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AvalonReeseFanFics

A/N:Happy Hump day my wonderful readers! We are almost there! One more chapter and our lovely Rowan and Steve take a huge step forward in their relationship. It's an unofficial thing, but I promise to you that it'll be very very cute. There's some cute stuff in this chapter too, but all the really cute things are coming up next chapter. Can you tell that I'm excited for next chapter? Cause I'm like… really… really excited. This chapter's a long one, it's about 15 pages long and the next chapter is about the same length. I'll see you guys on Friday and don't forget to tell me what you think!

Chapter 109

Grover had the teams up and ready to go as soon as he could. The man in charge was asking a lot of hard questions that Grover had the answer to but had no way to explain how he got them. Damn Rowan and her powers. This must have been what McGarrett felt like on a regular basis trying to deflect that he had a psychic working for him. A psychic who was never wrong and had a criminal network to back her up.

"Do you have any idea where your boys were when the building came down."

"Yeah. Maintenance closet on the bottom floor."

The question was in the man's eyes but he didn't ask it. Instead he said: "That's roughly 300 tons of steel and concrete between us and them. We need to shut off water, power and gas."

Grove groaned. "That's already been done. We need to get in, get them out of there."

"Before I start bringing in equipment, putting my people at risk, I need to determine if this is a rescue or a recovery."

"It's a rescue!" Grover shouted. "We already know they're alive."

"Really? Have you had contact with them?" he asked. When Grover couldn't answer he softened to him. "I understand you've got a personal relationship with these guys…"

"You damn right, Hank. I know these guys. They're survivors. And the longer we stand around here waiting around the less chance they have of coming out alive," he snapped.

"Protocol is we don't dig until we've located bodies," Hank argued. "The sooner we pinpoint their location the sooner we can come up with a game plan."

"I told you Maintenance closet. Okay. The last we heard they were checking out a possible suspect hiding in a maintenance closet. But hey… if it makes you feel better, I bet if you get a listening device you'll hear them banging away."

All of this had come from Rowan. But he couldn't offer up her text messages, he couldn't offer up anything other than the word of a psychic. None of which would be concrete proof to Hank. Hank would probably just think he's crazy.

Off to the side Chin and Kono were having their own conversation.

"Any updates?" he asked.

"Nope, we're still trying to locate. Grover says Rowan's tip about the maintenance closet will help though," she said. "Any… uh… any more updates from you know…?"

He hadn't gotten anything past Rowan telling them that Steve was going to start banging on pipes soon to make his location know, so that they knew that at least he was alive. She wasn't sure if Danny was alive. She couldn't tell him if whatever plan she had had actually worked. But she knew Steve survived the initial blast, it was the second one he wouldn't live through.

Chin shook head and Kono looked away. Together they surveyed the wreckage and together they came to the same conclusion.

They had been set up.

H5O-H5O-H5O-H5O

"Bonilla's playing right field… Bret Saberhag… Bret Saberhagen's on the mound…"

Steve followed the sound of Danny's voice back to him. He was ready. He was ready to get this stupid thing off of him. Ready to get him and Danny one step closer to freedom.

As soon as Danny saw him, Danny turned into a nagging house wife. "Where the hell have you been. I moved onto the '92 roster. It's a tough year."

"I found a flashlight," Steve said in lieu of an answer. He put it by Danny's head. "We're gonna need that."

Danny groaned again. "You gotta get this thing off of me, man."

Steve had found this massive bit of pipe. It took some maneuvering to get it out of the wall, but he got it. He slid it in-between Danny's leg and the column on his leg.

"Okay, when you feel the weight come off your leg, you roll out or slide your leg out," he told him like Danny didn't know what to do. He had to just hope that Danny could move the fucking leg. "But you gotta do it quick. I don't know how long I can hold this."

"That's very encouraging. I'm not even sure I can move."

"You can move," Steve urged because there wasn't any other options here. "You can. You can, alright?" Danny just nodded. "Alright, you ready? One… two... three…"

Steve put all his pressure on that pipe, forcing the concrete up and off of Danny. Danny cried out, he groaned and moaned but he pulled that leg of his out and then Steve let the concrete drop. Danny had rolled to his side, knocking some minor debris loose.

Steve knelt down beside him, he was almost happy that his friend was free but Danny was cupping his side and groaning again. That was not a good sign.

"Oh, that's no good," he said as Steve directed his pocket flashlight at the problem.

A piece of rebar poking out of his abdomen. Fucking. Hell.

"Stay still I gotta look at that."

But Danny either couldn't or wouldn't stay still. He groaned again. "God what is that? What is it?"

Well, this complicated matters. What was Steve going to do? What would Rowan do?

"Okay… so it's a piece of rebar…" Danny flopped back to the ground with a dismissive grunt. "It's just missed your vitals, but I gotta take it out. The tricks gonna be to stop the bleeding."

Okay. So, Rowan probably wouldn't have done it that way either. But hey, Steve was trying his best here, okay?

"Okay, maybe we don't take it out. Maybe we just leave it in for a minute," Danny said but Steve shook his head.

Steve was too busy stripping Danny of all the superfluous Kevlar and body armour so he could get a better look at what they were dealing with. And it was not good.

"Leaving it in is not an option. If this thing gets infected, sepsis sets in, then we got real trouble," he said, and he was not letting Danny go like that. He just wasn't.

"As opposed to our current situation?" Danny asked starting to chuckle nervously again.

"Well, we got one thing going for us and that's Rowan's predication about the rebar killing you was way off. So maybe she's wrong about everything else, huh?"

"One step to the left," Danny whispered to him and Steve. "She said… one step to the left. I'm alive because I listened to her and took one step to the left before the bomb went off. I would have figured that would have meant no rebar. Think she's punishing me for not listening?"

Steve swallowed back the worry that was overwhelming him. He needed to get that rebar out of his friend's stomach. "No, I don't think she's punishing us," he answered. "Okay. You stay still. I'm gonna be right back."

As he dug around the rubble looking for any kind of something, he could use for disinfectant as Danny kept talking.

"She's going to kill us," Danny said in a shaky laugh. "It doesn't matter if we survive this, Rowan's going to kill us. Maybe it's better if we don't get out, we won't have to listen to her lecture."

"Don't talk like that, it's going to be fine, chances are she doesn't even know…"

"She's going to know. How are you going to cover this up? I mean really? A whole building came down, it's gonna be on every news outlet," Danny whined throwing himself back down.

Steve ignored him, returned with a jug of cleaning solution. "This has peroxide in it, I can clean the wound with this," he said purposely turning the label away so Danny couldn't see what it was. He looked Danny in the eye for this next bit. "I'm not gonna lie to you. This is gonna hurt a lot. The really bad pain only lasts a couple of seconds. But you gotta stay conscious for me can you do that?"

He ripped up part of his shirt to use as a bandage wrapping it around his free hand so it was ready to go. As soon as he put his other hand to the piece of rebar sticking out of his friend's side Danny let out a shaky: oh boy.

And then Steve was counting again. Danny's nails dug into him but on three he ripped that thing out of his friend and the poured the peroxide on it for him. As soon as he was done disinfecting the wound, he put pressure to the bubbling bleeding wound as Danny screamed in agony and writhed in pain.

Steve winced but he knew this was what he had to do to save Danny.

"Okay, stay awake Danny. Who played left field? 86 Mets, left field, who was it?"

"George Foster, and he was replaced by Mookie Wilson after two seasons." The words came out through groans of pain but Steve was smiling cause he was still conscious enough to talk.

He was grateful he had done this to Danny cause if he had to snatch rebar out of Rowan's side she would have slapped him. And then probably gone unconscious at the sight of her own blood or just in pain. Just as he was sure Danny was glad that it was him down there with him and not Rowan, cause Rowan would have just slapped Danny to keep him awake.

"Midseason, right? That's my boy! Keep the pressure on it, help me while I tape this up," he said. He hadn't told Danny he found duct tape, and it was good thing because even though in a pinch that duct tape was going to save him, Danny would have bitched about it.

Once Danny was good, once he was duct taped up and he had wiped the tears out of his eyes, Steve helped Danny up, trying to take some of the pressure off of his leg for him.

"Hey, hey, keep pressure off your leg," he ordered noting how Danny seemed to cave in on his left where the injury was.

"Naw, naw, I'm okay. Let's get the hell out of here huh?" Danny held Steve's hand and tried to lead him out but all that was around them wall walls of destroyed concrete. "Which way?"

"We're not going anywhere, buddy. Place is caved in. We can't get out of here."

Danny took this in, Steve watched a million different emotions cross his partner's face before Danny turned to him and calmly asked: "Do me a favour, would you, please?"

"Of course. Whatever you need."

"Look at me in the eye, look at me and admit something to me," Danny ordered. Except he didn't tell him what he wanted him to admit thought he had a feeling he knew where this was going. "We should not have listened to Dekker. Hmm?"

Steve pulled the flashlight up and shined it in Danny's face. "You wanna do that now?" he thundered. "It was a lead we had to follow, Danny, okay? And by the way, you're welcome for saving your life."

Steve bend down and picked up a different piece of rebar. "What's that a souvenir?"

"Yeah, it's a souvenir," Steve sighed sarcastically. "The rescue team would have arrived already. They'd be listening in. Find something to bang on, make some noise."

They found their things to wail on, to take their frustrations out while they tried to make themselves known to the people searching above. They were quite for two seconds before Steve felt he needed to ask something

"Did… did Rowan say anything else when she gave you your tip? Like how we get out?" Steve asked. It hurt that she had tried to warn Danny, had given him a tip, but Steve had gotten nothing out of her except I'm scared. Though to be fair he told her on the regular not to tell her the specifics of her dreams. He really needed to start listening to Rowan and her dreams. Because it sucked being out of the loop like this.

Danny paused. "Actually no. She was really hung up on the whole… rebar thing," he said. He then glanced down to the side he was cradling "I can see why she was hung up on it."

"So what… she never dreamt the end?"

"Well… I mean… she was dreaming different versions. She had a version of what would happen if she kept me above ground and you below. You survive the initial blast and then kill yourself in like five minutes after that trying blast your way free, by the way. She had a version of what would happen if she was down here with us… it didn't end well… but she never had an option that lead to us both getting out of this alive. She didn't have an option that saved me."

"Well that can't be true, because that one step to the left sure as hell saved you."

Danny nodded. "Yeah but at what cost."

They went back to banging their rebar against metal shafts before Steve turned to Danny and said: "Hey… the uh… the option where Rowan was down here… why was it… I mean you explained the other one and you wouldn't… was it really bad?"

"Blast kills me and her. I'm dead before you wake up. She lives long enough to bleed out in your arms. You're overcome with grief, you try to blast your way out and fail. When they find our bodies, you're holding her to your chest and holding my hand."

Steve stopped swinging around his piece of rebar and turned to Danny a horror stricken look on his face. That was a lot to take in. That was a lot of nightmare inducing images to have rattling around one's brain. God Danny dying alone in the rubble had been traumatizing now he had to picture a battered and broken in his arms taking her last breaths right in front of him? He shouldn't have asked. He wasn't going to sleep for weeks over that one.

"You get why she didn't go with that option?"

Steve nodded. "Uh… don't tell her… don't tell her I…"

Danny just shook his head and that time when they went back to banging their rebar Steve didn't interrupt them with anymore stupid questions.

H5O-H5O-H5O-H5O

Rowan honked her horn outside of the condo that Amber lived in until the girl poked her head out. She had been on a sing along she knew what Rowan's care looked like but Rowan didn't know what number her condo was so this was going to have to be honk until she comes out situation.

Once she spotted Amber's over processed brown hair, she waved her out. Luckily Amber came out, even if she was horribly suspicious of this.

"Uh… hi Rowan…" she said her arms folded over herself. Rowan knew that Amber was intimidated by her. That she didn't like that Danny and Grace were so close to her. She had tried to show her that Danny had no interest in her but that just left it open to her being worried that Grace would never like her because she had Rowan. Which also wasn't true but there wasn't anything she could do about it now.

"Danny is currently buried under what is probably 100 tonnes of concrete, they're working on digging him out, I thought you might like to come with me to go pick up Grace and then wait for the rescue on site," she said.

Amber seemed to take this all in. She went an ashy color before asking: "Danny's what?"

"Buried under a fuck tonne of concrete because a building collapsed on him. Come on now, keep up," she snapped. She didn't have time for this. "Now I have to pick up Grace, and we're going to go to the collapse site to wait for the rescue crew to pull his ass out of this predicament. Now. Do you want to come or do you want to stay here?"

"Just give me a couple minutes. I just need my purse," she said and then she rushed off. Rowan was a little worried that Amber would be more concerned with getting herself looking pretty or whatever it was girly-girls like her did, but a few minutes later Amber was out of her condo. A purse on her shoulder, and dressed in white dress with all these different flowers printed nicely all over it. Rowan was impressed, she really did rush to get out there.

Once Amber was buckled in Rowan put her car in drive and roared off towards Grace's school. Rowan waited until they were on the road before attempting to answer the questions that Amber had.

"So they're okay. Danny and Steve, I know you probably care more about Danny but… yeah… they're both okay. They're alive, there are crews who know that they're down there and they're trying to get them out."

Amber nodded. "You must be scared… you know… for Steve" she whispered.

"Yeah. I am. But he's resourceful. He'll… they'll both get out of this," she said.

"But they're a little hurt, aren't they?" Amber said.

"Well I mean, they survived an explosion…"

Rowan glanced over to find that Amber's shoulders were shaking and she sighed. Oh dear. Rowan didn't have time to apply comfort, she was driving for one, and Danny kept reminding her not to drive distracted.

They pulled up to Grace's school and Rowan turned to Amber who was wiping away her tears. "Okay… so… we have to be a united front on this Melissa…"

"My name is Amber," she said in a soft voice, like she was afraid but it wasn't for Danny anymore. It was like she was afraid of Rowan.

"What?" Rowan asked and when Amber opened her mouth to tell her again she cut her off. "What did I sa—… okay you know what? I don't have time for this today, okay? I don't. We got bigger things to worry about. Now put a goddamn smile on your stupidly pretty face, cause I have to go in and pick up Grace and we have to be super positive or she's gonna start crying. Okay?"

The school bell went and Rowan left the car, and walked over to the curb waiting for Grace to come down the steps.

Amber came to stand beside her, mimicking Rowan's pose. As soon as Grace spotted them she cried: "Aunt Ro!" and rushed towards them, when she got closer she added: "Hi Amber!" with a big smile on her face.

She let Grace hug amber first and then she grappled onto Rowan's side. "Are we going to do another sing along today?"

Rowan shook her head. "No, no, we're going to go to a crime scene," Rowan said cause Grace's face to wrinkle. She wasn't interested in crime scenes which was typical for a young girl.

"Are we going to go see Danno?"

"Sort of," Rowan said, putting Grace into the car. "Sweetie… something's happened… to Danno and Uncle Steve."

When she dared to look back at Grace she saw that she was no longer smiling. Rowan frowned, she was going to kill Danny for making her do this. If they survived, she was going to kill them both.

H5O-H5O-H5O-H5O

It was literally instantaneous.

Catherine heard banging coming under the rubble, using her subsonic mic, and then Rowan was there. She had this pretty brunette in a white sun dress and Grace waiting by the medic trucks, a safe distance away, but Rowan was right up at the edge.

Catherine didn't know how she did it. Just appearing like that. Like she had been conjured by the sound of Steve making noise.

"Can you hear them?" she asked softly and Catherine nodded. "More… more than one?"

And that's when Catherine realized that Rowan didn't know if they were both alive.

God she wished she was still in the loop. Then she'd know which one Rowan thought was dead.

Grover crossed to Rowan and said. "I'm gonna need you to help Hank."

Catherine followed, Rowan was brought to Hank who was already looking over blueprints for the building.

"Alright, the noise seems to be coming from this area. My engineers are working on an extraction plan," he said showing them the place on the map. Catherine noted that Rowan was crinkling her nose, eyes blinking, like she did when she didn't think something was right. Her eyes kept assessing the map, drinking in the details.

"Okay, how long?" Catherine asked.

"It's a lot of guesswork here. GPR isn't giving us an image. Without knowing their precise location, it could take hours."

Suddenly Rowan was pointing at the map. "Maintenance room. Southside. They're there."

Hank turned to her surprised and then turned his suspicious eyes to Catherine who avoided his and then Grover who stared him down, waiting for a challenge.

"I'm sorry… and have you been in contact with them?"

Rowan turned her innocently wide blue eyes to him and said: "Yes." Quick and definitively like the little liar she was.

"Really… I find that interested because no one else has gotten through to them… so how did you?"

Rowan immediately turned to Catherine and Grover, her eyes begging them for help. Apparently, that was all she had in her little bag of lies. Grover leant forward. "Trust me… Hank… if she says they're there, then that's where they are."

"Okay, Lou, what is this?" Hank asked but Rowan was already walking away and heading towards the rubble. Grover waved Catherine after her and she was glad to leave Grover to explain Rowan and her psychic predictions.

Catherine watched as Rowan looked out over the rubble as if she were waiting for a sign, something that would show her were they were.

"Have you been… did you maybe…" she couldn't get the sentence out, she meant the dreams and luckily Rowan understood what she was trying to get at.

"I did."

"And did you warn them?"

"Course. But Steve didn't want to listen and Danny… I unno… Danny said he would but…" she gestured out to the destruction in front of them and sighed.

"But they get out, right?"

"I don't know," Rowan answered in a small voice. "I don't know if he's alive…"

"Who Steve?"

"Steve always survives the initial blast it's Danny who doesn't… Steve doesn't survive the rest without Danny."

God that was not good to hear. Rowan hesitantly took a step forward and Catherine put a hand out to stop her.

"I need to find where they are… maybe I can… maybe I can figure out if it's both or just one…" she whispered. She turned back when Catherine managed to snag a hand on the back of her shirt. She blinked her eyes at her like the contact had jolted her out of fugue state. She offered Catherine a hand. "I need you to come with me."

Catherine put her hand in Rowan's and together they made their way out across the carnage. They got to where Catherine had been hearing the banging when it happened. An electric shock ran up Catherine's arm so strong she yelped and backed away. She heard Rowan whisper: "They're both alive."

Catherine let out her breath but she didn't reach for Rowan again. She did not want to get electrocuted. She waited, watching as Rowan's eyes went to the ground, looking at the different pieces of concrete like they were see through. She took a few steps forward and then pointed down.

"They're right here…. Steve he's here… and Danny's… Danny's…." she moved a couple of steps over. "He's right here. Right under me…" when she looked up again she this look, this look Catherine couldn't describe as anything else but knowing. "Where's your cell thingie?"

"My what?"

"The cell thing? With the mic so they can get service?"

"Do you mean a cellular repeater?"

"Yes! Yes that!"

"Okay, yes, I can get that… Rowan can you… uh… just… you know before you fall through or something. We both know Steve will flip if you kill yourself looking for him."

Rowan reached out again, needing a hand for stability and Catherine took it. No jolt of electricity travelled up her arm this time and together Catherine and Rowan walked out of the rubble ready for phase two.

H5O-H5O-H5O-H5O

They had been banging for what had to have been at least an hour with no sign of it working. Steve was tired and hot and he could tell Danny was getting past restless. It made sense the man was in pain after all.

"This is pointless. They can't hear us," Danny said, groaning as he sat down.

Steve banged one more time before turning to him. He made sure Danny was just sitting and not passing out on him and then he banged again which just got Danny to yell at him.

"Whoa, Whoa, Whoa," "What?" "Can I die in peace, please?"

Steve didn't want Danny to think like that. They weren't going to die. They couldn't. Danny had a Grace and now Amber. And Steve had Rowan and he was finally figuring things out with her. He couldn't die now when he was so close to getting to where he wanted to be. He couldn't die without telling her how he really felt.

How did he really feel? You know what? He could figure that out later, right now he needed to make sure that he and Danny got out of this.

"You're tired and you're hurting. Just take a break, alright?"

Steve banged the rebar against the downed air duct one more time and Danny interrupted him again.

"Hey. Do me a favour. For once in your life…" "What?" "… can you just pretend you're a human being, and take this situation for what it is. Can you do that for me, please?"

No, he definitely could not. That would lead to a lot of panic and a lot of worry, and he might cry because all he wanted at that moment was Rowan and there was thousands of pounds of concrete and steel between her and him and that just… and he just couldn't leave her with only Wo Fat to take care of her… okay?

Instead he said: "I'm keenly aware of the situation—" "—Really? Because the human response to certain death and the prospect of never seeing the people you love ever again is curling up into a fetal position and making a mess in your pants."

"Okay, and what good's that gonna do you huh?" Steve asked. Thankfully Danny didn't interrupt him again. "Fear is a state of mind, Danny, okay? You gotta fight through it."

"Oh, I disagree. I think that fear is actually your friend," he said and Steve scoffed and turned away. Yeah, Danny would say that. "It tells you when you're supposed to avoid a situation but you never listen to it. That is why we are here in the first place."

Steve had finally had enough. "That would be a compelling argument my friend, if you weren't afraid of absolutely everything. Were you not the one who had a near mental breakdown because your girlfriend met your kid? It doesn't matter what the situation is for you. You gravitate to the worst possible outcomes."

"And once again I was proven right! We never should have gone into this blind in the first place!" Danny yelled back. "And besides, I find that highly hypocritical coming from you when you have done nothing but think the worst of Rowan ever since she came in contact with Wo Fat!"

Steve turned away from Danny and picked up the rebar again. "That… that was something… I didn't think the worst of her…"

"Really? Because she moved out of your place and you decided she was in league with Wo Fat…" "She was in league…" "And that you had to personally exorcise her of him, but whatever means necessary."

Danny had gotten up, he had crossed to the body of the man that had been in the room with them when the bomb went off and Steve let him. That wasn't fair. It wasn't the same thing. And he was working on making it up to her, on making himself better so he wouldn't continually do that to her.

"You've seen her in action, Danny," he said in a small voice. "We both knew what she was like before him… it's gotten worse since they've made friends."

"Rowan has done nothing but care for you and try to save our lives," Danny snapped as he went through their dead guy's pockets. "And honestly, after this I wouldn't be surprised if she decided to write us both off. This can't be good for her. It's been killing her to dream this stuff, it must be worse having to live it."

He said that as if he and Steve weren't dealing with the worst of it, as if Rowan had taken the rebar instead of Danny. He was going to argue that they had the worst of it, and not Rowan when a sudden jolt came over Steve, a squeezing pain in his chest, so quick it winded him. The rebar slipped out of his hand to grip his chest. But as quick as it started it ended.

"Whoa… whoa… what… what was that?" Danny asked. "Was that a… did you just have a…?"

"She pulled from the void," Steve whispered. His eyes scanned the concrete above them like he could see through it. "I think… I think she's here. I think she's trying to find us."

"Kay, well tell her to beam us up or whatever it is she does. I don't care if she has to take us through the void, just tell her to get us out of here."

Steve shook his head, it didn't work like that but he wasn't going to tell Danny that. "Hey look at this," Danny said getting Steve's attention again. Steve turned to him to see that he was fiddling with the dead guy's shirt. "This guy is wired. He's wearing a camera."

Danny let that sink in and Steve half laughed in understanding. "That's how they knew when to detonate. That guy had somebody watching."

And then his phone rang.

"Is that you?" Danny asked in surprise.

Yeah. It was but… how was he… how was he suddenly getting service? Oh god, please let it be Rowan he just wanted to hear her voice, was that so much to ask? It was, because it wasn't her.

"It's Catherine," he said, he rushed over to sit beside Danny so he could put the call on speaker. And then he answered. "Catherine?!"

"Steve?!" she cried. "Thank God. Are you guys alright?"

"Danny's a little banged up, but we're okay," Steve said. Trying to down play everything, trying not to act too relieved to hear her voice, to know that they probably had people working to find them. "Everybody else get out?"

"All accounted for except you two stragglers," Grover said and he smiled, thank god, he had been worried that Chin or Kono… or Grover and his men… at least now he only had to worry about he and Danny. "We got the whole cavalry here working to get you guys out."

"Great. We got an ETA on that?" Danny asked. "I'm literally being held together by duct tape."

"Yeah, we're working on it. We need to know your exact location," Catherine explained. Yeah that sounded fair they couldn't just blindly dig.

"We're in the maintenance room, south side of the garage."

"Oh my god, she was right," Catherine breathed out and Steve knew, Steve knew immediately that she meant Rowan. Rowan was there? God. God he knew it, he knew he could feel her.

"Rowan... she uh… she…"

"More than that," Catherine said. "But we'll talk about that later."

More than that? What the hell did that mean?

"Hey, how's the oxygen down there?"

"It's running low," he whispered because it was true and he wanted them to move faster. "Anything we can do from this end to speed things up?"

"Just hang tight. Listen, the entire area is unstable. You go moving something you're not supposed to and the whole damn thing'll come crashing down." At that both Steve and Danny subconsciously turned their eyes up to the rubble above them.

"Ah… that's encouraging."

Great, Danny had got his sass back.

"Steve, what happened? You were right behind us," Catherine asked.

That was loaded question. "Listen, you think you can establish a video call? I wanna show you something."

Catherine hung up on him almost immediately and in two minutes he was getting a skype call, thank god.

He shifted to make sure both he and Danny were in the picture and then answered the call.

"Hi," both Danny and Steve said to Catherine and Grover's worried faces.

"It's not as bad as it looks," Danny told them.

"Thanks for trying to make me feel better," she said with a smile. Steve smiled back to, it was nice to see daylight even if it was artificial.

God where was Rowan? He'd've given anything to see Rowan's face at that very moment. Even if she was mad at him.

He took his time showing Catherine all of the evidence, hopefully she could take screen shots of it to send off. They figured the best way of figuring out who did this was to figure out who picked up this guy to be bait, and who this guy was linked to.

He almost asked for Rowan, asked Catherine to just find a way to bring her to him when Grover reappeared in the frame.

"Kay so I got… I got some news," he said.

"What no good news or bad news?"

"No, but bad news, good news and then worse news. But I didn't want to say that," Grover snapped which shut Danny right up.

"What is it?" Steve asked before Danny could snap anything back.

"None of the extraction points are stable enough for us to get the equipment we need to get to you. Good news is there's a mechanical room 30 yard from you guys that has a ventilation shaft that we can get you out through. Worse news, you gotta get over there some how."

Danny took this in. "Oh good. The old escape through the vent trick. That's your big plan? That's what we're gonna do? Great." he growled. Well at least the sass wasn't suffering.

"It's our best shot."

"Okay, well, how are we supposed to do that when we're not supposed to touch anything?" Danny asked but Steve already knew the answer.

"Move very carefully," Grover replied. "It can still cave in on you. So, if you guys could… could you please… just be careful?"

Danny and Steve took that in. He could do it now. Ask Catherine to get Rowan here. He didn't want to do this without talking to her, but Danny beat him to it.

"Catherine, I need you to call Amber…"

"She's already here," Catherine said. Uh she was what? "Rowan showed up with Grace and Amber like…"

There came a sudden shout of: "GIVE ME THAT!" and Danny and Steve only had the barest second to exchange worried glances before the tablet was ripped out of Catherine's grip.

"I told you to wait for me before you called," she hissed and then Rowans angry red face was staring down at them. God that face, the face he so desperately wanted to see, he didn't even care that she was angry.

"WHAT diD I sAY?!" Rowan shouted so loud that the audio crackled unable to match her range. She was in such a panic that her inflection was everywhere. "I said NO PARKING GARAGES! What the hell were you THINKING?! I told you. I tOlD YoU BotH that it was GOING TO BE TODAY!"

What? No she hadn't. She hadn't told him anything.

"Okay, it's not as bad as it looks…" Danny tried to mollify, it had worked for Catherine but not for Rowan.

"Yeah Mr. Rebar? It's not as bad as it looks?" she shouted. Okay she had him there. "Why?! WHY?! Why CouLdn'T yoU JuSt listen to ME?!"

Well shit she was not taking this well. Steve ordered her to breathe and Rowan did. She took four of the angriest yoga breaths he had ever seen and then her eyes, which were still burning with a raging fire, bore into them.

"Kay so riddle me this did it go through your chest or your side?" she asked.

"My side," Danny admitted.

"Well that's wonderful, thank you for listening to that bit of advice. That was the best I could do by the way cause the other option was, that beam that trapped your leg, yeah, it was going to crush your fucking spine!"

Well that answered the question of whether or not she told him to go to the left to punish him. It really had been the only option she could find where they didn't die.

"Okay, Rowan, instead of freaking out could you maybe tell me how we get out of this?" Steve asked.

"No!" Rowan shouted. Steve's eyebrows furrowed in confusion and Rowan finally looked less angry and more afraid. She looked away from the tablet she was hold to whisper: "Cause I don't know."

"What do you mean, you don't know?!"

"I never got this far! I never got past Danny not fucking dying," Rowan shouted tears starting to leak from her eyes. "And when I did go past to see what happens Steve kills himself in an explosion trying to blow himself free, so you know… NOT GOOD THINGS!"

Steve took that in, damn, they did not think this through. Beside him Danny raised a hand. "Kay, I have a question, Catherine says you came with Amber and Grace… did uh… you know when I made you an emergency contact… it wasn't so you could pull her out of school…"

"Yes, Daniel, I brought Grace, because she was going to find out and it was better if she found out from me… and I picked up Melissa…" "Amber…" "—What?" "Her name is Amber, Rowan." "I don't give a FucK what her fucking name is! I picked her up so she's here too so that in the event that you guys don'T FUCkinG kiLL YoUrseLVes she'd be here to welcome you back to the surface with open arms!"

That was actually quite considerate of her, now if only they could get her to calm the fuck down. "Okay. Look. It's not all that bad. We're going to be okay," Steve told her, Rowan made a strangled noise in the back of her throat and Steve tried not to wince. "It's going to be okay? Okay? Just answer me this, the explosion that kills me…"

"It's not the explosion it's you getting hit in your stupid fucking face with stupid fucking shrapnel."

"Great. So I'll just duck better," Steve said.

"Like into Danny," Rowan said and Steve blinked his eyes at her. Before he could ask her to clarify she said: "You two are going to have to get really close to each other, like hugging each other for it to work. You're gonna have to go full bromace."

"Fine Rowan," Danny said. "I'll even wrap my legs around him if it'll get you to stop talking."

Rowan scowled at him but glanced over to the side. "Okay fine… as long as you agree… I'll uh… I'll get them to come here…" she said and then she was waving someone over.

Steve walked away as Amber came on the screen. "Hey Jersey."

God they had cute nicknames that was ridiculous. He tried not to listen to the conversation, to their pithy back and forths, he tried not to get emotional, but it got worse when Grace showed up. He couldn't help it.

This was what he wanted. He wanted something like that. Someone who, when they heard he was in trouble came through. And he kind of had it. Rowan was that something for him, she was livid right at that moment but he knew it was cause she was scared. She just wasn't… all the way his… yet.

When Danny was done with Amber and Grace he tossed the phone to Steve where he found Rowan's lovely face looking at him. She no longer looked angry, she looked afraid, she looked like she was about to burst into tears.

"I'm scared Steve," she whispered. "I'm really, really scared."

"Don't be," he managed to laugh out. "This is nothing."

"It's really not."

"No, but I promise, I promise it I'll be okay. Okay?"

Rowan looked down. "I wish you'd stop making promises you can't keep. I can't guarantee… I can't… I haven't seen a happy ending…"

"But that doesn't mean it doesn't exist. Okay. Me and you… we're going to get that happy ending. I know it," he found himself saying even though he didn't know if that was true or not. Rowan carefully wiped a tear from her cheek and he thought, in that moment, she was probably the loveliest thing he had ever seen.

He had all the emotions he usually found so easy to ignore clawing up his throats, all these words he should have said to her long before now but never did. This might be the last chance he'd have to say them. "Rowan I…"

"No don't," she said. "Don't say something stupid like good-bye. Just… tell me what you need to tell me when you get back up here."

Steve nodded. "I'll see you soon," he whispered and then they ended the call. God he hoped he didn't just make himself a liar.