Disclaimer: I do not own Hawaii 5-0 or any of its characters.
Even with heavy traffic, it only took Steve, Kono and Chin ten minutes to get from HQ to Kamekona's food truck. Abandoning the Silverado in the parking lot, Steve sprinted over to the big yellow truck scanning the area for the large Hawaiian. Steve hadn't even bothered to reply to the text message, wanting to get to Kamekona as quickly as possible.
Kamekona spotted them running towards him, noticing immediately that the team was one person short.
"Hey, where's Jersey? He with you?" he anxiously asked the head of the task force.
"No he's not, we don't know where he is," came the curt reply.
Kamekona turned away, twisting the dish cloth he was holding into a knot. "Damn it, I knew something was `ano`e with them two."
Steve stared at him, "Wait, what are you talking about?"
The big shrimp man looked at his cloth, then back at Steve. He was starting to feel a little uneasy. Maybe he should have done things differently.
"I had two guys here axing about particular items that I used to have for sale," wiggling his eye brows to signify something that may have been less than legal.
Chin advanced on him with a rather displeased expression on his face, standing in Kamekona's personal space like a school principal admonishing a school boy.
The big man started to babble, "I swear I don't do it no more, not since you guys got together." Then more to himself, he muttered "I wouldn't take the chance."
He stood to his full height once more and said "These two seemed to have old info. I got the feeling from them that the little h'aole was in trouble."
Steve stood in beside Chin then and said "Yeah he's missing. He was on a stake out and it looks like the pair of crooks he was watching got wise and took him."
Kamekona made a sound between a growl and a moan, looking down at the ground shaking his head slowly from side to side.
Steve interrupted his thoughts, "So, where are these two guys that came looking for your…eh other business?" looking around expecting to see them.
"They're gone. The pretty boy got a call and they left."
This really angered Steve, "Why didn't you stop them? Why didn't you call us sooner? Why didn't you keep them here? If something happens to Danny…"
By this Steve and Kamekona were standing toe to toe and nose to nose, with Steve's finger stabbing Kamekona's chest.
Kono looked on with a mix of awe and sheer panic plastered on her face. She really didn't know who looked angrier. She didn't think she'd be betting on her boss to come out as victor in this particular case, judging by the look of thunder on Kamekona's face.
Chin as always the voice of reason, bravely stood between the pair making Steve take a step back, "Hold on a second, we don't even know for sure that these are our guys."
Taking his phone out of his pocket, Chin located the two photos of Benton and Chi and showed them to Kamekona. Looking at the phone, he sadly nodded his head. "Yup, that's them," he sighed.
Steve bristled and moved forward again. Kamekona saw the movement and cut him off before he should start another rant, "Shoots, I couldn't let 'em know I'm outta that particular business now. They coming back to make a deal later."
"Do you have any idea where they have Danny?" Steve was getting desperate; he knew how ill Danny was. He also knew he wouldn't have a whole lot of strength if he needed to fight. The one thing that he hoped was that their two targets hadn't acquired any local muscle yet. They were not known to be very physical themselves so with any luck Danny would be safe…for now.
"No clue. The mousy h'aole got a call about needing to move someone but only for a short while. And…let me tink…oh yeah he said he'd be there in fifteen minutes, so it can't be too far away," Kamekona replied, down cast, sorry he couldn't tell them anymore.
Meanwhile, back among the pineapples, Danny tried to remember a time when he was colder, but nothing came to mind. He started to worry then because not much of anything was coming to mind. He tried to keep his fingers and toes moving as much as possible but he just hadn't the strength. He was numb all over and he could feel himself losing his grip on conscious again.
He began to give into the darkness that was calling him. His eyelids started to close when he heard it. "No no no don't fall asleep. Keep your eyes open. Stay awake."
Danny's eyes shot open and he looked around him. "Steve? Are you there? Steven?" he crooked.
Looking all around the chill room, he searched for his partner.
"Great, I'm hallucinating now," he muttered to himself but he listened to the hallucination and stayed awake.
Only a few minutes later he heard the door of the chill room open and watched as Tommy and Michael walked in.
"You got a blanket or something, it's chilly in here," he whispered to his captors as they walked towards him.
For an instant he thought Chi was going to punch him but saw Tommy give him a look and he walked away. Danny then realised something, for all the crimes and mayhem these two guys had caused, neither of them were very physical. It would appear that they always had "hired" muscle and luckily for Danny they hadn't gotten that far yet. He watched as Chi advanced again and pulled something from his pocket, muttering something to Tommy he walked to Danny and in an instant had him gagged.
The next thing Danny knew was the two villains were bending down to pick up the chair and move it. He started to struggle as much as his binds would allow, making it difficult for the men to move their prisoner.
Seconds later he stopped when two things happened. Tommy gave him a pretty harmless smack to the back of the head, but what really stopped him was the barrel of a hand gun aimed right between his eyes.
"Now my dear little blondie, are you going to stop struggling or will I just shoot you now?" came the cold, calm voice of Michael Chi.
"That's enough Mike. He's going to behave now, aren't you?" Tommy responded, first looking at Chi, then at Danny.
Danny just nodded his head realising that he needed to know when to pick his battles and this was one time to stay quiet.
"Right, let's try this again," Tommy said standing to the right of Danny.
The two men then carried the chair out of the cold storage room, down the length of a narrow factory floor to what looked like a tool-shed or a work shop. The chair was laid down, facing into the wall and the criminals started to build up a tower of crates behind him. Just before Danny was left alone Chi nudged him hard in the back of the head with the handle of his gun.
"Not a sound or I won't be so gentle," hissed Chi, giving a second harder shove.
"Come on, let's get going," Tommy urged.
The door of the room closed and Danny slumped in the seat.
He was relieved to be out of the chill room, to feel some heat on his skin but it wasn't yet getting into his bones.
He then felt the tickle of a cough in the back of his throat. He tried to calm it by breathing slowly through his nose but that didn't help. The cough came but really had not where to go because of the gag. Danny started to panic because he was finding it difficult to breathe, as a he continued to cough into the gag. His eyes filled with tears, but he didn't know what to do. Suddenly his partner's voice sounded in his head. "Calm down, you are fine. You can breathe just fine. The cough will pass. Everything is ok…that's it slowly, breathe in and out. You are doing great. Just keep that up. I'm on the way. I'll find you."
Danny had no doubt that his best friend would move heaven and earth to find him, but he just hoped it would be sooner rather than later because he was not getting any warmer, even though he was out of the chill room about ten minutes at this stage.