A/N: Yippee….Reviews are back again! Tomorrow is Sunday... day of rest! I really hope you guys like this chapter. Next chapter will be on Monday! Have a great weekend friends!
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Pride, Admiration and Respect
Chapter Fourteen
Sanchez, Cordoba and his goons had left the room a while ago leaving their three captives, well, two anyway, alone to contemplate their situation. Time was running out. Annie knew it. Steve knew it. Danny? Well, Danny didn't know much of anything anymore. The stab wound in his side had clotted a bit but was still bleeding in a slow steady stream. Steve stared at him as intently as he could but without being able to reach him and touch him, he couldn't tell just how much time Danny had left. He was breathing, that much Steve could tell, but it was extremely shallow and unsteady. Steve knew no major artery had been hit or Danny would be dead already but there was no way to tell what was going on internally either from the stab wound or the blunt force trauma he sustained after taking multiple hits to his chest and abdomen. All Steve did know was they needed to get Danny out of there like… yesterday!
But Steve's situation wasn't all that much better. He knew he was badly concussed. The pain in his head was thunderous. Every time he looked over at Annie, he swore he could see three of her. He was having trouble tracking and every time he moved his head too fast he was sure he was going to barf his guts up. He also knew if Danny were conscious he'd have no feeling whatsoever in his arms from being suspended for so long because Steve had almost no feeling in his arms either.
What he was sure of was they were beginning to show signs of becoming infected. The little he could turn his head to look showed him they were red and angry looking. There was also the beginning of an ugly drainage coming from them both and he assumed the reason he was shivering one moment and boiling the next meant he was running a temperature. He wasn't sure just how long they'd been there but he knew time was running out, that was for damn sure.
Annie watched as Steve took stock of both his own injuries and Danny's. She was terrified but doing her best to stay strong. In her heart, all she felt was sadness and remorse for having brought this down on her brother and his best friend.
"Steve…." she spoke, getting his attention. "I am so sorry. I never intended for this to happen, for you and Danny to get caught up in this. I never would have come if…"
"Annie…. stop." Steve tried to sound confident but his strength was waning rapidly from not only the concussion and blood loss but the infection as well. "You did exactly what I would have done… exactly what Danny would have done. This is not your fault!"
"I can't tell if he's breathing, Steve," Annie said, her voice watery. "Please tell me you can see him breathing."
"It's shallow and…. irregular," he hesitated to tell her, "but he's still breathing, Annie."
"Thank God!" As hard as it was, she attempted to reign in her emotions. "I heard them," she said, her voice a bit stronger as she swallowed around her words. "They called Chin. Demanded he drop off the flash drive at some church in Pearl City. You were right."
"How long ago…. how long was I out?"
"I'm not sure, a couple hours? Maybe. I called and called but you just didn't want to wake up. Didn't anyone ever tell you that you're not supposed to sleep with a concussion?" She attempted to keep her voice light and teasing but failed miserably.
She saw the flicker of a small smile he valiantly tried to give her but before he had the chance to say another word, the door to the large room burst open, Cordoba and Sanchez storming in with Cordoba's two goons hot on their heels. "Oh… this can't be good," Steve thought.
"They didn't show up!" Sanchez growled as he advanced on Annie. "Goddamn it all to hell…. they didn't show up! What game are they playing?"
Being a really good cop, Annie immediately saw it for what it was. A quick glance at Steve told her he was thinking the exact same thing. Chin and Kono had come up with something. Something that made dropping the flash drive at the church unnecessary. Sanchez was panicking and completely losing his head.
With an angry growl, he reached down and grabbed Annie by the upper arms. His grip was incredibly strong and Annie could feel the bruising already starting to form. His eyes were blazing in a fury of panic. Cordoba and his men were stationed behind Annie, where she couldn't see them, but she knew they were there by the way Sanchez's eyes kept darting over her head to look at them.
"Leave her alone…. you son-of-a-bitch…. leave…. her…. alone!" Steve weakly yelled. Cordoba's men moved from his side and immediately flanked Steve, guns drawn. "I'd keep quiet if I were you cop! If you know what's good for you," the biggest of the two warned as he pressed the barrel of his gun to Steve's temple.
Completely ignoring Steve, Sanchez literally picked Annie up, chair and all, with the force of the grip on her arms. "What the hell is going on Annie? Why didn't they show up? What did you tell them? Did you tell them what was on that drive?"
"How the hell should I know what's going on, Alex?" Annie cried out. The pain in her arms was intensifying as he began to shake her in his fury. "In case you haven't noticed, I've been here with you this whole time. I have no idea what Five-0 is up to!"
She tried to fight him off, twisting her body and pulling on the ropes that bound her arms, anything to get him off her. Finally, his arms gave out from the weight and he let the chair clatter back to the floor. It moaned and creaked from the impact but he didn't completely let go.
Annie continued to struggle to get her arms out of his grasp and as she did so, she noticed something remarkable. She tried to school her features, to keep her breathing under control so she wouldn't give it away, but when Alex had let the chair fall to the floor, the force of the impact, as well as Annie's struggles, had caused the back of the old wooden chair to loosen. Where her arms were completely immobile before, now she could feel some play between the ropes and her skin. She had to get him off of her before he realized it too.
Annie had no idea how long they'd been there but her mouth was bone dry from both fear and lack of water. But she did her best to try to work up as much saliva as she could. She had to get Alex away from that chair. She worked it as much as she could, leaned her head back and spit full in his face. His reaction was just as she'd hoped.
"Goddamn it…. you little bitch!" He roared as he immediately stumbled away from her, disgustingly wiping at his face. His anger seemed to geometrically multiply as he reached back and prepared to punch her full in the face.
"No! … Don't!" Steve yelled and struggled again, ignoring the blood and discharge running down his arms and the way the gun was pressing against his temple. His head was swimming but he didn't have to suffer through the dizziness for very long because Cordoba's man didn't take kindly to being disobeyed.
"I … told… you… to shut up!" he roared and before Steve could even blink, the barrel of the gun made vicious contact with his head. Steve lost the tender hold he had on consciousness for the last time.
"Steve!" Annie screamed.
"Enough!" Cordoba interrupted. "Enough! This is getting us nowhere and we have wasted enough time."
Cordoba walked around the chair. Placing his hand in the center of Sanchez's chest he moved his companion away from Annie and took the place in front of her.
"I am tired of this game. I want what is mine and I'm not willing to wait any longer to have it. Your friends at Five-0 will bring me the drive unless they want to find all three of your dead bodies. You know me, Annie," Cordoba continued, using her name for the very first time. "You have studied me enough to know that I am ruthless and will not be thwarted in my desires. I cannot risk having this location compromised so an alternate method of delivering a message is obviously needed. Someone will have to carry my message to Five-0. I think finding the body of one of their own along some desolate road should send the proper message, don't you? The only question is, which one will it be, Annie? Who will die for you this time?"
"I don't know what you mean! I don't understand."
"I was there, you know. In that warehouse when your partner foolishly took the bullet that was meant for you. Of course, he had no way of knowing at the time that there was another one meant for him as well. Only poor timing on the part of my associates allowed you to survive. So, I ask again. Like your partner before them, which one of these two will die for you this time?"
"This is ridiculous! Let's get out of here!" Sanchez exclaimed. "Just kill them all now and be done with it! I get her!" He snarled as he leaned over Annie until they were practically nose to nose.
Annie held her ground. She defiantly stared back into the hard, cold, hate-filled eyes of the man she once called "friend". What had happened to change him? A question for another day. Right now, she was much more interested in his sports jacket, in the way it hung open as he leaned over her. In the gun she saw sticking out of the waistband.
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~~H50~~~~H50~~~~H50~~~~H50~~~~H50~~~~H50~~~~H50~~~~H50~~~~H50~~
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99-1295 Waiua Place sat at the end of a long cul-de-sac with similar industrial buildings on either side. Both buildings were still partially occupied, judging by the number of cars and trucks in the lots out front. Ideally Chin would have preferred to conduct this raid at night, when darkness could be used to their advantage and the adjacent buildings would be more empty. But Steve and Annie had already been in Cordoba's hands for several hours and Danny even longer than that. Waiting another hour for the sun to go down simply wasn't an option.
Chin, Kono and Toast, along with Duke Lukela and Officer Okuda were in the surveillance van parked in the lot of the building next door. It was a small food distribution center so it was relatively easy for their "food truck" surveillance van to blend in with the various delivery trucks with logos ranging from Haagen-Dazs ice cream to DiGiorno Pizza. The rest of Duke's men were stealthily deployed around the building.
At the moment, everyone was leaning over Toast's shoulder as he sat monitoring all the equipment. He'd been unsurprisingly terrified when asked to participate in this raid. But a promise from Kono that all he'd have to do is stay in the van with Okuda on guard, as well as his own determination to finish what he'd started and find Danny, overruled his usual sense of self preservation. Thinking about the very large coconut shell filled with pakalolo waiting for him at home when this was over didn't hurt either.
"Heat signatures show nine warm bodies. Two are stationed on the ground floor. Probably guarding the stairway down to the sub-basement. Seven additional signatures show down there. Four are moving around and three are stationary, one sitting and two standing against a back wall. That's weird." Toast said.
Chin, Kono and Duke exchanged worried glances, not liking what that implied, even if it was a comfort to hear the three stationary signatures were all warm…. all alive… at least for the time being.
"Dammit… we need to know what's going on in there, Toast! How long before the digital audio is up?"
"Five minutes…. tops!"
Chin turned to Duke. "Get your men in position. As soon as we have audio and can confirm our people are in there, we move!"
"On it!" Duke replied, reaching for his police radio.
It only took a few moments more before Toast finally called out "got it… audio's up." After flicking a switch or two, they could all hear what was going on inside.
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"No! … Don't!"
"I … told… you… to shut up!"
"Steve!"
"Enough…. enough! This is getting us nowhere and we have wasted enough time."
"I am tired of this game. I want what is mine and I'm not willing to wait any longer to have it. Your friends at Five-0 will bring me the drive unless they want to find all three of your dead bodies. You know me, Annie. You have studied me enough to know that I am ruthless and will not be thwarted in my desires. I cannot risk having this location compromised so an alternate method of delivering a message is obviously needed. Someone will have to carry my message to Five-0. I think finding the body of one of their own along some desolate road would send the proper message, don't you? The only question is, which one will it be, Annie? Which one will die for you this time?"
"I don't know what you mean! I don't understand."
"I was there, you know. In that warehouse when your partner foolishly took the bullet that was meant for you. Of course, he had no way of knowing at the time that there was another one meant for him as well. Only poor timing on the part of my associates allowed you to survive. So, I ask again. Like your partner before them, which one of these two will die for you this time?"
"This is ridiculous! Let's get out of here! Just kill them all now and be done with it! I get her!"
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"That's enough" Chin growled as he and Kono double checked their weapons and their ear buds. "Toast, keep monitoring. Patch the audio through to the buds so we can hear everything that's going on. Duke... deploy your men!"