He places the case on the nearest table upon entering the warehouse.
His current mission is through. It's time to get his information.
Shelburne.
He expects to be given the information upfront. Does not expect the needle in his neck.
When he becomes aware again, he's hanging by his wrists. Something blocks his vision. He wants to see. Can't see.
Saw you watching her.
Why. Why.
Had to. Know her.
No.
Punch to the gut.
Why.
Know her.
Punch to the gut.
Why.
Don't know.
Cold water. Buzzing sound.
Oh god the pain why is this happening
Don't know her.
Don't know her.
Nothing.
Kono stared at her reflection in silent contemplation.
Her collarbone stuck out more than she liked. Her tank top, once her favorite, now hung loose on her frame. Her shoulder bore a round scar that would never fade. The top of a twin scar was just visible at her neckline.
She had avoided mirrors for months until now. And now she could finally see that she was a shell of the girl who had joined Five-0.
"Auntie Kono?" asked a small voice. She turned to see Grace standing in her doorway. The young girl's hair was frizzier than she had ever seen, and her eyes were puffy and red.
Grace was a wreck.
"What's up?"
"Danno hates me now, doesn't he?" she whispered.
"What? No, of course not," Kono soothed. The sound of Grace screaming at her father echoed in her head. Even after Danny had left, Grace's rant had continued. She had obviously inherited more than angry expressions from her father. "Gracie, your dad could never hate you."
"But it's all my fault!" she squeaked, fresh tears flooding her eyes.
Kono sighed and sat on the bed, patting the space next to her. Grace practically teleported to her side, throwing her good arm around her and falling into an all-out meltdown. "Nothing's your fault, honey. Sang Min is a terrible…was a terrible man, and he did a lot of bad things to a lot of good people. You didn't do anything wrong."
"I don't care about Sang Min!" she wailed. Kono's brow furrowed as Grace attached herself even more securely to her waist. "It's all my fault that Danno even left! It's my fault, and I yelled at him for it this morning and he has to hate me now and he'll go back to New Jersey and I'll never get to see him ever again and it's all my fault!"
"Oh, no, honey," Kono started, but Grace either didn't hear her attempts at soothing or didn't care.
"Danno wouldn't have left if I was better, if I hadn't liked StepStan so much and if I hadn't hated his hotels and if I hadn't made Uncle Steve go away and…"
"Whoa, hang on a second!" Kono interjected, making a mental note to ream Danny out for letting his daughter think this sort of thing. "Look at me, Grace. Look." Grace raised bleary eyes to meet Kono's. "First of all, your dad thinks the world of you. He hated leaving you, but he was in a really bad place for a while. You had nothing to do with him moving back to New Jersey."
"Then why did he go?" she sniffled. Kono sighed at the girl's confused gaze.
"He left because he got a job out there, and because he missed your Uncle Steve too much while he was still living here on the island." Grace's expression broke once more, and her tears started again with a vengeance.
"I told you! I knew it was my fault!"
"But it isn't-"
"If I hadn't made that stupid birthday wish, Uncle Steve would still be here and Danno never would have left!" With that exclamation, Grace ran from the bedroom and slammed a door nearby. Kono followed behind to find the bathroom door securely shut; a high-pitched squeal echoed from within.
"Grace," she started.
"Leave me alone!"
She sighed but obeyed her charge's order and returned to her room, where her attention was taken once again by her newly uncovered mirror.
It had happened on accident. Grace had wanted a blanket, and Danny had flown through the house to appease her desire. Kono hadn't realized he had taken the blanket covering her vanity until she had come in to change clothes.
When she had returned from the hospital a year ago, she had finally gotten a good look at herself in her mirror as she struggled to fix her hair.
Her eyes had been dead. And that had terrified her.
Those dead eyes in her otherwise living body had stuck around for the rest of the day. And the next.
And the next.
She had finally panicked. Took a bottle of shampoo to her bathroom medicine cabinet, destroying the haunted reflection before it could drive her completely insane. Her other mirrors she covered in the dark, when they could no longer tease her with a ghost of the girl she was.
Kono hadn't actually recognized herself when she walked into her room that morning. She had her gun pointed at the stranger in wrinkled, sweaty clothes at the same moment the stranger had a gun on her.
She had realized then that she was a stranger. And now, even with Grace's tears staining her purple shirt, she was still a stranger to herself.
But something was different about her now. She was gaunt, yes, and her skin was scarred and her hair sort of limp.
The eyes that watched her watch them were no longer dead.
Sad. Defeated. Lonely. Angry. Scared.
But alive.
And that made her think that the real Kono Kalakaua was still alive behind them.
She was just locked away in memories, like Grace was locked in her bathroom.
She just needed to gain the courage to come back.