Hello, guys!
After I had posted my first little one shot a couple months ago, I decided to give it another try. This time its more like a story, still a shorter one but not done at once Im already done with writing, so I will probably update every 2-3 days. You can expect 4 chapters, most of them are very similar in their length, although the last chapter is a little longer.
Important note: English is not my native language, Im speaking German and I am not some grammar expert. I gave my best tho and I hope you don't mind some language mistakes.
There isn't much of a storyline, it just deals with a lot of emotions and some aftermath of what had happened in this story. Nothing or no one belongs to me, its all from CBS. I just tried to imagine how it would have been, if Steve McGarrett was confronted with this kind of situation here
Have fun reading and I will see you at the next chapter!
/ no warnings, no slash
*
"No! No, no, no! Gimme' that!", Steves high pitched voice startled the 14 month old toddler, who was sitting on the floor in the kitchen, a second away from putting a way too big piece of apple into his mouth, which the former SEAL had lost to the dirty ground during his hectic attempt to make himself some breakfast. John, not impressed at all by his fathers order, sucked the piece of apple in and looked at Steve, who knelt down to his son and attempted to force him opening his mouth. It took another minute to get it out, which brought the toddler to start crying in frustration about the lost piece of fruit.
"Oh for gods sake…", Steve muttered, while he picked up the screaming kid and put him on his hip. Not a second later, his cell started ringing.
"You got to be kidding me!", he cursed out loud. With a quick movement, he changed the still sobbing baby to his other hip and picked up his phone from the table in his living room.
"Yes, McGarrett?", he talked into his cell, putting it between his shoulder and ear to be able to grab a tissue from the table in order to wipe away the sobs and saliva on his neck his son sprawled out on him.
"Commander, sorry to call you out of a hurry."
The Governor. Perfect timing. Steve growled inside and the man on the other line seemed to sense his stress – or maybe he just recognised the high pitched crying from John on Steves arm, which probably wont be overheard on the phone, let alone by the neighbours along the next three blocks.
"Steve, are you alright?"
"Yes. Yes, Im sorry, Governor. Just have a little situation here. What can I do for you?"
"I need your for a meeting today – in an hour. I wouldn't ask you if it wasn't important. Im meeting the chief of police and I really need you on this. It's about the drug situation we have since the last big incident at the harbour last week."
Steve growled again – quiet and inside, of course. He knew that wasn't a question, more an order. And he really could not arrive in the Governor s office with his son on his arm. Screaming like he did now. This morning had been already busted in all different ways.
"I, uh… yes, Governor, of course Im coming. Ill be there in an hour, Sir."
"Thank you, Steve."
The Call ended. Steve put his cell down, only to type in a different number and started a second call. Fortunately, little John had stopped crying after his dad found him one of his favourite soft toy elephant on the floor and was able to distract him with that.
"Williams?"
"Danny, it's me.", Steve answered, as his partner called in his name on the phone. "Listen, I… uh… I have a kind of a situation here."
"What's going on? Is John alright?"
"Yeah yeah, he is good.", Steve reassured his friend and looked at his son, who was playing happily with his stuffed elephant. "The Governor called me and forced me into a meeting in less than an hour. I don't know what to do with John."
"Just bring him in. One of us will stay at HQ anyway in case something important comes in, so we can watch him until youre done."
"You sure, Danny? I don't want you guys to babysit during work."
"Don't be an idiot. Just bring him in."
"Thanks, man."
Steve ended the call and grabbed the bag he always stored for cases like this. He put in some fresh diapers and some leftover food for the toddler. "Okay, little guy, were going for an excursion. What do you think, huh?", the former SEAL picked up his son and gave him a kiss on his curled brown hair. Thank god, he had already changed him into some little sweatpants and a T-shirt after waking up, so they were ready to go. Right before leaving, Steve swallowed three spoons of his cereals and put the rest of it into the fridge. Probably his dinner for the day. Then he left the house with little John on his arm.
When Steve arrived at HQ, his team was gathered around the smart table, taking in the last reports of the drug situation from HPD.
"Hey, guys.", Steve greeted into the room as he strolled through the glass door. All three of them pulled up their heads and a high pitched noise of endearment left Konos mouth.
"Hi, little man! Look at you!", she smiled, when Steve stood by the table and poked the toddler playfully in his cheek. John grinned from one ear to the other one – the same goofy grin as his father. Kono and Chin had to laugh out loud at the sight of the little guy's face and even Danny couldn't hide his smirk. Unbelievable; just a year old and already a charmer.
"Someone's in a very good mood here.", Chin smiled at him, shaking the little hand to greet him.
"Yeah, well, he should be tired. Woke me up about 4 times last night and here he is, awake like he slept through the whole night.", Steve sighed, when he thought about last night. He hadn't slept more than 1 hour until he was woken up again by his complaining son over the baby-phone.
Kono made a face. "Sounds pretty bad, boss. You need a coffee?"
"I would like to, but I need to leave now for the Governor. Are you guys sure it's okay?"
"Please, stop being a jerk. Just go to your meeting, he will be fine with us.", Danny took the toddler from Steve's arms and placed him onto his own hip. "You gonna have a nice time with Uncle Danno, right?"
Little John got interested in the buttons on Danny's shirt and started playing with it. Steve put down the bag and dropped one last kiss on his sons head. "Be good, okay? I love you.", he gave a last gaze to his team and a "thank you again! And be careful, he started walking like a maniac. One second you turn around, he is gone.", before he headed back out to his truck.
"You do, huh?", Danny talked to the little boy on his arms, who had lost interest on the button shirt and started poking Danny's nose instead. "Walking like a maniac… no DNA-test needed for your daddy, that's for sure."
Kono grinned and leaned on the table in front of her. "You do enjoy that, don't you?"
Danny looked at her for a second, before turning his gaze back to John. "Am I enjoying this? Yes, I do. I do enjoy the fact, my best friend turned into an overprotective parent and is acting like he is on duty for a mission raising his own child."
"Cut him some slack, brah. He is doing his best and after all, he has to do it all by himself. Let alone the fact, that Catherines death has been a little over a year ago. And to be honest, Steve wasn't in the best position to be thrown into such cold water.", Chin cut in.
"That's probably true. I mean, his own father wasn't capable to raise his children after the mother had died – or had vanished for the better say. Not really something I would declare as a good parental.", Danny agreed and looked in Johns face on his arm. It was like he looked right at his partners face; he was still amazed by that every time he saw the little boy.
"Do you think he got that? I mean, he seems doing really fine but… he looks exhausted and its probably not helping with his grieving process for Catherine.", Kono sounded concerned.
"He will be alright. He is doing a great job under the given circumstances and all we can do is offer him help with this little buddy here and be there for them. We all know Steve and there is nothing he wouldn't do for John to keep him healthy and happy.", Danny tried to calm Kono and neither of the cousins had to argue with that. No one had ever questioned Steve and his ability to raise his son. They were just worried for him to look after himself in the process and his emotional state about losing the mother of his child right after John's birth.
"Okay, let's get back to work until Steve is back. HPD needs our reports on the drug case, so we will keep working on that.", Danny snapped them back to reality. He brought John into his office and put him down on the floor right next to his desk. Steve had packed some toys and a few of his stuffed animals, next to fresh diapers, some food and a bottle. Danny occupied the little guy with one of his favourite toys on a little play blanket and sat down at his desk for his report. After a while, the toddler had lost his interest in sitting around on the ground and with some heavy effort, he put himself up into a upright position, hands holding on to everything he found near to him. A little shaky but with some impressive speed, little John walked around Dannys office and stopped at the door to check out the noisy blinds, which started to jingle every time he touched them. Danny shot him a look from time to time and smiled. He did enjoy to be around a cute little toddler like John, especially after Grace had grown up way too fast for his own taste.
As Danny took his time to stretch his stiff muscles after sitting a while in his chair, he then noticed, something was missing: John.
"You got to be kidding me, I didn't look for maybe a minute.", Danny mumbled to himself, as he stood up and hurried outside his office. While he walked up into the main room, Kono and Chin stood there and discussed some of the material they got in from HPD.
"Has someone of you seen John coming by?"
Chin tried to stifle a grin and Kono looked at him, like he asked her for the colour of her underwear. "Did you really loose an one year old toddler? What did he do? Changed into stealth mode, put on his camouflage pants and crawled out of your office?"
Danny rolled his eyes and waved at the bickering from his teammates. "Yeah yeah, laugh all the way you want. I wasn't looking for a minute and he was just gone. Vanished."
Chin couldn't hold back his laugh anymore and even Kono wouldn't resist grinning at her second boss. "Steve will be thrilled, when he knows you lost his child."
"Can we please go look for him, before we discuss about the possibility I get yelled at or not?", Danny growled and both of them, still laughing, strolled out to have a look around their offices. It didn't take too long, until Konos voice turned up from Steves office. "Found him!"
Danny came into the office of his friend, followed by Chin and he was greeted by the sight of little John, sitting on the floor and covered in the contents of the paper trash can, which laid fallen over right next to him. When Danny entered the office, John looked at him and started laughing at him. Danny couldn't hold back his smile, when the little guy stretched out his arms for him and the Jersey Cop picked him up to free him from all the paper garbage.
"Donno!", John squeaked happily and wrapped his little arms around Dannys neck. Since John started speaking his first words, Steve had taught him to say Danno, just to bicker on his partner for his nickname. But little John couldn't pronounce it properly, so all he was saying was Donno. Danny would never show it but deep inside, he was melting every time his best friend's toddler would name him that.
He rubbed the boy's cheek, when he turned around to the cousins and frowned at them. "Steve doesn't have to know this, right? This stays between you and me.. and little Speedy Gonzales here. "
"Depends, brah. Side Street's on you today?", Chin smirked at him and Danny glared back at him. But he thought this over and came to the conclusion, it seemed like the better option to pay for dinner and drinks than to endure the lecture he would get from his partner about losing his child.
"Yeah, whatever. Go back to work, you blackmailers.", he muttered and left Chin and Kono in the office, hearing their laughter all the way down.
Thats it for the first chapter!
As I said, it won't be too long for me to update, probably a few days! I hope you enjoyed reading :)