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AvalonReeseFanFics

A/N: Happy Wednesday my wonderful readers. Wow, thank you guys for being so understanding about the last few chapters. I was worried ya'll would be made but nope, you get me. Oh if only this was the only lie Wo Fat ends up telling. For those of you who are panicking, she is not dead. I've got the rest of the story to write and it would be really weird if she were a zombie. That really shouldn't be a spoiler cause I keep telling you guys that they're going to get married in season 7. But right now, Steve thinks she's dead and that's very important, if you need to know why check out ChristinaYang4ever's review for last chapter cause it sums up why it's gonna be important really well (thanks for that by the way). So I've managed to work in episodes 3-4 in passing, which, I will admit, is actually going to happen for a lot of the episodes as we're going to be focusing a lot on whatever Rowan and Wo Fat are doing. Don't worry you'll still see some of Steve too, all the good and funny bits. Specially all the funny stuff with Danny. For this chapter, however, we're still following the Five-0's and if I've done my job right, it should make you cry. Please tell me if it does when you leave me a review and I will see you guys on Friday!

Chapter 208

They were given a military plane to get back to Hawaii… and the whole nine hour ride back was just plain painful. No one talked, how could they when their most talkative member was in a wooden box that had been strapped down in the middle of the plane. No one could look at it, not without feeling the gaping hole in their lives her absence left.

But none of them were as bad as Steve.

Kono kept swiping at her eyes, Chin was looking away, Grover had his head bowed, a hand to his eyes to hide the tears that were falling and to avoid looking at everyone else's tears and Danny just sat there, head tilted back looking at the ceiling swallowing the tears away over and over.

His leg bounced, his eyes went everywhere but the coffin strapped down in the middle of the cargo bay just a few short feet away from where they were all strapped in in their tiny fold-out-from-the-wall seats. Steve on the other hand, was a complete mess. He was nothing but a hollowed-out shell of himself. Empty and broken, sitting there unable to fully comprehend what had happened, his chest carved out, his heart laid to waste.

They were halfway through the flight when Steve suddenly stood. He couldn't sit anymore, he couldn't sit there and try to bounce the feeling out of him. It wasn't working.

He found himself at her coffin. Knowing that his girlfriend was the one inside, face missing in a nice white dress. Covered in burns and cuts because he hadn't fucking saved her. This was all his fault. He had done this. He chased her out of the house. He didn't go and get her when he had the chance, and he wasn't in time to save her in the end. She died alone, in a basement, broken, battered and screaming for him and he hadn't been there for her.

He put his hand to the top of the box and felt everything in him start to shake and come apart and suddenly he was crying and leaning against the box.

"God I'm so sorry Rowan. I'm so fucking sorry. I shouldn't have pushed you away. I shouldn't have told you I was going to marry Catherine. Not when all I really wanted was to marry you. Fuck, you were supposed to be my forever, the girl who stayed. I wanted you so bad. I should have come after you as soon as I knew you were in Japan. I should have told you how I felt about you. Maybe if I had… maybe…" Steve's voice cracked, the quaking broke him, his knees gave way, but he didn't fall to the ground. He found himself draped against that wooden coffin that held her body sobbing much more loudly then he thought he was.

His friends didn't crowd him, they didn't know what to do or how to fix him, but Danny came to his side, his arm around his shoulder trying to calm him, to soothe him, but that burn of anger had turned into nothing short of desperate need. He needed her to come back, he needed her to be alive, had loved her goddamn it.

"Steve… buddy… you did everything you could," Danny whispered to him, but it wasn't true.

"She was there for four days! Four! Danny… I knew she was there. I knew she was there and I left her there… I should have gone… I shouldn't have picked Catherine… you all told me and I didn't… it's my fault. She's dead and it's my fault," he sobbed. He folded into himself, the pain in his chest caving him, emptying him out and filling him with nothing but that terrible agonizing pain. "I just want her back. I want her back!"

He roared in agony. He roared his frustrations and then sobbed into his friend's shoulder because he couldn't hold it in anymore. He just couldn't.

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Danny had picked him up from school and that was clue #1 that something had been wrong. He knew very little about the situation, but from what Renee had explained, Steven had gotten a ransom call for Rowan and gone off to rescue her. The whole team had gone off to help him get her back, and the Grover's had taken him in until Steve and Rowan came back. That was two days ago.

"Where's… uhm…" he whispered afraid to ask the question. He had known something was wrong when Rowan had dropped contact with him, she wouldn't have left him behind, and finding out that she had been kidnapped and now was being ransomed confirmed that.

But when Danny winced at the question, Nahele knew he wasn't going to get good news.

"Look… the op… the mission… it went sideways… Rowan's… uh… Rowan's not coming home buddy… she's…"

Dead. Rowan was dead. That was what that meant. But what did that mean for him?

"Look… I know this is a lot to ask, but I need you to cry it out now, cause Steve is not taking this well… and uh… I'm kinda of taking you home to a disaster zone."

Nahele took Danny's advice, and Danny let him cry. They got to Steve's house but Danny didn't rush him, he just sat there, with his arm around Nahele's back, letting him cry it out. When Nahele seemed done Danny asked: "Are you good? I mean you're not good, obviously not, but for right now… are you good for right now?"

Nahele nodded. "Okay good, cause I'm not going to lie to you… it's bad, like it's really bad. I've left him right now… but if it's as bad as I think, if he's gotten worse, you're packing your shit up and coming home with me."

Nahele didn't know what that could mean until he got into the house and then he understood. Steve was just sitting on the couch an absent look on his face, tears trailing down his cheeks. He made no move to wipe them away and instead just let them fall. He was just sitting in the dark, his elbows on his knees his fingers interlaced and to his lips. He flinched when Danny turned the light on.

"Hey… buddy… we've got Nahele here, he's back from school."

Steve grunted, or grumbled, some sort of words that might have meant something but otherwise his eyes didn't move. He just stared blankly off into space. He looked broken, like a shattered version of himself and that alone scared Nahele.

"Steve?" Danny asked, he nudged him and only then did Steve react. He jumped, his eyes swung around the room and then settled on Nahele.

"Hey! Hey! How was school?" he asked, shooting to his feet. He swiped furiously at his cheeks, and though he reanimated a bit, Nahele could see the damage, he could more than see the damage that this had done to Steven.

"It… it was okay… are you okay?"

Steve's mouth trembled. "Uh… yeah… uhm… Look… I know I said… I said I was bringing her back and we'd… and she… but uh… but uh… I couldn't… she…"

"It's okay, I've already told him…" Danny started but it was too late.

Steven looked away, his chin wobbling. Nahele could only stand there and watch as the strong, impervious McGarrett folded in on himself, collapsed to the couch and started to silently sob. As Danny stepped in to comfort him, Nahele knew he couldn't leave him. Steve needed him. He needed Steve. They needed each other. They were all each other had now.

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Though Danny tried, Nahele refused to leave Steve during this time of need. Even though Nahele was hurting, and he couldn't stomach looking at pictures of Rowan, he woke up in the morning ready to fake it till he made it because Steve needed him.

When he had gone to bed the night before, Steve had been on the couch, head in hands still crying, surrounded by beer bottles. His dog tags and her phone left on the table in front of him. Nahele had checked in later the previous night to find Steve passed out on the couch. He had carefully draped a blanket over the man, and cleared away the beer bottles.

That morning, Steve had kicked the blanket off at some point in the night and a few more beer bottles were both on the living room table and out on the lanai. Nahele had picked those up while making toast since he had a feeling that was all Steve would be able to stomach. He then boiled the strongest coffee he could make.

But he didn't want to wake Steve up, so he let him sleep. When Steve did wake up the coffee was cold, the toast was hard and the sun was high up in the sky. Steve had checked his phone and then cringed. Nahele didn't have to ask why, the background image was a picture of him and Rowan.

Nahele had tried to say good morning but Steve was catatonic and didn't reply. He merely walked past him, went to the fridge and took out another beer. Great. Just great. Steve was going to try to drink himself through this.

"Hey, Hey," he said getting in between him and the couch. Steve's pain fogged blue eyes focusing on him.

"Hey kid," he said softly, dropped a hand to his shoulder and then tried to walk away. Nahele put a hand out to stop him and the pulled the beer out of his hand.

"You gotta stop Steve," he pleaded. "This isn't going to fix it. This isn't going to bring her back. And even if it does make you feel better for a bit you're going to feel worse when you sober up."

Steve stared at him his eyes blinking as if his beer-logged brain couldn't process what Nahele was saying to him. His eyebrows narrowed in confusion. "Have you been home this whole time?" Nahele nodded to him. "I didn't even ask if you were okay…"

"It's okay, I know what grief is like… what it feel like to lose someone…" Nahele started but Steve lurched forward to give him an impromptu hug.

"I'm sorry, I'm sorry buddy," he whispered to him. "We're going to… we're going to be alright… we… we'll be okay without her." But the shaking had started again and Nahele knew what that was going to bring.

"Steve, don't… don't…" he tried to soothe but it didn't work.

"I can't do this by myself," he suddenly whispered, though Nahele was sure that Steve didn't mean for him to hear it, and the tears were stemming again and Steve was buckling to the floor.

Nahele just let him fall because he didn't know what else to do but it was sounding an awful lot like he was out a mom again and about to be out a home.

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Across the island, Danny was gearing up to do something he didn't want to do.

Danny knew he'd have to check on Steve. Steve who wasn't taking this well at all. Who had taken Rowan's death about as badly as they thought he would and then some. Not only was it killing him it seemed to absolutely shatter him. Like his strength and his will to live had been tied to Rowan Pierce's heartbeat.

But that wasn't what Danny had to do today. No, today he had to find a way to tell his daughter that her favourite Auntie Ro, wasn't going to be coming home.

He got to Rachel's place and Grace came sprinting out calling her nickname for him. He ran into her embrace letting his little girl get all the comfort she needed, to reassure her that he had come home from this latest Rowan-rescue and that at least he was okay.

"Is Auntie Ro okay?" she asked him before her feet even touched the grass again and immediately Danny faltered. He swallowed back the lump of tears he had been shoving back, as he had to be strong since Steve, their usually strong and fearless leader had crumpled at this blow to his fragile heart. He tried to smile but he knew, selfishly he felt like this conversation was going to be even harder than telling Nahele that his second-chance mom wasn't coming home.

"Monkey… I've got… I've got something to tell you about your Auntie Ro…"

And he hated the way the eager hopeful smile fell from his daughter's face and slowly faded out of her eyes.

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When Kono hadn't called him before coming back from Japan, had just arrived home without telling him, he suspected bad news. Adam had put on his bravest face and said: "So I've got a hospital care package for you and Rowan if you need to stay overnight… and uh… I'm willing to contact Shioma for information if we need to but I…"

He wasn't expecting her to blurt out: "She's dead."

Adam blinked her eyes. He was prepared for every outcome. For Rowan needing extensive medical care, for Rowan being fine and staying with Wo Fat, hell he was even ready for Kono telling him that there had been a shootout and either Wo Fat or Steven had been shot in the process. But at no point was he expecting to hear that she was dead, not when he knew just how rabid Wo Fat was about her protection. Why would anyone chance raining down that kind of wrath when they all knew that the only reason Wo Fat had been even remotely reasonable was because of Rowan Pierce. Maybe it wasn't Rowan, maybe it was someone else? Had her mother died?

"Wait… she's… you mean Rowan?"

Kono nodded, her chin suddenly starting to wobble. "We found her buried on the Takada Castle grounds… under a cherry tree by the water…"

Wo Fat had desecrated sacred grounds to bury her somewhere beautiful. Fuck. That… that was so like him.

But Adam didn't know what to say. He didn't really know Rowan, but he knew he could count on her. He knew that she was loyal, not just to Kono, but to him. He knew that when the time came she had literally walked into a hostage situation to save both him and Kono. And he had sold her out to McGarrett literally as soon as he could… he was the reason that she and Steve had that argument that got her grabbed six days ago. He was the reason she was dead. Because he wasn't loyal to the girl who had been nothing but good to him and his wife.

He looked up and saw that Kono, while struggling not to, was suddenly crying almost violently. He moved forward to wrap her up in his arm and hold her close, while the guilt crashed over him like waves crashed into the shore and his own tears fell from his eyes.

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At the Grover house, Lou had come in to a flurry of people asking how everything went. Was Rowan okay? How was Steve holding up? And he couldn't answer their questions. He just hugged them all once before heading upstairs feigning tiredness. He was followed by Renee who had known right away that something was wrong.

She was upstairs with him for ten seconds before she said: "Is she not coming back or did she not make it…?"

Grover turned to her, tears streaming down his face and that was all the answer she needed. Renee rushed forward to comfort him. This was the third friend he had lost in a short amount of time, and while Rowan had annoyed him, he never actually wished her harm, or wanted Steve to suffer the way he was going to suffer. But like Samantha's nightmares Lou couldn't take that burden from Steve's shoulders and he wasn't sure he could handle it if he did.

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Chin had gone to Jerry's, not having anyone else to go to at that time. Jerry had talked a mile a minute about all the tracking he had done on the app until it up and went dark. And he had so many theories, but Chin knew why the app had gone down.

"So I think… if he took it offline, then either something really bad was happening and he had to disable it or it got so overwhelmed that it wasn't functioning. Something did go out before it went dark and the damn thing had a seizure…"

"Or because she died."

There. It was out there. Jerry fell quiet and turned to Chin. "She… she…"

"Took a bullet to the back of the head. Max has her body and is… I guess going to figure out if she died before the bullet or because of it…"

Jerry took that in before turning to him and asking: "Are you okay?"

He wasn't but he had so much pain fracturing his heart between Rowan and Malia he was numb to everything.

But it was clear, to everyone who knew Rowan, that they were all affected in different ways and only time would tell if they would be okay.

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NA hadn't failed a mission ever. You gave him a job and he got it done, it was what he was known for. Complete the objective at all costs, no matter the consequences. But he had failed this one.

NA hadn't felt guilt like this in a long time. In absolute years. Since 2010. He had been 24 at the time.

But going down memory lane didn't take away the pain in his past, nor did it stop the stills of that video from replaying on loop in his brain.

He was supposed to be watching her. How the hell had she gotten snatched up on his watch?

Easy. When Rowan had gone home with McGarrett, he figured her safe. He had just beat the ever living shit out of Gabriel Waincroft he had to go underground to keep the cops from finding him. By the time he resurfaced that video was circulating and there wasn't anything he could do.

Except sit in that dive bar and drink.

He was six tequila and soda's in when the call from Wo Fat came in. He answered with a quick: "Did you get her?" but Wo Fat wasn't in the sharing mood.

All he got was: "I need you to do something for me." And though he had no idea why Wo Fat wanted Steven McGarrett under surveillance until further notice, and he had no real desire to put himself anywhere near that disaster of a man, NA figured well… it was the least he could do.