Chin plunged into the computer work at hand, allowing the distraction to take away his pain. There were already three files of information, all competing for his attention. He selected the one that seemed most pertinent to the search for Danny Williams. "Data's coming in, Steve. Forensics is at Kono's place right now."

"What did they find?" Kono drifted over to look.

Chin spared her a glance. "Same as at Danny's, coz. Scratches on the doorknob. Door unlocked; nobody home." Getting the picture, coz? Your face could look just as bad as Danny's right about now. Maybe worse.

"They didn't touch anything?"

"No, not even that tacky Buddha statue you have on the shelf."

"That tacky statue has a lot of sentimental value."

"And absolutely no financial worth at all." Chin moved on. "They found some footprints outside the window. At least one of the guys weighed about one forty, one fifty, probably just under five foot ten."

"Sounds like the haole dude," Kono observed. "You remember him, Steve. The one who got away."

Yeah, Chin could see that Steve remembered him. The look on the Bossman's face made that an incontrovertible conclusion. The haole was the one with the knife, who was willing to use that knife on Steve. Bastard had scuttled out through the back, probably sneaking around and waiting for a chance to turn the tables.

"Put together a composite, run it through facial identification," Steve ordered. "Let's see if we can put a name to a face. What's the word on the indictment? We hear from the D.A.'s office?"

"Here it is." Kono took the controls from Chin and pulled it up, and frowned. "Steve, they're demanding a call. What's up?"

"Good question." Steve pulled out his cell phone and dialed in the number. "Lt. Commander McGarrett. Yeah, that's right. Returning the call—McGarrett here. What's up?"

The other two waited in silence, staring at him. It didn't sound good.

It wasn't. Steve's face went dull red, then a chilling white. "How the hell did that happen?"

How did what happen?

"We handed it over to you, Inouye. Who dropped the ball?"

Who screwed up?

"You're damn right we're investigating. No, you keep that appointment on the calendar, Inouye. Kono will be there if I have to tie her to the witness stand."

Why does the D.A. think that she wouldn't be?

Steve hung up, and gave them the answers. "The tape," he said grimly.

"The tape of last night?" Kono asked. "Where Danny and I got Hanolo on record threatening to make Danny kill me? That tape?"

"The very one," Steve told her. "It's blank."

"What?" Chin couldn't believe his ears. "Not possible, Steve. I recorded that stuff myself and I did a partial playback early on to make sure that we were getting everything. That's not possible, Steve!"

Kono was horrified. "I listened to that tape too, Steve, after Danny and I notified the D.A.'s office to come over and file charges. I know it wasn't blank. What happened?"

"Good question," and it meant that they had more questions than answers. "Anybody have any bright ideas?"

Chin did. "Chain of custody," he said immediately, readjusting the sling around his arm. "I'll take that angle. There was only one tape in existence, and it was still viable last night. What time was that, Kono?"

"Two, maybe three AM," she told him, "right after Danny and I finished writing up the reports."

"Who had it?"

"I'll track down the records." Kono moved to one side of the table and began the computer search.

Chin started to stand, to edge closer to Steve, and immediately thought better of his actions when his arm began to throb once more. Steve noticed the action and took a step closer. He barely spoke above a whisper. "What?"

Chin didn't beat around the bush but he too kept his voice low. "This leaves Kono as the sole witness. You know that, Steve."

"Yeah." His boss tossed a glance at the young woman pouring through the computer files. "With Danny missing—" and neither of them could say dead, not yet. Maybe not ever. Sure as hell better not be ever—"and the tape erased, that means that without Kono, Hanolo walks."

"Which means that he's going to be after her with everything he's got."

"Yeah." This time Steve didn't look at her.

"She's tough, Steve."

"Yeah. But is she tough enough? She's a rookie, bro."

"She's grown up around cops. She knows her way."

"Yeah." It was more of a sound than an affirmation.

Time to get his boss out of the doldrums. "Facial recognition, Steve. Build the face, and I'll see if I can pin it to someone."

They dragged him to his feet, cutting the ropes that bound his hands behind his back. Danny tried to take advantage of the situation, tried to take a swing at one of them.

Cutler dodged easily, catching the fist and twisting Danny's arm behind him. "Save it, Williams. You're gonna need it."

How had he ended up on the floor? No matter; two brawny goons—islanders, by the looks of them—hauled him back onto his feet and held him there, since his knees were likely to dump him back on the filthy floor.

Not the best place that he'd ever found himself in, and that included the time back in Hoboken when he had taken part in the sting against that mob guy. What was the guy's name? Louie, was all that Danny could remember. Big son of a gun, liked to play with knives and pretty girls' faces. That was a bust that Officer Dan Williams had been proud of, and the operation that had put him in Investigations for good.

He was a detective, wasn't he? If he ever got himself out of this mess alive, he'd need to write up another report, just like he'd made Kono do a few short hours ago. Danny forced himself to dispassionately survey his surroundings: there was a post in the middle of the shanty, something solid enough to hold up the roof and keep the rain off of their heads. Was it raining? No, that was just the blood pounding through his ears. Dirt floor. Couple of pallets with filthy sheets on them in one corner, and a footlocker next to one of them. It was bright with sunshine outside, the rays pouring in to glint off the metal of the footlocker where the dust didn't absorb the photons. Danny stared through the window, hoping that something would look familiar.

"Tie 'im good to the post. I don't want him sliding down."

What the hell was this bastard planning? Whatever it was, Danny was sure that he wasn't going to like it.

"Kono? Time to head over to the courthouse." Steve looked up from his work of trying to make the features of Knife Boy fit the facial ID bag of tricks. It wasn't working as well as he wanted. No matter how hard he tried, Steve hadn't yet been able to get the sneer onto the lips, or the hard glint in the guy's eye. Bastard. He shifted in his chair, wondering why such a comfortable piece of furniture had turned into a rock.

Kono stepped back from her work. "Chain of custody of the tape, Steve: we had it until we—me and Danny and Inouye," she stumbled over Danny's name—"until we listened to it after finishing up our reports. Inouye wanted to make sure that our reports correlated with the tape."

"Did they?"

"Danny's did. Mine needed some tweaking," Kono admitted honestly.

Points for experience. Steve resolved to make certain that Danny's experience wasn't lost forever.

He was also going to make sure that Kono had an opportunity to gain similar experience. He leaned back against the seat. "Turn the lead over to Chin," he ordered, "and get your vest, Kono. From now on, you're outside, you're wearing it. Got me?"

"Steve—" she made a face.

He wasn't having any of it. "You're the only thing that's keeping Hanolo from walking around as a free man," he told her, "and that paints a big fat target on your back. You make sure that the bullets bounce—" His cell phone interrupted.

Steve glanced at it, and did a double take. "Danny's number!" he snapped.

Chin didn't need an invitation. "On it." He tapped frantically at the computer controls, sending a trace into motion.

Steve counted down the seconds, knowing that he had eight rings before voicemail took over. Seconds mattered: time for Chin to trace the call. Time to triangulate the signal. Time for Danny Williams to stay alive.

Time's up. Steve hit the answer button. "McGarrett." He tabbed the speaker, so that the other two could hear.

The voice that issued forth was not that of his partner, no matter what the small screen on the phone said. "You know what we want."

Stall for time. "Suppose you tell me. Make it official."

"Don't get cute, McGarrett. You get the D.A. to drop the charges, or we'll kill Williams."

A few more seconds. Chin's trace hadn't yet located the whereabouts of the call, still needed time to triangulate from the cell phone towers. Kono's eyes were round with fear.

There were rules in the playbook for this kind of situation, and Steve used them. "How do I know he's still alive? Let me talk to him."

It was as if the voice on the other end of the call was waiting for the request. "Talk to the nice man, Williams. Tell him you want to go home now."

"Danno?" When had Steve's voice learned how to shake with fear?

Maybe it was when you were listening to a similar call, not too long ago. Maybe it was when that bastard was holding a gun to your father's head, threatening to blow a hole through it. Maybe it was the very moment that you became an orphan.

"Steve?" It was Danny, tired and in pain. The eight by ten glossy of his partner's swollen and beaten face floated in front of Steve's eyes. He couldn't help but look at Kono. How was the rookie taking this?

Not well. A spot of blood testified that she had bitten through her lip.

Danny wasn't finished. "Steve, no matter what, don't let these bastards win." The words were mumbled, trying to push past the swelling in his jaw.

Chin signaled, pumping his fist. Got it!

Send SWAT!

Steve would hold them there as long as possible. "Let him go," he ordered, knowing that Hanolo's men would do no such thing. "You kill a cop, every hand on the Island is going to be against you."

Already every available unit was hurtling toward the location that Chin had triangulated.

"You drop the charges against Hanolo," the voice returned coolly. "You do that, maybe I'll let him go."

More time. More time for the rescue to draw closer. Steve had to spin it out, give Danny's fellow cops the seconds they needed to get to the scene. Steve's hand itched to fling the phone to the floor and dash out after them.

"What's Hanolo to you?" Steve challenged. "Maybe with him out of the way, you step up in the organization. You want to be the Big Kahuna?"

"Not me, man. Not on these islands."

Clearly it was the haole that had escaped. This was a mainlander that Steve was talking to. Didn't mean he was any less dangerous, not with Danno in his clutches. It did mean that he wasn't as familiar with the Islands as Steve and his team.

The computer in front of Chin had small little green dots on it, each one representing a cop bearing down on the place that Chin had triangulated. That place was in the middle of the Kahana Preserve, a spot with few roads and no way to make a fast entrance. No matter what, it would take upwards of thirty minutes for anyone to arrive.

It had already been two minutes. Twenty eight more to go.

"You drop the charges, I let him go," the voice continued. "The hearing this afternoon—I'm thinking that the judge is going to find not enough evidence to hold Hanolo. You get me?"

Steve flicked a glance at Kono. More blood on her lip. "You want Officer Kalakaua to take a hike on this one."

"Got it in one, McGarrett. You think you can do that?"

"Don't do it, Steve—"

Crck!

Danny's voice cut off.

Steve's blood went cold in the same instant. He'd heard the exact same sound, could identify it even after all these years.

A village in the Middle East, one his unit had been ordered to defend as important to American interests in the area. The orders were clear: defend from marauding bandits and enemy tribes. Don't interfere with internal customs. Don't interfere.

The woman had tried to flee from her abusive husband. He'd beaten her, raped her, even cut off a finger because his curry had been served too cold. She couldn't take it any more, finally tried to escape, only to be caught and dragged back for a public flogging.

The sound echoed in his ears for days, never really leaving until weeks after his unit was ordered out of the village. Not the screams of pain, but the crack of the whip.

It came back.

Steve knew exactly what was happening. The leather cracked through the air, and the sound was the least of it. It sliced through Danny's shirt, and through his skin. Steve knew that as if he were in the room with him.

The first hint was the near absence of sound, the sudden intake of breath where the brain refused to acknowledge that agony such as this could exist.

The second—when reality hit—was the cry forced out, unbidden, filled with pain.

Third came the choked back noise of a man trying to re-conquer himself. That was the worst, the knowledge that it had happened—and the fear that it would happen again.

"Danno!" When had Steve jumped to his feet? He'd never know, and it didn't matter. What did matter was the sound of the man, his friend, and it was all because Steve had allowed a rookie to try to take down a hoodlum with too much power.

Crck!

No awed silence this time. Danny's brain knew exactly what had happened, and the scream that followed was one he had no control over.

"Stop!" Steve yelled at the phone.

A gurgled noise from Kono, and she fled the room, hand to her mouth.

Crck!

This scream dwindled down into nothingness. Steve clutched the phone between his hands so hard that he suddenly feared it would break.

"Well, damn," the voice said conversationally. "Who'd have thought he'd pass out so quick? Guess we beat him up a little too much. Well, better luck next time." Then, hard: "That was just the beginning, McGarrett. You make sure the charges are dropped, or Williams here is going to only wish he was unconscious."

The signal dropped.

Steve whirled around. "Chin!"

"Twenty minutes out, boss." Chin stared at the computer image, interpreting the dots of light superimposed on the map.

They could catch them. SWAT would get there within twenty minutes, ready for action and loaded for bear. There would be gun play, and perhaps even hostage negotiations, and Danny's fellow cops would bring him out, dead or alive. Preferably alive. Steve feared it would be dead. Hanolo's people played for keeps.

Steve ought to be there, leading the charge.

Chin correctly divined his thoughts. "You can't be everywhere, Steve."

Knuckles whitened on the rim of the table computer.

"They're Danny's friends, too, Steve," Chin reminded him. "Danny's worked with them for the past year or so. He's a haole, but he's a cop and he's one of them."

A small part of Steve's brain noted that Chin had said them. Not us. As though Chin didn't really consider himself part of the clan anymore.

That didn't matter, not now. Chin was part of Danny's clan. Part of his family. Part of Five-O.

Steve looked around. There was another missing piece of the family, and she wasn't back yet.

Once again Chin read Steve's mind. "Lots of places I'll go for you, Steve," he said, "but the ladies' room in an official government building isn't one of them. We'll wait her out." Just like we'll wait to hear what they find in the Kahana. Gonna be a long few minutes, boss.

Chin turned on the chatter on the airwaves, listening in on the pursuit, his own knuckles white.

"Turning onto the dirt road three miles north of Ha'ania. Got fresh dirt tracks."

"Roger that. Squad Quincy Two on your tail."

"Bravo Twelve, approaching from the southern end. We'll take the Leilani Trail in, on foot."

More than enough to take out Hanolo's crowd. How good were those cops in the bush? Steve wished he could be there; the SWAT teams could be good, but they wouldn't be as good as a man who'd just served his country overseas, doing missions similar to this. Bring 'em out alive had been the motto. Lt. Commander Steve McGarrett had had a reputation for doing the impossible.

This was just another impossible task that needed doing, and Steve McGarrett wasn't where he needed to be.

"Place looks deserted." Hushed, over the airwaves.

"No vehicle."

"One door. It's open."

"Cover me."

Long silence, with only the snap of a twig to indicate that anyone was moving. Lt. Commander Steve McGarrett wouldn't have snapped that twig.

Creak. A door being eased open, the noise joined by radio static to Steve's straining ears. His fingers tightened on the rim of the table, the computer in the center blinking with the little green lights merged into one. Target location identified.

"Fresh tracks out here. They probably took a hike."

"Watch yourself."

"One room." This in a normal tone of voice, filled with both relief and regret. "Empty."