"I'm fine," Danny insisted as they left the hospital an hour or so later. His breathing had cleared under oxygen treatment and he had no burns at all. Despite the clean bill of health, Steve was agitating for his second to go home and rest. "Besides," Danny added, "is my apartment habitable?"
That was something that had not occurred to Steve, either. He didn't really know much about the effects of smoke on properties, but from the looks of the smoke-smeared windows that stuck in his memory, he doubted that Danny would be going back home today at least. He made a mental note to find out about that and then it occurred to him that Danny would need some new clothes. The suit pants and dress shirt he was wearing were smudged with soot and smelt strongly of smoke. Quite what had happened to the suit jacket, Steve did not enquire. He was pretty sure Danny would not know either. "All right," he capitulated. "You can come back to the office. But first, we're going to get you some new clothes."
"Steve…" Danny thought that clothes shopping was a waste of time, but then he glanced down at himself and realised how dirty and dishevelled he was. "All right." He wondered how much cash he had on him and if he would have to make a stop at the bank to get some more out to pay for this, but Steve swept him along without allowing him time to object and when he left the store with a bag of clothes to last for several days, he had not spent a single red cent. Steve, waving aside any objections, had paid for the lot.
Back at the Palace, Danny went to shower and change into something clean and Steve called the fire department. The chief he spoke to confirmed what the captain at the scene had suspected; there had been an accelerant used and from what they had found so far, it was spread across most of the top two floors of the building. It was arson. The fire crew was still on the scene and would be for a while longer, making sure that the fire would not flare up again. The police lab team was waiting at the scene for entry.
Steve had barely put the phone down before the door opened and May stuck her head in the door. "Steve, this was just delivered," she said and put an envelope down on his desk. Her tone was subdued and Steve, glancing at it, saw exactly what had May so disturbed. In addition to the fact it had been hand delivered there was a crude drawing on the front of a burning building.
"Get someone up here from the lab right now," Steve ordered. He only belatedly realised that May had handled the envelope using her handkerchief.
"Already on the way," May replied.
"Keep Danno out of here if you…" Steve stopped, for it was already too late. Danny, his hair still damp from the shower, was standing in the office looking perplexed.
"What is it?" he asked and stepped forward. His eye fell on the envelope and his face drained of colour.
"Sit down," Steve urged and the shaken man did as he was told.
"Mickey Johnston?" he asked after a few moments. "So the fire wasn't an accident."
"No, it wasn't," Steve agreed, not answering the first question. He was sure that Johnston would be at the back of this, but he refused to speculate until they had the proof. "But we don't know that Mickey Johnston was at the back of it. He could just be cashing in on the fire."
"How do you know the fire at the apartment building wasn't an accident?" Danny asked.
"The captain at the scene suspected it and the chief confirmed it," Steve replied. "We're still waiting for full details."
"So it could have been Johnston," Danny concluded. His colour had returned now. It disturbed him that his neighbours were now homeless for a period because of him. He could not have known that Johnston would go after him and certainly could not have known that the whole building would be at risk, but he felt guilty all the same. Until Johnston was caught, going home – if he was ever allowed to do that – would be out of the question. A hotel would eat substantially into his budget, but he couldn't risk going to staying with any of his friends. He didn't want disaster brought upon their lives, too. "Why is he targeting me?"
"That I don't know," McGarrett admitted, although it wasn't easy to say. He was spared any further questions as Che Fong himself arrived to dust the note for fingerprints.
There were few prints to be found. Most were smudged and only a couple stood out. Che thought that he would find they belonged to the janitor who had brought the note upstairs. Carefully, they opened the envelope.
The printing on the note was crude but legible.
Roasting the pig was just a warning. You have 24 hours to release my brother. If you do that, Williams will live. If you don't, he will die a slow and painful death. I am everywhere.
"That sort of says it all," Danny commented after a few stunned moments.
"It's not going to happen," Steve declared. "We're not going to release Jimmy Johnston and Mickey is not going to kill you, Danno. We're going to get him."
"Sure, Steve," Danny agreed. He knew what his boss was trying to do and appreciated it. Still, it wasn't pleasant being confronted by a threat like that and he knew that if he had not wakened when he did that morning, he might not have wakened at all.
As Che left to chase up the prints on the note, Chin came into the outer office. He looked relieved to see Danny, but there was something else in his eyes that warned both detectives that his news was something they were not going to like. "Danny I'm glad to see you're okay, bruddah," Chin told him. "But I got some bad news."
"What is it?" Danny asked, thinking that perhaps his neighbour's mother had died from the smoke inhalation.
"Your snitch, Benny? The one who set up the Johnstons?" Chin hardly needed to say anything else, but he carried on. "HPD just found him dead."