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AvalonReeseFanFics

A/N: Happy hump day everyone! Only one more day before the SPOILERS chapter! I'm so excited I really hope you like it. Okay! For everyone who was wondering when Catherine would finally just go… well… here it is. This is the moment where she figures it out that Steve is all Rowan's. After this… Catherine will not be a problem… or at least not a problem again until the end of season 5. She does reappear, there will be a minor issue, but it's a minor issue between Steve and Rowan and not really Catherine, you know what you'll get it when you read it. I should really stop telling you guys so many spoilers. I'm sorry in advance cause this kind of ends on a cliffhanger, and the next chapter is kind of… off topic, but there's going to be so much fluff that it should make it worth it? RIGHT?

P.S. JP! So glad to know you're still here! I can't wait until you have everything caught up! I hope you like it!

Chapter 115

Catherine stared at Steve as he fiddled with the satellite phone in his hand. She had been so relieved to see him when he showed up at the airport. That feeling had quickly left her. He had called Rowan when they landed. He had called Rowan while she negotiated a deal for the horses. He called when they got to Amir's town… well.. actually she couldn't be too mad at bout that one because during that call Rowan told them that Amir was injured in a field somewhere. After rescuing Amir and bringing him down he had called Rowan again and now he was sitting there, ignoring everything Amir and Farah were saying to him, to play with the phone in his hand.

Clearly, he had to call Rowan every other hour on the hour or he'd go insane.

Which pissed her off to no end.

She didn't ask Steve to come along. And she certainly didn't need him acting like he was there with her against his will. She didn't need him on the phone with Rowan every five seconds either. She had thought, when Steve showed up in the airport to go with her, that he might have had a change of heart. That maybe, maybe he still had feelings for her, that maybe, she'd have a chance to win him back.

But looking at him sitting there, his leg tapping away like he was anxious, his eyes never leaving that phone, she was starting to think that even this far away from Rowan, that girl still managed to have a hold on him. Maybe Catherine would never be able to shake Steve of it.

"She'll be fine if you don't call her right away," Catherine hissed to him.

Steve's eyes turned to her, a sort of pain she couldn't describe shone back at her. A pain she didn't understand. A worry she had never seen on him before, even when he was on active duty. What had Rowan done to him?

"No, she won't."

Catherine shook her head and suddenly Steve was on his feet. "Just… uh… just give me a minute."

He took his leave and Catherine turned back to Amir. He had just woken up, he was in a lot of pain, and very weak. But he had been telling her his tale, of how this happened.

"Do you know which faction took your Najib?" she asked.

"Yes. It was a splinter group, under the command of Umar Hassan."

"Hassan?" she echoed but all Amir could do was nod. But Catherine knew that couldn't be true, because Hassan was supposed to be dead.

"Amir, that's not possible. Umar Hassan was killed in a drone strike two years ago. He was a high-value target. It was… it was a major operation," she told him.

Amir grabbed her hand tightly. "He's alive… and his men take my son."

He felt back to his pallet and Catherine let him go. He needed to rest, and she needed a game plan. She left his side, letting his wife, Farrah, take her place and then walked the short distance to the back of the house. Steve was pacing by the well that Amir had hid her in eight years ago when the Taliban came looking for her.

She stood back trying to ignore the way Steve seemed so relaxed now that he had Rowan on the phone. Lighter, less… less anxious with a small wistful smile on his face. But try as she might she couldn't ignore it, just like she couldn't avoid listening to his conversation.

"Oh yeah? well… I'm glad you're staying somewhere… I guess…. No, you're right, I would definitely rather be there with you too," he glanced up and caught sight of Catherine. He put up a finger, just one more minute. Fine. She'd let him have it. "Yeah I gotta go… no… that's not… uh… has anything… anything changed? No? Okay, I guess that's good? Means I can still change it, right?" He glanced at Catherine again. "Yeah, I really gotta go this time though… yes… uh… have fun at Danny's don't… don't wear him out too much, please?" Steve said the barest hint of a smile on his face.

They never seemed to have long conversations, he and Rowan, nothing meaningful either. It seemed to just be small talk, meaningless small talk.

"Yeah. No. I miss you too. Very soon, I promise. Ro… Ro… I gotta go okay?" he glanced at his watch. "In three hours, before you go to bed, promise. Yeah, kay… bye…"

He hung up the phone and then walked towards her. Catherine tried to shove away her anger but she found that she couldn't.

"Do you really have to call her every time something happens?" Catherine growled.

Steve sighed, his eyes turning heavenward before he turned them back to her. "She's been dreaming every night for the last week and a half of the same thing."

"So?"

"It's of me getting my head cut off by the Taliban."

Catherine gasped. Oh god… but if Rowan… if Rowan was dreaming of that, why did he come to Taliban central? Rowan who was right about everything. "Maybe she's wrong… she's been wrong before right? About the timing? I mean… how long did she dream about that building collapsing on you and Danny before it happened? Like three months? She never could pinpoint when it was going to happen."

"Actually she did. She told me and Danny it was going to happen day of," he admitted and Catherine balked at him. Why the hell had he gone into that building knowing it was going to collapse on him. "I ignored her, brushed it off as unnecessary concern and I nearly got me and Danny killed."

Steve looked away from her and Catherine just glared at him. Seriously what game was he playing here.

"But uh… we figured it out. It's the frequency of them Cath," Steve whispered. "The more frequently she has the same dream the closer we are to it coming true. Every night for a week and a half, and where am I now Catherine?"

"Then why did you come? If you knew… if she told you…?"

"Because she's learning how to control the dreams, which means watching them play out with different endings. And every option that starts with me not going with you, end with you getting raped and murdered and… well… I couldn't let that happen, now could I?"

He looked away and Catherine's heart swelled with happiness. She knew he still had feelings for her, she knew it!

She crossed to him, she had her hands on his face, trying to pull him down for a kiss but Steve struggled, swatting her hands away. Once free from her grip he stumbled back and away almost wildly.

"Geezus, Catherine, what the hell was that?" he asked.

Catherine blinked her eyes confused as to how she had read that situation so wrong. "You just… I thought we were…" When Steve just shook his head Catherine found herself looking down to his boots. "I guess I was hoping, you know after you said you and her hadn't given each other labels… that it was a phase, that you'd get it out of your system if you… slept with her a few times, that maybe… being here with me might… but I guess…"

"This isn't a phase, Cath," Steve whispered. "I'm sorry but it's not. Do you know where I'm supposed to be right now?"

The answer was, In Hawaii with Rowan, but Catherine couldn't bring herself to say it to him.

"If I was home right now, Rowan and I would be getting ready to go out. I'd be taking her to this fancy restaurant she's been begging me to go to with her, that I had to fight tooth and nail to get a reservation at, and somewhere around dessert I was gonna swallow all my irrational fears and worries and ask her to go steady, okay? That was supposed to happen tonight, but I'm here with you. In Afghanistan. Leaving the girl I want to be with at home, alone, worried about me because she's been watching my head come off my shoulders for 11 nights straight."

Catherine opened her mouth. To tell him once again that she didn't ask him to be here that he didn't have to come but he interrupted her, stopping her before she could do that. "I know I could have left you Catherine, I know I could have just let you come alone... but there's so much history there and I still care about you. That's just not going to go away because I've got growing feelings for someone else. I still care about you, I care about whether or not you're safe, and Rowan was pretty clear that you can't do this with out me, so… I'm here. I'm going to help, but that doesn't mean I have romantic feelings for you. So… please, don't do… that… again."

He meant trying to kiss him and not only did she understand, she nodded. Of course, she wouldn't try that again, there were only so many blows to her pride that Steven McGarrett could land on her. But as they headed inside, Catherine felt like a part of her life was officially ending. She had foolishly not believed it before, but at this moment, a chapter of her life had ended and a new one was opening for her. She just didn't know where it was going at that moment.

H5O-H5O-H5O-H5O

Rowan bolted up screaming Danny's name. In his room she heard him tumble out of bed, she heard Amber cry out in surprise.

The dream was fresh in her mind. It had changed. It had changed to whatever Steve's new plan was and then it changed back to way things were. But it didn't matter because Rowan knew 100% that it hadn't happened yet. She could still save him.

"What? What happened?"

Rowan tried dialing the satellite phone that Steve had called her on. He hadn't called her before bed like he had promised and now she knew why. He had been planning an ambush. She got nothing but dead air.

"Call Joe White," she ordered and Danny groaned. "No. Call him. NOW!"

"Has it happened? Is that the issue, did he get captured?"

"No, but he's going to. And I know where they're going!" Rowan cried standing up. "Call Joe right now. We need to get to Afghanistan, we need people at that compound before they get Steve there."

"Alright. Whoa. Slow down," Danny said grabbing her shoulders. Amber peaked her head out from the bedroom and sleepily asked what was going on but she was ignored.

"So… he's going to get captured but it hasn't happened yet?" he asked.

"Danny for the love of god, please don't fucking fight me on this. You fought me on the parking garage and look what happened!" she cried. Danny straightened and then nodded. Yeah she got him.

"Alright, you're right. I'll call Joe, but uh… I don't know what you want me to tell him."

"Tell him Steve's been captured. Tell him that they're on the way to the compound. I'll find it on a map for you. But tell him that if we don't get people there ASAP Steve's going to loose his head… literally…"

Danny nodded knowing he wasn't going to say any of that because then the Navy would want to know how he knew, would want to verify his info. No, he was going to have to tell Joe the truth and he was terrified to do that, but Danny also knew that Rowan was right. She was always right.

They both had to work together to make sure that this one vision didn't come true.

H5O-H5O-H5O-H5O

It happens at night.

There are two pickup trucks and a canvas top truck.

Catherine has you distract the first two by having your camel stopped in the middle of the road.

She doesn't find Najib but she finds other boys, and frees them but one of them falls and that alerts the others in the pickup trucks

There's a lot of shooting… she… she goes with the boys and you… you try to fight them off but there are too many. One's going to punch you, he's going to punch you really hard, right against your jaw and you just go down. When you try to get up they hit you with a rifle. After that you're unconscious until they get you back to the base.

Well.

He had changed a few things.

Instead of night time it was broad daylight. Instead of a camel he had a herd of goats. He figured… that would be enough right? Catherine was going to make sure that none of the boys tripped and that would be enough to make sure he didn't get caught, that he didn't get his head cut off.

Except it wasn't.

A kid still fell.

The guys got out of the trucks. Catherine frantically tried to shoot and Steve did the same. But there were too many, Steve was stuck out in the open. He tried to use the truck as cover but they threw a grenade.

There was nothing Steve could do to avoid a grenade. Plus he wasn't expecting it, Rowan had said nothing about a grenade.

It threw him back and into the windshield of a pick up truck where he rolled off and hit the ground. The world swam around him, it was nothing but ringing bells and clouds of spotted black. He barely realized it when the was grabbed and thrown into the back of a truck. He barely felt anything.

Except fear.

Rowan was right. And if he didn't survive this… like she kept telling him he wouldn't… he'd never be able to tell her the truth… that he… he'd… he'd never see her again. He was going to make her live through that dream of hers like he promised her she wouldn't have to.

And honestly that was much scarier than whatever was going to happen to him next.

H5O-H5O-H5O-H5O

"We're wheels up in ten minutes," the soldier called and Danny nodded. He glanced to where Rowan was standing glaring at him, tears on her cheeks, and he winced.

"Don't look at me like that. Joe could only get one of us on the plane."

"Then it should be me going. I'm the one with all the info in my head."

"And you've told me everything, which means I've got it now. If it changes call me, okay?" he asked.

Rowan had practically fainted over the last vision. The one that confirmed that Steve had just gone through with his badly laid plan, that Steve had just got captured.

She said they had changed things, that they had moved up the bad plan. That they had changed some things but not enough. Steve had been blown back by a grenade. They didn't need to beat him, the grenade had done half the work for them. They were looking at possible broken ribs, she said something was wrong with his shoulder and he kept holding his head. Joe had said that was possible percussive damage done to his inner ears. Danny no longer doubted her. He didn't doubt her at all and by the way Joe White was getting all these people to move, he wasn't doubting her much either.

Rowan groaned and rolled her eyes. "Look, Kono's on her way, okay? She and Chin are gonna watch you, gonna sit with you, gonna make sure you're calm. I'm going to update you at every step, okay? Every step."

He knew this was word for word what Steve had said to her before he left. He knew that Rowan was in full-fledged panic mode. Tears were brimming over in her eyes, but she wasn't sad or scared, she was angry. The wet kind of angry, where she yelled a lot and cried even more.

But really what was she going to do? Stow away on the plane? If she was caught that could mean jail time and not even Rowan was that stupid.

"Just say okay so I can feel better about this?" Danny pleaded and Rowan's scowl solidified and she rolled her eyes.

"Fine. But I'm going to be calling you a lot. The dream keeps changing…"

"Are they ending up in the same place though?"

"Yeah, in the compound just inside the Panjshir Valley, little place outside of Nahrain. They'll have about thirty minutes before they decide to go between beating him up and cutting his head off so they will have to move fast."

"Got it Ro," he said and then pulled her in for a hug. "Don't worry, I'm gonna bring our boy back. And when he gets back to Hawaii I'mma let you lecture the shit out of him."

Rowan half laughed. "Good, it's what he deserves."

Joe White popped up behind them. "Time to go," he called over the drone of the engine. Rowan waved them both off as Danny headed down the tarmacs to the carrier plane that would take him to Steve.

He glanced back to be certain that Rowan was still there, in the hanger waving him off. He waved back and then went inside the plane. He had a best friend to save. Rowan was Kono's problem now.