classic cheesy ending. Hey, at least I finished.

Truly, I want to humbly thank everyone for reading.

For the follows, what an encouragement.

For the favorites, such a compliment.

To the reviewers, a special THANK YOU! Would love to hear from you. Any input is always appreciated.

Until next time,

Respectfully,

\,,,/BronsonL