Bonding

By

Landon Richardson

Official Disclaimer

The characters of Lieutenant Commander Steven 'Steve' McGarrett, Chin Ho Kelly, Kono Kalakaua, Adam 'Toast' Charles and Governor Patricia Jameson do not belong to me in any shape or form. I am merely using them for my own entertainment purposes.

The character of Detective Sergeant Danielle 'Danni' Williams probably can be considered to be mine by now. Although she was originally based on male Danny, she soon evolved becoming her own person. She has her own background, her own family, her own history and her own distinct personality. This isn't to say that the Danny Williams we all know and love is completely gone, he still emerges through her at times. I like to think of female Danni as what Danny could have been if everything in his life had gone his way. As in full custody of Grace and a decent relationship with his ex.

The character of Grace has also changed slightly due to the change in Danni. Her surname is Taylor as this is her father's surname and was Danni's married name (Danni reverted back to her maiden name when she was divorced). Her parents also are amicable which has also impacted Grace but never fear, she's still the sweetheart we know and love, if anything she's more a sweetheart now.

The character of Supervisory Special Agent Jack O'Connor, Unit Chief Supervisory Special Agent Ryan Moore however do belong to me as does any other character who you do not recognise from the show. Please do not use them, or my version of Danni and Grace without first asking for my permission to do so.

Author Note

Welcome to Bonding

The one shot which comes after Burn and before Respect the land.

If you have not read the previous stories before this one then I would suggest you do as this may not make much sense otherwise.

I always enjoy having these little one shots between the main chapter stories and I hope you enjoy them as well. I feel they give a glimpse into the life between cases for the team.

Anyway, please enjoy

Overall Summary

Sometimes all you need to bond is a common cause, the rest will begin to fall into place naturally.

Overall Romance

Hints of Steve McGarrett / Danni Williams (McDanni)

Mentions of past Duncan Taylor / Danni Williams (Dunni)

Warning

This story features a female Danni Williams in place of a male Danny Williams. Although in some stories I write, Danny does exist, he does not exist in this one.

If this is not your cup of tea then please hit the back button.

Another note

I do not have a Beta so please forgive any mistakes which may creep in, I always do my best to edit the story and check it but sometimes mistakes do creep in.

The places I've mentioned in Hawaii are ones which come from google, including the addresses. I've never been to Hawaii myself in person so I apologise for any mistakes which I may make, these are not intentional.

Wednesday 6th October 2010

The Governor's Taskforce Headquarters

3rd Floor

Ali'iolani Hale

417 King Street

Honolulu

Oahu

Kono Kalakaua's Point of View

Kono Kalakaua sat behind her desk, staring blankly at the flashing cursor on her computer screen and wondered what the hell she was meant to write next. The Arsonist case was finally over which was something she was glad about, especially after finding herself face to face with Barclay down in the interrogation room the previous day. The man had this look in his eyes which had sent a shiver down her spine every time his gaze had flickered over to her. She had found herself wondering how Danni Williams, small, almost delicate looking Danni Williams, could have held her own in a fight against someone like him until help had arrived.

Shaking her head, Kono allowed a small smile to come to her face.

Just when she thought she couldn't respect the other woman more than she did, the blonde went and showed Kono that beneath Danni's kindness and her strong work ethics was a badass who was ready to emerge if the situation at hand called for it.

Pushing the thought away, Kono focused her attention back on her screen wondering how exactly she was meant to word the report she was working on, she was tempted to just write exactly what was in her head and submit it to Danni to read over but she had no idea what the woman would do if she did. Would she correct the report herself because they were still in the early days of their taskforce or would she return it to her like Steve had done to the one report which had landed on his desk, covered in post it notes which had been scribbled over in Steve's bold, jagged handwriting, telling her where she went wrong and instructed her to make the necessary changes and resubmit to him.

It wasn't worth the risk, not if Danni was anything like her partner and would simply return it. The last thing which Kono wanted was to be in the office late trying to complete it, especially as Steve had already hinted that they would probably end up with a new case the next day. Kono didn't want to be one of those cops who was always behind on their paperwork, not when she was still trying to make a good impression on Steve and Danni and show them that they were right to take the risk on her that they had done.

She wrote another paragraph, stated that she had taken photographs at the crime scene before she had handed them into CSU as instructed by her boss. It seemed good to her, simple and concise like they had taught them in the Academy. It was just a shame that the reports they had written in practice there had been for lesser crimes which a brand-new officer into the department would be likely to deal with on a regular basis. There had been no classes for cases like the three which she had just worked on. She guess that the Academy has assumed, like so many others that by the time Kono started working on these sort of cases that she would have been in the force for a while and learned the skills on writing reports until she could do them with her eyes closes and adapt to anything.

Kono pushed her chair back and came up to her feet, reaching up and stretching her arms above her head before she twisted at the waist right and left, allowing her arms to sweep out trying to loosen her muscles before they tightened up too much. A lingering present from the surfing accident which had ended her career in the main circuit. She glanced out of her office, her eyes landing on her work colleagues who seemed as though they were writing reports in their offices and groaned at when she saw.

Her cousin Chin Ho Kelly, had apparently never lost his ability to write reports and was breezing through them, a content look on his face as though there was nowhere else, he would rather be at that time then sitting in his office chair in front of the computer. Giving what his past had been like and what had happened to him previously she couldn't blame him for being happy, anymore then she could blame him for the loyalty he now had for Steve and Danni, the two people who had ignored the gossip that had floated around the island for years about him and had decided to give Chin a chance and let his skills at the job and his attitude speak for themselves.

Jack O'Connor looked as though he was already finished with his reports if the large stack of files which was now in his out-tray was anything to go by. He was looking down at the desk, two hands lightly gripping his short blond hair as he read something. Kono tilted her head at him, her mind drifting back to what the other man had said to her in the car when they had been on their way to the Chens murder crime scene. How the mother of his two young daughters was dead and that they didn't miss her.

Kono didn't know Jack well, none of them did yet, but from the small amount she had gathered Jack was one of those rare combinations of being a nice guy who could kick ass, either physically or mentally, when the case demanded it. He reminded her a bit of Danni in the way that nothing seemed to faze the pair of them, they simply took everything in their stride which meant that whatever the mother of Jack's two daughters had done was bad enough to turn Jack against her.

The question was, what did she do that was bad?

Pushing the thought away she focused on Toast who was standing at the computer table in his usual position, typing away at something, she would have thought that he would have struggled with reports but from a conversation which she had overheard between Steve and Danni, Toast's reports were actually extremely good. When she had asked the man himself about it, he had merely chuckled in response and told her that he had spent the majority of his time writing other people's reports for cash when he had been at high school and had learnt how to adapt his own innate writing style to reflect the other person's. The same as he was doing now, he had found out the way Steve liked his reports to be written and adapted to it, ending up a report which had everything in it that their boss wanted to see.

It was a skill that she had decided that she would have to get the other man to teach her.

Kono blinked, looking towards her office door when it suddenly opened without a knock, revealing Steve standing in front of her.

"Hey Kono, how is your report coming along? Are you nearly finished with it?" He asked her, foregoing any small talk the same way he often seemed to do.

"Yeah, it's coming along nicely boss." She assured him, her eyes flickering over to her screen again at the half-finished report.

"I'm glad to hear it, in that case you can leave it for a while and finish it off later today. Jack and Danni are about to start work on the ledgers that we received during the Sang Min case. I want you there to shadow them since it will be good experience for you. You can hand your report in to me first thing tomorrow instead of this evening." He told her, giving her a faint smile which she noted barely reflected in his blue eyes before he turned and headed back out of her office and made a beeline towards Jack's office, no doubt to relay a similar message to the other man.

"Great, just great" Kono murmured to herself, tilting her head back and groaning before she leaned forward towards her computer and hit the save button. This would mean that she would have to spend her evening working on it instead of catching some waves like she had initially planned to do. She turned the screen off and picked up the bottle of water she had on her desk and left the room, heading in the direction of Danni's office where she assume they would work, stopping in her tracks when the small blond woman left the office in question, a stack of black leather books and files held under one arm while she held a purple mug of what Kono assume was coffee in her free hand.

"Hey Kono" Danni called out to her with a smile on her face as she changed her direction so she was heading straight towards her. "I figured that it would be easier for us to work if we use the table by the kitchen, it would give us a chance to spread out the files and any notes we make on them." She stated as she came to a stop, tilting her head back slightly so she could still see into Kono's face.

"Working at the table sounds fine to me." Kono agreed easily with a nod as they both turned and headed over to the table. Kono pulled out one of the chairs, watching as Danni placed the files on the clear surface. "So, is it just you, me and Jack working on this? The boss man didn't mention anyone else." Kono questioned as Danni lowered herself into the chair opposite, her movements careful and slow no doubt a result of her fight with Barclay the day before, the same as the stiches at her temple and the colourful bruises which covered half of her face were.

"Toast is joining us as well." The blonde responded promptly as she looked up at her. "We'll be doing a lot of cross checking so having someone working with us whose sole job is to do that while we work on actually deciphering the books would be helpful, especially if it quickens up how quickly we get through these."

"What about the boss man and Cuz? What will they be doing while we're working on this?" Kono asked as she reached for her water bottle and unscrewed the top, taking a long sip of it.

"Steve has a meeting with the Governor at her office so he should be leaving here to go there any minute now and Chin is…" Danni's voice trailed off for a moment, a thoughtful look on her face before she spoke. "Chin is heading off to the CSU building to pick up some reports which we need for the Barclay case, normally one of them would bring them over to us but they are swamped over there with work at the moment so Ryan rang and asked if we could collect them this one time. Chin happened to be in the room with me when Ryan called and he offered to go in my place." Danni told her. "I think he plans to join us at this when he gets back if he's still working at it."

"Sound good to me" Kono sad in response, looking up just as Jack and Toast approached them, Jack taking the seat beside Danni while Toast dropped into the one beside Kono.

"Everyone ready to start now?" Danni queried, looking around them all with a questioning look on her face.

"We're good, I'm just logging us onto the network Blondie." Toast told her, flashing her a wide grin before he turned his attention back to his laptop, typing away at it with an ease that Kono wished she had.

She couldn't help the grin which came to her face at Toast's comment. Somehow, she had the feeling that the man next to her was literally the only person who could get away with constantly referring to Danni as Blondie, both to others and to her face without being reprimanded about it. Looking at the blonde woman, she didn't even appear annoyed by the use of it, she merely looked resigned to it.

"So, how exactly are we going to go about doing this then? Boss man merely said that this had something to do with the Sang Min case." Kono questioned, glancing towards Toast when he spoke up in a distracted tone.

"Sang who?"

"Sang Min, Toast" Danni answered in a brisk tone. "You weren't here when we were dealing with the case but Sang Min is a snake head who was responsible for the underground trafficking ring which transported immigrants and criminals into Hawaii, mainly via boats". She explained, reaching up as she did to hook a stray curl behind her ear. "When we took him down, we discovered these ledgers in his main base of operations." She stated, lightly dropping her hand against the one of the four thick, black leather-bound books which she had been carrying earlier. "These belong to Sang Min and no doubt contain a record of exactly who he had brought into the country and giving us details on them. The only issue is that all of it is written in a code. Chin and I have been working on them when we've had the time and we have finally broken the code to them so now we'll need to go through them which as you can imagine will probably end up taking us some time." Danni said, finishing up on a sigh which Kono copied.

"But not as long as it would take us to go through if you and Chin hadn't cracked the code in the first place." Jack pointed out as he reached out and took one of the books from Danni.

"That is true." Danni agreed, flashing him a quick smile before she picked up one of the other books and held it out to Kono who took it from her, her eyebrow rising when she felt the weight of the ledger.

"So how are we going to do this exactly?" Toast asked curiously as he leaned back in his chair, crossing his arms over his chest. Danni opened her mouth to answer him before she closed it when Steve approached them, his eyes flickering over them all before they focused on his partner.

"I'm heading out to the Governor's office now Danni" He announced. "Have you got everything handled here?"

"Yeah, we're good Steve, give me a call when you have finished with the Governor." Danni remarked, looking up at him with a smile.

"Yeah I will, drop me a call if you need anything Danni, I can always leave the meeting early if you need me back here with you." Steve remarked, his face dropping in a way which made Kono grin when Danni immediately shook her head and pointed her finger at him with a stern look on her face.

"Do not even think about leaving that meeting early Steven, these meetings with the Governor are important and you will attend each and every one of them even if I have to drag you there myself and sit outside in the waiting area to babysit you while you are in there." She told him, clearly ignoring the look on Steve's face which turned from surprise into bemusement, "The Governor is our boss so you make sure you stay there and listen to what she has to say to you. Understood Commander."

"Understood." Steve said with a raised eyebrow. For a moment Steve and Danni merely stared at one another, having a silent conversation before Steve suddenly nodded at her, his eyes moving around the group again as he spoke. "I'll see you guys tomorrow morning or later on, have a good evening if I don't see you." He stated, nodding to each of them before he turned and headed towards the exit.

Kono turned her attention to Danni, watching as the older woman watched her partner with a thoughtful look until he disappeared from sight before turning her attention back to Toast.

"To answer your earlier question Toast, we'll go through the ledgers and tell you the names, you can then look them up using the database and then we can take it from there." She told the younger man who nodded at her.

"That's a lot to put on Toast alone" Jack piped up, tapping his finger against his closed book. "If you give me a moment then I can go and grab my laptop and we can split this into two groups. Danni, you and I can work together since we're on the same side of the table, you giving me the names while Toast and Kono do the same? How does that sound?" The blond suggested.

Danni looked at him, tilting her head to one side before she nodded.

"That sounds like a better use of our time, good plan Jack" Danni agreed with a smile, "Are you both okay doing that? It means that you and I will have to go through two books instead of just one Kono." She said, directing her comment to Kono.

"Doing it the way Jack suggested is fine with me" She replied with a nod as she reached out and took the book which Jack offered to her before he came to his feet and moved away. She dropped it onto the table and opened it to the first page, her eyes widening when she saw the sheer number of initials and details listed on each page. She looked back up to see Danni watching her with a warm smile though the other woman merely remained silent, turning her attention back to Jack when he re-joined them, his laptop in hand

"Let's get started" He announced as he took his seat again, smiling at them before his attention focused on Danni clearly waiting for her to call out the first name.

They must have been working on it for at least an hour or so when Kono leaned back in her chair and groaned, her fingers coming up to rub tiredly at her temples.

"Is it just me or do these names seem literally endless?" She asked, the comment causing Danni to sigh even as she nodded in agreement.

"He's clearly been in business, doing this for longer than we initially thought, some of these dates go back fifteen years or more." She stated, tapping her fingertip against the page in front of her.

"Say what you will about the man but he was certainly hardworking and organised." Jack added, his mouth curling up into a smile before he glanced down at his watch thoughtfully. "I don't know about any of you but I'm feeling pretty hungry right about now."

"We could grab some food maybe or order something in and get them to deliver to the security desk downstairs? I'm pretty sure Steve has someone manning the place twenty-four hours a day." Danni suggested, looking around them.

"Don't you have to be getting home soon for Grace?" Kono asked curiously, raising an eyebrow when Danni shook her head at her.

"Normally yes but Wednesday is her evening with her Dad. It's five thirty now, so by the time the food come it probably be just gone six. As long as I'm back home by seven thirty then I'm good and can stay to grab something to eat with you guys." Danni explained.

"You know we could always take the ledgers back to your house Danni?" Kono suggested brightly. "It would give us a chance to finally meet Grace in person, you talk about her all the time."

"Not tonight Kono" Danni answered with a shake of her head. "Grace is always tired when it comes to her bedtime and she turns from an Angel into a grouchy little girl who is constantly stating to anyone who will listen that she's not tired when it's clear to anyone with eyes that she is. I would rather you all meet her during the day at a weekend when she'll be her usual sweet self." Danni explained.

"I can understand that" Jack said. "Bedtime is an absolute chore for a parent, trust me I've been in the same situation more time then I can count. Add in a bunch of strangers for her to meet and Grace will never go down to sleep, she wouldn't want to miss out on any of the excitement."

"Exactly which means that she would be extremely tired for school tomorrow morning which is the last thing I want." Danni admitted

"So maybe we could meet her on an upcoming weekend instead as a group?" Kono pressed, smiling triumphantly when Danni nodded at her.

"Now that's a plan I can agree to" She stated.

"You know what I feel like tonight? I feel like some Chinese" Toast suddenly said, a thoughtful tone to his voice. "I know this really good place which is near here that does the best Chow Mein you will ever have on the island. If I call in and order then they will definitely have the food here by six. I'm like one of their favourite customers."

"So, we're agreed then, we're going to order Chinese in and eat while we work on these?" Kono asked, looking around them.

"Yeah" Toast said, turning to look at her with a wide grin before he shrugged. "Just think of it all as a bonding exercise.

"Bonding" Kono repeated, looking around at the other three before she grinned back. "You know what, I can do bonding."

Author Note

Thanks for taking the time to read. An especially big thank you if you have left me a review, favourite the story or decided to follow it.

I really appreciate it