Chapter Four:
Chin looks over the choice of lunch Sergeant Lukela dropped off for Five-Oh. There are sandwiches and wraps and a whole pizza. Bottles of water are crowded onto a corner of the table, and it's one of these that Chin grabs.
Danny wanders in, sees the food, and turns to the water too. His face, Chin notes, is gray and drawn. And, if there was a mirror here, Chin thinks he'd look about the same. They've only been working on this case for seven hours straight now.
"I don't know why they thought we'd be able to eat right now," Danny says, dropping into one of the chairs and letting his head fall back. Chin sits across from him, trying to ignore the way his coffee-filled stomach hates the smell of tuna fish sandwiches and greasy pepperoni pizza. They sip their water in tandem, progressively drooping closer to the table to rest.
Then a whirlwind named Kono Kalakaua breezes in, grabs a couple bottles of water and some of the pizza. Following her and grabbing a sandwich, thankfully not tuna, is Mary McGarrett. Following Mary is Kamekona, and he drags the rest of the food to the table. Danny grumbles, but steals one of the sandwiches—tuna—and takes a small bite before inhaling the rest.
"Mary figured out Steve's message," Kono says suddenly, pizza halfway to her mouth. "'The greatest enemy was once a friend. A mirror reflects what we want or don't want to see. Joe, leave Mary out of this. It's our business.' Then there's some address that we couldn't quite figure out. We figure it's coded using some cases we've all worked on."
"Do we have any idea where to start?" Danny says, stealing another sandwich—not tuna—and tossing it to Chin. Kamekona only looks slightly put out that his mountain of eats keeps shrinking on him.
"No," Kono says through a mouthful of pizza at the same time Mary says, "Maybe."
Chin gestures at Mary, and she grins. "I think the mirror might be an interrogation room. I mean, it's a two-way mirror, right? So it shows the suspect only what they want to see."
"Or what they don't want to see."
"That's…really vague," Danny says. "Are you sure that is what he wrote?"
"No, brah," Kamekona says, leaning back in his chair so Kono can pass a bottle of water to Mary. "It's what made the most sense out of his phononic Latin."
"Phonetic Latin," Kono corrects. "He wrote the message in phonetic Latin, but his hidden message was in Pidgin."
"Glad he has so much faith in us," Danny growls.
"He does," Chin says. "He wrote it in phonetic Latin for Mary, and Pidgin for Kamekona. The message is for all of us, not just Five-Oh. Think, everyone, what have all of us done together?"
"We cleaned out that storage locker," Mary says. "Y'know, my parents' one."
"That's right!" Kono exclaims just a little too brightly. "The one you guys gave us all one thing from. I got those little tiki surfboards."
"I got our parents' wedding china."
Danny smiles and points to his watch. "Later, he gave me an old stuffed owl for Grace." He remembers Grace hugging the ratty thing, happy simply because her Danno gave her something of Uncle Steve's.
"He made Joe take an old jewelry box," Chin says quietly. "It had a mirror in it."
"Maybe that's it." Danny leans forward, clapping his hands once. "He said mirror, right? It's a clue, it's gotta be."
"Do you know where Joe is?" Mary stares at all of them, Kamekona included. She reads their expressions, lingering on Chin. "Do you know how to find him?"
"Maybe," Chin says, returning her stare. He stands up and walks to Steve's office, ignoring the others as they clean up the remains of lunch. Five minutes later, because Steve is such a sneaky bastard and doesn't trust anyone fully, he has what he needs from the safe under Steve's desk and is waiting at the data table when the others join him.
He shows them a jump drive that he plugs into a port. He pulls up maps and tracking data. Danny looks at it for a few seconds before groaning as he drops his head into his hands. Chin ignores him and pulls up real-time tracking.
"Is this GPS?" Mary asks. "On Joe?"
"Yes," Danny says from behind his hands. "Somehow Steve put a marker on him. And Chin knew about it. Why do you know about it?"
"He told me after he stopped trusting Joe. I was the one to suggest tagging him. We used the music box." Chin moves the maps so they overlap. "Notice where he visited?"
"Isn't that Fred Durran's ex-girlfriend's place?" Danny leans forward and stares at the address. "Why's he stopping there?"
"That's where he's living right now," Chin says. "How'd you know that's where Durran's ex lives?"
"Who's Durran?" Mary whispers to Kono.
"He was an arms dealer Danny shot the first day he and Steve teamed up. It's in their reports."
"So why is Joe living with her?"
"She bit me," Danny says to Chin, like they haven't been eavesdropping on the conversation. "I like to make sure the people who hurt my family or me are where they're supposed to be."
"I think I know who she is," Kamekona speaks finally, and they all turn to where he's trying to get comfortable in chair far too small for a man of his size. "She's a low-runner. A messenger. One time, and you didn't hear it from me, she got mixed up in some really bad stuff. I helped her, and she said her uncle'd help her pay me back. I saw the uniform on that haole and I ran."
"So, you think Joe's her uncle?" Danny asks.
Chin, though, thinks Danny's got the wrong conclusion. He sorts through the girl's personal photos, uploaded to HPD's server after her arrest and Durran's death. He finds the picture he needs and puts it on the front screen. Beside him, Kono gasps and murmurs something that sounds suspiciously like a curse.
"Yep," Chin says. "Her uncle isn't Joe White."
"It's Lieutenant Commander Wade Gutches," Danny finishes.
"Do we talk to him about her? About Joe?" Mary says. "I mean, they're connected, aren't they?"
"Yeah, maybe," Chin says, but he's not holding his breath. He knows Joe dropped the box off and disappeared again. Probably with Gutches's help, but how are they supposed to question him without leverage?
"Hey," Danny says suddenly. "What did you guys read the address from Steve's message as?"
Kono consults her notes. "4678 Kahala Avenue," she says, and Chin stares at her, noticing that Danny's doing the same.
"You sure?" Danny sounds like he's choking on something. Kono nods, and Danny spits out a curse. "I told you it wasn't a coincidence."
"Yes, you did," Chin agrees. "Follow," he says to Kono and heads toward his office, Danny trailing after. As soon as she shuts the door, he says, "That's the address of a house that was burned earlier today."
"It's not a coincidence," Danny puts in. "We don't know if Steve was there, but HPD has asked for our help on the case."
"We're supposed to hear back from Fong about trace taken from the scene in a couple hours, but we need to find Joe soon if we want more answers."
"So, we should talk to Commander Wade's niece," Kono says, but Danny shakes his head.
"Duke told us they have an undercover officer watching her. We're supposed to contact him."
"Let's do this," she says.
ooOoo
As soon as Joe White realized Steve had that damned music box bugged, it was too late. Wade's niece had already taken the information regarding his little side-trip to Japan to Wo Fat, with the very strong insinuation he'd taken Steve to see Shelburne.
Then she'd drugged Joe and locked him in a boat on the Ala Wai Marina. Her new boyfriend, still as scum-baggy as her ex, Durran, had taken the boat out and let it drift away while he rowed away.
Now, the drugs have worn off, and Joe's already kicked his way onto the upper desk. He thanks the lazy butt who took him out because the moron left him half a tank to get back to shore, which is still in sight.
There's still daylight when Joe makes it to the marina. Almost immediately, he finds the scumbag boyfriend hiding behind a stacked wall of crates. A quick hand has the boyfriend at his mercy, but he still leans down to listen when the boyfriend asks for him to believe him.
"My name is Samuel Kale, I'm an officer with the state police of Idaho."
"Idaho?" Joe says, skepticism thick in his voice. "Like the potato?"
"Yes," Samuel says, frowning slightly. "I transferred to Honolulu PD half a year ago. It was kept under wraps so I could do some undercover work for my bosses. Me being new and all."
"So, how'd you get mixed up with Jeanette?"
"She's a messenger in the underworld. HPD figured she could get my foot in a lot of people's doors. Now, I need to talk to you in private."
"And where do you suggest we do that?"
"How about Five-Oh headquarters? They're looking for you anyway."
Joe squints up at the darkening sky before shaking his head. "They want answers from me, ones I can't give."
"Just come with me," Samuel says. "It won't hurt you to help find McGarrett."
McGarrett? Steve's missing?" Joe grabs Samuel by his collar and shoves him against the crates. "Who took him?"
"We don't know, but he left a message for you. That's why we need to get you to Five-Oh."
"Okay." Joe lets Samuel down and rubs his hands over his eyes. "Okay, let's go."
ooOoo
Danny receives a call from Duke Lukela regarding the transfer from Idaho who's bringing in Joe White. Danny does a happy dance, which just sorts of looks like him having an upright seizure. He doesn't care. It's the first good news they've had all day—not that Mary and Kamekona's translation of Steve's message hasn't been good itself.
He shakes off the thought and runs to tell the rest of the team.
ETA is less than ten minutes, and he's bouncing from his office to the data-table to the break room and back. His circuit takes him past Kamekona and Mary holed up in Kono's office and Kono and Chin who are hiding any evidence they don't want Joe to see. Danny would help them, but he can't get his feet to stop moving long enough to do anything more than brush past the cousins.
Eventually, his marching feet take him to the front door where he catches sight of Idaho—a blond haired, blue-eyed, scrawny-looking kid probably barely old enough to drink—and Joe. Before he's quite aware of it, he's got Joe's shoulders clenched and he's shaking him, but there are no words coming from his open mouth. Joe shakes him off and stares around the room. Looking for escape routes, Danny's sure.
"What's this message Steve left for me?" Joe almost sounds smug, like he thinks they need him.
Danny draws in a deep breath to tell him exactly what they need him to do when Chin shakes his head, and Kono moves to a side table covered with photographs of the message. Joe glances at all of them, reading their hardened expressions, and joins Kono at the table. Danny most definitely doesn't smirk to himself when Joe double-takes at the first picture.
"Is that blood?"
"Yeah, Steve's. Do you recognize the address?" Danny points to it, but Joe's already shaking his head. "It was recently torched. Know anything about that?"
"No. Why would I?"
"You know who took him?"
"I have an idea. Don't you?" Joe stares at Danny, and Danny feels his stomach sink.
"Chin," he calls as knots tie themselves together in his intestines. "Call Halawa Correctional. See if Wo Fat is still there."
Joe nods.
Chin makes the call and speaks with the warden for a brief moment before hanging up. "They're checking now," he says. "They've had him in their count consistently, so they think it's unlikely that he escaped."
"Could he be using a body double?" Kono wonders.
"It's more likely he paid off some of the guards or even the warden," Joe replies.
Chin's phone rings before anyone can offer any more theories. "Lieutenant Kelly." He listens for half a minute before thanking the caller and hanging up. "The warden says they're going into lockdown. Wo Fat isn't in his cell, and no one's seen him since yesterday evening."
"The night Steve went missing," Kono says.
"That bastard!" Danny punches the wall twice. "That fucking bastard! He's going to kill Steve. He's going to fucking kill him, and we can't do a damn thing for him."
"Maybe I can do something," Joe says, and Danny commends himself on his self-restraint for not punching the snake in the nose. "He must have eyes on that address—" he stabs at it with a sharp finger, "—if I show up and wait there, he should set up a meeting."
"That's a pretty big if," Chin murmurs. "Meanwhile, we think he may continue to torture Steve."
"Wait," Mary says from the doorway of Kono's office. "Torture? My brother is being tortured? Who is this Wo Fat character?"
"He's the man who took Steve," Danny says, avoiding her glare, he doesn't need her anger on top of his guilt. None of them do. "He took him once before. We had to get him from North Korea."
"Is he really going to kill my brother?" Mary ducks her head quickly, but they all see the tears.
"Not if we have anything to say about it." Kono looks determined, strong. Never mind that she's fighting back her own tears.
They pause to let her words sink in. They are Steve's only hope, this rag-tag group of cops and civilians. And, Danny thinks, they will succeed. Failure is not an option. "Let's get you geared up," he says to Joe. "Idaho?" The kid, who's been waiting patiently, snaps to attention with a curt 'Yes sir.' "You're his shadow. Do not, emphasis on the do not, let him out of your sight at all."
"Sir, yes sir." Idaho actually salutes him before leading Joe to the equipment room.
"Kono, we're going to need someone who's handy with electronics and a sniper rifle to watch all access points at that address."
"Good luck, Danny," she says and hugs him before she runs off to get suited up too.
"Chin, you're with me. Let's try to retrace Steve and Wo Fat's steps last night."
"I'll take Wo Fat. You know Steve better."
"Will do."